Tag Archives: Family Life

Her First Phrase

1 Jun

SUNDAY MEMORIES

Judy Wills

 

                   JUDY

 

 

 

Our oldest daughter, Karen, was born in Germany, just two months after we arrived in country. We, of course, doted on her. The German lady who was the church nursery worker doted on her, as well. On our last trip in Europe before heading back stateside, Frau Katie stayed with Karen while we were gone. They both had such a good time together, that we weren’t missed at all.

As Karen was learning to speak/talk, we discovered that she was not only speaking English, but she had some German words mixed in there as well! Apparently Frau Katie was speaking to her in German! That was quite a revelation.

I really don’t remember Karen’s “first word” the way many children do. But I do remember her first phrase. Here’s how it came about:

My Mother came to visit us in Germany, while Karen was just 22 months old – a good time to be learning to speak. We squired Mom around as much of Europe as we could in the time she was with us, and usually took Karen with us. We had a great time together. As we would be driving along, Karen and Mom – in the back seat together – would be “conversing” together. And every now and then I would hear Mom say, “Karen, look at that flag!” We would be passing a building or house that was sporting a flag of some type, and Mom was pointing it out to her.

2

Mom’s time with us came and went far too quickly, and she returned to New Mexico. We had another year of our tour in Germany, and we returned to our routine. And as we would drive here and there, we would hear Karen say, “Look at that flag!” as she saw flags on buildings, just like when her “Oma” was with us. Gave us quite a chuckle to hear her say that, with the same inflection that Mother had given the phrase.

And that is what Karen’s first phrase was. What a fun memory that is!

 

 

 

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Does Anything Last Until the End

31 May

Walking by Faith, Not by Sight

Janet Perez Eckles

Goodness, spring is almost over and the spring cleaning isn’t done. Nudged by a bit of guilt, I rolled up my sleeves, and began with closets, then drawers. As I tossed out jars of who-knows-what in my bathroom drawer—old tubes of lipstick, creams that probably ended up there from when I was a teenager. But among the junk, to my delight, I found the little bottle of perfume I’ve been searching for for months. It was my favorite for its delicate, yet delicious scent.

 Without hesitation, I popped the glass lid off, brought it to my nose, and the scent was, well, blah. How could that fancy bottle of perfume lose its fragrance?

Visit Janet’s Blog and website Janet Perez Eckles  to read the end of this story.

 

 

 

His Way

 

 

 

 

 

Grateful for the privilege of inspiring you…

My website in English

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My story (video)

Inspirational video  just for you.

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Reflecting on Mother’s Day

20 May

Once again, we are blessed to have a post from Patricia Franklin. She is reflecting on her Mother’s Day experience this year. It touched my heart, I hope it touches yours too~Onisha

A Few Thoughts

Patricia Franklin

Mother’s Day – always a special day, especially when you don’t have any special expectations, but enjoy the blessings that come with the day. 
 Mine was great, simply because I got phone calls from all of my children — a rarity for me.  The boys usually call, but my daughter does not get that privilege very often.  We had a winter storm here for Mother’s day and it was cold, windy, rainy and snowy.  So I decided we would go to a movie.  We went to see “Heaven is for Real.”  I loved it.  The theater was full and everyone was crying by the end.  
The elderly lady next to me was huge, had a big box of popcorn and a gigantic drink. She also had a big bag.  Don’t know how she fit it all into her tiny seat. She was with her adult son.  At one time I might have remarked on the way she looked, but I have learned for the most part to look at people’s hearts and not the exterior.  Maybe it is my age, or maybe it is that working at a crisis center for so long, I have learned to see people the way they are inside.
At the end of the movie, the woman turned to me and said that she lost her husband two years ago.  The tears were streaming down her face as she continued “My son said he had to go first to prepare a place for me.”  I said “The children know”  (as in the movie) …  “I don’t know why the world finds it so hard to believe … it is really very simple.”  I had to leave the theater then, or lose my husband in the crowd.  So I patted her on the shoulder and left. 
It was very crowded exiting the theater. Usually everyone is in a hurry to get somewhere else fast, but something was different with this crowd.  Everyone was smiling and friendly and unhurried, instead of pushing and shoving and in a hurry to get out into that busy world again.  What a beautiful experience.  If only we had more uplifting experiences like this in our lives, imagine what would happen.
We then went to a restaurant and had dinner next to a family with two little red headed boys.  The smallest boy turned around in his high chair, smiled and spoke to me like he knew me.  We enjoyed watching the family so much and I told the Mom so as I left.  The little boy was blowing kisses to me and I thought how quickly they grow and are gone. This family seemed to treasure these precious moments.  It was very nostalgic to me and made my Mother’s Day very special.   A beautiful, simple day filled with love and care.

 

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Time is Going By Fast

19 May

1

My Take

DiVoran Lites

 

I’m surviving Bill’s being gone surprisingly well. I’ve only had a couple of moments of wondering what to do with myself. As you know, I enjoy solitude and I love being at home. I’m getting some blogs done and perhaps a bit of de-cluttering, though that isn’t going as I hoped, but who cares?

2Bill’s having fun too. He calls each night and gives me a report of his day’s doings and plans for the next day. It’s cooler in California than it is here, he layers his long sleeved shirt and his jacket. He’s taking notes for his blogs, so we can look forward to hearing all about his adventures.

Jacob is in Japan. He’s having a good time. He’s sending blogs and Face Book entries, though I’m not sure I’m either catching them all OR replying so that he hears back. His mother says the blogs make her laugh and cry. We may be extraordinarily well disposed toward Jacob, but we think he’s an excellent writer with a gift for humor.

Bill will be home on the 16th. By Thursday he had listened to unabridged books on his car C. D. At this rate the seven he took with him in especially purchased holders won’t last. Maybe he’ll get some music on the radio now that he’s near big cities in California and that will make his CDs last longer. He has developed a fondness for classical music. I’m not surprised, though I know he’ll always love Herb Alpert, Jackie Gleason, and Chet Atkins. He has such a good ear for music that when he started to take violin lessons as a child he could play by ear—that is until he fell out of a tree and broke his wrist. Did he really hate practicing that much?

The time is going by fast. I may “let” him go for this long again, though on the way to the airport I told him I wished he’d cut back to seven days. Neither of us has changed since we were eighteen. I always preferred a book, and he always preferred to be on the move. It’s wonderful that at this time of our lives we can pursue our passions while still having good times when we are together.

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I AM Breaking a Big Rule

15 May

Blackberry blooms copy

On the Porch 

Onisha Ellis

I am breaking a big rule of blogging today. I am going to ramble, go off topic, bounce around. I am NOT going to stay focused. Why oh why would I commit this crime? Because I can. Because that is what my brain is doing. So let’s rock and ramble!

 RAMBLE ONE

I enjoy eating boiled eggs. For seventy calories I can grab a God created protein snack. I do not enjoy boiling them and peeling them is even worse. So this Easter when Facebook was filled with posts about baking your eggs in the oven I joined the frenzy and tried. It worked!! They peel like a dream even a week after I baked them! My eggs had a slight brown spot on the egg white but it was very easy to flick off.

Here is the “recipe” and you can visit Unsophisticook! to read the complete story.

 

How to Bake Hard Boiled Eggs

 

Total Time: 40 minutes

Ingredients:

eggs

ice water

Instructions:

  1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
  2. Place desired number of eggs in a regular or mini muffin tin and bake for 30 minutes.

Remove eggs from oven and, using a pair of tongs (I like these tongs with rubber tips from OXO), immediately transfer the eggs to an ice water bath. Allow to cool down for at least 10 minutes.

RAMBLE TWO

I have been working my way through book blogger websites, looking for bloggers who would be willing to accept an ARC (advanced reader copy) of Rebekah Lyn’s (otherwise known as my daughter Beck) upcoming release, Jessie. I feel the same anxiety I felt when I left her with a babysitter, sent her off on her first sleepover and drove her to college. Do mothers EVER get over the instinct to protect their children? I am pretty sure I have spent more time praying over my children in their adult like than I did when they were little tykes.

If you happen to be a book blogger or just enjoy reading and reviewing, speak up in comments and I will email you an ARC.

I am humbled and thankful that my BFF Pam has joined the Rebekah Lyn Books team as a marketing and Publicist assistant. Launching Jessie and planning Teas has so many elements to pull together, I was feeling totally overwhelmed.

RAMBLE THREE

My heart has been filled with prayers for a sweet thirteen year old, Kylie Myers who is receiving chemo for a rare cancer. You can visit her Facebook page Smiiey For Kylie. She has had a rough time adjusting to having cancer and the side effects of chemo.

Her dad is author Mark Myers who wrote Virgil Creech Takes a Swipe at Redemption.

When I think of Kylie, I wish she could meet my friend Wanda and her daughter, Allie who has been on a similar chemo schedule with Kylie. Allie shines with joy and confidence in Christ and my faith is made stronger when I see her on Facebook rocking the headscarf or sporting the smooth head style with her brother.

That’s the end of my ramble. There is a lot more in my brain such as why does the male cardinal insist on constantly banging his head on anything shiny, but that is for another day. Our blackberries are in full bloom and the locals say if we get a frost while they are blooming, our winter will be called a blackberry winter. Temps are expected to drop this weekend so we will see, I like blackberry blossoms because they remind me the flower of life is beautiful and even though there will be thorns, the fruit will be delicious.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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A Time To Be Alone

5 May

Kitty

My Take

DiVoran Lites

Bill got to the airport by 6:00 a. m. We talked all the way there so the forty-five minute trip went quickly. I have been encouraging his sixteen-day trip because I want him to feel free to do what he wants to do, just as he encourages me. But on the way, I let him know that I wished he wouldn’t go for so long. He said he wouldn’t always; he thought about ten days would be good in future. I think so too, though I must admit I am looking forward to being alone, but not alone during this time.

Being seventy-five and seventy-six, and having been married fifty-six years—being first-born perfectionist, control-freaks requires a lot of discussion, and a great deal of give and take. Brush fires flare, but are soon snuffed out by love and forgiveness. Above all we know how blessed we are to have had each other and our family for all these years without any major disasters. But still…we’re both independent and we both like things to go our way. It’s the little things.

After I got home I spent time with my journal, reheated the coffee I took along, had an egg and toast and went back to bed for an hour. The first thing I did when I got up was to take all Bill’s pills off the dining room table and put them in his room out of my way. I set up my book prop and a couple of books as a reading station for meals, moved the large rug in the studio to a spot I like, and started a new shopping list. Some things I want to buy myself but he’s so efficient at taking the list and going to the store that I find them delivered before I even go out. What I want right now and have been wanting for a long time is a new kitty litter scoop, chosen by me. See what I mean about it being the little things?

I had to laugh when I sat down at the computer. There are a few things that bug Bill no end, so he left me this:

DiVoran—Please use this checklist while I am gone-Thanks.

  1. Lock all doors at bedtime.
  2. Lock all doors when you go for your walk.
  3. Turn off the water after you water your plants &flowers.
  4. Make sure refrigerator door is closed before you go to bed at night.
  5. Take out the trash on Friday mornings-No recycle until I get back.
  6. Turn off coffee-tea makers & cup warmers before bedtime. (I guess that means I’m allowed to forget and leave them on all day.)

Love ya,

Bill

So for two whole weeks now we are free. He will drive, drive, drive in the deserts and mountains of the Southwest and I will write, write, write in my comfortable house that I love.

Ecclesiastes three is a popular chapter and I use it a lot. I believe there is a time for everything. I like it that in our marriage there is a time to be together and a time to be alone. I’m glad also that there is more time together than alone and that we still have each other after all these years.

1 wedding

 

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Teodor Flonta~Memories of Easter in Transylvania

19 Apr

On Facebook today my friend, Teodor Flonta shared  his childhood Easter traditions growing up in Romania during a Communist regime. With his gracious permission, I am sharing them with you~Onisha Ellis

From Teodor

 

HAPPY EASTER! 
to all my friends from around the world with #Tasmanian eggs coloured with onion skin, just as my Mama used to do long time ago when I was a little boy in #Transylvania! You can read an excerpt from ‘A Luminous Future’ about my Easter there.

Mama borrowed an old Bible from Piţurca, the only one in the whole village, and started reading to me in the evening. On Thursday night, we would creep into the church, terrified that we would be seen and reported to Comrade Petroi. The church was dimly lit. We would sit on the cold and hard floor in front of the altar, jumping at any slight flicker of the shadows. Father Iordan said that we were like the early Christians, who had to practise their religion in secret. At the end, we would leave only after checking that nobody was on the road. This went on until Easter Thursday, when we were allowed to hammer on the toaca until sunset, to announce the death of Christ. The toaca was a 20cm wide board on a 2m pole in the church courtyard. After sunset, neither hammering on the toaca nor the ringing of bells was allowed until Sunday, the day of the Resurrection.


On Easter Sunday women placed little baskets full of coloured hard-boiled eggs and cross-shaped loaves of white bread in front of the altar for the blessing. The children, dressed in white shirts, took the first Communion in front of the congregation. However, the spectacle we were waiting for was to come later in the church courtyard during the frenzied egg-cracking competition. We wrapped one hand across our egg, exposing only the pointy end, and hit each other’s eggs hard. If your egg cracked, you lost your egg.

“Mircea, I bet I can take away your eggs,” I challenged him outside the church.


He gave me a push and responded, “Try this, smarty.”


I tried and lost.


“You want to try another one?” he asked.


I suspected he was so confident because there was something fishy about his egg. So I accepted the challenge, pulling out from my pocket my special egg. I hit hard and a funny, thick sound, not at all like the sound of an egg cracking, was the result.

What did you do, stupid? You have a wooden egg,” said Mircea.


I ran away laughing.


“And yours is filled with pitch. I could hear it,” I said.

 

Transylvanian born Teodor Flonta is a retired academic, author of ‘A Luminous Future’ – a memoir about life under Communism in the 1950s and 60s – and of multilingual proverb dictionaries and apps (available on iTunes and Google). He lives in Tasmania, Australia, with his wife, Ariella, surrounded by beautiful grandchildren.

 

You can find Teodor’s books on:  AMAZON   BARNES AND NOBLE

 

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A Small Serendipity

13 Apr

SUNDAY MEMORIES

Judy Wills

JUDY

                                                    

I really love the serendipities that happen in our lives at times. Some are so large they just overwhelm us when they happen. Others are just sort-of average, but just enough different to make us sit up and take notice. And then there are the small ones. Those that just happen in a flash…and then are gone, leaving us to wonder how/why did that happen?

Fred and I experienced that just recently when we went to Disney’s Magic Kingdom. Busy day – lots of high school bands around – lots of Senior Trips around – kids in the same color t-shirts. We usually enjoy seeing these groups. Most of them are not terribly rowdy, and are just having a great time.   Occasionally we see them doing the “flash” thing – breaking into song or the “wave” or something like that.

We had just finished a ride and were on our way to lunch, when a young man caught up with us and said, “would you be my stand-in parents?” We stopped and I asked why? He said his parents had just gone on a ride but he couldn’t get on, so….. I began laughing and ask him what we could/should do. He hesitated a minute then said, “how about a hug?” And so that’s what we did – a group hug for the three of us – all of us laughing at the same time.

And then he was gone.

I told Fred he was probably dared to do that by some of his classmates, but that was okay. It was a fun thing.

MUCH later, I told Fred we should have told this young man that we couldn’t be his stand-in parents, but would stand-in GRANDparents work? Nothing slow about me!

Disney

 

 

 

 

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Gorging on Green Beans

7 Apr

My Take

DiVoran Lites

 

Author, Poet and ArtistGreen beans have almost no calories, but they’re full of nutrition and are some of those all important fruit and veggies we hear so much about. Our grocery store has wonderful fresh pole beans, right now. We’ve had them twice. But no matter how fresh veggies are, if they aren’t properly cooked and deliciously seasoned, they can be practically tasteless.

One of the weight loss plans we’ve been on, taught us to stop eating when we felt full. Another (the HCG plan) showed us that our weight was more affected by carbohydrates than by anything else. Of course, that included the supposedly magical whole grains we love. Now we try for one small piece of bread or a rice cake a day, and we’re keeping the weight off.

I was brought up to believe that for supper you should have

1 meat dish

1 salad (it could be canned pears on a lettuce leaf and some cottage cheese)

1 cooked vegetable (where I came from they were always canned, but later I sometimes served frozen)

1 carb, usually rice, pasta, or potato, sometimes two if you count the bread

1 dessert (half the time it was JELL-O®

I tried to feed my family that way. I think most American moms, in that era did.

In later years, it was hard for us become accustomed to fresh vegetables. I didn’t know how to cook them and because we didn’t use them fast enough they went bad in the refrigerator. Now we say, “Hmm, this broccoli, spinach, or asparagus, these artichokes, carrots, or green beans, are wonderful!Yes, we have learned to cook and season them properly. We cook them in one of three ways: pressure cooker, microwave steamer, or pot on the stove. For seasoning we use bit of salt, a chopped up garlic clove, and herbs. We grow basil, tarragon, thyme, rosemary, marjoram, and oregano. We have a chart that tells which foods go with which herbs, but we’re doing a lot of experimenting on our own. Every combination we’ve tried so far has been good. The only other dish we have for supper is our meat. All protein is the same except for fat count. Yes, we seem to be carnivores, maybe someday we’ll switch to vegetarian, but maybe not. Anyhow, we have semi-healthy snack in the evening and eat a few nuts. And our weight, blessedly, is holding well.

Oh, and by the way, we asked our internist who is well educated in nutrition whether we had to eat a large variety of vegetables or not, and she told us it wasn’t necessary. We buy the ones we like and for the present our weight and the food we eat are flowing together nicely. What a relief!

How do you feel about vegetables?

Green beans

 

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Frau Katie

30 Mar

SUNDAY MEMORIES

 Judy Wills

Judy Wills

 

I’ve mentioned Frau Katie before (September 1, 2013), and how we came to love her as part of our family. She was such an important part of our lives when we lived in Wiesbaden, Germany.  I also mentioned in that blog, that she came to visit us when we lived in San Antonio, Texas.  We wrote many letters back and forth to arrange a time for her to visit. She also had some other friends in the States to visit, so she would be with us for one week, then she would move on to visit her other friends.  The time was set – May of 1973.

 

Frau Katie with Judy, Karen and Janet. Along the River Walk in San Antonio, Texas

Frau Katie with Judy, Karen and Janet.
Along the River Walk in San Antonio, Texas

 

Katie began asking what she could bring us from Germany – to remember our time there, as well as a remembrance from her.  I don’t remember just what I told her to bring for me – I just wanted her presence with us again.  But I distinctly remember that I flippantly told her to bring Fred “a Mercedes Benz!”

Well, she did just that!!  Isn’t it a beauty? All those moving parts…….

2

Fred has had such fun with that little car, and it sits on our bedroom dresser where he/we can see it every day.  Our older grandson always enjoyed playing with it when he came to visit.  I’m sure our younger grandson will do the same. I’m not sure he’s discovered it yet.3

 

 

In spite of the fact that I didn’t really ask for anything from Katie, she brought me a lovely present anyway.  It is the 1973 Hummel plate.

 

 

4

 

I have always enjoyed the Hummel figurines I have, but this is really special. Somewhere along the line I was told that this year’s plate (1973) had something unique about it……..but for the life of me I can’t remember what it was!

 

In any case, I have it on a easel in our dining room side board, and enjoy looking at it. And I always think of Frau Katie and her generosity when I look at it.

 

 

 

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