Christmas Letter 2020

Christmas greetings to our family and friends!  I want to write a Christmas letter without mentioning the C word, even though we all know it affected many things about our lives this year.  We still had many blessings and we still had many highlights and good times this year.

     We were blessed to host 20 students, 23 family members, 50 church folk, and 18 others as guests for meals in our home.  We even had 26 overnight guests.  Probably our governor would not have approved of every gathering, but we behaved pretty well when he was most insistent.
      We got to make a trip to South Dakota to see our oldest son and his family over the long July 4^th weekend.  This was our first time to see Mandylyn in person, when she was over 10 months old.  We had a great time with them.
      We were privileged to have a week’s vacation in northern Georgia in late July.  We were gifted a stay at a resort in the mountains.  The weather was really hot, but we still had a lot of fun together, hiked to a beautiful waterfall, were able to enjoy swimming, canoeing, paddle boating, a museum, quilt shop, and antique store.  We even had time to sit by the lake and read and relax.  We also saw 3 different sets of friends on the front end of the trip and toured a cave in Tennessee on the way home.
     Elizabeth had the opportunity to move to Bedford, Indiana to begin working for Evangelistic Faith Missions in mid-August.  She has enjoyed getting to know another group of God’s wonderful people there and is challenged daily by all the work there is to do for EFM and Shepherds Global Classroom.  We have gone there 3 times to help with various renovation projects at the office.  We are thankful that Elizabeth is content in knowing she is where God wants her to be and He is teaching her many things in her new work.
     All of our “away” kids and grandkids were with us for the August 23rd weekend to celebrate Elizabeth’s graduation with her BA and Jason’s graduation with his BA and MA from God’s Bible School and College.  We so much enjoyed having everybody together for the weekend.  The only drawback was that Jason and Karen were not with us in person for a reason I am not mentioning (see paragraph 1).  But we are very happy and proud of our graduates and we (finally) got pictures of them together when Elizabeth came home for her birthday weekend in September.

     Because of shorter work hours from mid-March to mid-August, I got time to make small quilts for the 4 youngest grandchildren who didn’t have a quilt from grandma yet.  I also made one for our Georgia friends’ new baby and a nap quilt for Elizabeth to have in her Indiana life.  Because my quilter has retired, I quilted these smaller quilts using one of our sewing machines and a walking foot.  Because my quilter offered her machine for sale, and it has long been a goal/dream of Rowen and I to have a long arm quilting machine, we plan to buy it from her on our New Year’s trip to Missouri!  We hope to learn how to quilt and save a lot of money by doing it ourselves.  Hopefully we will get experienced enough to quilt for other people too, someday.
    We had to have a new roof and a new furnace and air conditioner this year.  We are thankful to have those things done and trust that is the end of huge and expensive projects!
      We’ve always wanted to have a porch so we could have a porch swing.  This year the family got me a swing for Mother’s Day.  We have enjoyed it very much.
     We tried to have a family picture in August, because of our last one being from 2017 and we’ve gained 2 more grandchildren since then.  A couple of us were missing, but Emily photo-shopped them in.  You will be able to tell which ones’ faces are added in.  Hint:  it looks like they are wearing grass colored clothing.  But that is all of us until next year when we will be getting another grandchild.  
     We are thankful for all the blessings this year held, but most of all we are thankful for an unchanging God who is in control and is still the Answer that every one of us need.  We are so glad we are committed to His purpose in our lives.  We are so glad Jesus came to be our Savior, our Emmanuel, “God with us.”  We celebrate that! 

Love to all,
                   Janet and Rowen Albertson and family

PS I am so sorry I have been too busy to keep up my blog this year.  Please click on Emily's picture  on the side bar and look at hers.  She has been so much better keeping her blog updated.

Long overdue post

 Life has been too busy to blog.  Please look at Emily's blog to catch up with the details.  

We were blessed to have a vacation in Georgia the end of July.  Rowen's employers gave us a week at a time share.  That was such a blessing to get away and to have a place to stay and cook our own food, but fun things to do there and in the surrounding area.  We got to see our CO friends the Kauses who live in TN on the way.  We also got to see one of our "adopted" GBS kids (Jimmy) as we got into Georgia and to meet his family.  We got to see our lifetime friends, Kent and Ann, who graduated with Janet in 1979.  It was a lot of fun to go out on the lake with them, even though I disappointed Kent by not "driving" the tritoon.  At least Rowen and Emily bravely drove it and I had such a nice visit with Ann.  It was a privilege to have a vacation with Elizabeth and Emily.  

In August, Elizabeth moved to Bedford, Indiana to work for Evangelistic Faith Missions.  I went with her to get her settled.  She came back home for the weekend of August 22-23 for graduation.  All of our family was here together, except for Jason and Karen, who live so close, but not allowed to be out.  They were in quarantine.  We are so thankful that Jason has a very light case of Covid-19, with only loss of taste and smell as symptoms, but it was sad that he didn't get to be at his own graduation where he received two awards and his Bachelors and Masters degrees!  We were so looking forward to Elizabeth and Jason graduating from college together like they did high school back in 2011.  But it was sweet to have everybody else here for the short weekend.

                Elizabeth and Mishael, Randy's 5th.  They were making cards.  Mishael turned 4 on
                                                Grandma Janet's 59th birthday on the 24th.
                                
These were making birthday cards, get well cards, and graduation cards!  Elizabeth and Jason graduating, Mishael, Janet, Mandylyn, Karen, and Jason all having birthdays within days of each other, and Jason needing to "get well."   
                            
                                                    Of course, there were games to play...  

                            

It was wet on Saturday afternoon, so we played corn hole on our front porch!

Lots of visiting

Mandylyn (Randy's 6th) wanted to play the piano.

Looking at old photo albums:
Micah, Randy, Jeffrey, Lesa, and James
Elizabeth and Mandylyn on the swing

Elizabeth with Charissa, Mishael, Mandylyn, Jewelyn, and Jonathan.  All Randy's except Charissa is Tim's oldest.

On Saturday morning, we did some pictures at the park close to our house.  Our Assistant Pastor, Andy Stroud came to take the largest group pictures.  From the left, Jonathan, 8, Jewelyn, 6, James, 13, Mishael, 4, Mandylyn 1, Micah, 11.5, Piper 8 months, Felix, 4.5, and Charissa, almost 9.
Randy and Joy's family:  Jonathan, Micah, Mishael, Mandylyn, Jewelyn, and James
Tim and Brenda's family:  Piper, Charissa, and Felix
    Here is the whole group of us, minus Jason and Karen
Randy's four boys

The girl granddaughters

All the girls (except Karen) in the family

Jeffrey and Lesa

Our unclaimed treasures

Jonathan and Piper

Rowen and Janet

Emily, Randy, Jeffrey, Rowen, Janet, Tim, Elizabeth (missing Jason)

Randy and Tim with their precious little girls.

                                        

On Sunday was graduation.  It was a closed graduation, with only 6 people per graduate.  Because we had two graduates, 12 of us got to attend.  Everybody was supposed to have on masks.  Here is Elizabeth coming down the aisle.

Elizabeth after getting her diploma.

                            

Jason's name on the screen for his BA in Ministerial Education.
The program which shows all the graduates and their degrees.
Our family which was at the graduation
Rowen, Janet with Elizabeth

                            
                                            Elizabeth with her original family, except Jason

Emily and Elizabeth

Elizabeth with her diploma

Janet with her student secretary, Audrey Yoder, who graduated with an AA, and is back at school to work towards her BA.

That night when we videochatted with Jason and Karen.

That is probably enough for now.

Blogger changed how it works, so the spacing just will have to be the way it is...

July 4 weekend trip to South Dakota

We were all able to get off on July 3 - July 6 for a long weekend, so we decided to go to see Randy and Joy's family in Parkston, SD.  It had been over a year since they had been to Kentucky, and we had never seen Mandylyn in person since she was born August 26, 2019.

So we traveled from very early on Friday morning and arrived at their house at almost 9 p.m.  We packed in as much excitement and fun as we could the next two days and then came home all day Monday.  It was almost 2000 miles!

Mandylyn trying to get acquainted with Grandma.

 Elizabeth with Joy, Jewelyn and Mishael in Joy's kitchen.  Randy remodeled the house completely before they moved in.  This part of the kitchen was not even part of the kitchen.  It was part of the garage; but what he did was so helpful for more space and more storage.

 In the dining room.  It is a large room with two tables, and the portacrib behind Jewelyn.  Right behind me is going to be a breakfast bar, but right now it is the second table.

 Some of Joy's beautiful flowers!

 

 Micah in the tire swing

 Piggy back rides for all!

 

 Fun on the trampoline

Grandma's tradition to clip fingernails and toenails for the grandkids and tell them stories while I do it!

Joy showing Daddy her garden

 Games at the large dining room table

 Grandpa playing a game at the smaller table

 The girls all accidentally matched on Saturday.

 Mandylyn watching the goings on from her portacrib.

 Mishael trying out his new quilt from Grandma.  It is actually a great fit for his toddler bed!

 Lunch on the picnic tables under the pavilion.

 Afternoon swim time!

 Grandma did NOT want her hair to get wet, hence the pink shower cap...

 Joanna came after her shift at Wal-mart.  We were so happy to get to spend time with Joanna, as it's been a long time since we've seen her, except for Emily who drove to Illinois and surprised her with a visit in early June when she was at her parents' house.  Emily and Joanna are best friends, as well as aunts to these precious grandchildren of ours.

 Emily and Joanna with Jewelyn and Mandylyn

 Jonathan holding Mandy

 Jewelyn and her sweet sister!

 Micah and Mandylyn

 Suppertime after grilling burgers, hotdogs, and chicken!

 July 4th was very pleasant, not too hot or too humid.  It was a perfect day.

Elizabeth holding Mandy.

 Joy, Randy, Janet, and Rowen

 Mandy in the highchair

 The aunts' and kids' table

 Grandma and Mandylyn

 Playing at the park with the aunts

 Playing school

 Making home made ice cream!

 Yummy s'mores

Toasting the marshmellows 

 Yummy!

 James with his ice cream and strawberries

 Joanna with her marshmellow masterpiece

View from the tree fort 

 Mishael coming down the slide from the tree fort

 Jewelyn at the top of the tree fort

 Grandpa

Jonathan

Joy and Randy

James and Micah

 Fun on the trampoline

We walked to a close by park for fireworks.

 The beautiful moon while we waited for the fireworks.

Grandpa and Mandylyn ready for fireworks 

 It was a very nice fireworks show, especially for a small town!

This one looked like a bouquet.

The next morning was Sunday and we went to Ravinia to the reservation church Randy pastors.

 The day lilies were very beautiful and so is the little girl!

A handsome young lad named Jonathan

  A couple more beautiful ladies and the flowers.

We were early so we took turns playing the piano.

Elizabeth

 Micah

 James

 Grandma and Grandpa and six of their nine grandchidren

 Grandma and Grandpa and Mandylyn

 Aunts and the kids

 Joanna and Emily.  Emily and Elizabeth stayed at Joanna's house while we were there, so they had a wonderful time visiting with her there.

 We went to a lake after church for eating our lunch.  The kids are watching a boat get into the water at the boat ramp.  They are very interested in the process because this is where they bring their boat sometimes.

Jewelyn with two of her aunts

Eating the Sunday dinner we brought along in crock pots.

 Watching the water

After we got back to their house, Emily and James painted each painted a picture.

 Micah drew a vehicle

 Micah's truck

 The paintings complete!

 We went to Mitchell for Faith Missionary Church's service.  Randy's family sang a special song:  "Here am I, Lord, Send Me."

 After church, supper

 

 Time for bed.  Emily read the kids books and we had to say goodbye.  We packed it in and had to leave early in the morning.

 We are so glad we got to go and see them where they live now and get reacquainted with the kids.  It was a special time.

 Monday morning we started out early and the kids did not wake up to see us off like they wanted to.  They were worn out!

We stopped in Osklaloosa, Iowa at lunch time to eat with the McKays and Tonya Poe and her granddaughter.  The McKays furnished the food and we had a good, quick meal and visit with these dear ones.

 The young people's table.

 Waving good-bye until next time.

 We got home just after midnight.  It was a safe trip with light traffic.  We are so glad we got to go on this fast, short, long weekend trip!