Advent Wreath

A friend of mine does gorgeous wood-working.  He's been turning his hobby into a small business.  Look at some of the things he's made.

The Advent wreath is in the shape of a cross.  It can hold tapers or the little votive candles.  (I can find votives in purple and pink much easier than I can find tapers.  So I prefer the little glass globes for the stumpy candles.)

The Christmas-tree ornaments are delicately worked and make a full nativity set.  When I saw them on the Christmas tree at church, I coveted them.  When a set went up for sale at our school's annual fund-raising auction, we were lucky enough to get a set for ourselves.  Woo hoo!





Matt's website isn't fully set up yet.  But for those of you who know us, the website will give you enough information that you would know how to contact him if you want to purchase something to be crafted over summer for gift-giving next fall/winter.  For those who will be attending symposium, there may be some of these beauties for sale there; there were last year, at least.  For those of you who don't know us, there's information on the website about a craft booth in Spring Green.  (He doesn't know that I've bragged about him here in public, and I'm not finding information online.  So there's nothing for me to point you to, for easy-breezy ordering information.  If there's something you'd be interested in, you'd just have to write or call and start asking questions.)

Mom

Things continued to go downhill for my mom.  Two weeks after her fall, there was a precipitous decline, but somehow she managed to live through it.  We enrolled her in in-hospital hospice.  Her gazillion meds were discontinued.  Not long after that, she was awake and aware and discussing with my brother that she agrees it's time to stop all these life-extending measures. 

She's been 10 days without dialysis now.  She's not eating.  Mom is dying slowly.  At one point, someone reminded her about going to be with Jesus, and she asked plaintively, "What's taking Him so long?" 

The hospital lost her hearing aid.  That's sad.  When you wish for her to be able to hear many times "I love you" and "Jesus loves you and forgives you and cherishes you," she struggles to hear.  Last time I was there, she kept reaching for the volume-control on her hearing aid, trying to turn up the sound, and she couldn't find it.  Nevertheless, God will be faithful to His promises to her.


Every wound that pains or grieves me
by Thy stripes, Lord, is made whole.
When I'm faint Thy cross revives me,
granting new life to my soul.
Yea, Thy comfort renders sweet
every bitter cup I meet,
for Thine all-atoning passion
has procured my soul's salvation.   (TLH 144:3)

Anniversary

The doctor has been telling me all along, "You're still healing.  You have to give yourself a full year."

Okay.  It's been a year now.

Changes to learn to live with:
~ sciatica
~ need for an extra two hours of sleep per night
~ headaches when I overdo
~ a perpetual infection that needs to be kept to a minimum
~ introversion has been greatly magnified
~ walking slower 
~ easier to get rashes and sunburn
~ fuzzy-brainedness (that irritates Gary when I complain of it because he says I still have a better memory and thinking ability than most people ... which doesn't make it any easier for me to adjust to)

BUT ...
I'm talking, driving, going to work, and able to do pretty much whatever I did before (except that I must do So Much Less of it.)