Friday, June 21, 2013

My Newsy Christmas Letter in June......

     It was brought to my attention today that I have the tendency to forget to let people know what is going on, on this side of the Holmes Fireplace.  I have so many people swimming with me in this portion of the "river of life" that I think everyone should know what the important events in our family's life are.  This person was absolutely right to point this out to me and want to know what is going on, so I decided that I needed to catch up.  There are so many things that are happening that even IF I wrote a Newsy Christmas Letter to send out, if I wait till Christmas, it will be a VOLUME, not a letter, so here goes!!!

I don't tend to use actual names on my blog, for safety sake, but those who know us know what the initials mean.  

     Lets start out with L, her husband D and my 2 sweet grand babies!!!  Well, D has finished his 2nd semester at Seminary and is working full time this summer and preparing for the Fall Semester.  E. has gotten her enrollment done to start HER masters program at the Seminary as well, plus she is the Publicity Officer for the women's organization on campus.  They work in family ministry at a small church in the D/FW area as well.  My handsome C.  Just turned 3 and is becoming quite a little man.  His mommy is working with him on all of his preschool items as well as taking care of sweet little RL who just became a whole year old.  It is just amazing to me that a year ago I was there for her birth into this world!!!!  She is trying to walk, negotiates the stairs in their townhouse quite well and both of the kids LOVE to play outside in the courtyard with their friends.  They have had some car trouble in the recent times s we are trying to help them out with that situation, but at the moment they have our pickup truck to get them by till we have time to make a wise decision on a vehicle for that blessed little family.  C knows which is the go petal and which is the stop petal  in Grandma's white truck and the go one should have been painted green while the stop ones should be red.  Yep, he is one smart little man!!!  L and D are wonderful parents. 


     A1 and her husband A2. are out for the summer.  A just graduated with her bachelors in Elementary Ed and has passed all her state tests to get her license in this state.  She has had one interview on the western side of the state but we are hoping for somewhere closer to where they are currently living as A2 still has a couple years of school to go before he graduates.  Each summer he has an internship with the Dept of Game and Fish and thank God this summer he is working where they live.  This week A, has been over here helping me at work and generally hanging out with me.
A2 still struggles with his days in the Air Force and his 2 deployments in Afghanistan, but things get better every day. 

     This brings me to kiddo 3.  S is finished for this semester as well.  He is working toward his EMT Basic certificate.  He is also working with the volunteer fire dept here locally.  He is on a job search to start paying some of his own bills while he continues his path to become an emt and maybe enter the Navy in about a year.  He is definitely his Dad's son as he is finding his niche in caring for others in need.  He is going to be a wonderful emt or medic in the navy, which ever he ends up choosing.  He also helps me out when I need it. S is a real surprise to most people as the surface that he projects is what he THINKS the world expects and wants to see, but there is a much deeper, more compassionate, and very very smart person hiding behind some uncertainties about what is really expected to be a man in this world.   

     Last of the kiddos is M.   He is a pretty amazing human being.  It takes awhile to get to know him, but once you do, it is well worth the effort.  In the last few months he has become a licensed local minister in our local Church of the Nazarene.  Now along with his general high school classes, he is taking the first of his seminary classes as well.  He meets with the pastor once a week for instruction and homework assignments.  He also attends the church board meetings, as well as the communities Ministerial Alliance meetings once a month.  He is also still on the competitive Bible Quizzing team and his Dad and I had the privilege of going with him to Point Loma again this year to watch him compete in the Regional Meet as part of the huge annual Regional Youth event for the Nazarene church. As well as these activities, he donates several hours a week of his time working at our local museum dedicated to the investigation of the Shroud of Turin.  He has impressed several of the scientists who have done research on the Shroud with his knowledge of the history, the research methods and equipment used.   Several of his closest friends and mentors besides Pastor Rob include one of the local Lutheran ministers, and  the priest and deacon from one of the local Catholic Churches  These quite honestly are just the highlights of this kids life.  It is really hard to remember most days that he is 16.  

     The last part of our newsy update is Jonathan and myself.  Twenty two years ago he decided to jump into this great, big, fat adventure that I call my life and helped me bring about everything you see above.  Some days I still cant believe he decided to take a chance on what many others thought was a very risky investment, but here we are.  He has been there to help me walk through the loss of my grandparents.  Its hard to explain to people that because of being only a toddler when my sister came down with leukemia and subsequently died, my grandparents were more like an extra set of parents to me than most peoples grandparents.  Then, he was there to help me walk through the loss of my younger brother.  Little did we know that not too long after that we would face the loss of my dad, to whom we, both. were very close, and then only a few months later and very unexpectedly, he was there with me for the loss of my older brother and (next to Jonathan) my very best friend in the world.  Well, all of that is old news, to most who know me, but it brings me to say that in a few months Jonathan is now looking at retirement from the career that brought him to me from a place far, far away.  Retirement is something very new to me so I have begun a chart of all the things that are opening up to us.  We are looking at a number of new ventures that will benefit us, the community around us and take us further toward the goal that God has for us individually as well as together.  We have no idea right now just what our next big adventure is going to be, with you can bet your boots that with God in the lead, and us holding tight to each other, it will be just as amazing as life has been up to this point.   If we judge the future by our past, you can also be pretty sure that our future will be something that many people consider very unconventional and even down right ODD. 

I hope this helps to catch everyone up on the major highlights of our family circle, too bad Family Circus was already taken!! 


2 comments:

  1. Very well written, and it was nice to get it so unexpectedly. Everyone get a Christmas update on others but never in June! Glad to hear that all in all everyone is doing pretty well.

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  2. I love your Family Circle Update. Kind of special to read!!

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