Christmas Letter 2024

 Dear Family and Friends,

Christmas greetings and love to all of you from our family!  

We are blessed more than we can fathom.  God has been so good to us.  Our friends and family have stood by us with prayers, visits, food, gifts…God has used all of you to get us safely through another year!

Because of Janet’s health, we had more visits this year from friends and family, some from long distances!  In March all our kids were home together for most of a week.  That visit was due to bad news from an MRI, and wondering how much longer we would all be together.  But God… Apparently, He wrought a healing in those new areas of concern, because they haven’t showed up since.  In February, we had a chair lift installed on the stairs to the basement, and it has enabled much quilting to begin again!

Emily got to stay for a week after the siblings left, and she helped Janet get started piecing quilts again!  We got 2.5 quilt tops made that week.  The first quilt was quilted from the wheelchair, and wasn’t the best job ever, but after that, the quilting became part of the therapy for starting to walk again. By the end of November, a total of 15 quilts have been made and delivered to the ones for whom they were made!!  

The last 5 were quilted on a new longarm Moxie 15 Handi Quilter.  For years, we have been watching for a quilting machine that could quilt bigger swaths at a time than the one we had, which could only quilt 6-7 inch swaths.  This fall, we got an email with a “too good to be passed up” price and we felt clearly that was God’s provision for us.  It has been amazing and fast and trouble free to have the new machine quilting 11 inch swaths at a time! 

In April, Randy’s family visited us on their way to the Interchurch Holiness Convention in Gatlinburg, TN.  It was good to see all their family, as only Randy had come in March.  Then Janet’s three sisters and one sister-in-law came and spent several days so we could have IHC online together.  We watched services on the computer monitor in the living room, played games, quilted, laughed, and made new memories.  The girls did all of the cooking.  Rowen didn’t know how he would handle a house full of women, but he had a great time!  We laughed until we were nearly in tears.  What a great endorphin time we had!

The end of April, Elizabeth moved home to be a blessing to her parents.  Her work for Shepherds Global Classroom (SGC) is all online, so she works from home.

In June, Janet started walking with a cane and driving again, so we went on a road trip to see her Daddy in Columbia, Missouri!!  We hadn’t known if Janet would ever drive again, or if we would ever make a trip again, but God… We had a wonderful time, and got to see Tim’s family and Emily, as well as several of Janet’s siblings.  It encouraged Daddy to see us again.

Jeffrey and Lesa flew to visit us for a few days in July, and timed their return to help our friends move/drive to a new pastorate in TX!  So that was a huge blessing.

Later in July, Emily came from Tulsa for a week’s visit.  Her visit coincided with our church’s VBS, which both of the girls enjoyed helping with.  While Emily was with us, her friend called to tell Emily her apartment complex was on fire!  This was a scary time, as she had only brought a carry-on bag with her, and there were possessions she feared for.  But God… As she had walked out the door of her apartment, she had prayed for God to watch over everything in it.  And He did!!  The fire stopped in the attic just outside of her apartment.  Her apartment did have smoke damage and was a mess from the attic insulation in the rooms where the firefighters poked holes in the ceilings.  Her violin and pencil drawings were in perfect condition, and her clothes and so many other things were salvageable. God also protected her fireproof box and keys from being stolen.  Neighbors’ homes were looted, but nothing was missing from Emily’s home, though there was evidence someone had trespassed.  

Emily was blessed by a dear older lady who let her live with her for several weeks.  When the residents were finally allowed into their apartments to retrieve what they could salvage, Tim and Emily’s pastor’s wife went with her into the hot, stinky apartment.  Someone in the complex opened their refrigerator, and immediately the stench was much, much worse!!  It was a hard day, but God was so good to allow the things that mattered most to her to be saved.  

There was a dear lady who went to heaven about that time and some of her furniture was donated to replace what Emily had to leave behind.  God had His handprints over the whole situation.  We were able to make another trip to Missouri to get the furniture and help Emily move into her new apartment in August!!  On the move-in day, there were so many helpers, many from Happy Hands Education Center where Emily works.  There was a lot of sign language going on!  It was so good to meet many of Emily’s co-workers.  We got to go to church with Emily that Sunday morning.  Then in the evening, we went to the church where she is helping with interpreting services for a Deaf ministry. We got to see the Deaf Jesus Film that night.  It was very impactful!

We feel like Emily is in a safer place in her new apartment, and she has the blessing of having her own washer/dryer.  She has had several friends over for meals and games, and even had overnight guests recently!  God is so good!

We had several highlights in September.  Early in the month, we went to friends’ wedding in Pennsylvania.  We enjoyed the weekend away and the PA fall colors. Another event was hosting Jeffrey and Lesa and the Houston SGC team for the weekend.  We enjoyed getting to know new friends who are working in that part of God’s kingdom.  We also had a 5-week quilt club for GBS students; two girls came every week and completed a table runner and four placemats!

In October, Rowen and Janet had a few days away celebrating our 41st anniversary.  We went to the Red River Gorge area in Kentucky and enjoyed our sweet AirBnB and the skylift to the top of the Natural Bridge.  While we were gone, Emily flew home and drove to Niagara Falls with Elizabeth and a dear friend from church.  Then Emily had a week at home with us. 

Besides lovingly caring for Janet, cooking, and cleaning our home, Rowen has been able to resume helping others who needed his shopping and handyman services because of Janet’s improved health and mobility.  We are enjoying being retired.  Janet had the privilege of editing several books for friends this year and continues to help online with the God’s Revivalist magazine.

It has been our joy to resume our Sunday hospitality ministry since Elizabeth moved home.  We have enjoyed having some of our church folk and GBS students over for food and fellowship.  We’re thankful for this privilege!

In October, Janet’s scans showed no advances in the bone cancer, so it seemed a good time to move ahead with the knee replacement that had been canceled last year when her femur broke.  On November 22, she had her left total knee replacement done.  Physical therapy will continue until December 24.  We thank God for this opportunity to make her knee more stable and for being on insurance to help pay for it!!

We cannot mention every person who came, brought food, prayed, and cared for us this year, or this letter would be twice as long.  But we do appreciate all the times that God’s family has shown loving care to us in this year.  We could say it was a year of trials, but we have to say it has been a year full of triumphs and blessings too, in just the combination that God knew was best. 

We are trusting Him for the new year, and all its unknowns, and trying to faithfully pray for our friends and loved ones in the needs they have.  God is Enough!

Have a blessed Christmas and New Year!

Rowen, Janet, and Elizabeth Albertson