Our Short Family Vacation to Missouri

As we warned you in this blog, we drove to Columbia, MO for Thanksgiving with Janet's family, then to Joplin for a few days with Randy, Joy, and Quil. We left home on Wednesday morning at 3:15 a.m., with about 3" of wet snow on the ground, and snow falling. The roads were only treacherous for about the first 300 miles! We saw many roll-overs, a jack-knifed semi-trailer truck, and slipped around some ourselves, but the Lord protected us and kept us safe and not too tense. The rest of the trip was quite uneventful; we did enjoy seeing each family member, and benefited from catching up on their lives for a few hours. And, of course, we had tasty food to eat too much of!
In Joplin most of our family was involved in the Kids Club that Joy and Randy have successfully started there. They average about 25 children each Sunday afternoon, which is really capacity for the facilities that they currently have available. They have had 32 at one time! This picture shows Brenda playing the piano while Joy leads choruses.

Janet's parents Wanda and Rex Scoles have each endured physical difficulties this year. Mother had blood clots in her lungs in June, then had her gall bladder removed in October. We were grateful to see them both stronger and healthier than they've been for some time. They really enjoy their only great-grandson.

Our Overnight Guests

We were priviledged to host the Faith Bible School traveling quartet last night. They are on their journey to Phoenix, AZ for their campmeeting over Thanksgiving. We have known most of them for several years, and they are always a blessing to us when they can stop by our 'way station'. They are always welcome, as are you and yours!

Left to right: David, Stephanie, Nora and Nathan, and Jessica.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We are planning to travel to Columbia, MO and then to Joplin, MO this next week to sharing a few hours with most of our Scoles family. There is snow and cold weather in the forecast for the middle of the week, so we don't know for sure how that might influence our travel. Most of Janet's family (her parents, her five siblings / spouses, many nieces and nephews) plan to be together on Wednesday night / Thursday morning. We will be in Joplin with Randy, Joy and Quil over the weekend.

We trust that whatever your activity, and whomever you are with, you will know the presence of our Lord as you are able to give thanks for His blessings in your life. I know that some will read this that are not in the USA, but please be thankful anyway.

Please let us know who you are, where you are, and what your Thanksgiving was like!

What do you discuss?

"Great minds discuss ideas. Average minds discuss events. Small minds discuss people."
- Eleanor Roosevelt

If this is indeed true, what if you find yourself discussing nothing at all? Let me know what you think. . .

A wedding quilt for Tim and Brenda

On September 15, I bought material to start a quilt for Tim and Brenda for a wedding gift. The colors are cream, plum, sage, and yellow with plum/sage in it. Plum and sage are her wedding colors. The pattern I decided to use is Garden Wedding, a variation of the Irish Chain pattern. I got the pattern and instructions from the book, Quick-Method Heirloom Quilts. On September 24, I started cutting the strips of the material. After all the strips were cut, I sewed them together as per instructions, and cut them to the sizes required. After that, I started building patterns and then rows. In the picture below, you can see the rows on the foosball table and ironing board.

In this next picture, I am pinning the rows together. The following picture, Beth and I are holding it up about half way done. This method of piecing is so much faster than the quilts I have made before. I really recommend it! I got completely done with the quilt top yesterday, Nov. 9!

The top, sides, and bottom of the quilt have the plum edging shown in the last two pictures. Last evening, Brenda and I were working on designing and starting pillow shams to match. She has also purchased more of the cream and green, so she can make curtains to match. Right now, Tim and Brenda don't know where they will live after they are married, so we can't make curtains yet.
My goal was to have the quilt top done by Thanksgiving, so I can take it to Missouri to get it machine quilted by a couple there who do such a nice job for a very reasonable price. It is very expensive to have it machine quilted here in Colorado. I am thankful to the Lord for His help, and to my family for letting me have the time to work on the quilt "every spare minute" for the past 7 weeks!

This picture is of the quilt top laid over the guest bed for viewing.

This picture shows the bottom edge of the quilt.


This picture is of the corner.

THIS QUILT IS NOW DONE! ON JANUARY 23, 2008 JANET FINISHED HAND-SEWING THE BINDING ON! Not bad - 4 1/2 months - and it looks wonderful! Congratulations Janet!

Christy Mendez and Manoj Manoharan

November 3, 2007 Rowen's niece, Christy and Manoj Manoharan renewed their vows in a lovely ceremony in Greeley, CO. They were married October 23, 2006 in India. Manoj came back to the US in September to join Christy here. They were required to be married here for their marriage to be recognized. Christy is one of our special nieces. She lived with us for a month when Emily was born 9.5 years ago and was a great help to us. Manoj is a wonderful Christian man. We enjoyed making his acquaintance and hope to see much more of him.

Our Precious Grandson Quil

Our Grandson Quil is 5-months old this week! Don't you love his big eyes? And what about his maintenance-free hair do? We love him, and look forward to seeing him in a couple of weeks!