Category Archives: Jaymison Joshua

Determination or…

…the many faces of mastering the marker pen lid.

I should have videoed this series because this little guys determination to take the lids off the pens was hilarious. He would yell when he finally gave up and wanted one of us to get the lid off for him.

Auntie Katie was a great helper.

Prayer for our sons and grandson and other young men in our lives from the third chapter of Proverbs:

The Rewards of Wisdom

1 My son, do not forget my teaching,
But let your heart keep my commandments;
2 For length of days and years of life
And peace they will add to you.
3 Do not let kindness and truth leave you;
Bind them around your neck,
Write them on the tablet of your heart.
4 So you will find favor and good repute
In the sight of God and man.
5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart
And do not lean on your own understanding.
6 In all your ways acknowledge Him,
And He will make your paths straight.
7 Do not be wise in your own eyes;
Fear the Lord and turn away from evil.
8 It will be healing to your body
And refreshment to your bones.
9 Honor the Lord from your wealth
And from the first of all your produce;
10 So your barns will be filled with plenty
And your vats will overflow with new wine.
11 My son, do not reject the discipline of the Lord
Or loathe His reproof,
12 For whom the Lord loves He reproves,
Even as a father corrects the son in whom he delights.

13 How blessed is the man who finds wisdom
And the man who gains understanding.
14 For her profit is better than the profit of silver
And her gain better than fine gold.
15 She is more precious than jewels;
And nothing you desire compares with her.
16 Long life is in her right hand;
In her left hand are riches and honor.
17 Her ways are pleasant ways
And all her paths are peace.
18 She is a tree of life to those who take hold of her,
And happy are all who hold her fast.
19 The Lord by wisdom founded the earth,
By understanding He established the heavens.
20 By His knowledge the deeps were broken up
And the skies drip with dew.
21 My son, let them not vanish from your sight;
Keep sound wisdom and discretion,
22 So they will be life to your soul
And adornment to your neck.
23 Then you will walk in your way securely
And your foot will not stumble.
24 When you lie down, you will not be afraid;
When you lie down, your sleep will be sweet.
25 Do not be afraid of sudden fear
Nor of the onslaught of the wicked when it comes;
26 For the Lord will be your confidence
And will keep your foot from being caught.

Stars and Stripes Weekend

How cute are our little grands sporting their 4th of July matching outfits??

On the Fourth this year we gathered at Jamie’s Uncle’s home for a potluck barbecue. I didn’t take a photo of the salad I contributed but it was from our Mennonite Girls Can Cook blog and here’s the link. A refreshing summer Watermelon Cucumber Salad from Bev.

Before we left to the 4th of July gathering I worked on our backyard planters weeding. Our front planters need a lot of work still and I hope to get to them this week.

A walk about the yard taking photos of all the pretty things and weeds that are blooming.

Our day lilies are in their glory right now as is this Clematis.

After a wonderful 5th of July service at church honoring God and country we took a Sunday afternoon drive up Aladdin Road all the way to the Washington US Border with Canada. On the way back we took a side road to check out Deep Lake. I’m not able to upload the photos from this spur of the moment road trip yet.

We are expecting some out of state visitors this week. Looking forward to that. What is up in your corner of the world?

Lumberjack Take Two!

For the summer lumberjack redo party the sleeves were cut off the flannel shirts. Jaymison Joshua turned one on April 16th right in the middle of COVID-19’s isolation restrictions. On Sunday since the family were all together in Colville a party redo was scheduled for JJ. We had Addy’s on the day before. For Addy’s party we were served lunch and for JJ’s party we were served brunch.

Jaymison warms up slowly to people he doesn’t see often so Katie and Andrew had their work cut out for them to win him over.

Uncle Joshie and Auntie Lolo have been able to travel more and spend enough time with Jaymison so he is more comfortable with them.

Granny Great, Mommy, JJ, and Granny, four generations on Jamie’s side of the family.

Great Uncle Scott and Aunt Rhonda have not been able to be around enough for JJ to be on his best behavior with them. We called in the stabilizer…mommy for the next photo.

Baba and Gramps enjoy seeing our little lumberjack as much as possible. It’s been so good to live in the same town!

Jaymison loves music, singing and dancing so he was very engaged and moving back and forth while we all sang Happy Birthday to him!

For Jaymison’s re-do party his parents served brunch with pancakes, waffles, bacon, little smokies, and his Granny and Addy made a pull apart Monkey Bread for his birthday cake.

Jaymison loves anything with long handles like brooms and mops so Gramps and Baba bought him some garden tools and he’s enjoyed them.

While he wasn’t using them this boat crew used them to row row row their boat and we all joined in with a round in song. Fun!

The boat crew could pretend while JJ used his gifts elsewhere.

Jaymison Joshua and Joshua enjoying chillin on the porch swing.

It was such a full weekend enjoying these celebrations and time with loved ones.

We have a 4th of July event with Jamie’s family that we are looking forward to. What are your plans for the 4th?

 

Best-Laid-Plans Hodgepodge

Dear and me at a courtyard on the campus of Magdalen College (pronounced Maudlin) in Oxford England. (July of 2014)

The phrase the best-laid plans is a translation of a Scottish proverb that was first published in 1786.

The best-laid plans refers to something that has gone awry, something that has not turned out as well as one had hoped. The expression the best-laid plans carries the connotation that one should not expect for things to always turn out to plan. Like many proverbs, the best-laid plans is usually quoted by itself, though it is not the full proverb. The full proverb is, the best-laid plans of mice and men often go awry. This is a passage from the poem To a Mouse, written by the Scottish poet Robert Burns in 1786. The verse was translated into English, the original Scottish quotation is: The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft a-gley, / An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain, / For promised joy. Note that best-laid plans is spelled with a hyphen, as best-laid functions as an adjective before a noun. Laid is sometimes misspelled as layed, though layed is not a word. Laid is is the past tense and past participle tense of lay.

And now here are the Hodgepodge Questions on this first day of July!

1. Are you currently making plans of any kind? What kind? 

Currently I am making plans for getting things ready for some summer visitors arriving next week. 

What emotions are associated with the planning process? 

Excitement to be able to share our new environs with some loved ones who haven’t visited with us in our Country Bungalow before.

Tell us about one plan you had to cancel due to the current situation which shall remain nameless. Ha!

We had to cancel our trip to England scheduled for the middle of September. We are very pleased with the cancellation policy of Airbnb. They refunded us our money within an hour. We still need to call British Airways and try to get our money back for our flights. That was a big chunk of change and we hope to have good dealings with the airlines. As you can imagine they are swamped with phone calls. We were going to stay in Oxford. We are disappointed for sure. 

2. Last time you saw stars, either literally or figuratively?

Our country bungalow is in a part of town where there are no street lights and very few lights shine from neighboring properties so star gazing is something we can do most nights when we don’t have cloud cover. It really is amazing to see so many stars and to be able to pick out constellations.

3. Blueberries yay or nay? Blueberry pie, blueberry muffins, blueberry yogurt, blueberries by the handful…what’s your pleasure?

Yes to blueberries. I like them fresh picked by the handful. I also enjoy them thrown into a bowl of cereal/granola.

4. swim against the tide, swimming upstream, in the swim, sink or swim, makes your head swim…choose one of the ‘swim’ idioms listed and tell us how/why you relate?

In the current climate of our country I’m definitely swimming against the loudest tide. I know there is a quiet tide that I’d fit in with but it is being drowned out by all the angry noise.

5. Sum up your June in a single sentence.

A glorious time in June for family to be all together again.

Be happy in your mask! 

Start them young!

6.  Insert your own random thought here.

One of my favorites to quote in good times and bad times, C. H. Spurgeon:

“Visit good books but live in the Bible”

“Let us not fear the enemy until he actually comes, and then let us trust in the Lord.”

“Lord, help us in such a way that we may see that thou thyself art working. May we magnify thee in our inmost souls. Make all around us to see how good and great a God thou art.”

Thank you to Joyce for coming up with the Hodgepodge questions!

Catching My Breath…

We’ve enjoyed some nonstop fun since Friday afternoon and I’ll need to catch my breath before I can share all the activity. So good to have our little family reunited for the first time since Christmas.

(Not in any particular order for this post)

Seeing Auntie Katie and Uncle Andrew for the first time in 6 months.

Enjoying a Baba and JJ tradition of singing Row, Row, Row Your Boat with hand motions.

Three generations.

We had a mix of weather this weekend, cloudy, wet, bright, dark, sunny, showers, thunder, warm, and dry. So far we are lower in Yellow Jacket and Wasp swarms and higher in mosquitoes.

Hopefully I can come around and see what you’ve been up to soon.

Father’s Day Celebration 2020

For our Father’s day celebration in Colville we gathered at Dan and Jamie’s Saturday evening. It was a small group with Dear, me, Dan, Jamie, Addy, Jaymison and Linda (Granny). I was happy to be able to get some snaps of the grands with their dear Granny, Jamie’s Mom.

Happy Father’s Day to our son. Let’s see how many shots I can get with everyone looking at the camera.

I think we did good with 3 out of 6!

And on the official Father’s Day we received this photo via text! Happy Father’s Day to our son, Daniel. We are happy that he is a hands on dad. He doesn’t even shy away from those diaper changes others would refuse. We pray that Dan and Jamie will always be a team in leading, guiding and teaching our grandchildren in the things that matter most.

This coming weekend we’ll get a photo of the whole family together. We are having a couple days with temperatures in the upper 80’s here! I mowed today and will try to do some weed wacking in the early hours on Tuesday. After Tuesday we’ll cool down some. Summer has arrived for at least a couple of days. We had a cooler Spring than normal and we were commenting on the fact that the wasps and yellow jackets are fewer in number. Hooray!

These Two…

They have fun together and they frustrate each other, too. It will be interesting to see how they interact as JJ gets older.

It was a lot easier to take photos when there was just one grandchild. Jaymison and Addy are on the move in different directions much of the time and Jaymison, when not on the move, wants me to hold him so taking photos is difficult. I will never complain that JJ wants me to hold him. Too soon he’ll be off on bigger adventures without his Baba…

June 19th on the kids’ driveway. We’ve been getting some nice sunshine here and there. I got some fun photos at our local Father’s Day celebration and as soon as I can upload them I’ll share them. Hope you all are enjoying some peaceful moments at the beginning of Summer. We have a fun weekend planned ahead with all of our little family together for the first time since Christmas here in our neck of the woods. Got to get busy freshening up the linens in our two guest rooms. It will be a wonderful way to finish off June.

A June view from our kids driveway on our way home. We never get tired of this great view.

Happy first week of summer to all of you!

Coast Family Reunited

What a treat to enjoy time at Josh and Laura’s home on the west side of the Cascades. It had been 6 months since we visited on the “Coast”.

My sister and her husband joined us on Saturday afternoon for a meal and early Father’s Day celebration for Dear.

We had good walks, good talks, watched an online church service together, ate a lot of good food and played cards. Josh and Dear enjoyed shopping at Cabella’s and another favorite store of theirs. The Girls were able to shop at Business Costco and Hobby Lobby.

Laura found the recipe for this cake and she and Katie baked it on Saturday. Cake recipe coming later this week.

Our kids on the East Side sent us a photo from their walk, too.

We made it home safe and sound from the Coast on Monday taking a new route home. I’ll be catching up with blogs soon. Lots of scenes from the road to share. Hope you are all well.

Looking Up Hodgepodge

1. Last thing you said yes to? Did you regret it?

I said yes to watching our little grandson Jaymison on Tuesday morning. No regrets at all. It’s always fun even though I come home tired.

2. No big deal, no contest, no dice, no hard feelings, no ifs ands or buts, no kidding, no offense, no pain no gain, no way…choose one and tell us how it applies to your life currently.

No offense but you are wrong! What most of my comments would be on a lot of facebook and instagram posts lately if I really thought it would matter to make a comment. I have only commented when I have felt I have a voice in someone’s life and the post does not line up with the gospel of Jesus Christ and the shared faith I thought we had together…

3. Thursday June 11th is National Making Life Beautiful Day…in this strange season how are you adding beauty to your days/life?

I’m in the process of  completing a scrapbook for Jaymison’s first year of life. Getting pages accomplished and seeing all that has happened in his life in just one year has added beauty and smiles to my days. I have his 1 year pages to do and I’m all finished.

4. According to an article found here, these six foods taste better in June than at any other time of the year-strawberries, asparagus, peas, peaches, beets, and garlic. How many of these have you tasted so far this month? Anything on the list you’d say ‘no thank you’ to trying? Rearrange the list starting with your favorite (1) to your least favorite (6).

I’ve only tasted strawberries and garlic this month…but the month is young. I wouldn’t say no to anything on this list. This Ice Cream cake has strawberries in it and no garlic. 🙂 Recipe on my blog yesterday.

  1. Strawberries 2. beets 3. garlic 4. peaches 5. asparagus 6. peas

5. Describe your current mood in three words.

Content but bewildered.

6. Insert your own random thought here.

Back to question 5 and my response. I’m bewildered and distressed by dear friends who seem to have left their faith for rubbish. I went back and forth from Galatians where Paul says who has bewitched you foolish Galatians…and this.

The Light of the Gospel (2 Corinthians 4)

4 Therefore, having this ministry by the mercy of God, we do not lose heart. 2 But we have renounced disgraceful, underhanded ways. We refuse to practice cunning or to tamper with God’s word, but by the open statement of the truth we would commend ourselves to everyone’s conscience in the sight of God. 3 And even if our gospel is veiled, it is veiled to those who are perishing. 4 In their case the god of this world has blinded the minds of the unbelievers, to keep them from seeing the light of the gospel of the glory of Christ, who is the image of God. 5 For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord, with ourselves as your servants for Jesus’ sake. 6 For God, who said, “Let light shine out of darkness,” has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.

I’m looking up and in the Word of God (The Bible) to get my bearings…

Thank you to Joyce for coming up with the questions for Hodgepodge!

Friday Fete

It’s not a hummingbird but it flies like one. What kind of bug is this?

Turkeys continue to visit here and there.

Fun to catch the fan.

This little guy is probably going to have a growth spurt. He’s eating everything in sight.

Addy is enjoying her bicycle and she got a bell and handle streamers this week. I think she likes them and riding with her new accessories!

I’m limiting social media at present. Many mean well but there is just too much noise. I need to protect my head and heart. I haven’t stopped praying. I’m reading my Bible which is the best Truth I can digest right now. The only dialogues I’ll participate in are face to face, one on one conversations. That way I can see and hear the tone of the conversation instead of trying to guess what is being communicated. I do have phone conversations with my “Coast” kids since I can’t see them face to face right now.

My morning readings this month are Psalm 19, Psalm 119, The Gospel of Luke and then I read a chapter in Proverbs that corresponds with the day. I finish up with a good dose of Spurgeon. Thursday was the 4th so I read Proverbs 4. These verses stood out to me;

Proverbs 4:13-18 (ESV)

Keep hold of instruction; do not let go;
    guard her, for she is your life.
14 Do not enter the path of the wicked,
    and do not walk in the way of the evil.
15 Avoid it; do not go on it;
    turn away from it and pass on.
16 For they cannot sleep unless they have done wrong;
    they are robbed of sleep unless they have made someone stumble.
17 For they eat the bread of wickedness
    and drink the wine of violence.
18 But the path of the righteous is like the light of dawn,
    which shines brighter and brighter until full day.

Hope you all have a good Friday and great weekend in your corner of the world.