I have 8 nephews and 2 nieces among my siblings. For the most part, we’ve never lived in the same city, so they are just these far-off adorables you get to see growing up through Christmas card photos and the every-other-year family gatherings. They are a pretty likeable bunch!
Until March, we have never lived closer than 13-20 hours from my sweet niece, Elise, the firstborn to my brother Joe and his wife, Robin. But then she moved here following 2 years of leading missions trips with YWAM and what extra joy she has brought!
She turned 22 on the 22nd and it is fitting for she is at least 22 times happier and excited about life than most anyone else on the planet. She has made us laugh at least 2200 times since she got here and she has been a happy encourager to all of us no less than 222 times.
We have a video of Elise when she was 9 years old, very happily describing the pretty outfit she has just purchased for church, just bubbling in anticipation of the moment she’ll be able to don it and model it for us all. The very weekend she moved to Denver this year, on a Saturday afternoon, she bounded into the kitchen sharing excitedly, Look at this cute outfit I got for church today!! and drew us all into the excitement of how cute she would be. She never fails to pull us in by her exhuberance for living, where even small feats are opportunities to celebrate.
Happy Birthday, sweet Elise Rachelle Moslander! You are color and light and a world traveller with a big heart. You have become the beautiful young woman I always knew you would be, but have surprised me by being such an amazing woman of faith and trust in God! You are a faith woman, for sure!
May all your blessings come times 2 this year!…Aunt Jeanie
NOTE TO SELF: Take good care of my sweet niece, Elise!
The sweets and baking arts are not my calling, though I enjoy baking a wedding cake for a crowd because of the challenge. But through the years, I have latched on to a few, and I mean a few, recipes which have become known as “Family Favorites.”
One is Fruit Pizza.
Please do not mistake this goodie for the pretty pictures of fresh fruit on a light crust that you might see in a Pampered Chef booklet or a Pillsbury Dough magazine ad. This little pile of indulgence is heavy and sweet, chewy and laden with fat and sugar and could probably kill you, if you ate the whole thing.
The recipe came to Dave and I within a few weeks of our marriage from one Mrs. Howard Helm of Minot, North Dakota. She was a faithful KHRT radio listener, where Dave was the afternoon/evening dj at the time and she stopped by the station to bring this dessert – in a time and place where it was received readily, without reservation and enjoyed by the whole staff.
This is old-fashioned-if-you’ve-gotta-die-of-something-it-may-as-well-be-dessert Fruit Pizza. Nothing light and fresh about it – well, the fruit is until you bathe it in the “sauce.” But it is pretty darn-tootin’ fun on occasion. Tristan asked for it for his family birthday celebration and though we all get very excited about it initially, we can barely finish our servings and are bemoaning how rich it is before we finish. But give it a couple of hours and we’re back.
Do you have the courage?
Old-Fashioned (Killer) Fruit Pizza
Crust: one roll of prepared sugar cookie dough, pressed onto a pizza round or into a cake pan or cookie sheet, baked 12-15 minutes (until browning). Remove from oven, set aside to cool.
Sauce (make this while the crust is in the oven): 1/4 cup of water, 1/4 cup of lemon juice, 1 cup of frozen orange juice concentrate (don’t mix it with water-just the actual concentrate!), 1 cup of sugar, a dash of salt and 3 tablespoons of corn starch. Whisk these and bring to bubbling in a saucepan. Cook until thickened and then set aside to cool (must be totally cool before spooning over the fruit).
Filling: Beat 8 oz. softened cream cheese with 1/2 cup sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla.
Fruit: any combination of your favorites in season or frozen. We love bananas, strawberries, kiwi and even mandarin oranges or fresh peaches. Then we pop raspberries and/or blueberries on top because they look so pretty. I used to place all the fruit in very careful patterns and designs, but when I started just using a cake pan, the sauce covered it all up anyway, so now I just throw it in.
Finish:
Spread the cream cheese filling over the cooled crust.
Place fruit over the cream cheese. Load it up and pack it on.
Spoon the sauce over the fruit. Chill for a few hours or overnight.
Over the years, we have strayed from the traditional o.j. concentrate glaze and tried fruity combinations like mango-orange, or strawberry-grape. I also put way less sugar in now, but you can’t tell!
Today Tristan, my first son-in-law ever, turns 28!
Happy Birthday, Tristan, superb son-in-law and waaaaay above average husband to my daughter, Stephanie. Happy Birthday to you as we celebrate your life represented by faithfulness and trustworthiness in all you do. Happy Day to a Hoosier who chose rightly to live in Colorado, for it set up a chain of events that made you one of us, a blessing we regularly praise God for! Blessed and glorious Day of Remembrance for us all as we stop to honor you and the life you lead!
Tristan is a rare find. Unassuming and humble, you might not notice genius in the room or divine the depth of talent and creativity, nor the well of of knowledge and intelligence if you were passing through a space with him in it. You could be near and yet miss the wry twinkle of a quiet, but wicked sense of humor, or fail to see the deep thoughtfulness about the powerful issues of the day in politics, religion, worldview.
No. One might pass Tristan and see a kind person, a quiet man gently playing with his 3 children or engaged in a conversation with family or friends. A person might say, “Doesn’t he play the drums?” And not even realize that he is truly one of the best around, sought after by the best musicians, not only at drums, but at all instruments. You might just see the best of him: an incredible and loving husband and devoted father, and still not get to see the rest of him.
But we, his family, are blessed. We are blessed to see the giant of a man he is. Tris is the big-brother of the fam, now. He is some one we all trust and our go-to guy about anything and everything that ails us. He knows our secrets, our faults and our failures, and yet, can be trusted with that information. You cannot buy that kind of character or love. He is a gift. We are blessed.
So, today, Tristan, I bless you and I thank God for you. These are the gifts I want you to open today and throughout this next year:
Grace to you, Tristan, and peace. Be blessed with provision through your giftings and abilities, both the technological and the artistic-musician sides. I pray that resources make themselves available and that your resourcefulness will become an even greater and valued comodity!
May you be preserved in blamelessness your whole life long. May your beautiful wife bring you joy and your children, great delight. May God hear all your prayers and your secret heart’s desires and answer you in times of trouble.
I pray that, while should it ever fall my lot – I would defend you to the death, may the Lord be your defender and protector and may He keep you safe on every side.
I pray that you, planted firmly by living waters, will begin to see the fruitfulness of your faithfulness before God and that this next year will bring blessing on every side, provision, new opportunities and new open spaces. I pray that we’ll see the explosion of the color of you all around, for this new time and place and new year for you and you family.
I am so pleased with you as my daughter’s husband and as the father of my 3 beautiful grandchildren. They are the proof of the man you are. I am so pleased to call you son, and thankful to your parents for sharing. I am so blessed you were born to be a part of us. I love you wholeheartedly, Tristan!
Happy Birthday, cherished one…Your very own (and hopefully not dreaded) m-i-l :)
NOTE TO SELF: Make Tris a drum cake next year.
pictured: Tristan in the Hershey store in Times Square on a recent family vacation; Guini helping Tris open his presents yesterday; Tris and my other amazing son-in-law!
Last night we celebrated Guini-poo. She was in ponytails wearing a Little Mermaid dress with sparkly pink shoes when she graciously opened all her presents, layed the clothes aside without much thought, oohed and aahed over the fun stuff and then got the pink, shimmery bike with the glittery festooning and horn and took off riding, never to be heard from again.
She rode and she rode and she rode. Perhaps she stopped long enough for the Little Mermaid cake?
Since the day you were born, sweet Guinivere, I have always seen you as my little princess. So fitting that you love the Disney Princesses so and have landed on my personal favorite, Ariel. And it is kinda funny because you are the only Kelley kid who isn’t a red-head, but your princess-of-choice is one! (See Guini above as Ariel the Little Mermaid at the Fall Harvest Fest -sometimes known as Halloween – shhhh…).
To know you is to love you, Guini-muggins. But to know you takes thought and patience and time. In the crowd, you are quiet and self-sufficient, but get you alone and the true powerhouse, chatterbox comes out. At three, you already know your own mind. You are sweet and sensitive, sassy and silly. You are smart and singular in purpose. But my favorite part of you: the singer, as you belt out the song of the Lord.
A few weeks ago, just you and me on a Saturday evening watching the most gorgeous purple and orange sunset of the summer, your little song of the Lord began to rise. And as we stood, arms raised toward heaven, I know the whole neighborhood heard your unabashed worship, it would have been impossible not to, as you sang from the deep place in your heart with your loudest voice over and over and over:
He loves us, O how He loves us!
He does love us, Guini. And He loves you and He is going to use your strong passion to declare it! I am watching, giddy with excitement!
Happy Birthday, my Guinivere!…Nonna
NOTE TO SELF: More one on one time with Guini.
pictured: Guini, “Under the sea” and Guini as Ariel; Guini with the Little Mermaid beach towel and the bean bags game, both handcrafted for her with love from Aunt Stormie!
Dave, on his blog, talks about the 27 years of movies, but the very first movie, the one we watched at a place he was housesitting on May 26, 1981, the movie he invited me over to view on TBS – while I was unaware it was a “date, but was without a doubt, retrospectively, a date(!) was “Man’s Favorite Sport.” Rock Hudson, Paula Prentiss, silly romance, our beginning.
Not completely our beginning, I guess. I had known him for almost 3 years. We were friends with common friends and connections. We met at Bible College in Minot, ND. But I left for a time and he wrote to me and our friendship was sweet and very nice. Naturally I thought he was sooooo cute, but he had a serious girlfriend, so I never let on that I thought so. When I moved back to Minot, I can remember sitting at a cafeteria table with some friends, one of which called him over to discuss something or another. As he left, she said to the group, “Oh, Dave Rhoades is so cute, oh my gosh.” All the other girls nodded and answered affirmatively, while I coyly said, “He’s alright.”
But on May 26, he stopped by my office and asked me to come over and watch a movie. I thought it was just a “friends hanging out” thing, but wonderfully-it was not.
Our second date was the very next night.
Our third, the next. I think you get the idea.
By June 8 – we both knew we were in love. I know being “in love” takes a hit in Christendom, but crimenentlies people, being in love is FUN stuff! I still like it!
June 16, 1981, Dave proposed to me.
We were married July 23, a Thursday night, at 8 pm in Wimbledon, ND. – slightly less than 2 months after that first date.
We were married 27 years ago tonight. I didn’t have the wedding of my dreams (I blame my brother Joe for this, but that is a whole different story), but I married the man of my dreams.
Last night, we were at a small prayer meeting of about 40 or 50 people at church, preparing for Heaven Fest and our kids were leading worship. Dave was at the back videotaping the amazing music as Dave and Tara started leading a song they wrote that I love, “Jesus, Name Above All Names.” The melody is sweet, the harmonies were full and there was my beautiful husband looking at our kids through the camera lense. From my vista, I could see them all, including the grandkids who were now running and dancing around my feet. For a moment, I lost my breath and I am certain my heart skipped a beat.
We did this, Dave, I was thinking. We fell in love, we gave our love to God, He gave us our children, we gave them back to Him, and the love goes on. This is what we have to show for 27 years.
You are still so beautiful to me. Happy anniversary, Dave, I would marry you all over again…J
pictured: Dave when I first fell for him; me just before I walked out the door to marrry Dave; post-wedding – my officemate, Elaina, had just thrown a bunch of rice straight down my dress.
Happy Birthday, Dave, son-of-my-heart. Happy birthday to a man who is both steady, worthy of trust and wildly abandoned and pliable and in the hands of God. Happy day to some one who is youthful and adventurous, with ears to hear the Spirit of God and eyes to see what God is up to on the earth. Happy and blessed days to an unassuming guy who holds the keys to the very heart of God, as well as to our own hearts. I don’t think people can know just by looking, perhaps not until they have been in a room with you – the depth of character and the strength in spirit you carry.
Last night, at our family celebration (Tredessa’s birthday, your birthday and Father’s Day for you and dad and Tris and Rock), the film clip I chose for you seemed so obvious to me, I thought everyone would select it. And I cannot help but keep coming back to the parallels between the movie, Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade, and the prophet Elisha and you.
Let me share a few of my thoughts: Indiana Jones, in finding the Holy Grail, chose wisely. He saw the humility in the cup of a carpenter and though the other cups were regal and embellished and valuable, he understood what the greedy could not. And I see you in that. I can see the great cloud of witnesses in the heavenlies watching your life like an exciting soccer game. They are like, “Yes! Alright-he chose wisely!” And that is what I see you doing repeatedly.: Choosing wisely. You chose a good wife, you are choosing a good and godly life, you are choosing to raise your son with love and affirmation and empowerment according to God’s revealed plan for him. You’re a good chooser.
But before Indiana actually got to the carpenter’s cup, he had to cross a great chasm. You feel the anguish of his dilemma as he knows how close he is to the treasure, to the Grail. But it is a long rocky descent and there is nothing that can be seen that would save him from certain destruction. He stands on a cliff edge deciding what he’ll do. You hear the voices of his comrade: Hurry, Indie, you must hurry. His father, who had been kidnapped by the Nazi’s to get Indiana in on the hunt for the Holy Grail, will die unless Indie succeeds. His dad is praying, “Believe boy, you have got to believe.” And no matter how many times I see the movie, that step of faith he takes, the first step, that crazy are-you-out-of-your-mind step always reminds me of what living by faith (and not by sight) is all about. And I have watched you over these past two years, especially, open the acient book like Indie (only yours is The Book), read it, decide to believe and take a step and God has met your foot everytime.
I am telling you this today: God is going to meet the step you are taking today and tomorrow and over the next 40 days. Your foot will not slip. And that, my sweet son was a prophetic word that rose up as I was typing! (See Psalm 121 – Lift up your eyes to the hills so you can see where your help is coming from, God won’t sleep through this!)
I have seen it with my own eyes. I am a witness to your life and God’s great work in it. I have watched God repeatedly call on you to do the impossible and He has given you level ground each time. But you’ve gone willingly. That is how you remind me of Indiana Jones.
That brings me to Elisha and comes partly from reading some 2 Kings yesterday. He is interesting, but I know less about him than Elijah, his predecessor – which is weird because Elisha did twice as many miracles. Even after he died, a dead man thrown into his grave was brought back to life. But I have been thinking about it – and I really see Elisha’s character in you: he was generally thought of as less crusty than Elijah. He was powerrful enough to to perform miraculous feats, yet gentle and sensitive to the condition of the people, weeping over their fate. He was a servant minister to Elijah, yet a powerful prophet of esteem in his own right, the mantle given him by Elijah after God chose him.
And it occurs to me that in both these men, there was a father-son relationship. Indiana’s own dad had been kidnapped, but Indiana was risking everything to save him. Elisha submitted himself to Elijah, his spiritual father. These were both good and honoring sons. They both committed themselves to sonship. And so, they inherited everything the father had.
And on your birthday, I want to tell you what a good son you are. I want you to know that we see the spirit of sonship in you toward your earthly fathers, spiritual fathers. And we see that you have submitted your heart to the Father as a son who welcomes the training and discipline that comes with that. That is why, today and all your days, you will walk in the inheritance of the Father. All He has is yours. And I wonder if your anointing might not pull some earthly fathers back from the brink, out of bondage?
I love you, son (your silly side, too)…Mom
pictured: Dave with Tara, Dave and son, Hunter, holding niece Gemma, Dave leading awesome worship, and Dave!
Blessings on your birthday, Tredessa, mighty warrior and quiet-spirited woman of God. Happy Birthday to my 3rd daughter and child, a glorious baby born on a glorious day. Happy days and blessings on you, holy woman, centered not only in the middle of the family birth order, but in the middle of what God is doing on the earth in these days. I am just so pleased with who you are and the faith-life you lead, Tre. I am so proud of the woman you’ve chosen to be. I am amazed at your giftedness and humility in its presentation. I love the song of your heart and your commitment to really see people where they are and speak life into their woundings and brokenness. I am in awe at how you see into the hearts around you when others are oblivious.
Here you are in full-time ministry, supported by people who believe in your call. That is a precarious place to be, but you trust God and press in to acknowledge and know Him more and more. Can He be as pleased to see that as I am? Yes, I’m thinking.
These are the gifts I am offering as prayer, the things so true I hope you will receive and open today:
I am praying for you a year of wonderful, fresh and energizing friendships. You are such a loyal and true friend. You work tirelessly for the Kingdom, pouring time and life into inner city kids, and the destitute in other nations. You administrate big dreams and huge projects for visionaries and still have time to speak life into hearts, one-on-one. You’re a caring and honoring daughter and a deeply loving sister. You are instilling spiritual legacy into your nieces and nephews. You watch and speak and pray and teach. And I am just asking God to place you smack-dab in the middle of people who will pour life back, who will speak blessing over you, watch over you and be the kind of friend you are to everyone else. I am praying you will reap everything you have sown and that it will be magnificently life-giving!
I am praying for your Jim-from-The-Office, your Mr. Darcy, your Boaz. He is out there, my beautiful. You possess so many of Ruth’s attributes: she was devoted to God and to her family, she was humble and teachable, she was focused on her responsibilities – all the while trusting God to provide, and she was a woman of her word. And so God sent her Boaz – a man devoted to God and successful in his business, a proven man, undistracted from his responsibilities, a man of his word and a man who jumped through all the necessary hoops to win Ruth for himself, thereby exemplifying the redemptive work of Christ.
And while the Bible does say God is your husband, I am still praying for the flesh-and-blood husband/lover who’ll do your heavy lifting, mow the lawn and change the oil in your car. I am praying for that man who will go to great lengths to win you to himself, for the one who will pay the price for a wife like you, even if he leaves his socks on the bathroom floor. I am praying for your Boaz.
I pray you will come to understand the beauty of who you are. I pray you will see what others see: you are a woman who is worthy of trust, beautiful inside and out. I pray you can appreciate the girl in you who is sometimes silly and zany and embrace your wildly romantic and passionate nature for the gift it will be to your future husband. I am hoping you can grasp the amazing anointing you have to administrate and organize and “put legs on” vision and operate in it with joy as it flows from who you were created to be, but not become bogged in the details of it, laying aside all the things God has spoken to your heart. I pray that you will learn to trust yourself-with abandon and a sense of the carefree – just like the rest of us know we can. You can trust you, Tredessa.
I pray you’ll know the intensity of the strength you have added to the minstry work going on at Confluence, and through Get the Word Out! and Leaving a Legacy. I hope you can understand the gift you have been to Worship and the Word and Heaven Fest. You are not a shadow on the wall just because you’ve chosen to be a servant of all. When you walk in the room, everyone else is stronger for it. There is a sense that a quiet wisdom and element of the power of God has just entered, not with the persuasive words of man’s wisdom, but with the power and demonstration of the Holy Spirit (1 Cor. 2.4 NIV).
Oh, my middlest of children-we’re the lucky ones. “Blessed,” I know, but I am singing the Amy Grant song in my heart in honor of you today (http://youtube.com/watch?v=yE6MGGuxpa4). It describes so well how anyone who knows you knows: they are the lucky ones! How did God know, I wonder, how much I would need a Tredessa in my life? Does He know, I wonder, how honored I am that I got to be “Tredessa’s mom” ( a title I accept with joy)? Thank-you for your love of the Word of God and of the life of worship to Him you lead. You’re the kind, when you love you love with all your might.. .
Happiest Birthday, sweet Dessa. Oh baby, we’re the lucky ones…Mom
NOTE TO SELF: It is apparent that Tre is always the one behind the camera, our designated family photographer. Take pictures of HER, now!
pictured: Tredessa in Kindergarten and this past Easter at church
This is a big one! Are you doing OK? I won’t say how old you are, but will only mention you graduated high school in 1957. But life is good, right? You finally got dad to retire, sort of. We’ll keep on him, mamala!
I think it is an amazing thing that the yearbook committee described you as, “A girl certain to please God.” And long before Rick Warren published that wildly popular little volume on ‘purpose,’ you’d already determined yours: To live a holy life by walking close to the Lord.
And my sweet mama-I think you have fulfilled God’s purpose for your life in your generation! I believe you have pleased God. I am making the call – you have lived and are living a holy life because something of the sacred permeates all the hours and minutes of your life. You are blessed. You were a loved daughter, and are now an honored mother and grandmother and great-grandmother. You walk in health and the beauty of a heart that always chose love and believing the best in people.
I just wanted to say that you are the woman I admire above all others I thank-you for asking God for me, for loving me and raising me for Jesus. I still tear up at the line in the country song, “And when the day is done, my mama’s still my biggest fan,” because I know that and carry it close everyday!
So-know that you are called blessed. Know that all of your children and their children and their children’s children call you blessed and praise God for you. We’re the reason you were born – in case you wanted to know!
Stay for a long, long time, mamala. I love you!…Jeanie
Steph is afraid some of you might of missed the super-cool-Transformers-Optimus-Prime cake we did for Gavin’s birthday because I have been a blog-posting maniac this week? See it here
