Old Church Altar Rail ... before and after...

A few weeks ago I did some dumpster diving at the Church renovation dumpster and saved this old altar rail, that was around the pipe organ area to prevent people from falling into the sunken area that it was in. I think it will be a cool addition when I use some of my assemblages in exhibits or prayer station workshops ... it will kind of set aside an area as a sacred space. I spray painted the already distressed wood a cherry red, not coating the piece entirely, then sanded it down, and washed it off. After it dried I coated it all with a dark walnut stain. I like the red distressed look of it now.

Here are before, during, and after photos...



(after spray painting, before sanding it all down)


I may still spray a light coat of polycrylic on it when the stain dries more.. and then it's ready to be used!

Grandson Friday!! (with guests too)

Today is probably the last Friday I'll have all three boys for awhile... they start school next week, and all three will be in school now (at least part of the day for the youngest)... wow, how fast they grow up!

A friend of ours from Church had some serious health issues and had to be taken to a hospital in Milwaukee, so since I had the boys today, I offered to take the two older girls as well... it was a busy, but fun day!

We walked up to the Church construction site, to take a few photos. They were putting in more of the driveway, have lowered part of the floor in the Church Nave area, started framing in part of the office that will be my part of the office, more work on the elevator areas and more.











Kasey came home from a morning photoshoot and spent time with all of the kids before heading off to her next job. Jeff likes to check out the photos with Kasey.

Then it was lunch time... between 7 of us, we devoured 14 hot dogs, and had potato chips or cheetos that some of the kids tried to eat with chopsticks and yummy chocolate drop cookies too.... yumm!

We had pesky wasps that were hiding under the deck chairs and had scared us inside, after Jake was stung by one, so, while we waited for Grandpa John to come to the rescue with wasp spray, we played the fan/ball game... it was just a little mild chaos. The purpose of the game is to toss the lightweight plastic balls at the ceiling fan blades (having the fan turned on HIGH), and then ducking as the balls come flying all over at you ... lots of laughing, screaming, scrambling for balls and fun!



After a few games of "Shark Attack", which Savannah and Mariah really got into along with the boys, the kids went outside for some sprinkler fun, and to make rivers with water and the hose in the sandbox... ahhh, a break for the ole gramma here..*L*

All in all, it was a fun day with the kids! Now I'm off to spray some more of those wasps that have decided to swarm around the deck still... eek.

Business cards from laminate samples

I found a string of laminate samples for .99 cents, so I added a label to them, sprayed them with some polycrylic and "VOILA!", business art cards! I have about 100 made so far, and enough for about another 100.

Kind of neat using found objects for business cards for my found object assemblage art, eh?

Happy Birthday to my MOM!!!

Today is Mom's 79th birthday... Wishing her many, many MORE too!! Love you MOM!! xoxoxox

“L’dor V’dor" ... From Generation to Generation.

“L’dor V’dor.” The phrase translates as “from generation to generation,” but its implications are more complex. It is a part of Hebrew prayers and means we are not just responsible for ourselves, but we are meant to do something for others, especially for young people, to tell them the stories of ages past.

L'dor V'dor

Unto all generations, we remember.
We trace the names, shreds of books,
Faded Hebrew calligraphy on tombstones,
Marks of settlements,
Remnants to rebuild with.

In religious tradition, God writes our names in the Book of Life,
To determine our next year,
To number our days.
We may also think in another way
About the names in the Book of Life.
The Jewish people have much history to remember,
Many journeys to document, many relatives to locate,
As we have moved through the countries, empires, and epochs.

And so, we have always listed names,
From the Bible on forward,
To see where we have come from.

To know who we are, we must know where we come from.
It is our duty to mark and remember and tell.
Let us recount the stories of our ancestors and our families
We are a small part of a long journey
That we can tell to our children
To tell to theirs.
~ Phil Brown ~


"These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up. Tie them as symbols on your hands and bind them on your foreheads. Write them on the door frames of your houses and on your gates."
Deuteronomy 6:6-9 (NIV)

++++++++++++++++++++++

I've decided to use this pedestal I altered a couple of years ago with this piece.. I LOVE how it looks together!! Fits well, I think.

Redeemed, Saved From the Snare of the Fowler

I've added more things to this assemblage... and changed the title a bit too... added are...a "flower" with a small angel inside to the vine on the right, and the most recent addition is the rusted metal trap/snare, with a cross trapped inside it hanging on the left ... I love the analogy of the cross inside the trap.

I'm in the process of making a booklet that shows my assemblages, along with the explanation or summary that I use when I have them in a prayer station kind of thing, here is what I have for this piece;

Redeemed, Saved from the Snare of the Fowler
33” x 29" x 10”

This broken doll, in need of restoring, is representative of all of us - we are broken people in a broken world.
This doll could have been thrown out, thought to be worthless, yet she has a quality that has much value.

This is how God looks at each of us...we are worth SO much even in our broken state, in need of repair, needing a Redeemer, and yet, God gave His life for us because God loves us THAT much. We have been saved from the fowler, from the snares and traps of the enemy (Satan).

God will use his people in the most broken times of their lives to show his love to the most broken of people.

O, Lord, who uses broken things;
Who through broken clouds gives us sweet, sweet rain;
Who gives us bread from broken grain;
O, Lord, make me stronger through broken things.

If we will unashamedly acknowledge and exhibit God’s handiwork in our lives, we will be constantly reminded that God has a purpose and place for us. We are created in Christ Jesus for good works, and saved from the traps of the enemy.

God mended our vessels so He can fill us full-to-overflowing with fabulous treasure that He wants us to share with the whole world. God uses broken things. THANK YOU LORD!

"Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler."
Psalm 91:3

"Let the redeemed of the Lord say so, who He has redeemed from the hand of the enemy..." Psalm 107

Grandson Friday!! Shark Attack.....

Today the grandsons, Jake, Josh and Jeff were here. It's always a treat to have them come!! We've played this game, ever since Jake was small... where I hum the theme to the Jaws movie, and pretend there are sharks swimming around on the floor. The safe places are the chairs, couch, footstools, and other blankets, pillows etc. that the boys put out as "boats". I made a short video of the game... I sound like some crazed gramma, but it sure is FUN, and the grandsons love it too..*S*

FREE SCHOOL SUPPLIES ... generous donors.

The Williams Bay Health Care Center residents and their families donated school supplies so that those who can't afford them would be able to have them. They asked Christ Church if we could hand them out to others. So I went over and picked them up on Tuesday afternoon, after sorting them and having a Church member take a big box of the supplies out to Twin Oaks Shelter for the Homeless, we also had them in our downtown Church site for people to get for FREE. Some others from our Church also donated some funds and I went and got $100 in more school supplies to add to them.




Thank you to Judy Lamb, program director, and the residents for their donations, as well as the donors at Christ Church. If you could only see the gratitude and thankfulness of the ones who received the supplies!

There were some sad stories of the trials that some are going thru, and we are praying for them, for jobs and work to be available for them, and for their families too.

To see the delight in the eyes of the children, who came with their moms to get the supplies, over just a colored eraser top, that they have never had before and "always wanted", it just touches your heart that something so simple gives such joy to the kids.. and the parents joy at being able to get the needed supplies is evident in their eyes too.

THANK YOU TO ALL FOR HELPING OTHERS IN SUCH A WONDERFUL WAY!!

Clint's Benefit a HUGE Success!

Today was also the benefit for Clint Ginner, a friend of our son and daughter in law, John and Janel's, and he used to work for my Dad's tree business too, before he went into business for himself. Clint was hurt horribly in an accident when he fell from a tree at work. He is facing some tough times, and in a wheelchair right now, but it is hoped he will be able to sometime get out of that and walk again soon.

The benefit had HUNDREDS of people in attendance ... and they made well over $55,000 I'm sure. So many people donated SOOOO much for the benefit of Clint and Jaimie and the family...it was so great to see everyone come together for them.

I was the lucky bidder on a pair of antelope antlers .. not sure yet what I'll do with them, but they are pretty cool!

My Bailey Family, along with a bottle of Bailey's was donated to the cause. I don't know who bought it, but I hope they enjoy the Bailey's and the assemblage pieces too.

God bless Clint and Jaimie and the family!! You are in our prayers!!

Saturday's Creation Sundaes & Bake Sale a BIG HIT!

It's Maxwell Street Days in our town.. and today we did an outreach to the community - we gave away FREE icecream sundaes, but with a theme...Creation Sundaes. We told the story of creation, from the Bible, as we dished out the ingredients in an assembly line fashion...complete with costumes to showcase each individual day of creation. It was so fun!! And everyone, children and adults, seemed to LOVE them!
We served over 270 FREE Creation Sundaes.



Here are some photos from the day... along with the ECW Bake Sale and Veggie Sale that took place at the same time.



Even the cops came in for a sundae!

Here are the ingredients we used, and what each server for each creation day said...

Day One Sundae Items - spoonful of vanilla ice cream and squirt of chocolate syrup. Day One Person says (in a grand, loud voice): Long ago, before the earth and all things in it, there was only God. On day one , God said, "Let there be light ." God called the light day, and the darkness He called night.

Day Two Sundae Items - several cubes of blue jello jigglers & a spoon of whipped cream. Day Two Person says (in a grand, loud voice): On day two, God made the sky & clouds.

Day Three Sundae Items - a large spoonful of crushed oreo cookies or crushed chocolate chip cookies (representing dirt/land), and shredded coconut colored with green food coloring (representing grass or plant life). Day Three Person says (in a grand, loud voice): On day three , God separated the land from the waters and created flowers, trees, and grass.

Day Four Sundae Items - candy or chocolate stars, and/or candy or gummy moons or suns (if you can find them.) Day Four Person says (in a grand, loud voice): On day four ,God made the sun, moon, and stars.

Day Five Sundae Items - Swedish or gummy fish, and/or bird candies Day Five Person says (in a grand, loud voice): On day five , the birds of the air and the fish of the sea were created.

Day Six Sundae Items - Animal Crackers, or Teddy Grahams, and/or Keebler Elf cookies. Day Six Person says (in a grand, loud voice): On day six , God made animals and then He made people to be like Him. He named the man Adam, and Adam named his wife, Eve.

Day Seven Sundae Items - hands out a spoon & napkin, and with a wave of his/her hand, shows the person the direction of a table or chair where they can sit, rest and eat their sundae creation (saying the following line as well). Day Seven Person says (in a grand, loud voice): And on day seven, God rested. He saw everything He had made and said that it was good....VERY good!

Check out our video of the day too... LOTS of fun!! So much so, we are going to do it again for Scarecrow Fest on Sat. Sept. 18th! Come on over then and get a FREE Sundae too!

Church Renovations Continue...

Lots of things are now gone in the continuing renovations going on at the Church. The Chapel and Christ the King room walls and ceilings are gone, carpet gone, flooring gone.




The stairs and floor from the Sunday School room area toward the Church Nave are gone, that door will be taken out and a wall will be put there. The floor in the Church choir area, where the organ used to be is gone..they will be lowering it to the level of the rest of the flooring in most places.






Some of the walls in the Sunday School room are gone, this will be the new office area for me and Deb, with a glass partition so we can see out to the glass doors below.

The nursery is all gone...the floor, the walls, along with the closet and floor that were next to it. This is where they will be installing an elevator to access the downstairs Parish Hall and the upstairs offices and Sunday School rooms.






And the outside is a mess too.... the digging for the driveway and parking are started, more trees will have to be removed soon. The glass doors by my office to the outside are gone, the new addition/entry way will be connected to that part.




So, it's proceeding slowly... and I can't imagine we'll be back in the building anytime soon... probably not till Jan. or Feb. 2011, or later?

Views from the passenger seat ... loooong day of driving...

We made it home!! YAY!! Started out at 7 a.m. from Sherman, TX and arrived home, in Wisconsin about 10:30 p.m. John drove the whole way, he is beat, and headed to bed as soon as we got things inside. I'll unwind and post some photos...views from the passenger seat today....


John seemed to take great delight in torturing me as we drove home.... all these GREAT JUNK SHOPS... and we didn't stop at any of them!!




Some of these photos are blurry ... I think because John sped up as we drove past them just so I couldn't jump out to see them.. haha..*L*





Alot of these photos are not in order of how we traveled home ... some bridges, old buildings in St. Louis ... Semi's and a big River (don't remember what river)...










Another HOT day too... 101 in Missouri (misery).







We saw quite a few accidents, looked like bad ones too, and as we traveled it seemed they were happening within shorter periods of time to when we came upon them. The bad one in Dallas yesterday was 2 hours before we came upon it... there was another one where a car had driven thru a guard rail, down an embankment, and the rescue squad had just pulled up to it when we drove past... and then there was THIS scary one!! It happened within seconds of us ... a short ways past an exit that said Dry Gulch, USA, we came up over a small hill, and there was a semi trailer tipped over in the medium strip... the dust was still flying in the air, and we had seen cars in the opposite lanes swerving off the road as we came over the hill...wondered what was going on, evidently the trailer was headed for them, but luckily tipped over when it hit the ditch...yikes!! The semi was hauling a double trailer, and the back one disconnected. No one was hurt, and the semi was pulled over, along with other cars that stopped to see if they could help, and probably to calm down after such a close call!!

We were thanking God for our safety in travel for sure!!

More interesting things along the way....





John DID offer to stop at the Worlds Largest Rocking Chair thing...however when we came to the exit, it didn't appear to be anywhere close, so we decided to just keep driving..still a long way from home at this point.

But when we stopped for gas, there was Larry's place that was next door, so I ran over to look thru it for treasures... but, it was mostly coke collectables...dang!






Stopped for a late lunch sandwich at the Indian statue truck stop, just before the Oklahoma Tollway...





Ohhh, and saw this amazing tightrope walking horse... *G* heh heh...


As we entered Illinois we started getting into some stormy weather... these clouds looked pretty ominous....





Luckily the worst part of the storms we avoided ... just some rain.... and finally our exit to Wisconsin... YAY!!





Thank you Lord for the great visit with Paul, for our safe travels, and nice time!