"May you live to enjoy your grandchildren." PSALM 128.6 So thankful to be alive to know and love and be full of JOY with my grandkids!
Friday: Trumpets! Cymbals! Drumroll ...
Ruthanne and Terry closed the deal and are moving to Leisure Village, 1/2 mile from me in the north part of the park!!!! They came back to Grand Rapids today to give the owner the downpayment. Terry's brother, Ken, came along too--to further inspect the place. It's amazing to think of them moving here to Grand Rapids. What a blessing.
Thursday: I messaged Jesse today and asked if I should pick Kaity up ... or not. She has been a tiny bit difficult lately ... well ... not difficult; just NOT interested in doing anything once she is here. Almost like she would rather be somewhere else. I don't want to assume Kaity wants to come over just because I am her grandma (how uppity would that be?). Jesse told me that he really needed me to take Kaity this afternoon because he wasn't feeling well. Interestingly, he is getting closer to a diagnosis and possible treatment (which is encouraging) ... but that's for another post ... another day.
I prayed and asked the Lord to help me accommodate Kaity today in whatever way was reasonable. She came over and mostly stayed on her phone--but she wasn't snarky one bit. She was softer and kinder today than she was last week. I don't think my grandkids realize that I have feelings ... and sometimes my heart hurts when they are so cold and distant ... or sarcastic ... or unkind. Anyway--I'm a big girl and shouldn't be self-focused anyway!
Wednesday: A few weeks ago (a VERY few), Ruthanne and Terry put an unusual and frankly totally unexpected question to me. Would I mind very much if they moved to Grand Rapids ... if they looked for a house at Leisure Village?
WHAT?!?!?!
You could have knocked me over with a very light breeze. Seriously?
This was Ruthanne's idea evidently. The last time they were in Grand Rapids (quite recently), Ruthanne had gone into my bedroom to use my "master bath" (which is tiny but nice) and remarked about how nice my little house is ... how adequate ... how cozy ... how much storage I had, etc. I agreed with her and didn't think anything more about our conversation.
But then ... she called one afternoon and asked me the above question. And Terry too was inquiring. They asked a bunch of questions about this place and asked if I could look and see if there were any homes available.
Then Christmas happened. Ruthanne and Terry flew down to Georgia to be with Shari and Mark and kiddos and were gone for a week. In their absence, I did talk with the office manager here at the park and just asked about availability, etc. She said there wasn't really anything available ... except for one double-wide--but then she said she thought the owner was "asking too much" for it and we both blew it off.
However, I talked to Ruthanne and Terry a day or too later and casually mentioned that home to them. They asked me to find out more information--which I did. And then they flew home to Detroit and today they drove up to take a look at the house that is for sale--through the park management.
The house was a total DUD. We hated it. Definitely a smoker's house--it wreaked of smoke. We were given a "tour" by our park manager (in charge of the sale) and we were polite and took our time with her but basically declined pursuing anything further with that particular house.
We decided to just take a little drive through the park and have a look around. I thought it would be fun to just show them the rest of the area--because there is a south side of the park (where I live) and a north side too. We drove up and down the streets, casually commenting about which houses were pretty and which ones were junky ... and suddenly Ruthanne said: "That one's for sale!" And she was right! The "For Sale" sign had phone numbers, which Terry called and the owner agreed to meet us in one hour to show us inside the house. This house was being sold by owner, not through the park sales.
Meanwhile, we looked it over on the outside and discovered the house was completely empty ... and a much nicer house than what we had just looked at. We could see in the windows on the front of the house and liked the openness of the layout--the kitchen looked super nice, and it flowed right into the main room.
Here's a picture of the outside!
Tuesday: It's two days after Christmas and school is still OUT for Christmas break. SO ... I picked up FOUR children today and drove them back to my place. Here are just a few pictures of our time together.
Brendan went into my finger puppet bin and retrieved Lambchop to put on top of my little railroad Christmas tree. He thought it would be funny to see him spin around with Santa and the reindeer--and it DID crack everyone up!
Super thankful for these grandkids. I am a very blessed grandma.
Sunday: Our Christmas Day worship service was cancelled because of slippery, snowy roads ... so disappointing. Pastor Jim and a few of the worship team put together a 30-minute Christmas devotional on Youtube--which I watched and I'm glad I did. It was a blessing!
I went over to Dylan and Kelly's by about 11am. I had such a nice few hours with them and their little ones. I tried to get a picture of all four kiddos in front of their giant Christmas tree ...
Thank you, Lord, for leaving heaven to come to earth for us. Thank you for Your faithful love. Thank you for knowing us and loving us in spite of who we are or what we have done. Please come back soon, Lord.
Christmas Eve: Here is the card I designed this year to give to neighbors, friends and family.
Front:
Christmas Eve: Last weekend, Chris and Ella, Matthew, and Kaity came over and opened Christmas presents. The boys just had $$ gifts, which is NO FUN at all ... but I had a few gifts Kaity opened. I told Emma that we would do her gifts this weekend. She suggested that we do it tonight--so we did.
MERRY CHRISTMAS, dear Emma. You mean the world to me, granddaughter. How I wish I could make every dream of yours come true. Ah ... that would be foolish of me! I thank the Lord that He has you; and that if you are willing, He will make something truly beautiful of your heart and life. He is the only One who can do that for us! Probably half of our dreams are not what He would want for us anyway! His ways are perfect. His love for us is completely undeserved ... and eternally unending.
