I called home this morning to tell my parents about the 4″ of snow we’d gotten and my dad told me that Uncle Tom had died a few hours earlier. He’d been sick for a while though the doctors had given him another 5 years or so…
Here’s a picture of him at my wedding with Jon and I:
Jen: one of my parishioners has offered to go with me to get my ears re-punched and double pierced if/when i decide to do it
Jen: apparently, i can do it in town
Mom: hmmm Lutheran Goth — not incompatible.
Jon and I are headed to Seattle in mid-November to see family. My mom just informed me that she and my dad, my brother, and his girlfriend are going to fly up for two days while we’re there so that we can have an early Thanksgiving.
I am shedding tears of joy right now…
San Jose Mercury News: Bomb plot figure dies in prison
This guy tried to blow up my brother’s community college three years ago. I hate to say that I’m really having a hard time feeling bad about him hanging himself…
Jon’s grandmother passed away at 2:00 this morning. Keep Jon and his family in prayer, especially since his dad and aunt are both pastors and have to drop everything to deal with this. (This of course would have to happen during Confirmation weekend for them.) It was sad but it’s been coming for awhile. We’re not flying to LA for the funeral because it’s just going to be a simple graveside service and we also saw her two weeks ago and said our good-byes then.
Oh yeah… Ronald Reagan also died today.
My parents “took delivery” on the two kittens around Easter and they finally (!!!!!!) sent me back some pictures.
The young princes napping on the afghan I made Mom for Mother’s Day. Homer is the gray cat and Jethro is the tiger.
The young princes stalking a Lunardi’s bag.
Confirmation at one of Jon’s parishes was yesterday and the service went well. We did have one kid almost faint but we got him off his feet before he fell. The kids read their faith statements and did a great job. The two most touching ones were the ones from two of my kids who have learning disabilities. The music was wonderful despite not having enough communion hymns to cover the communing of 150 people. (Our communion system works well for 60 and acceptably for 100. 150, however, is 45 minutes of sitting. Our sanctuary couldn’t even accomodate that many.) I also had to go get more wine and one of the fathers had to go and get more cups with me. Afterward, we had a lunch for the kids and then we went to the open houses for three of them. I’m not planning on eating again until probably Thursday — I am still completely stuffed because I had to eat at all three places (though not too much) to be polite. We slept until noon today — we were just so exhausted.
The other church’s Palm Sunday service was wonderful. We sang All Glory, Laud, and Honor (which I love and unfortunately only gets sung once a year) and the kids processed around with palms. We had just enough wine consecrated for communion and I could see our deacon mumbling a prayer about that. Jon’s sermon was excellent and featured some Hebrew — something that made the interim pastor (who was worshipping with us because he was also going to be at the confirmation service and thought he should make appearances at both churches in the parish) joke that Jon was trying to upstage him. 🙂