GRAND DAUGHTERS ARE THE BEST……

Well I decided to help you all keep your faith in me, and show you that before I stamped again, I actually did clean the bathroom….here it is all shiney and clean. We have two, and I cleaned the other one too, but I didn’t take a picture of it. The house was completely clean when my true friends came from NY, and it was just the best catching up with them. Old friends who fit you like a glove…..what a special weekend. And after all, Keith got to unexpectedly come home in time to see them and then to stay right through Thanksgiving – that was the best. He had to leave Thanksgiving evening, but we had 3 whole days with him – it was awesome. Anyway- I didn’t stamp until all that was over. My new friend from the dentist’s office got very sick over the holiday so had to take a raincheck, but we will have her over soon. The day after Thanksgiving I had my friends from work over to stamp with me. It was a wonderful time of bonding, it’s good to do something besides WORK together. We stamped and laughed and ate and stamped some more – and of course I had to show them the Black Magic technique-thus
I promised no more Black Magic cards but there are two more in this post. To your left now is one of the cards I designed for my NY/NJ customers – if you click on it you can read the Wisdom from a Snowman part- it’s pretty cute. The best part about this card is using real twigs for his arms, actually I vamped them off the grape vine wreath on my front door – very handy. I actually spent my day Christmas shopping today. So different from last year when we had our kids living here…..and we got to see Layla girl for Thanksgiving and then Tovah and Lami for Christmas….it was so fun to shop knowing we would see them, but then two days after Christmas is when we said goodbye to our darling two grand daughters who went to Kenya with their parents. I remember the last few nights that Tovah and Lami spent here before they left, their sweet daddy let me put Tovah down to bed. She was in a stage of hating bedtime and wanted someone to read to her, etc. I would go up there and lay by her little toddler bed and read to her and sing to her….Tell me why the stars do shine, Tell me why, the ivy twines, tell me why the sky’s so blue, and I will tell you, just why I love you…….Because God made the stars to shine, because God made the ivy twine, because God made the sky so blue, Because God made you…that’s why I love you………and then Mr. Moon Mr. Moon you’re out too soon the sun is still in the sky, Go back to bed and cover up your head and wait till the day is night……and she would say Sing me another song Gramma, and after a night or two Davis gave me a limit of how many songs I could sing before telling her she just had to go to sleep, but one night before they left she woke up crying and cried out for me instead of her parents, I nearly thought my heart would BREAK in two…..and even as I am remembering I am crying a little here….I miss those girls as well as their cousins so much!! Anyway- the holidays last year were awesome knowing everyone was getting together and we saw all our kids between Thanksgiving and Christmas,,,,this year is kinda blue in comparison – but we won’t have that heart wrenching goodbye two days after Christmas. There’s so much pain in goodbye….isn’t there? On your left now is the other card/bookmark I made for my NY/NJ customers – it’s called a crossover card- and uses the awesome background papers…..those were fun to make though I would have liked to be AT the BACKWARDS workshop and see all my friends!! I’m getting kinda blue here, I better cheer up…..You know, for at least a month Keith and I had to keep the door to the little grand daughters room shut, we could not even go in there after they left…..it was like we were in mourning……it’s nice to know that your kids are where God wants them to be…..and you can be so peaceful in your heart knowing things are right, but you can still hurt really really bad. When I talk to Layla( in NY) or Tovah( in Kenya) on the phone and hear those precious little voices, man it smarts. Think of the olden days when families moved away from eachother, they didn’t know if they would ever see eachother again……at least being missionaries in this day and age you get to see your family more often and we are blessed to have email and telephones, I thank God everyday for that!! There’s another Black Magic card for you on your left -(it’s on MY left right now anyway) – Those are addictive!! Anyway- it was still fun to buy some warm things for Tovah and Lami today and of course Layla and Madison and Chloe always need warm things……I went to one store that I ALWAYS shop at and everything just looked ugly….did that ever happen to you? But then I went to Old Navy and just went nuts with the cute things they have!! Kids things- just adorable. I can picture our precious little girls in everything we bought them. Grand daughters are just the best. Wouldn’t know much about grandsons yet….don’t have any of those. Actually tho, I have a little nephew Malachi, first born of my only sister, who I can’t imagine loving a grandson anymore then!! I used to sing these songs to him too, and he would always make me sing the coo-coo part of one song where you coo like a bird over and over and it made me feel so silly but hey, it was his favorite part. He also lives far away now. Well, I think I will close on this last card with this – for Madison, and Chloe and Tovah and Layla and Lami……”Tell me why the stars do shine, Tell me why the ivy twines, Tell me why,,,,the sky’s so blue? And I will tell you just why I love you…….Because God made the stars to shine,,,,,Because God made the ivy twine, Because God made the sky so blue, Because God made you, that’s why…..I LOVE YOU. Happy Thanksgiving and Merry Christmas sweet Grand daughters….I hope the clothes we bought you will wrap right around you and hold you tight with a great big hug from Gramma Karen and Grampa Keith. We sure do love you. Good night girls. Sleep tight…..no more stories now, no more songs….go to sleep.