Robert Hugh Jones....see you soon...

Rob's grandfather, Robert Hugh Jones passed away on Saturday evening. He was 89. Rob had flown to the US to be with his parents, and other family members to celebrate his grandfathers' 90th birthday which would have been on October 21st. Instead, the family spent the weekend over Canadian Thanksgiving / Columbus Day weekend sharing memories of this wonderful man and supporting each other in grief.

Pappy, as we called him, was in failing health. In the last month he had experienced many physical set backs and was in the hospital when he passed away.

He was a kind and gentle soul. He loved his family. His passions in life were good food, lots of cards [he'd play just about anything] and his friends and family.

When he first met me he took me out to his garden and tested me on what the various growing plants were. He told me if I didn't pass the test, I couldn't marry Rob. Lucky for me I recognized many of them and Rob subtly helped with the less obvious ones. :0)

Pappy was a kind man. He welcomed me into their family right away with kindness and gentleness. We spent time over many Christmases playing cards, eating great food, laughing and just sharing time together.

Pappy loved my children and when we were together gave them attention and encouragement. Jonah loved to sit and play 'Pitch' with his great-grandfather. He has very fond memories of those card games. Lauren has been very tearful over the last few days. I have sat with her and allowed her to express her memories and feelings about losing her great-grandfather. She has said things like,"He was so nice", "He really loved us", "We had fun together". I'm so glad that she has these wonderful warm memories. I'm glad that I have them too.

So, I just want to take this opportunity to say...See you soon Robert Hugh Jones. I'm glad that you are reunited with your wonderful wife and your grandson who passed away too soon. I'm glad that you are with your Lord and saviour. I am sad to have lost you in this life, but am thrilled to know that this is not goodbye. It is 'see you soon' because I believe I will see you again in that eternal place where there is no pain or sorrow and there are no goodbyes...ever. Thanks for your love, encouragement, enthusiastic smile, and for all of the hours of card playing we shared. Thanks for welcoming me into your family and for how you have loved and encouraged my children. You were one of a kind and my life is better for having known you.

With much love and hope for the future,
Your grand-daughter in-law,
Andrea

Church is AWESOME!!!

Last night we started our 3rd service per Sunday at CrossRoads church here in Red Deer. We're doing the same service 3 times each Sunday in the hopes of appealing to people who like to attend church at different times in the day.

So, the kids and I attended service last night at 6:30 pm. It was a great family service. After the service, there was a pancake supper served by church volunteers. They had all kinds of different toppings. It was wonderful to sit with people and fellowship over food after our time of worship.

This morning, Spencer and her father had a conversation on the way to the sitter's house. According to Rob, it went something like this....

Spencer: "Dad, last night I go to church and it was AWESOME!"

Rob: "Really Spencer?"

Spencer: "Yep, they had pancakes at church and I had some and they were AWESOME!"

Rob: "They were Spencer? That's great!"

Spencer : "Yep. Mine had whip cream and that was AWESOME!"

Spencer: "Mine had stawberries and they were AWESOME!"

Spencer: "And mine had syrup and that was AWESOME!"

Spencer: "And mine even had Gummi bears and that was AWESOME!"

Spencer: "Yep church and pancakes are REALLY AWESOME!"

Spencer obviously has discovered the word 'awesome' in the last week. But even more special for us was how much she enjoyed this event in which we got to eat nice food and spend time with people who love Jesus. Spencer is right....it was AWESOME!!!!

This week....bad news all around

I realize that I am not the only one that this happens to, but this week it seems that as each day went by, Rob and I were confronted with bad news. Early in the week my mother called and said that my grandfather had fallen in the nursing home and apparently had suffered a stroke [we were told that this was likely the cause of his fall]. He had left sided paralysis.

A few days later I got an e-mail from a friend going through a very dark time on a number of fronts. And still later in the week we got a call from another friend who has a tumor on their Thyroid gland and water on their brain. They are not sure if they are dealing with cancer at this point or not.

Then I got a call from my mother late yesterday to say that my grandfather had been taken by ambulance from the nursing home to the hospital. He was then transferred to a larger city likely for brain surgery. Apparently, he hadn't suffered a stroke but instead had fallen, hit his head and his brain had bled due to the head trauma!!! So today, my 87 year old grandfather, who is already suffering from Dementia, underwent brain surgery to remove the blood that had accumulated in his brain after his fall. Following the surgery, all of the paralysis has resolved and this has made my 89 year old grandmother jump for joy to say the least.

We are all breathing a sigh of relief as this could have had a much more negative outcome.

It is in times like these, that I am so glad that I have a loving saviour that I can lean on. I spent the day today, praying. Praying for my grandfather, my grandmother, and the surgeon as he performed neurosurgery in a city that is mostly without power due to Hurricane Earl hitting the Canadian province of Nova Scotia.

I felt peace today, despite the bad news of the week as I know that no matter what is on the horizon God knows the circumstances and is with me no matter what. No matter what!! The circumstances may look bleak. They may actually be bleak. But that doesn't change His love for me or His desire for my good.

Thank you Jesus for the peace that you give to us. Peace that passes all understanding!!

"See ya later Dad!!"

Well, it's time again for a Seth story. For those of you who read this blog, you have gotten to read a lot of "Seth stories". These are stories that detail the exploits of our Autistic son Seth. He has a zest for life that is unrivaled!

Yesterday I was at an all day meeting. My wonderful husband was with the kids for the day. Jonah had a dentist appointment for a cleaning so Rob pondered what to do with Seth and Lauren for the 75 minutes Jonah would be in the dentist's office because there is NO way that Seth would sit for that time.

Rob decided to take them to Bower Ponds. For those of you not from Red Deer, Bower Ponds is a wonderful park area in our city with walking trails, paddle boats, a children's park etc. While walking through the park, they saw a young man that Rob knows from church working in the paddle boat area. He waved Rob over and told him that he would let Rob and the kids use a paddle boat for no charge. So, into the paddle boat the 3 of them climb.

They started to paddle around the pond areas and all of a sudden Seth stands up in the boat. Knowing our sons' love of water, Rob quickly grabs him by the shirt and says, "Seth sit down." Seth then turns to his father and says, "See ya later Dad!" and jumps out of the boat and into the water!!!! Now, if you live in Arizona this is likely a refreshing thing to do. In Red Deer yesterday, the high was 15 C and at night it is getting down to around 4 C, so the water was quite cool yesterday morning to say the least.

According to Rob, as Seth hit the water his eyes became the size of dish plates and he yelled, "Help me Father, Help me!! Rob paddled the boat back to him and hauled him back into the paddle boat and they quickly returned to dry land. Seth had to strip off in the parking lot and wear Rob's coat home to ensure he stayed warm and dry.

As you can see even little excursions with Seth become very interesting and adventurous!!

I lost my magic

I can't believe how fast the time goes. The weeks since Rob returned home have flown by. Rob got home, was home for 24 hours, then went to a 2 day conference in Calgary and within the first 24 hours he was home from that his parents arrived from Toronto.

We had Rob's parents here last week from Saturday to Thursday and then this week on Monday I started back at the College!!

WHEW!!! No wonder I feel tired a lot of the time. :-) Anyways, I've missed writing so I am going to write today.

Seth has been having some trouble with sleeping. He has not been settling to sleep easily. This is nothing new for Seth. He has been this way since birth and we have always gone through times when his sleeping was very little indeed.

But this time is a little different. It's different because of what Seth is communicating at bed time. He gets into bed and then gets up in tears and tells me, "Mom, I can't sleep because I've lost my magic." What does that mean???? I have no idea. I try to ask him questions about it, but he doesn't seem to have the words to tell me anything more. Rob goes in and talks to him, but he has no ideas either. In the morning, he has "found the magic again" which I guess is good, but gives me nothing else to go on. He has also told me that he keeps the magic in his hand. So, I can never quite understand how it gets lost in the first place.

So if anyone knows how to find Seth's magic at around 8 pm Mountain time, I'd sure appreciate the help. :0)

Coping

This is going to be very sappy I guess, but I just have to get off my chest how much I am missing my husband. For those of you that don't know, Rob is on a missions trip with some of his young adults handing out Bibles in Greece. He is in the middle of a 14 day trip. For those of you who follow me on Facebook, you know that this will be the longest we have not had contact with each other in 17 years!!

It's hard to go for 14 days without speaking to the person who is your best friend and really helps you do life. I realize that many marriages are not like that, but ours really is. Even after all this time, I look to him for feedback on so many things. I can always count on him to be honest with me and tell me when I need to make changes. He's also the first one to tell me when I've done a great job at something. His opinion means the world to me.

Also, I have to say that I have a new appreciation of the hard work that is involved in single parenting. Kudos to any of you are doing that or have done that in the past. I realize that many single parents don't have 4 kids and included in that a child with special needs and a child that is not yet 3 years old, but regardless of the circumstances, being the sole parent in ANY situation I think is daunting. It's hard being the one that makes all of the decisions, deals with all of the conflicts, and has to be everything to all people. I didn't realize how much I rely on Rob to come home at night and just be a sounding board about various situations that have come up with the children.

So, I had to come up with some coping mechanisms to get through these two weeks. It's likely wimpy but here's what I did. I developed some new 'while Dad is in Greece' rules.
1) Anyone who argues with the Mom goes to their room for 2 hours.
2)The children are being given 2 warnings to stop any fighting between them. If they cannot come up with a compromise / resolution in 2 warnings, they each go to their respective rooms for 2 hours.
These rules are absolute and unwavering. They do not change because of someone's opinion, feelings, etc. Life has been going well since the implementation of the new rules.

I also have been writing e-mails to Rob. He won't get them until he comes home and quite frankly, they aren't for him...they're for me. They're my way to get my thoughts and feelings out so that I can process my day and move on. They are serving their purpose. I write to Rob and I feel so much better. I can often hear what he would say back to me. I'm sure when he gets home, he'll make fun of me for sending him all of these messages, but as I said, they aren't for him...they're helping me get through this time alone.

So, I'm a little lonely, I'm tired and a little cranky at times, but this is time of real growth for me. I am spending this time with my kids and enjoying being in their lives all day every day for 2 whole weeks. I don't have a lot of time left to do that. I'm spending concentrated time praying for my husband and our young adults on this trip and trusting that God is using them to tell people about Jesus. And I'm waiting. Waiting 7 more days to see this face again......OPA!!

Hop...Hop...Hop...

We're getting a bunny. Today. I know...I have a lot on my plate and what am I thinking. He's coming from a breeder here in Alberta and he likes to be be petted and held as do both of his parents. He is a pure bred Netherland Dwarf rabbit. That means that he will be no bigger than 2 lbs when he is full grown. I thought that would be good as he will always look like a baby bunny. I am intending to bring him to visit Seth's class in the Fall. He is 8 weeks old and the kids are over the moon excited. Now the compromise begins on what to name this cute little creature. I'll post some new pictures over the weekend of the kids with the bunny.


This picture was taken from the web site of the bunny breeder....Happy Days Rabbitry in Grande Prairie Alberta Canada. Her web site is www.happydaysrabbitry.webs.com