Out With the Old Year

2007 is almost one for the history books, and I for one am glad. In general, '07 was not all that great for us, and my family and I are looking forward to a better 2008.

There were some good times though. The one high point that leaps to mind was the visit of my daughter, son-in-law, and granddaughter from California, for Thanksgiving.

Another fun time was had at a get-together at my friend Tim's place out in the country. And since I'm tired of snow and snow pictures, I'll post a few photos from last fall's "brush burn", as a quick farewell to the old year.

Out in the country...

As more people arrived, this table was filled to overflowing with food.

Ignition!

Thanks again to Tim and his family and friends, for a fun time of great food and fellowship.

I'll leave for now with my wish for a happy, healthy, and prosperous New Year for all of you.

See you in 2008!

Christmas 2007

This is belated, but I hope all the readers of The Porch had a good Christmas. Ours was good, we sang a lot of carols both at the Christmas Eve candlelight service, and at the Christmas morning service.

Then, home to open presents, and help ourselves to our Christmas "buffet". Simple stuff really, we build whatever sandwich we want from choices of turkey, ham, cheese, lettuce...then add selections from a veggie tray, snacks, etc. That way, no one has to prepare a big dinner; that's been our tradition for a few years now. New this year...our second daughter requested potato salad. So my wife made some, and it was very good. That tradition may have to happen again next year.

In the evening, we went over to my mom and stepdad's, and exchanged presents there. Everyone was thankful for a good day, and happy with what they got (a few items of clothing have since been exchanged for different sizes for a better fit).

My favorite present? Thanks for asking! Our daughter in California gave me a really nice scrapbook of photos of our granddaughter's first year. That's as good a gift as I could wish for.

All in all, a satisfying time of enjoying the decorations, being with family, and most importantly, remembering the birth of Christ our savior.

Last Sunday in Advent

Christmas is almost upon us, and happily, I've gotten all my shopping done. We should be able to enjoy the next couple of days and relax a bit.

We went to Church today, my son ushered, and the sermon was good. We sang one of my favorite hymns, Oh, come, Oh come, Emmanuel.

As it happens, I don't have anything particularly profound to add to this post, so I'll share the words of that hymn.

Oh, come, Oh, come, Emmanuel, And ransom captive Israel
That mourns in lonely exile here Until the Son of God appear.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Thou Rod of Jesse, free Thine own from Satan’s tyranny;
From depths of hell Thy people save And give them vict’ry o’er the grave.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Thou Day-spring from on high, And cheer us by Thy drawing nigh;
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night And death’s dark shadows put to flight.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Thou Key of David, come And open wide our heav’n-ly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high And close the path to misery.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Oh, come, Thou Lord of Might, Who to Thy tribes on Sinai’s height
In ancient times didst give the law, In cloud, and majesty, and awe.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Thou Wisdom from on high, Who orderest all things mightily;
To us the path of knowledge show, and teach us in her ways to go.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Oh, come, Desire of nations bind In one the hearts of all mankind;
Bid Thou our sad divisions cease, And be Thyself our King of Peace.

Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel Shall come to thee, O Israel.

Winter weather update

Since I last posted, the ice from the "ice storm" has melted off. Before it went away though, I managed to get a couple of nice pictures while the sun was out.

Ice covered trees in our backyard...

...and in part of our neighborhood.

Then Saturday, December 22nd - the aptly named first day of Winter, we started with rain, which changed to sleet for only a little while. Then from mid-afternoon through the evening, it snowed. The weather forecasters were saying we could have six inches or more, but it looks like we had only two or three inches accumulation. The folks in St. Joseph and on north had more, and I-29 to the Iowa border was closed for a while.

No trouble getting around here today, and we'll see how warm it gets tomorrow. I imagine we'll still have snow on the ground, at least in the shaded places, for a bit of a white Christmas.

Could have been worse

The ice storm turned out better than it could have been. Our electricity didn't go out, and we got maybe 1/4 of an inch of ice. I was able to get out around 10:30 and shovel an area of our driveway near the garage door, and put down some ice melt chemicals. While I was out, I heard a crack and watched a medium sized branch fall from our neighbors tree.

Later I went back outside with my camera, and noticed a few more small to medium sized branches had fallen from the same elm tree, landing on my side of the fence.

I like how the snow caused this exposure to darken the sky.

More pics:
If there's going to be an ice storm, I prefer it to be just enough to give a "winter wonderland" effect for a few photos, and stop short of major damage like we had in 1984 and 2004.

A view from a different porch...

Close-up...icicles on lights, not icicle lights.


Love these digital cameras.


I heard that parts of southwest Missouri had a bigger storm these last few days, and a lot more trouble with the ice. Mike, how are things at your place?

Wait, is it too late to choose more snow instead?

Here's a photo taken out my front door, just to prove we did indeed get over an inch of snow last Thursday evening.

Since then we've had one round of sleet on Sunday, and now tonight, the freezing rain has begun. We're in an ice storm warning for the rest of tonight and most, if not all, of Tuesday. I've heard from a couple of sources that we're forecast to get up to 1 inch of ice. Looks like there will be plenty of slick spots tomorrow, and driving and walking might be treacherous. I'll be surprised if many schools are open tomorrow.

Now, if I have to have winter weather, I'd much rather have a foot of snow. But it doesn't look we have much choice. There's been some mention that the temperatures could rise a bit tonight, and if it's even 30 degrees or above, the rain will mostly drip off the tree branches and power lines before freezing on the ground. If it stays in the 20's instead, we could have a major ice storm with trees down and power outages. I expect the utility companies will have a busy night and day tomorrow. I'll try to post an update tomorrow, assuming it's not all that bad and that IPL is able to keep the power flowing.

Look at the photo again, 'cause I have a story about the evergreen tree to the left of the house across the street. 44 years ago (give or take a year), I watched the neighbor man carry that tree out of the front door of that house, and plant it where you see it standing. The couple who lived there at the time had bought a live Christmas tree, with the roots in a ball of dirt. It has thrived and grown through the years.

Is that you, Don Knotts?

Just to reassure any readers who might be wondering, yes it does get, um, creative (silly) around our dinner table sometimes. A couple of recent cases in point...

A week ago or so, somehow we got on the subject of Australia. Ayers Rock eventually got mentioned, and our youngest daughter had read about it. Something was said about it being the biggest rock in the world. That reminded me of something I read in a book recently, so I asked, "Do you know what the biggest living thing is?"

My son answered, "That fungus". So he had heard about that. There's a hillside in Oregon which has this fungus growing on it. Apparently they tested the DNA at several places and it's all the same fungus...connected by tendrils or filaments underground. It covers acres and acres and according to science is thought to be at least 2,000 years old.

My son said "If it's that old, you think it would have learned to talk by now". I replied, "It's probably such a low frequency that we can't hear it".

He paused a bit, then seemingly out of the blue:

"Well, if we could hear it, it'd probably sound like Don Knotts."

Inspired, I tell you. Where did that come from?

Then tonight...

Somehow we got on the subject of how Hannibal crossed the Alps on elephants. How many elephants?

"Twenty-one", according to my youngest daughter. That sounds like a pretty good guess to me. Hannibal probably couldn't get his hands on all that many elephants at once, so maybe the rest of his army was on horseback or on foot. The discussion turned to elephants in general. Their big ears? A natural radiator, according to my wife.

I added that elephants can communicate over distances of miles, using sound frequencies too low for most people to hear. One group of elephants can hear the other group call, from way out of sight. My son picked up on that...

"Hey! Is that a K-Mart up there?"
"No, but we've got a Wal-Mart."

Heh. Much more of this, and we'll be ready for Fake Trivia Night.

And more thanks.

”My mom has been through and difficult year and more and we are thankful that this Thanksgiving, Thelma (that's the title the two parents gave her) is much stronger, alert and active than she was early last spring.”

Such good news to hear how much better your mom is recently. Thelma’s older sister – my mom – has had a rough go of it this past year too, but all things considered, she’s doing pretty good now.

Not to get too carried away with old news, but there’s a story in my family…

Apparently, our grandparents had some difficulty deciding on a name for your mom. They asked my mom, who was three or four at the time, what her little sister’s name should be. Mom replied in a soft voice, “Velma”, the name of her best friend at the time. Our grandparents thought she said Thelma…

So I’ve been told, anyway.

”We have two great kids and this summer added a son-in-law to the mix. We thank God for them all.I'm more in love with my bride than ever before and it's glorious!”

Mike, you have a truly neat family. Quality, that’s the word. Your wife is one of the kindest people I’ve met. You’ve all given me and my family great hospitality every time we’ve gotten together. Not to mention a great deal of fun.

”We go to a church where the pastor preaches the Sovereign God of Heaven, the beauty of His Word and the grace He imparts to His people.”

Outstanding. Grace really is the key to it all. Now, we Lutherans might phrase it a bit different, something along the lines of preaching law and gospel; the gospel of Christ the redeemer, centered on the cross and the empty tomb. (Interesting how I’m thinking of the passion season while we’re sitting here in the beginning of Advent.)

At our church we’re thankful this year for our new Director of Christian Education. He’s really gotten the youth involved – high school And college (!) - to the point where we’ve gone from four or five “die-hards” attending to where they’ve outgrown the old youth room, moved, and are about to fill their new quarters. Church kids bringing friends, outreach actually happening…we are blessed.

”Some of the folks from our church went with our family to distribute Thanksgiving meals to convenience store clerks who had to work on Thanksgiving. The stores are located near our church and I can say the employees were happy to get the food, but I am thankful for the happiness in my heart as a result of being a part of that effort.”

What a great idea!

We had a great thanksgiving. Our second daughter came home from Missouri State, then our first daughter, son-in-law, and cute, sweet, one year old granddaughter came from California to stay for a few days. On Thanksgiving day itself, we had both sets of parents over to our house. We all were thankful for and enjoyed great food.

The out of town kids stayed for most of the weekend. Board games were played, good conversations took place, and we got to hold our grandbaby.

Did I mention she’s sweet and cute?

Yes, we’re blessed more than we’re usually aware. And come to think of it, things did go pretty much according to plan.