I really haven't forgotten about this blog!!

It's just that I've been a little busy lately... where do I begin?

Amy, our oldest lamb, GRADUATED on June 14th! We had a wonderful time with our family and friends that day - pictures coming soon!

Since the Christmas play that our church did, Psalty the Singing Songbook has gotten married and had three kids! So, for the last several months, I have had the privilege of making costumes for all of them. I did, of course, have a LOT of help, but the job still took up most of my time since the last week of April. The performance was yesterday and every one of the kids did a FANTASTIC job. Stay tuned for another post on this, complete with pictures! I hope to get them posted sometime this year.

It's been nine months, and I'm still struggling with the aftermath of my gall bladder's rebellion and subsequent dishonorable discharge. The doctor calls it "Bile Acid Gastritis" and the bottom line is that I can't eat anything that has fat or oil of any kind, no spicy foods, and no caffeine. That pretty much eliminates everything from my diet except chicken breast, granola bars, and sugar snap peas. I've literally lost all the weight I have gained since getting married 23 years ago, so I'm not complaining about that part of it, but it would be nice to have a bite or two of steak without fear of reprisal. The doctor says it'll get better, but it can take a long time. Define "long", please?

Since the end of May, all of us except Gary and Collin have had some sort of virus that has knocked us out, one at a time. I just KNEW that Collin would be next, and I've prayed for the last two weeks that he wouldn't get it because of his big part in the Psalty performance. Anyhow, now that the play is over with (just yesterday!) and we thought we had a chance to recover and get our lives back in order, Collin came to me this afternoon and said those dreaded words: "Mom, I don't feel very good." He had a fever of 103, aches, chills, etc. I'm so glad he waited until after I took a nap this afternoon. Any suggestions on how to sanitize the whole house at once to kill off this thing once and for all? Stephanie suggested taking off the roof and just dumping in a few truckloads of bleach...sounds like a plan to me! How does one sanitize furniture and carpets, without ruining them? I also think we need to bleach all the chairs at church.

Amy had a minor car accident on July 7th - she wasn't hurt except for some minor stiffness and a sore neck, but that went away a few days later. I'll let her tell you more about it on her blog. The blessing of it all is that now God has provided us with a really nice van. It's a '98 Chevy Venture. Yeah, it's over 10 years old, but it's in excellent condition. It's definitely never spent a winter in northern Illinois (so there's no rust), and has only 66K miles on it. And, it has A/C vents in the back, so the kids are REALLY happy!

I finally, for the first time in my life, read all the books in the Chronicles of Narnia series. Mandy likes to have me lie down with her for a little while every night when she goes to bed. So, since I couldn't sit at the computer during my evening moments and update this blog, I decided to start reading books again. Now I'm close to finishing the second novel in the Mitford series, by Jan Karon. Only six more to go...

And, my parents' house has sold and they are moving here from Tulsa this coming weekend!! For the first time since I was 18, we'll be living in the same state! It will be such a blessing to have both sets of grandparents nearby. What a blessing that their house sold so quickly - God's hand is definitely at work here.

Here it is, late evening, and since I'm gonna have to set a timer to wake myself up every three hours to monitor Collin's temperature, I had better get some sleep. I'm looking forward to a normal life again, but I don't think it's going to happen this week. Honestly, though -- when I look at so many others close to me and compare my own struggles with some of theirs, I think I live a rather idyllic - no, blessed - life. We are truly blessed beyond measure.