Praise

Audrey came through her surgery fine and will be kept sedated through tomorrow. Thank you for your continued prayers as she recovers.

Prayer Request

As many of you know, our little Audrey was born with a problem in her heart. Her surgery will be Tuesday, February 2, at 7 a.m. Thank you for your prayers. Coming sometime soon: Audrey's birth story.

A Special Baby Shower

Last Friday night was a special time as the church ladies had a baby shower for me. One special thing that our pastor's wife did was to call my mom and ask her for any words she wanted to say, since she lived too far away to be there. Then our pastor's wife read my mom's words and gave me a couple copies of them for Audrey's memory book. Another special thing that our pastor's wife thought to do was to have the ladies gather around me and pray for Audrey to turn to the right position and that we would be kept safe with the rest of the pregnancy, labor, etc. Those two things really touched my heart and made me more thankful to have the Lord and Christian friends.

Of course, what fun would a baby shower be without all those cute baby items to oooh and ahhh over?! :) Our dining area is still decorated with a large array of bags and bows in various shades of color--mostly pink. ;) I could spend all day going through them and looking at things at least five times!


And, of course, all those thank-you notes need to be written! Just the thank-you notes themselves are a reminder to me of what God can do. I've probably had these baby thank-you notes for about a couple years, in hopes of one day being able to use them.

Untold Millions Are Still Untold

In preparation for our church's mission conference at the end of this month, we put up our missions board last weekend. This one was pretty simple, too, since we just bought the pictures to put on the board. The title is also the title of a chorus I remember singing in Sunday school as a child and one that we have taught our Sunday school kids to sing.

Hallelujah, What a Saviour!

That is the title of our Christmas bulletin board, which we put up earlier this month. It's one of those simpler, quick boards that is rotated. The gift in the middle of the board was even made by someone else! But, the message is the important thing, reminding us of God's love in sending the wonderful Saviour that we have.

Thanksgiving Memories

This recent Thanksgiving definitely had some memorable points to it! It was one of those where we will be saying next year (Lord willing), "Remember this time last year??..."

For starters, it was such a blessing and answer to prayer to see my mom able to do things that she would not have been able to do just a month before. After seeing her this summer in such ill health, I just kept thanking the Lord for the renewed strength He had given her. I must think of moms (at least mine) as Energizer bunnies; they are just not supposed to get ill or something. And she certainly has needed more strength, as she and my sister recently have had to care more for my grandparents due to their health issues.

It was such a pleasure to visit with my very good high school friend after not having seen her since our wedding five years ago! Our husbands were so patient to let us have our gab fest too. :) We stayed longer than planned, because the time just went by so quickly.

Mark enjoyed being part of the harvest action on the farm. The combine, the big trucks, and "mowing" corn were definitely a different pace for him and an enjoyable change.


As always, we enjoy our Thanksgiving food. Of course, they all had to tease me about being served last so that everyone else would get enough. :) Later in the afternoon, I decided to have my pregnancy pose debut; I would not have escaped my sister's camera anyway. ;) And, of course, we worked in some silly pictures and had some good laughs. That finally drove the guys out of the living room and back to watching their football game. We women calmed down enough then to play a game we hadn't played before (Talkin' Tango) and had a good time with some more laughs.


We all have so much to thank the Lord for, even with inconveniences, disappointments, and illnesses that come our way. The lesson of giving thanks in everything is one that I will always be working on it seems. I hope you have some good Thanksgiving memories to look back on too!

A Quick Little Music Review

Somewhat recently, I added a new music site over on the right, pdfpiano. You can go to this site and sign up to receive a free monthly arrangement that you can download and print. I've already received arrangements for "Amazing Grace" and "Come, Ye Thankful People Come," both of which I like and are probably considered moderate in level.

Also recently, I purchased the new hymnal from Bible Truth Music and really like it! If you are familiar with the original "Soul Stirring Hymns" hymnal, this is what it reminds me of. Although no hymnal could contain all our favorite hymns--probably wouldn't fit in the pew rack!--this hymnal is really loaded with many good ones, plus some choruses. I don't know about you, but growing up singing so many good hymns in church, I would much rather sing those older ones than many of the newer ones. There are some hymns in this new hymnal that I'm used to playing in a different key, but all in all, it's a great hymnal!