Category Archives: 6 Looking Back // Memories!

I’m at that age where you have lots and lots of memories. When I am waxing melancholy…

21 Days ’til Christmas ~ Holidays are Joyful!

December 4, 20092 Mi Familia, 5 Songs I am Singing, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, 7 Keep Christmas, 9 TV & Movies/Books & Entertainment, Stuff I Actually Thinkbing crosby, christmas, christmas music, memories, the carpentersJeanie

“The lights on my tree, I wish you could see, I wish it everyday.”

I grew up with very traditional Christmas music. The 1960’s were when you could purchase an LP for $1.98 at the supermarket full of all the classic songs like “Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…” and “A Few of My Favorite Things” by various artists including Johnny Mathis or The Ray Conniff Singers. Occasionally you’d buy an album by a stand-out like Bing Crosby. I still treasure the 2 Christmas records I have by him.

“Merry Christmas, Darling,” by the Carpenters was my first sort of non-traditional Christmas pop-song. I’d hold my dad’s little transistor radio (which I’d snuck from his second dresser drawer) to my ear, and, at barely 11, sing along with Karen, trying with all my heart to understand her longing.

Through the years more and more Christmas music has been added to the songs I love. Dolly Parton and Kenny Rogers have produced some great stuff. Lee Greenwood sings a couple that always pierce my heart. The Partridge Family album still makes me laugh and I even enjoy a Motown Christmas. Harry Connick Jr. is great for seasonal cheery tunes as well as some sacred and I do love the 90’s Mariah Carey album. And let’s not forget that Amy Grant, is a Christmas-music genius.

Looking Back

But this year, I am feeling very traditional again. I am reaching back to music I grew up with, the songs my mom played on the Hi-Fi during my early days. I am less about the pop side of Christmas and anything that has been produced since 1970 and on, and sort of loving melodies that have been recorded so many times no one even remembers who did them first (like “Winter Wonderland”) and some that have been recorded a lot but the first recording is all that matters (like “White Christmas” by Bing Crosby).

The cool thing now is, of course, that “Merry Christmas, Darling” is a classic. It IS one of the old tried and true songs of the season. And now I understand the deep sentimentality. For I wish, if I might “have the wish that I wish for tonight,” to gather everyone I love from near and far together during these long, dark winter nights to laugh and remember, to sing and make merry, to be close and bask in the 6-7000 lights on my tree. And we could play Karen and sing…

That I wish you a Merry Christmas

Happy New Year, too

I’ve just one wish on this Christmas Eve

I wish I were with you, I wish I were with you.

Bed space is limited here. So if you are going to come and see me and make my wishes come true, please call in advance.

pictured: The Moslander family Christmas card, 1968. Jeanie, Joey, Timmy, Tammy and Danny (Love love love to my siblings! Please note: I was reading from The Children’s Book of Knowledge – which is why you are all so successful and smart. You may thank me with a very nice Christmas gift.)

The Joey

November 17, 20092 Mi Familia, 3 Celebrations & Festive Events, 5 Songs I am Singing, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkjoe moslanderJeanie

My brother Joe painted a barn in a golden field for my 49th birthday. He painted a house flanked by colorful autumn trees for my 50th birthday. He just gave both of them to me when we met at my parents’ house in Springfield in October. I have only been asking him to do something like this for me since, hmmm, the early 80s. He is pretty laid back (my total opposite, ahem*).

But I love my brother and I love my paintings. So now I am thinking they were worth the wait.

He is gentle Joe, my first best friend and partner-in-crime. He once saved me from drowning and later from something far worse. We were two peas in a pod! He grew up to be a man I admire, pastoring, then serving his community as a Police Officer, then back to pastoring. He married so well and has 4 amazing kids. I am so glad to have such a great little brother (Except maybe when we were in Springfield at church on Sunday morning, he kept introducing me to people as his ‘little sister’. I’d laugh and then say, “Actually I am his older sister.” Then he’d say, “I believe that actually went without saying I think they could tell.” And? I wanted to smack him).

He still watches over me and listens to my heart and I still pretend to beat him up (I always win because boys can’t hit girls). And I still, everytime I see him, sing Joe the song I sang to him when I was 3 and he was almost 2 and I actually thought the song was written for and about him:

I’ve got the Joey Joey Joey Joey down in my heart

Down in my heart, Down in my heart!

I’ve got the Joey Joey Joey Joey down in my heart

Down in my heart to stay!

And it’s true. I do.

Delicious Autumn

October 21, 20092 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkautumn, autumn quotes, fall, hael's cometJeanie

“Delicious autumn! My very soul is wedded to it, and if I were a bird I would fly about the earth seeking the successive autumns.”
~George Eliot

I am visiting my parents in Springfield.

Two days ago I watched my backyard Aspens flutter dark green to yellow in one day. I swear it. The leaves were turning that fast, hourly lighter and brighter in color. Today it is snowing in Denver, really snowing, they say. By next week the naked branches, up to their knees in brown crunchiness, will glare at me as I attempt to rake up the once-glorious leafery.

But I?

I have chased autumn into a Missouri mood that lingers like musk on my skin. I have escaped to turning-leaves on proud trees and the deep intensity of autumn colors that hold both the memory of exuberant youth with its’ fresh, green-spring growth, and the exploding red-to-the-core ripeness of the late summer tomato, now seasoned to a complex beauty, indisputably richer and wiser for the aging. The blazing urgency of the season, so much to experience before it all passes into winter, is salty on my tongue. I inhale the cinnamon-scented air, and taste the pungent, spicy and intangible gift of the equinox while the crickets sing that haunting song I have always loved.

Burnt sienna and ochre rustle restlessly as autumn falls and the cool night air sprinkles wet diamonds onto my keyboard and into my mouth filling my lungs with cool, brisk air and enduring toasted warmth at once. Haley’s Comet spilled burning meteor fragments in the wee hours, punctuating the night sky with light, a spectacle for late-night lovers young and old.

What is it about fall? Not just nostalgia, so much sweeter. Faded, yet more glorious. Softer, yet stronger. The taste? Lingering, commemorative, a celebration of all that has ever been with a watchful eye for all to come. Delicious.

I always hate to see summer end, yet the autumn is my life’s palette, the colors of my heart. Even the heading at the top of this page gives ode to the falling leaf…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Grab the season with gusto, hold it close until the last leaf flies away.

pictured: a google image of Missouri and what I am surrounded by

The Convivial Occasions of October

October 12, 20092 Mi Familia, 3 Celebrations & Festive Events, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, 9 TV & Movies/Books & Entertainment, Stuff I Actually Thinkbirthday cake, birthdays, brighton CO, chocolate-cherry cake bites, cinzzetti's, dave powers, delirious, harvest fest at nhcc, hunter, jeanie rhoades, october, platte valley players, roy rogers, roy rogers museum, seek and soak, seekandsoak.com, swine flu, tom ewing, wheels-in-motion cake, worship and the word movementJeanie

Last year I said October is Orange. And it still is. My church turned orange last fall, too. I do love my house-of-worship-advertising sweatshirt with the bum logo (thank-you, sweet Katie!).

This October is craaaaaazy-busy-fun and occasion-filled!

Like, we have three family birthdays in October (mine, Hunter’s and still-to-come: Jovan’s!). I turned 50 (shhh…there is no need to think about this, nor mention it aloud) with dinner at Cinzzetti’s~

Cinzzetti’s

Pictured: Me and my baby, Stormie; Patrice is telling me right at this very second that she is pregnant with their 3rd child! Me, Pearl and Marilyn. I screamed immediately following…

DP nearly ate Cinzzetti’s out of mussels; me and the 5 grandbebes who were well-contained in our private room.

I have sweet friends (almost every single one of whom is younger than me, I noticed), and a lovely family. Thank-you, everybody for celebrating my life even if I could have gone without noticing the new decade. I am blessed.

Hunter and the wheels-in-motion cake and fun-on-wheels party for himself and 25 of his closest friends:

Hunter turned “The Garage” into a speedway. There were trikes and bikes and skateboards and more. Kids zoomed one way and then the next. It was crazy loud and speedy. Hunter got the chocolate fudge cake he wanted in the shape of a “5” and when, the other day, he reminded he really, really, really wanted some lightening bolts, too, in honor of his current favorite movie, Bolt, I whipped up a strawberry cake at the last second to cut out and ice some lightening bolt shapes for flanking the main cake.

But, oh my goodness, it is what I did with the cut-off-cake crumbs that needs to be mentioned. Into a bowl: leftover chocolate-fudge cake, the rest of the fudge filling, a block of cream cheese, a can of cherry pie filling. Mixed well. Cookie-scooped onto baking sheets and thrown into the freezer until they were just firm enough to coat with melted white chocolate. Chocolate-Cherry Cake Bites, o yeah! To. die. for. Yum. Seriously!

Poor Magoo ended up very, very sick at his own party. He conked out, but the fun held up.

There was a Worship and the Word Movement PSTeam (prayer-support team) potluck at the MadCap Theater (a great improv place-you should totally go!)

http://www.madcapimprov.com/

Last night there was a Seek and Soak with TOM EWING (a man DP called a general in worship ministry). Here is the kick-off song featuring Tom, Sing to the King

In the video, left to right: Rocky Rhoades on guitar, Tom Ewing, Tristan on drums, Stormie on bass, DP on lead guitar (and leading the whole Seek and Soak), Lewis Brown (a.k.a. Proxy), and Lewis Brown, Sr. on sax. It was an amazing night. Musical worship, the Word of God, 3+ hours of encounter-worship, about 100 people entering the Presence, even Baptists! :) Smile, Emily! That was for you!

Let’s see…what else?

Jovan and Rocky will find out if it is a boy or a girl at their next appointment. Goody!

There is the celebration of Amy Jo’s baby-to-be this Thursday night.

And Saturday night I get to go see the final Delirious concert in Colorado ever as they are on their farewell tour. This band changed everything in the 90s and they are still such a class act, men of integrity who love Jesus and are soooo talented. They changed the sound of worship and people around the world go deeper worship via the songs of the Lord they introduced. Got to see them at Ichthus and now here. I love them and how they have influenced my own children to become History Makers.

Also ~ Dave will play the lead in the Platte Valley Player’s community theaters’ presentation of “Suspenders,” a musical comedy, as part of the grand opening celebration of Brighton’s newly restored/renovated armory as a community arts center/theater in Brighton’s “downtown.” He’ll be performing in it over the next few weeks leading up to Thanksgiving. I’ll be attending the very first performance on Monday the 19th (an event for which I bought a dress!!). I am somewhat divided in my joy about the fact that Dave is also painting the backdrop for the show and there are 6 giant 8′ x 4′ canvases in my living room at this time.

Family Time!

I will be going to spend a week with my mama et papa in Springfield, MO, where they wrongfully and stubbornly retired a year and a half ago and now wish to leave to be closer to any of us that they know (do you know of anyone house-hunting in Springfield?? Help!). They will spoil me rotten and my brother Joe is meeting me there, too. We will visit Branson, about a half hour from them, for the express purpose of giving my mother her dream-come-true in visiting the Roy Rogers/Dale Evans Museum before it closes its’ doors for good this December.

I am already working on church Christmas decor. In October!

Upon my return, I will enjoy the grandbebes playing dress-up for the church’s annual Harvest Fest and then, as they have all requested (informing me that it is a tradition, one I must have started unknowingly), all will gather at our home for broccoli-cheese soup (because I make incredible zuppa).

Life. It can wear you out!

Dave is sick and they are checking him for H1N1 tomorrow morning, though they have already started him on antibiotics. What in the world?? Who has time for this?

Just trying to keep up…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Loosen up some time in November and December. Right.

September Garden

September 22, 20094 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkautumn, cucumber, fall, garden, seasons, summer, zucchiniJeanie

“But now in September the garden has cooled, and with it my possessiveness. The sun warms my back instead of beating on my head … The harvest has dwindled, and I have grown apart from the intense midsummer relationship that brought it on.”
– Robert Finch

Pearl has beautifully cleaned her garden and cleared it away. My cousins in the midwest, I have heard, have done the same. But I always struggle to let go, to actually let summer pass into fall.

Early last week I thought the zucchini looked weak and perhaps were nearly “over,” so I watered them once more, gathering an arm-load of fruit, planning to uproot and end their time over the weekend. The very next day, however, they were alive again with large yellow blooms, shouting their worth and prolonging their stay.

Some of the garden will make it through the cold.

But these cold days and cold, cold nights are going to do all the tender plants in. Ultimately many of the flowers, including the petunias and nicotiana and zinnias, will make it through this frigid spell and will shine like stars in the universe in October as Monarch butterflies dance around them, captivating my fancy while I should be doing something productive. And if I cover my tomatoes and peppers, which, of course, I will, they will suffer some, but keep producing – almost until Thanksgiving, the Lord willing and I remember to pay special attention.

Some of the garden won’t make it through the end of the week.

But the cucumbers, the zucchini and the spaghetti squash will likely not make it past this week. Their tender leaves are taking a hit that will be irrepairable. I have already pulled most of the green beans.

It’s so hard to say good-bye.

But it is hard to let them go. It is difficult to watch the yard begin to retreat into its winter-ready clothes where once it danced merrily in dazzling color and sizzling heat. It’s hard to hear the sound of dry, rustling leaves where children once splashed in water to the frog, toad and cricket’s song of the castinets.

The harvest is dwindling.

Today I brought in 2 armfuls of baby zucchini, lemon and English cukes and some other variety of cucumber. I ate a couple of small beans right there amidst the soil and fading green. I grabbed some huge, very happy-looking peppers (where a fridge full of their colorful cousins await being used), and I grabbed the reddish tomatoes, which are too soft inside to expose to such cold, but will continue their ripening on the counter and be delectable in the next 2-3 days.

This is the September garden. It dwindles.

Scenes from a Good Summer or “Reunited and it Feels So Good”

September 20, 20092 Mi Familia, 4 Home & Garden/Food & Seasons, 5 Songs I am Singing, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkfamily, family reunion, moslander, ross moslanderJeanie

Ode to the Family of my Summer, for I shan’t and mustn’t acknowledge an autumn which does not truly begin until the September (or Autumnal) Equinox, on the 22nd day of this month ~ yes, just a couple of days from now, but still. Despite the fact that my sweet daughters, Stephanie first and then Stormie, have brought me a pumpkin spice latte from Starbucks each (how sweet are they??), I won’t purchase my first until it is truly autumn. I must sing of my love for the summer until the last verse fades softly…

Ross and Norma with grandkids and great-grandkids

Dad and the brothers visit

Press close, bare-bosomed Night! Press close, magnetic,
nourishing Night!
Night of south winds! Night of the large, few stars!
Still, nodding Night! Mad, naked, Summer Night!
~Walt Whitman

Joe’s wife, Robin with my dad; hanging on “Moslander Mountain”

Ross the Boss, Mrs. Moss, and all the Little Landers (Jeanie, Joey, Timmy, Tami and Danny)…except Tim didn’t come this year, but the rest did – with their spouses and children.

It was a divine time, full of remembering and creating new memories. Cousins kidded and cajoled. Siblings sought to reconnect. Dad told us where we came from and gave us insight for our futures. Mom cheered us all on and hugged the stuffing out of us. Love was in the air and in our hearts.

Gerron, Jordan and Austin being dudes

Tredessa, Grandma Moslandr and Uncle Joe

Sister-in-Law, Dawn.

Dawn and Dan share family secrets

Just the other morning my sister-in-law, Dawn, whom I have known and loved since she was 14, emailed me these beautiful sentiments about The Moslander Family Reunion:

“I took you all in during our time spent together. Kinda like a wonderful meal! I feel full, but want to take in some more. Good memories, but missing everyone.”

Cousins Rocky and Corbin having fun at the Phipps farm

Riding horses at the farm.

Brothers telling fish stories, no doubt

So blessed.

Me with little sister Tami and her husband, Gerron; Jordan and Rocky-best cousins forever!

I love my family. I am so blessed by wonderful parents and amazing siblings who have married so well. They have gifted me with extraordinary nephews and nieces. And everytime we are together, all is right with the world.

Aunt Tami with her nieces; Aunt Tami pulling me into silliness.

“In every conceiveable manner, the family is link to our past, bridge to our future.” Alex Haley

Mom and Dad.

Whom I have also sometimes (with great affection) called “Mammogram” and “Pap Smear.” Not sure how they feel about that! This is the result of these two people.

All my love to family, both near and far, both born to us and joined by love.

Related posts:

Scenes from a Good Summer ~ Heaven Fest
Scenes from a Good Summer ~ The Grandbebes
Scenes from a Good Summer ~ The Garden
Scenes from a Good Summer ~ Puerto Rico

Previous posts about the Moslander family reunion:

shoes are good

August 19, 20096 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkcandies, danskos, forever 21, high heels, shoesJeanie

Mary brought this up.

My friend and protege, Mary, is a shoe freak, sort of. And she is acquiring a collection. In fact, just today when we met for lunch, she was sporting a pair of hot pink satin, rounded-toe pumps. All the little girls within a 50-foot radius noticed them right away. Mary got me on the shoe topic.

I had to “give up” shoes for awhile following first, a terrible right foot break by which I can now measure the barometric pressure in the atmosphere, and then a bad left knee injury, which, after 4 torturous months of recovery, got re-injured in Maui and has been the bain of my stair-climbing existance ever since.

Memories.

I recently realized I am mourning the fact that I got rid of the high-healed flip-flop-style, stone-beaded shoes I wore to Dave and Tara’s wedding in ’03, (but which were still just so stinking cute) in the garage sale in June. And I mourn all the Candie’s slides I have ever owned and lost. And I weep that, unlike the days of my youth, the shoe heel just can’t be sky-high anymore. And while some people seemingly wished I would fall and break my neck back in the day when they could, I had, after all, been practicing since my toddler days, often walking around for hours on tip-toe to “pretend” high-heels, so, I mean, I rather excelled in that area.

Ah, shoes. I once had a collection!

At my age, comfort must come in to play.

Sad, really. But there are shoes that are both comfortable and cute, I was forced to find.

Case in point: the hippie flip-flops my friend Amy Jo made for me last summer. They are orange, for crying out loud. How wonderful is that? And really? The flip-flop is truly the first shoe I remember (I wrote an ode to them last summer), though when I had my first pair at the age of four, sort of a faded brick-red color (is that true or just because everything in early 1960s memory is sort of muted and washed out in photos?), they were called “thongs.” How times (and words) have changed and how I loved those shoes. I think my knees were perpetually scraped up because I couldn’t help looking at them admiringly as I’d run around the neighborhood. And I thank Amy Jo for these soft, fuzzy ones.

And there are the beloved, very cute, super-comfy-but-you-can’t-tell-that-by-looking-necessarily black and white shoes I got from Kohl’s last summer for Heaven Fest for only $12! They are made on a base of that dense foam like a baby’s Bumbo chair (btw, amazingingly wonderful seats for babies!). It is like wearing shock absorbers (which I apparenty need because Dave says I walk everywhere like I am going to a house on fire), but ever-so-stylishly.

However, I can’t get the stripes of the foam clean and pristine after 2 summers’ use. So, they may have to be retired. And this is a sad thought to ponder. I may not be able to let them go.

grease

And I cannot show favor to other cute and comfy shoes without giving at least an honorable mention to these low-heeled slides and thanking the Candies people for considering middle-aged women who fondly remember their youth and Olivia Newton-John in Grease. Thank-you, Candies shoe people, from the bottom of my heart!

I can dream again, can’t I?

Stormie got these Forever 21 shoes in the most retro-70s color and naturally I am in love with them, but can only wear them around the house, and not very gracefully, I am sad to say. I mean, how fabulous are these??!

Shoe advice.

So I cheer on my younger counterparts: my daughters and Mary and Stefanie and my little sister, Tami, and other shoe-stars. My advice: The flat-shoe craze will never fill your heart with joy as you look back over your shoe life, so go ahead and wear the shoe with pizzazz because shoe-beauty can cover a multitude of pain. Be careful running through the woods in platforms and up and down ladders with heavy boxes. Save your feet for the perfect shoe! For, while I thank the earth-loving Boulder-types for telling me I look “cool” in my Danskos, and I do love how much further and more energetically I can get around in them, I can also admit, they are truly hideous looking. And not my inner-shoe style. They are just… necessary some days. *sigh…

what an ugly, ugly shoe…

Have platforms will travel (happily)…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Rebuild the ruins of the once-glorious shoe collection.

Thank-you Stormie and Jovan for helping me share shoe love. And thank-you, Mary, for getting me thinking about it.

1st grade.

August 12, 20092 Mi Familia, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Think1st grade, gavin, prayer, schoolJeanie

A million years ago (or at least 43)

My first grade teacher was Mrs. Devlin, a tiny woman with very flat, calloused heels in her black, slingback shoes. She was nice enough, though not overly warm and by the time we were in 3rd grade she would see us and exclaim, “My, my how you have grown! You’re as tall as me, now.” And we were.

Now the first grandson

gavin1 gavin2 gavin3

gavin4 gavin5 gavin6

Gavin just started all-day school today. He is a first-grader in a new school near his house and he has entered that part of his life (how did it get here so fast?) where he will spend many of the prime hours of his day with children and teachers and people other than his parents (and nonna).

He loves school. He just loves it. I am glad, but I want to keep him surrounded with prayer and godly perspective. I want to protect what has been deposited into his life and guard his heart and mind. I want him to grow in the grace and admonition of the Lord and be made holy despite the secular surroundings he will face.

gavin7 gavin8 Gemma thinks she is ready, too

So, I figure, my prayer life just got amped up up as I spend more time praying for my “little red-headed Kelley kid.”

Lord, You know….Gavin’s Nonna

NOTE TO SELF: Keep declaring the awesomeness of our God to the next generation!

pictured: Do teachers always have to wear sweaters even in the heat of August? Is that a rule?

Maybe 25,000?

August 9, 20091 Christ is All, 5 Songs I am Singing, 6 Looking Back // Memories!, Stuff I Actually Thinkheaven fest, heaven fest 2009, the name of jesus, volunteersJeanie

Heaven Fest 2009

So, we may have doubled from last year. The final count remains to be seen.

There are so many things to recall from yesterday. So many things almost made me burst into tears, in a good way. Things like…

Like walking through the hip-hop stage auditorium and seeing hundreds of kids, wall-to-wall, shoulder-to-shoulder belting out, “Our God is an Awesome God.” I was seriously catapulted into the Presence within seconds.
Or coming out of the finance office and looking out, from my high staircase vantage point, and seeing a 3-mile long line of cars to the west, another one to the north and crossing east as far as I could see, no end of them in sight. Then, looking around the yard just below me and seeing small groups of people in circles praying for one another while just a few yards away, professional skateboarders were preaching the gospel to a lot of young men and they were responding to the invitation to follow Christ.
Then there was almost running out of parking (we only had space for 7000 cars or so) and having the farmer right next to the HF offer his land to us at the last possible second for a very low fee. That is grace! That is a miracle! And for a couple of hours, Dave and Tara and Luke and Tredessa and Kyle-O got out in the dusty field (yes, the festival “big wigs”) and directed cars like any parking volunteer would.
Tireless volunteers (so many) who worked themselves sick to make the Name of Jesus glorious. Leadership who had to “go with the flow” when things fell through the cracks and they did it with great humility and longsuffering. I saw the “leaders” serving and sweeping floors and picking up trash and pounding fence posts and I saw them work around the clock (still there in the middle of the night, for goodness’ sake), going above and beyond what we could ever have asked because God called them to it. If I mention names, I will miss some one, but will you know yourself when you read this? I hope so…
The Sacred Assembly – hearing the crowd behind me chant “Jesus…Jesus…” with the sky being electrically lit up in the offing, watching low fog clouds roll in while a fresh breeze cooled us. And seeing husbands and wives and youth groups serve each other communion and just stay and worship…long after Third Day and Skillet had rolled off the property.
The Kid’s area was a happening place! There was a mini-brob for the kids and jumpy castles-so much great stuff.
Kent Henry – my favorite worship leader of all time…got to hear him preach it up (very prophetic) and lead worship (Tristan played drums for him) and he prayed over my kids and spoke into their lives. He was there as a spiritual father, a worshiper who has impacted the worshipers who are putting HF on. We were so honored that he came.

Oh, it was a good day.

But mainly? I love that making the Name of Jesus glorious was what every. single. thing. was. all. about! Yes, Lord! Your kingdom come, Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven!

I am so loving and praising God for His faithfulness…Jeanie

NOTE TO SELF: Thank all the people who made this happen – no matter how long that takes. Watch for and tend to the fruit…

“The LORD has done this and it is marvelous in our eyes. This is the day the LORD has made; let us rejoice and be glad in it.” Psalm 118.23-24 NIV

www.heavenfest.com photos should be posted in a few days

People help…we are in awe!

August 5, 20091 Christ is All, 6 Looking Back // Memories!church, heaven fest 2009, prayer, prepJeanie

The Northern Hills Church building is a-buzz with full-swing prep for Heaven Fest 2009. Our friends and ministry partners are working their heads off, relentlessly committed to Jesus and this festival. We remind each other over and over that it is to make His Name glorious.

The pace is so hectic I forget to take pictures, but I want to remember, when it is all passed, with gratefulness. Here are a few things I will remember from 4 days before:

Stef-with-an-“f” and her crew lining up a thousand volunteers; Rocky on-the-go

Lots and lots of materials being delivered (including 10,000 mis-printed programs – yikes!)and Pam-the-intern making it all happen!

25 or so of us gathered on the veranda for 40 Nights of Worship and Intercession, praying, singing, reading the Word

O God, bless these people! Show up again and show Your glory and may these who have sweat and cried and toiled be blessed with the fruit of their labors. May they get to see that all of it has been worth it and that Your Name has indeed been made glorious!