Happy 2008!

Welcome to the New Year! TWO THOUSAND EIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!! WOA!

Just a few things I thought about tonight...

Jason will be permitted to drive a car in the year 2015.
Sarah in the year 2021.

Jason will graduate in 2018.
Sarah will graduate in 2024.

Jason will be of age to be married in the year 2024. (if he graduates college first!)
Sarah in the year............who are we kidding..........never.
Okay, just kidding...we'll let her marry..........someday. Maybe.
But no way am I putting an acceptable year in print! She'd hold me to it someday!

As if all of that's not quite scary enough....
Our grandkids will most likely be born between 2025 and 2040.
IN THAT CASE, they are going to think we are WAY old because we'll have to say...

"When I was born in 1972 or 1975....." Which will mean to them :
"WOA...you were born in the nineteen-hundreds?"
"Man, you really are old!"
hahahaha

Todd and I will celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary in the year 2047!!!!!!!!!

Okay, so I hope I'm not the only one who looks at those year numbers and thinks....WOA...........is that possible? I mean, that looks REALLY wierd. I know 2000 looked wierd to us when it came, but I don't know what 2047 will look like!
By then, Apple will have invented some of the following...

iEat....A device that plugs into a USB port in your abdomen that in less than 3 seconds gives you an entire day's supply of nourishment and nutients ALONG with a variety of songs tailored to your daily routine.

iExercise...A machine which you can step inside of like a hampster and be completely tone and buff in a matter of minutes by attaching electrodes to specific power points on your body thus stimulating muscular movements and excercising your body without ever going to a gymnasium!

AND WITH ANY LUCK AT ALL.....And this is the one I hope for the most...

iLaunder...A hamper the size of a kleenex box that traps all the dirty clothes you can imagine and shrinks them to the size of a popcorn kernel, automatically detects the setting and temperature in which they should be laundered, sends those that must be dry cleaned through a teleport to the nearest iCleaners of your choice, after which within minutes recieves them back, folded, pressed and then pops them out into the ready and willing hands of your iDoItAll Robotic Maid (mine's going to be named Rosy!" and she will put them all away for you. Without complaining or claiming that there aren't any more clothes hangers.

Ahhh..........yes............the joys of hoping! I actually don't hope for any of these things. I hope only for love and peace and happiness. (Okay, maybe I still hope for the iLaunder.........and the robotic maid).....you all know me too well to believe I wouldn't hope for that!

At any rate, I hope you all have a great New Year and can look forward with anticipation to the years that lie ahead and do something in this new year that will help you prepare yourself for all the ones to come.

Love and Peace to you all!

Sharon

Christmas 2007

Well, Christmas has come and gone....again. Whew, how time flies! The kids got a lot of fun toys, we spent a lot of time together as a family and had a great visit with a lot of our family members and spoke to the ones we couldn't be with over the telephone.

We were thankful to have such a sweet Christmas this year. Our children had a blast and enjoyed every minute of it. Even the car ride to and from Lufkin was pleasurable this time! We may be making progress! I hope.

Todd got me a new iPod Nano for Christmas so I have been spending lots of time downloading my favorite music and photos! I haven't gotten to the "video" part of it just yet.......I'm good with music & pics, though!

We went to Lufkin for a few days before Christmas to spend time with Todd's family and to visit my Dad & Carol as well! We got to go to my Dad's church and listen to him play piano which I loved and then to their house for visiting which was a real treat. At Todd's parents we had the traditional Christmas feast on Christmas Eve before packing up and heading home. Christmas Eve night, Todd grilled steaks for us! They were so beautiful that I took a picture of them! See below!

On Christmas day, the kids woke up around 7:30 which is LATE for Christmas day! We enjoyed watching them see their presents from Santa and then opening gifts from us. They had so much fun. Then, Todd & Jason watched movies while I started preparing a Christmas dinner for us and my Grandparents! They came over for dinner. It was great! I made a HUGE turkey, dressing, sweet potatoes, green bean casserole and my very first Pecan Pie! (which, I also took a picture of!) Sarah & I got matching aprons for Christmas and wore them. She loves to "help" me cook. She's only mixing water and flour, but look how happy it makes her!

We probably had one of the best Christmases EVER this year. We got to spend a lot of quality time with those we love. I did wish we could have seen some more of those who weren't here, but there's always next year! I missed my sisters and brothers, my mom and some of my closest friends during the holidays, but they were with me in my thoughts.

I hope each and every one of you had a great Christmas and I hope your New Year is great as well! Love and peace to all!

Love, Sharon

Is there a Santa Claus?

Well, it's that time of year that the age old question dances around in little ones' heads........."is there a Santa Claus?" My eight year old is surely questioning this thought in his mind even if he wouldn't admit it.........if you don't believe, you don't recieve! SO, our pastor sent me a link to this editorial from September 21, 1897 regarding this question. I think this is such a great editorial! I personally know that the spirit of Santa is alive today; in every mother who asks for help in getting gifts for her children because she cannot work, for every father who works overtime this time of year to provide special treats for his family on Christmas morning, for every family that takes joy in giving of their time and gifts to others who are not as fortunate........this story is for you! Merry Christmas!

Eight-year-old Virginia O'Hanlon wrote a letter to the editor of New York's Sun, and the quick response was printed as an unsigned editorial Sept. 21, 1897. The work of veteran newsman Francis Pharcellus Church has since become history's most reprinted newspaper editorial, appearing in part or whole in dozens of languages in books, movies, and other editorials, and on posters and stamps.


"DEAR EDITOR: I am 8 years old.
"Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus.
"Papa says, 'If you see it in THE SUN it's so.'
"Please tell me the truth; is there a Santa Claus?

"VIRGINIA O'HANLON.
"115 WEST NINETY-FIFTH STREET."

VIRGINIA, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except [what] they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect, as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, VIRGINIA, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus. It would be as dreary as if there were no VIRGINIAS. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence. We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The eternal light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies! You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if they did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.

You may tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived, could tear apart. Only faith, fancy, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, VIRGINIA, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.

No Santa Claus! Thank God! he lives, and he lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay, ten times ten thousand years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.