Our Anniversary

Yesterday, December 29, it was 35 years that we've been married.

Who could have known when we set the date for 4 days after Christmas that 35 years later it would be a good time to get away! Between Christmas and New Year's has been great every year for some down time. Since moving back to NJ 22 years ago, we discovered Walnut Valley in Lancaster County, a quiet little spot that brings back peace to the soul. So we spent 2 1/2 days there - just chillin'.
I read through 2 whole books, plus we took a hike in Pa. state gamelands nearby and went out to eat at Lily's in Ephrata - a nice restaurant with ambiance.

When life is busy with lots of stress
Where can we go to find God's caress?
A place to reflect and be restored,
Back to the loving arms of our Lord?

Walnut Valley

Party Time

It seems like we've had more parties than usual this December.

On the 17th, we had a Christmas lunch and gift exchange at the office with most of the staff - pastors, secretaries, interns. There were 16 present at that. I organized the meal but had help from the ladies and girls. The food included: hot turkey and cheese sandwiches, tortilla soup, a variety of salads and a beautiful display of different kinds of Christmas cookies.

I only worked 2 days on Christmas week: Monday and Wednesday. And Wednesday was surprisingly quiet so I was able to get everything done with time to spare. We had 2 Christmas Eve services this year and both were well attended. The church was full both times. I love that service each year - simple yet meaningful, remembering the birth of our dear Lord.

I puttered in the kitchen all Christmas day. Andy and I were by ourselves with occasional visits from his Mom and Dad. They went to a son's family's house for Christmas brunch, and another son's for Christmas dinner. Andy worked a little on the front porch and finished the railing around it. It was a beautiful day, absolutely no breeze with a brilliant sun, so we were able to relax a little in mid-day. With the sun shining on the front of the house, we didn't even need our coats on.In between relaxing, I cooked the Christmas turkey, made 3 batches of rolls (6 dozen), made a cheese ball, set the tables, etc...getting ready for our family dinner on Friday.

The girls and their families arrived late morning on Friday for our Wallin family gathering. We ate dinner at noon, then opened presents and enjoyed being together.

What a blessing a loving, accepting family is. How good and pleasant it is when brothers live together in unity! (Psalm 133:1)

Then on Saturday off we went to another party. This one at my brother's north of Reading, PA. All of our girls and their families were there again, as well as a nephew (and family) from Texas, a niece (and family) from California, another nephew (and family) from New York, a niece from D.C. area, a nephew on leave from the service, etc. It was a huge gathering and very good to be with some of these relatives whom we hadn't seen for a number of years.

I had a conversation with a great nephew from Texas. I asked him if he knew who I was. He said, "No." I told him I was his grandpa's sister. He looked shocked. He had no idea his grandpa had a sister. Then I told him that he and Grace (we were all playing a game together) were second cousins. Neither Grace nor Jordan had any idea they were related and wondered what a second cousin was.

I'm very thankful for all my brothers and sisters, their children and grandchildren, and for the privilege we have of getting together and enjoying one another's fellowship.So are the parties over? Will this be a quiet week? Well, as you can see by the Daisy Counter, we celebrate our 35th wedding anniversary tomorrow! Quite a milestone! We will be celebrating, but I'll report on that later.

Merry Christmas!

While they were [in Bethlehem], the time came for the baby to be born, and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn. (Luke 2:6 & 7)

I love this picture.

Remember all the feelings that you experienced when your first child was born! How tender, how loving you felt toward this precious little one. Now imagine how much more Mary's feelings were magnified when she thought about giving birth to the LORD, naming Him Jesus because He would save His people from their sins!

AWESOME!

Baby, it's cold outside!

Do you think global warming is taking a break this year?

Brrr! Sunday morning when we got up, there was ice everywhere. I'm very thankful I can park my car in the garage because I don't have to scrape ice or snow off the windows before taking off. When I got to church the phones were ringing with people calling to ask if church was canceled. We rarely cancel (never say "never"), in fact, we still had all three services. Attendance was down by only 100 or so - 1,100 this week. I took some pictures, but I'm almost embarrassed to post them after looking at Christian's. They had a lot more ice than we did here in NJ.

The fountain grass in our garden by the street

white pine tree at the church

Just for kicks and grins, I watched the temperature on my car thermometer yesterday morning as I drove to work. When I got in the car (in the garage), the temperature was 46 degrees. One mile/two minutes later as I pulled into the church parking lot, the temp had gone down to 24 degrees. And it was actually 19 degrees. I was glad to get into the nice warm office.

The water in our pond is pretty low right now, but what is there is frozen.
Andy made a lot of progress on our front porch today. It was so cold, I don't know how he could stand it, but he worked all day till around 3:00. Then, believe it or not, he went for a bike ride. He came back from that pretty frozen!

Isn't it looking good!

Scents, Aromas & Odors

A week ago yesterday, Christy came over with her tribe and had a candle party at my house. She had mailed out over 70 invitations, but we had decided a little last minute to go ahead with it, so not a lot of people came. She had a nice display set up and a number of candles did get sold. I think there were about 5-10 people who came.

Having all those scents around reminded me of a book I had read a number of years ago. It was Reforming Marriage by Douglas Wilson.

I really like this book and have referred to it a number of times over the years. It's about marriage, in case you couldn't guess. Of far more significance than burning candles that produce a pleasant aroma in the home is the spiritual aroma of our homes. Douglas Wilson says in his introduction:

"And walk in love, as Christ also has loved us and given Himself for us, an offering and a sacrifice to God for a sweet-smelling aroma." Ephesians 5:2

How would you describe the spiritual aroma of your home? When visitors arrive, before virtually anything is said or done, what is one of the first things they notice about your family? In many cases, it is the aroma. Do they feel as though a bad attitude crawled under your refrigerator and died? Or do they think someone has been baking spiritual bread in the kitchen all afternoon?

Perhaps the one living in the home is not in the best position to answer this question. Aromas are the sorts of things one gets used to. The residents usually do not notice those things that immediately strike a visitor. So if there is an offensive aroma in the home, it can sometimes be a difficult problem to solve. No easy formula of resolution is available. Nevertheless, the Bible does teach on the subject. The text noted above says that when Christians walk in love they are imitating Christ, and the sacrifice of Christ is a pleasant aroma to God. Similarly, a Christ-like home atmosphere produces this sort of aroma before God and consequently before man.

In other words, keeping God's law with a whole heart (which is really what love is) is not only seen in overt acts of obedience. The collateral effect of obedience is the aroma of love. This aroma is out of reach for those who have a hypocritical desire to be known by others as a keeper of God's law. Many can fake an attempt at keeping God's standards in some external way. What we cannot fake is the resulting, distinctive aroma of pleasure to God.

In the home, where should this wholehearted obedience begin? Where should the aroma originate? Jesus taught us, with regard to individuals, that cups must be cleaned from the inside out. If we apply this principle to the home, we should see that the "inside" of a family is, of course, the relationship between husband and wife, as they self-consciously imitate the relationship of Christ and the church. John Bunyan once exhorted husbands to be "such a believing husband to your believing wife that she may say, 'God has not only given me a husband, but such a husband as preaches to me every day the way of Christ to His church.'" The health of all other relationships in the home depends upon the health of this relationship, and the key is found in how the husband is treating his wife. Or, put another way, when mamma ain't happy, ain't nobody happy.

You get the idea. I am so thankful for Andy, my dear husband. God blessed me incredibly in giving us to each other. He really does love me unconditionally and sacrifically, a wonderful example of how Christ loves the church. I feel totally loved and accepted in the beloved. Because of this, I am so motivated to treat him with respect and do all I can to serve him and make him happy. That reminds me of a young man who was in our small group who told us the best piece of advice he ever got was at his wedding. A friend of his whispered in his ear as he stood in the receiving line: "don't forget: happy wife, happy life!"

So as much as I like to burn the vanilla coffee candle, the much greater challenge is to constantly check my attitude and heart before the Lord. Is the aroma of love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control permeating our home?

Christmas Cookies!

Tomorrow we're having our office staff Christmas party. We will be exchanging gifts and having lunch together. I organized the party but all of the women are making and bringing dishes. We're all bringing a dozen Christmas cookies. I thought it would be fun to bring my favorite Christmas cookie, so I asked my mother for the recipe she uses. When she sent it, I told her she should ask her boss (her son!) for a day off, then come down and help me make them. She took my advice and came down Monday afternoon and had dinner with us. After dinner I mixed up the dough and refrigerated it overnight.

This morning after breakfast we started on the cookies. We had a pretty good system going: Mother rolled out the dough and cut the cookies. I decorated them and put them in the oven. When they were done, I took them out of the oven and put them on racks to cool.
After the first couple of batches came out of the oven, the smoke alarm started blaring. Believe it or not, the oven temperature was up to 550 degrees! Yikes! Not this again. So I turned off the oven, let it cool down, then turned it back on. And it worked fine the rest of the morning. But I had Andy call the repair people to set up an appointment for them to come out to see what's the problem.

We got lots and lots of cookies made. I'll be taking a lot more than 1 dozen tomorrow for our party, then we'll have lots for our family Christmas, too. And Andy and I will probably be eating lots between now and then!

In other news, our Living Nativity made it into the Courier Post on Monday's front page. They have some really nice pictures that you can check out. The sets and costumes really look good this year. We'll have 3 more nights that it will be showing: Friday, Saturday and Sunday this coming weekend.

Party Animals

There's a lot of partying going on in the Wallin household lately. On Wednesday, Dec. 3rd, I was responsible for another Ladies' Night Out. It was our church's Christmas party. We had about 80 women attend with games and fun activities, food (of course!) and an inspirational Christmas story.

Building Snow-women!

Then on Wednesday, Dec. 10th Andy and I both went to a couples event at church. There were probably about 150 people who attended that. We were supposed to work together as a couple to build our house. Actually the "house" was already built of cardboard and we were supposed to decorate it with things that were provided. Ours was pretty plain, neither of us are idea people: just plain vanilla. But some of the others were pretty amazing with what they were able to accomplish with the same materials we had. It was still fun (I think!).

And here is the finished product "proudly" displayed on our kitchen table. Fortunately, I took this picture before a certain someone came over and ate the tootsie roll chimney.

Yesterday C & C and their 5 children came over and spent the day with us. I had an open house for Christy's candles. We had munchies and snacks all day as people came and went, looking at and buying candles. Then I fixed a baked ziti dinner with a salad before going over to walk through our church's Living Nativity.

After church this morning, Tommy & Dawn came over to have our usual Sunday brunch: omelettes and waffles. Another young man from church joined us, as well. Then Andy and I hurried back to church: I to "man" the phones, Andy to trouble shoot for another night of our Living Nativity.

This week promises to be busy and full, too. My mother is coming down Monday afternoon to spend the night and bake cookies with me on Tuesday. Then Wednesday, we're having our staff Christmas party. Friday, Saturday and Sunday nights next weekend are the final 3 nights of our Living Nativity. It has been very well attended this year and we could have a record year if the weather continues to be nice.

Merry Christmas!

I got our Christmas letters out in Tuesday's mail, wrapped presents until I ran out of wrapping paper and tonight we put up our Christmas tree! Yeah!

Offering

I told Andy I was a working fool today. Whew! I'm glad to finally sit down and relax a little.

Andy left the house this morning at 6:30 to go to C & C's again to help Christian with their building project. That left me home alone all day long. But I wasn't lonely or bored. I filled my day with laundry, cleaning house and baking. It's a good feeling to have a clean house - too bad it doesn't last long. (Although it lasts longer now than it did when there were more people who lived here.)

Every Wednesday we have a staff meeting at church. Whenever anyone has a birthday, I make a cake and we celebrate as part of the meeting that week. Well, this week there are 2 birthdays! Pastor Jim's is today; Pastor Ralph's is Friday. Ralph likes carrot cake and Jim prefers cherry pie to cake. So today I made a carrot cake and a cherry pie. We'll party hearty tomorrow!
I also spent some time outside mid-day stringing Christmas lights on all our bushes along the driveway and in front of the kitchen. It's kind of hard to tell but the lights are on. They really look nice now that it's dark.

On Sunday we sang a song that I've been meditating on all week. It's called Offering, written by Paul Baloche:

The sun cannot compare to the glory of Your love
There is no shadow in Your presence,
No mortal man would dare to stand before Your throne,
Before the Holy One of heaven,
It's only by Your blood and it's only through Your mercy,
Lord, I come...

I bring an offering of worship to my King,
No one on earth deserves the praises that I sing;
Jesus, may You receive the honor that You're due,
O Lord, I bring an offering to You.

The song reminded me of Romans 12:1:
Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God -- this is your spiritual act of worship.

Amy tagged me to put on the 5th picture in my 5th folder, so here it is:
My 5th folder was our Norway trip and this picture was taken the first day we were driving. We stopped along the road at this place to take a picture of this waterfall that was roaring off the top of the cliff.

Now I tag Mother and Dawn.

It's Tuesday Again

If you read Christy's blog you know she took Patrick to the neurologist yesterday. I went with her to watch the other kids while she was in the appointment with him. I worked about 2 hours in the morning, then left to go up to her house. In spite of the fact that it was mid-morning, traffic was still pretty awful. I got there just in time to help her get shoes and coats on the kids, then off we went. The appointment was with an extension of CHOP and was about 45 minutes away from their house. When we got there, the 3 oldest kids and I stayed in the outer waiting room while she took Patrick and Asher with her to an examination room. There was a TV in the waiting room and just as we got there, a video started: Peter Pan. Because the kids rarely watch TV, they were mesmerized through the whole movie. So there really wasn't much for me to do except watch it with them. I could have left and I don't think they would have noticed! That's how tuned in to the movie they were.

After the appointment, I came on home, then went in to the office for another 45 minutes before calling it a day.

Andy worked today on the front porch. It's looking good. He finished the siding, put in the lights and hung the shutters again. Then this afternoon he prepared to put the railing up. He dug and poured concrete for the posts that will hold the railings at the bottom of the steps.

So what did I do today? Well, my house needed a good cleaning and laundry needed to be done. I also took the Thanksgiving turkey carcass, put it in a pot, covered it with water, added an onion and a couple stalks of celery and cooked it about an hour. I was able to get more meat off the bones, as well as 3 quarts of broth. So we'll have turkey for a couple more meals.
The rest of the week promises to be busy, so I don't know when I'll be back.