Mollie and I just returned from my mom's birthday lunch at "The Little Tea House" in old West Palm. I thought I'd share a photo of four generations of our family celebrating her 60th birthday over tea and treats.
We had a wonderful time enjoying a delicious lunch of curried chicken, tuna salad, spinach quiche, and pear & gorgonzola salad with raspberry vinaigrette. After inhaling our first course they brought in an out-of-this-world dessert for the birthday girl: a beautifully scrumptious chocolate cake! Besides the cake, Penny and I reveled in the best homemade scones we've ever had. We smothered them with devonshire cream & berries and poured ourselves a piping hot cup of Earl Grey tea. Yummm! Now I'm ready for a nap!
Today is my mother's 60th birthday! As you can see by the recent photo, she doesn't look it one bit! I'm hoping to have inherited her genes:)
What a joy it is to be able to honor the woman who, in a sense, holds the world together for the rest of us. She's a shining example of a devoted wife, mother, grandmother, sister, servant, friend and confidant. We are each blessed for the love she's poured in to all she's done for us over the past 42 years she's been married to my dad. We don't say it often enough.....thank's, mom, for committing yourself to loving this crazy bunch of kin you inherited by no choice of your own!
So, this afternoon the girls in the family are taking her to a special lunch (I can't say where, as that's a surprise to her!) to celebrate this landmark and then tomorrow night we'll enjoy a birthday dinner at our house. Simple is the way she likes it, and simple we'll keep it!
Despite the fact that we'll be using credit cards for most of our travels expenses, we were told that a good amount of cash would be necessary during our stay in Russia. In order to get a decent rate of exchange the bills need to be in almost perfect condition. Last Thursday I went to our local bank and ordered $1000 in unmarked bills. As I understood it, this can take up to a couple of weeks for the bank to attain. They called me on Monday and all the money is in! Didn't expect that! So I'll be making a trip to National City to pick up our currency this week. Where would you hide that kind of cash for a couple of weeks? Under the mattress (like my grandmother), in a cookie jar, behind a book???
Dave and I have never traveled internationally. That said, since Chris and Penny received their court date last Tuesday, it's been a whirlwind! Their agency has been kind enough to allow us to tag along with "mom & dad" in the process of making travel arrangements, i.e. providing contacts for travel, visas, etc. What an ordeal!! For those of you who know me well, you'll remember that I get knots in my stomach just ordering pizza, so this is WAY outside of my zone of comfort! That's where Dave comes in. He has been AMAZING!! Definitely proving himself, once again, to be my Knight in Shining Armor:) We've used his technologically awe-inducing iPhone to handle phone calls via speaker phone, itinerary's and much more. It's a wonderful age we live in!
So here's where we stand so far. The first leg of the trip will take us from Miami to Moscow through Atlanta. Once in Moscow we will catch a flight to St. Petersburg and have two full days to enjoy the sights & history of that city (as well as adjust to the 9 hour time change!). We will then head back to Moscow where our connecting flight to Krasnoyarsk will be waiting for us.
Once we arrive in Kras, we will meet up with my brother & Penny who will have already have been in the former Soviet Union for over two weeks. We will spend two nights in Kras, with a great possibility of witnessing firsthand "Gotcha Day" for the Goeppner family! How cool is that???
Once the boys are safely in the care of their "forever mom and dad" it's only a day or two before heading back to Moscow. We will spend a week with them in the capital city before returning to the states and reuniting with our family.
We still have a lot to do to prepare. There's the will - making sure it's in order; finances, life insurance - ditto; the kids and their school work - I could go on and on, but you get the picture. The unknown is always a bit dismaying, but we have God directing our paths, so we're ready to kick back and watch Him do His thing!
I'm so proud of Mollie and Benjamin! They both received Grand Champion Ribbons for their 4-H Exhibits they entered a couple of weeks ago. Ben received GC for BOTH of his! Mollie entered just one exhibit and received GC for that! So when being judged on their own, they were given 1st place blue; when being judged with a group of others in their category they received 1st place amongst their competitors!! Well done - I am delighted for you!
Last night I was "on assignment" for a CF Royal Palm Worship Party...an 80's Roller Skating Party! It was great fun to see all the crazy get-ups and roller skate to 80's music. Very nostalgic! Dave was up for going with me, which made it even more fun. He and I went in "normal" clothes...no time for shopping at Good Will for acid washed jeans:)
Anyway, one of the band members had his Canon and graciously offered to email his photos of ME! Being the photographer most times, my face obviously stays on the wrong side of the lens for me to make it into any of the pictures! So here are a couple of the shots sent to me I thought I'd share with you! (snapping shots of everyone doing the "hokey-pokey" and a "normal" pose of me and my wonderful hubby!)
The retreat was a great success...thanks be to God! We had 100% attendance both days! The discussions were thought provoking, the bible study was transforming and the personal connections memorable! I'm so excited about the possibilities that lie ahead as we continue to meet monthly to fine tune our relationship with God and others. We discovered that we all have the power of influence and we need to decide how were going to used it for the kingdom. I'll be sure to keep you posted as we learn to have well-ordered lives and hearts that are effective in leading others toward a passionate relationship with Christ.
You haven't heard much from me this week as I've been consumed with preparing for a Women's Retreat I'm co-leading this weekend and have had little time to post. There's so much involved in preparing for something like this, from the outlines, notebooks & favors, to the food, decor and icebreakers. It's been great fun, though, and I've learned so much in the process.
Monday I worked on my opening devotional and inductive study guide. Today I will be wrapping up the conclusion and fine tuning it a bit. I'm happy with the way it's turned out and pray the ladies walk away with a few nuggets to help them in their spiritual journey with Christ.
Tuesday was spent reworking the Application Guide that goes along with our first book...."Becoming a Person of Influence". We will have a time Friday night for book discussion using the guide but we had to decide which questions and discussion topics to concentrate on and which ones to ditch, as we can only do what time allows.
Yesterday was a busy day on my end. I had to make all the copies for the notebooks....nine Application guides for our nine books, and a boatload of other materials that will help us along in this almost year long course: book lists, notebook covers, inductive study guide, contact list, retreat schedule, and outlines just to name a few. I finished putting the last notebook together at 11 p.m. last night.
I also had a lot of shopping to do. Notebooks, dividers as well as a number of giveaways, favors and items to make the presentation just perfect. It's all in the details, right??
Tomorrow will be filled with morning prayer for God's covering and then we will hit the floor running. We'll be turning the choir room into a homey, comfortable atmosphere where we can all relax and enjoy the next twelve hours. That will be a huge job all in itself! Then, the ladies will begin arriving around 6 p.m. and there's no turning back!
Below is the schedule we've prepared for our Retreat Weekend. I'll post pictures and the outcome on Sunday. Keep us in your prayers as we introduce these special ladies to God's role for them in leadership.
Friday Night 6:00 Registration • Receive Name tags • Pay Fee $30 • Receive Note Book
6:30 - Welcome/Prayer/Eat
7:10 – 7:35 Friday Night Opener/ Housekeeping/giveaways
7:35 – 8:05 Bethany – • Devotional and Explanation of “Tool Time” • Explanation of Notebook
8:05 – 8:15 Break - Coffee & Dessert served
8:15 – 9:00 Book Review • Bring bible, book and folder to “living room”
9:00 – 9:20 Game/prizes
9:20 – 10:00 Testimonies of Salvation Experience (3 minutes each) Receive Information for tomorrow.
Saturday 8:15 – 8:45 Church Open & available for your quiet time.
Today we had General Exhibit Judging for our local 4-H chapter. Our club, The Eagles, is studying Florida History which allowed us to have a lot of freedom in our exhibit choices. Benjamin decided to do a 3-D rendering of Castillo De San Marcos. It is actually the oldest fort in the US, located in St. Augustine Florida. He did a great job, with a little help from dad, and ended up with a blue ribbon.
Mollie and Benjamin both submitted an Earth Weaving project we did at one of our meetings. It's basically a wall hanging made with weaved twine and natural elements we found in our backyard. After questioning by the judges, they both ended up with blue ribbons for those as well.
I'm so proud of both of them! Their projects will be on display in the 4-H pavilion at the South Florida Fair where they will be judged against other exhibits in their same category. They have the potential to receive ribbons for that, too. I'm sure I won't be able to help myself and will just have to do a post on the outcome at the Fair...stay tuned for more!
According to recent news headlines in Europe... "Two patients were seen at a Berlin hospital with perplexing symptoms -- chronic diarrhea and other bowel problems, and substantial unexplained weight loss (about 20% of normal body weight). Both patients had undergone extensive diagnostic tests without solving their problems. Then, an astute clinician asked about their usual dietary intake and discovered that the sufferers typically chewed from sixteen to twenty sticks of sorbitol-sweetened gum per day."
I'd say there are probably a lot of very excited people out there cleaning off the shelves at their local grocery store right about now! What do you say?
President Bush is in Israel now, attempting to move forward peace talks with the bickering Palestinian and Israeli leaders. It's amazing to me that we're hearing very little of this in the media, as the President has made some very bold statements including the following...
"President Abbas and Prime Minister [Ehud] Olmert have to come together and make tough choices...And I believe it possible - not only possible, I believe it's going to happen - that there will be a signed peace treaty by the time I leave office" in a year's time."
WOW! It will be interesting to see if his gut proves him right! I will certainly be following BBC on this one...
In an article back in November, BBC did a story on the history of the middle east peace plans beginning in 1967 with the Security Council Resolution 242. In my lifetime there have been ten main proposals and, I'm quite sure, not a few back room talks unannounced to the rest of the world. We're at it again and can now add one more to this list:
Camp David, 1978 Madrid Conference 1991 Israeli-Syrian talks Oslo Agreement, 1993 Camp David, 2000 Taba, 2001 Saudi plan, 2002 Road Map, 2003 Geneva Accord, 2003
On New Years Eve we rediscovered a fun game from the past...Boggle. Since then I've been playing it often with the kids and have found it's a great brain exercise. It sharpens their critical thinking and sparks creativity & memory skills. And on top of that it's FUN! No rolling of the eyes or begging for mercy when I pull out the box...they actually WANT to play! Give it a whirl and see for yourself - it's great for all ages, too!
Saw this ad the other night during the news and it gave me chills! Rudy's not my first choice vote, but if he keeps these kinds of promo's coming, he just may tap in to the American spirit enough to win the election. What do you think?
You'll notice I changed my links around so they're easier to identify and I've also added a couple of new ones. One in particular I'd like you to make note of is under Ministries - Calvary PSL Women.
My PSL friend, Stacy, is married to the brilliant and wonderful Mike who happens to be the pastor of their church, Calvary Chapel Port St. Lucie. The women's group at CCPSL is exploding and Stacy has decided to add the world wide web to their m.o. in reaching out to and connecting with these ladies. I'm very excited about the new blog they've launched and have decided to jump in on the fun a bit!
They are currently going through the Chronological Bible in a year. The blog is a terrific way to keep the women motivated and give them tools for further study. It' s a great format for discussion, questions and staying connected. I hope you join me as I join these ladies in committing to read through the Bible this New Year!
The jukebox is back by popular demand. I've downloaded a whole new set of songs that will play randomly. There are christian as well as secular artists on the playlist. If you scroll down to the bottom of the blog you can turn it off if you'd prefer silence while you read, or you can pick a song of preference. Anyway, I hope you enjoy it!
I thought I'd start the New Year off with a new look for my blog and a few quotes for a chuckle. Enjoy!
Youth is when you're allowed to stay up late on New Year's Eve. Middle age is when you're forced to. ~Bill Vaughn
People are so worried about what they eat between Christmas and the New Year, but they really should be worried about what they eat between the New Year and Christmas. ~Author Unknown
Never tell your resolution beforehand, or it's twice as onerous a duty. ~John Selden
New Year's Resolution: To tolerate fools more gladly, provided this does not encourage them to take up more of my time. James Agate
A New Year's resolution is something that goes in one year and out the other. ~Author Unknown
Location: Royal Palm Beach, Florida, United States
I've enjoyed documenting life stories and events through the lens of my camera for a few years now, deciding to take my hobby to the world of blogging. I'm no professional, just a mom with her own take on things who loves to share her perspective with others. I hope this photographic journal inspires you!
