Firsts, Needs & Update

We have a busy week ahead with the anticipation of our oldest son's graduation party on Friday. We are getting lots of help with it which I am so thankful for. It looks like our Michigan weather is going to be much cooler this week, which will help greatly! The hot humid weather is very draining!

We had some more firsts to go through this past weekend. It was Danish Festival here, which we have gone to for over 10 years. The last several years our older boys have helped set up booths on mainstreet in town for the crafters. This was the first time, without Matthew. We got several cards in the last few days from those on the crafting committee, just finding out about Matthew, and missing him. But the sting was real again, as we moved through more firsts, remembering last year. There is a big parade in town during the festival, and after it last year, we went to visit him at the dime store he worked at. The tears came easy for both Norm & I this weekend, but by God's grace and mercy, once again, we made it through it. Every year we are able to set out items at friends on the main route into town, so Norm was able to sell several mowers, which was a great blessing. We sold the last litter of pups we took in, and as I was selling the last one this morning, Norm was taking a new litter to the vet! The timing was so good. After over a month with no pups, we are thankful that it has picked up. Aren't you amazed when you know it's God's timing and not ours - when God wants to show HE can provide - and it's not of our doing? We've seen that so much.

Our youngest son, Benjamin, got a bad case of either poison ivy or poison oak. None of our children have ever gotten this before. I think he's making up for the rest of his siblings. It's covered one leg in particular and under one arm. He keeps bathing and changing sheets, and it seems to be healing, but he's been struggling with it for almost two weeks, so pray that this heals for him. It's quite irritating to him.

We have had so many ask where we are at with the remodeling and what we still need. We just updated our needs page, and would rather just to try to keep that updated, than posting so much of that here. :)

As I've shared numerous times, Matthew's favorite song was "I Can Only Imagine", by MercyMe. I received this link to a really neat video/musical to this song. It takes awhile to load, but well worth it. It's beautiful, and hope you enjoy it like we did.