Christmas Eve Celebrations

This morning we celebrated Christmas with our kids and grandkids. We had fun opening gifts, playing with them all, having brunch - thanks Janel for the delicious hashbrown casserole and to Lauren for the yummy coffee cake too! And thanks to friends Ron and Susanne who sent us a HUGE delicious homemade Christmas bread! I made stuffed mushrooms too - yum!
It was a really fun and wonderful time with all of us together!!

Here are some photos of the morning celebration....



Kaine bought all the kids punching bags, they had fun with them for about an hour or so, but the base of them, filled with water, didn't last long with the jumping on them and punching our grandkids did! 3 of the 4 burst - good thing it was only water on the carpet! But they were fun while they lasted..*L*




Kaine bought Jorden a bag of soft plastic balls, Jorden LOVED them as John-John dumped them on her. And we all had fun with them playing a game the kids discovered last year. If you throw soft things at the ceiling fan, while it's on high speed, the blades when they hit the object, send it flying all over the place..*L*































Here's what the living room looked like after the gifts were opened - trying to figure out how to do the duck hunting toys, and playing with others too.


The grandsons all wanted "Snuggies", so we got them all one, here they are at home after our celebration, snuggled up in theirs.

It was a wonderful morning. Kaine and Lauren left to take Jorden back to her mom, John, Janel and the boys stayed for another couple of hours more.

Then it was on to fixing a snowball salad for tomorrow, some chicken wings for later at the Karstetter celebration, and a little napping before we headed out later that afternoon for the Iverson's.

Thank you Lord for our family!!!

The Boy Jesus, A Foreshadowing ShadowBox (assemblage, found object shadowbox)

It's been a busy week or so... lots of preparations for Christmas, and getting ready for year end things, bookkeeping wise, too.

One of the gifts I was going to give my friend, Deb, who I work with at Church, is this shadowbox. I love this picture, it's one I found in a large print in an old frame at Good Will. The original was about 18 x 22 inches. I took it to a photo place and had many images of various sizes made so I could use them in future assemblages and framed for gifts.



This one is in an 8 x 10 gold frame that I touched up with dots of a shimmery gold paint. The front of the shadowbox frame is from an old clock, and John made a back box that I painted & stained to match, glued the framed photo in place, then attached the frame and the box together with both glue and brackets.

The marble globe-looking piece fit well with what the boy Jesus is holding in his hand, and I added the crown at the top of it. The cross I painted gold and added the brass crucifix to it. Inside is also a small votive candle holder.

I gave this to my friend this morning, having spent most of the night finishing it and hoping the glue, epoxy, paint & stain would be dry in time... it was and Deb loved it! I do TOO, it was hard to not keep it for myself! *S*

Granddaughter Jorden's Early Christmas Visit

I was able to pick up Jorden on Monday afternoon so she could spend two days with us and we would be able to celebrate our family Christmas early with all our kids and grandkids here together! We always look forward to her visits!

On Tuesday, after I worked in the AM, Kasey and I took her to my Mom and Dad's so they could watch her open the gifts they bought for her. Before we left, I pulled out a cute old fashioned coat that was her Aunt Kasey's when she was about 2 - 3 years old. We took a lot of photos with her wearing it, she looked SOOO cute.!





Jorden liked Red's duck toy a lot - Red is my parents dog, he's about 14 years old, and Jorden loved the "puppy" Red too! She also loved the movable Christmas doll with the candle at Nana and Papa's.




One of her gifts was a cute rocking chair that she'll keep at her daddy's apartment to use. And she received a dolly and some cute clothes too!

After Nana and Papa's, we stopped at Church to get photos with the poinsettia plants that the altar guild put up earlier that day...they are beautiful and make great props for photos!







On Wednesday, before Jorden has to go back to her Mom, we'll have our family Christmas with our kids and the 4 grandkids... more photos to come from that later!

Pre-School Christmas Program - somebody was added to Santa's naughty list...

Our youngest Grandson, Jeff had his 3 yr. old preschool Christmas sing this morning. Here he is when he first came in, and he seemed to be cooperating... but things changed fast.

It was a cute program of songs that the teachers led the kids in singing. Jeff however, decided he was NOT going to do anything but stand there for most of the songs, even though his mom pulled out her cell phone and told him she was calling Santa right NOW!! *lol*


Were the other kids trying not to watch Jeff's bad behavior here? *L* Nope, just some actions to the song that Jeff decided NOT to participate in, no matter what the teacher, his mom, or we grandmother's said.




His mom, Janel, did get some video footage of him, not singing...*L* We all decided it would be good to show at his high school graduation, or when he had kids of his own and thought they were bad! *L*



But WAIT... just when we had given up on seeing him sing, there came a song about snowballs, and the props each kid had was a piece of paper they were to smash into a "snowball"... Jeff was eager to do it... the reason being, they got to throw them at the end of the song, and YES, he tried to bop his mom with his! *L*



And then Jeff finally did pick up his bells to ring during one song, but rather reluctantly. His Mom did say that he was upset about her taking their dog, Buck, to the vet that morning and having to leave him there for a removal of a growth on his eye, so I guess he was reacting to that.

The next day, when he came for grandson day at gramma's he was out of his "mood" and back to his normal smiling, Jeffro-self! *S* Gotta love him!! And we DO!! xoxoxox

Wait For the Lord... Keep Watch, Take Heart

This is a wonderful song to meditate on. It's one of many songs from Taize, which I was introduced to about 18 years ago when our french exchange "son", Sebastien, sent me a cassette tape of their music. I fell in love with the worship associated with it.
(The Taizé Community is an ecumenical Christian monastic order in Taizé, Saône-et-Loire, Burgundy, France. It is composed of a little over 100 brothers who come from Catholic, Orthodox and Protestant traditions. Over 100,000 young people from around the world make pilgrimages to Taizé each year for prayer, Bible study, sharing, and communal work.)



Here are the words to the song.

And below is one of many videos on YouTube of this prayer song.
(REMINDER: Turn off my playlist music before playing the video song.)

This is a prayer hymn I have in my heart and mind lately. John's back is not doing very well. He was able to come home late Friday afternoon, but his pain and leg problems started to come back just before he was discharged. It's been disappointing and very painful for him, especially since he was doing so well the first day and a half following the surgery. He's been in a LOT of pain, and is walking worse than he was before the surgery now. The on-call doctors have said he needs to give it awhile, because there is swelling that needs to go down, and he needs rest. The pain meds don't seem to be working well, and he isn't sleeping well either. The prayers of others have been a comfort, and we are so very thankful for them. The words to this song are also a comfort to me... "Wait for the Lord, keep watch, take heart."



So, it's about time for the patient's pain meds ... then 4 hours of sleep before the next time. I hope to fall asleep with this song in my heart, in my mind and in my spirit, and as a prayer for John and his healing.

Pre-Op and Post-Op

John had surgery today. We left very early this morning, at 4 a.m. to head to Milwaukee. John had to be at the hospital by 5:30 a.m., surgery scheduled for 7:30 a.m. The roads were pretty good, considering all the snow and ice we had. One lane was good most of the way and we made it in plenty of time. It was very cold however... minus - 1 (F) when we left Delavan...brrrrrrrr (windchills of minus -25 (F)).




Yesterday John was doing some "pre-op" stuff, ...giving bobcat lessons to Kasey so she could plow, if needed, while he is laid up for a couple of weeks. She did very good actually, she just needs a little practice, hopefully though she won't need to use the newly acquired skills very soon.



Then today John had a few more pre-op things before the actual surgery. They have these new kind of gowns now for patients, they are paper-like, and have a place to attach a hose, where warm air (or cold air if preferred) is pumped into the gown keeping the patient toast warm, or pleasantly cooled. *L* This is John with the gown on waiting on the aides to come to wheel him into surgery. He was like the stay-puff marshmellow man, all puffed up..*L*



During surgery Kasey and I went to the Family Center, where there was internet access (we both brought our laptops to work on to pass the time). The surgery went very well!! Dr. Kurpod said he removed 3 disk fragments that were pushing on the nerve that was affecting John's leg, and that John had an abnormally placed nerve as well which maybe was part of his problem? Not sure how it came to be abnormally placed?...something to ask the surgeon when we see him again.

John was out of recovery and back to his room by 11:35, we came to his room, stayed for about 30 minutes, then went down the hall to the family multi purpose room to do some work. John has been sleeping, snoring away soundly, for the last couple of hours. The nurses have said he'll be getting up sometime soon to walk, and then he has other things he must be able to do before they decide later today or tonite on whether he'll come home, or stay over for a night.

We are thankful for all the prayers and well-wishes from family and friends, please keep praying!! John has said his leg already feels better, his back is a bit sore from the surgery, but it's not real bad. Thank you Lord!!

Thank you everyone... *heading back to check on the patient again*
With love,
Roberta and family
xoxoxox

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**** UPDATE ****



About 4 p.m. they told John he was going to go for a short walk... they told him just to the nurses station about 8 rooms down the hall and back... but Kasey and I waited, and waited, and waited... and lo and behold, John and the nurse on duty came around from the OTHER side... they had gone the whole "block" around the floor in record time! John was and is doing great! No pain in his leg or backside, just some in his back where the surgery was, which is to be expected. Kasey said it's a "Christmas miracle", and to me, IT SURELY IS!! I'm so thankful for the great results so far for John.

The nurses told us that there were several things that had to happen in order for John to come home today. His walk was one of them, he passed with flying colors.

He had to eat regular food with no problems.. and he ordered a nice dinner, which he devoured... Kasey and I went to the Dining Room and brought a dinner-to-go back with us, to eat with John in his room... we bought him a giant chocolate chip cookie, which he ate along with his meal, so he passed that test as well.

He had a bladder scan, and although he did go to the bathroom, evidently it wasn't enough... and they are afraid of an infection if he doesn't empty his bladder.

Dr. Kurpad came in around 7 p.m. (he'd had a long day of surgeries!) .. he told John that the abnormal nerve placement he had was probably something he was born with ... and that the herniated disk was broken into many pieces around the nerve that was suppose to be on one side or the other of where it was, but it was instead, in the middle of the broken disk, causing the problems. So, now it's been corrected and we are so happy!! And thankful for Dr. Kurpad and the nurses and others caring for John.


But, he wasn't able (as we had hoped) to come home tonite... Kasey and I got home around 8:30 p.m. ... and tomorrow I'll call John to find out when I can come and get him... but we are so thankful and appreciate SOOOO much the prayers of many friends and family. Thank you for all the special messages on Facebook as well, I plan on reading them ALL to John tomorrow when he comes home, he will also, undoubtably, be thankful for you all!!

With much love and thanking God for the blessings and healings for John!
Roberta and family
XOXOXOXO

The Diary of a Snow Storm Continues...

If you look at yesterday's post on my blog, you'll see I am keeping a photo diary of the snow storm we are in the midst of here.

This is our back yard at 7:15 a.m. this morning. And our pine tree at 8 a.m. (and it's still snowing lightly.)


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And at 11 a.m., here is the walk up to our front door, John had already plowed it - and it's still flurrying.




The sidewalk in the front of our house looking south up the street. I love how beautiful it looks with the snow covered branches.


The snowplows are doing a good job of plowing our driveway back in, and the sidewalk entrances at the corners too. I was temporarily stuck sideways in the entrance from trying to get out over the pile of snow the snowplow left for us.



The old oak tree at our Church was so pretty covered with snow, I had to snap a few photos of it too.







More photos to come later in the day as the storm progresses .....

The Diary of a Snow Storm - Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow...

Weather reports on TV are saying by Wednesday afternoon, we'll have over a foot of snow here in S.E. Wisconsin.

So today and tomorrow, I'll take photos throughout the day of how the storm is progressing ... this one is our back deck at 7 a.m. this morning.

Hopefully the big snow will finish up in time for us to head to Milwaukee early on Thursday morning for John's back surgery without any problems on the road.
And later today, John is going to show Kasey and me how to fire up the bobcat so we can plow out the house and the church sidewalks, if needed, while he is laid up following the surgery.
I'm sure that will bring adventures IF we have to do that..ha!

More photos to come throughout the day.....
Snowstorm... kinda stalled, 10:00 a.m., flurrying a little still, not much accumulation however.




The snow started to melt on the streets, but it's getting colder again, and although the snow stopped for a bit, it's pretty overcast and the ground is covered now, as you can see by the photo of our pine tree at about 4:00 p.m.













This is a 7:45 p.m. view of our deck again, the snow has started again, and I hear sounds of snowblowers and plows outside in the neighborhood...

Maybe we WILL be getting a foot of snow as predicted by tomorrow night?? I know the TV stations are showing a LOT of cancellations for tomorrow already... school kids are rejoicing in WI..*L*

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What a difference 45 minutes makes.. 8:30 p.m., and it's getting pretty windy outside!











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The snowstorm continues, slowly ... 10:45 p.m.