Meetings, Friends and Night-time Stroll on the Beach

Every other year, our church regions have a mini-convention; this year our church hosted the event. It was a great weekend of teaching and seminars, renewing friendships, and sharing the joys and sorrows of working in our different churches. We are so thankful that we are part of this wonderful body of churches.

Of course, there was a bit of business to discuss as well...

..and friendships to renew.

We enjoyed having Dave and Crystal here for the weekend as our main speaker; he was our former pastor and dear friends.

Roy and Barb also joined us to present a financial seminar 

And we were able to enjoy many days together with Stan and Cheryl (not only family, but our own personal pastor and wife!).

Their last evening with us, we escaped to the beach for an evening stroll.

We arrived just as the sun was setting

Cousins enjoyed time together

The evening was cool, but it was so relaxing to just be near the water at the end of a very busy weekend.

Thanks, S&C for the fun evening at the beach!

The following weekend, the women's ministry board met at our house for a marathon day of planning for our early events for the women in our church. We usually spend an entire weekend for the planning, but this year we had a difficult time trying to find a weekend that we were all free, plus a place to meet. We were thankful for the amount of work that we accomplished, and praise God for the gifted and gracious women that work so hard on this team.

Cousins weekend

February and March were very busy months for us. We had visitors almost every weekend. (A friend told me that she was going to hang a "vacancy/no vacancy" sign in front of our house!).

We were so excited to share in hosting the "Sunwall girl cousins get-together" this year. Each year they gather together for about 5 days at one of the cousins' home. They have so much fun together, laughing and singing and eating and seeing the sights of the area they are visiting. (They even tried to re-create an old photo that they had found of their own mothers and their cousins. Crazy girls!) This year's event was hosted by Penny. But since Jim's sister is one of the cousins, we were privileged to share time with hosting.

The seven girls represented six families this year. 

Jim and his cousins (and sister!)

A visit to California had to include an afternoon at the beach...

...so we headed to our favorite spot--Laguna Beach.

Unfortunately, the weekend they were visiting was cool and windy, unlike the week prior when we had 85 degree temps!

Just getting away from the snow and winter was enough for these girls!

Dear to the heart of all the girls was their cousin Doreen who passed away last year. 

This was her little sister's tribute. (Doreen always said, "I love everybody!")

Blessed be her memory!

We enjoyed an afternoon snack

...and were joined by this visitor.

We stayed until sunset, then headed back to town.

That evening, we ate at one of our newest favorite haunts.

The food was delicious, the fellowship spectacular!

It was about 50 degrees outside, so we bundled up in coats and scarves under the heat lamps, and ate our meal. 

We had a great slumber party that night...

...and in the morning, at the church service, the cousins blessed us with their beautiful harmony as they sang the song, "10,000 Reasons" 

Pastor Jim prayed for the children before they left for junior church.

We were so happy to have our two boys and their families also join us for the day.

Another cousin and her husband also came to enjoy the Sunday with us.

June "shared" her lovely jewelry with the kids.

This little girl loved it!

But then, so did she!

A very fun and full day, but always time for a story. 

Milestones

In January, our youngest grand-daughter celebrated her first birthday. It's hard to believe that just a year ago I was enjoying this little girl as a newborn. Time goes by so quickly! We loved you little one, and wish you lived closer by. We are so thankful that we can skype with you so often and see you growing up. 

 A couple of days later, our oldest grand-daughter celebrated her 4th birthday. 

It seems impossible to think that this little princess has already been in our lives for four years. What a change  these little girls have brought into our family of boys! 

We pray that God would continue to bless our children and grandchildren as they grow and mature. May they always love Jesus and remain faithful in serving Him alone.

Family Christmas

We celebrated our family Christmas on December 30th this year. It was the only time that all of the boys and their families could be here. We had a very fun and memorable time. These are just random pics of the 4 great days that we spent together...all fifteen of us!

We even managed to get a pretty nice family photo! (Bribery with chocolate does wonders!)

 The day after our family Christmas celebration, we celebrated New Year's Eve together. The grandkids loved all the noise makers (at 6PM!) 

 Her first New Year's celebration.

Since we also had two family birthdays (Dec 31st and Jan 2nd), we threw in a birthday cake on New Year's Eve also. We loved having the whole gang together to celebrate!

 Birthday boy...

Birthday girl.

We love our boys so much and the beautiful women that they have married, and now our wonderful grandkids that have entered the family. God is so good to us, and we praise Him!