Monday, December 19, 2011

Merry Christmas!

       Yes, I know it's not PC to say that, but I say it loud and proud.  Ok, maybe I should be more meek and mild about it. I just want people to know where I stand.  Not as a rude, culturally insensitive person, but as a person who is uncomfortable with the genericization of the Holidays.  (Yes, I made up that word...it's not in dictionary.com anyway.) If you are Jewish, I want to wish you Happy Hanukah!
      So, where was I?  Oh yes, Merry Christmas!  If you are reading this, you might have gotten my Christmas card link:
http://karenrenee-sweetsojourn.blogspot.com/ And you found us!  Congratulations to those of you to whom the blog-o-sphere is new.  I discovered this world when Victor was sick and I put out the notifications on how he was progressing on Caring Bridge.org.  I still have not closed that account if you wanted to go back and read anything about Victor's recovery last spring. http://www.caringbridge.org/visit/victorperez1
       From late June until now, I've been occasionally posting on this site.  So in lieu of the Christmas Card letter, I am saving trees and labor by posting this update of how our family is doing this year. With pictures. 
            Daytime Christmas tree                                                                   Nighttime

Mia agreed to let us color coordinate this year with the ornaments, so it's silver and white, with blue, green and white lights.  I've really enjoyed that for a change.   We also had a snowflake (recycled plastic soda can holders) theme on the windows.
I'll try to get a daytime picture for the next post.  
 
If you've been following us on Facebook, I've been posting about this GIANT snowman down the street...that reminds me of the Tasty-Puff giant on the first Ghostbusters movie.  Yes, it is 2+ stories tall!  Today I drove by and he was headless...scary.

So, the halls are decked...

The  neighbors have sent over the Christmas cookies...
You've got the cards,

     
 ...so now let's talk about our year.  Lately, I've been calling it our wilderness journey.  It started on May 14th when Victor decided to trim the tree in front of our house.  He fell and the rest is on the Caring Bridge site.  I do not want to rehash that today.  I want to talk about getting out of the wilderness!  Victor is still recovering.  His memory is great--the only thing he cannot remember is the 3 weeks right after the accident, but that is God's protection on him I believe.  His rib fractures and scapula have healed. His third lumbar was chipped, so if he overdoes it, he gets some back pain.  This is an excerpt of an earlier blog post:
     "His inner ear is still bothering him.  He says it feels like there's water in there.  He doesn't hear well out of the right ear and the left ear is very sensitive to sound.  So one minute it's, "What did you say? I can't hear you!" and the next minute it's, "You're too loud, can you move back a little?"  The worst part for him is that he is nauseous ALL THE TIME unless lying down AND DIZZY.  So, poor guy, he walks around like he's on a sailing vessel."   We ask you to continue lifting Victor up to Jesus. 
    Though V is not working right now, don't think he's not busy.  I have the most organized house in the neighborhood I'm sure!  He does all sorts of things around the house and yard, just pushing through the nausea.  He's really trying to do his best.

     Mia is in high school now!  She played soccer this fall for the Westbury Phoenix team.  It keeps her in shape and the teams she plays are quite challenging.  But each year they improve.  They won more games this year than last.
      
Nice block or nice dance step--you pick!
      She goes to school 4 days a week.  At Home Ed Plus she takes Science and Algebra, and at Schola in Sugar Land she takes French and an integrated History, Literature and Christian World View Class called The Great Conversation.  She's such fun and funny too.  Here's a picture from her 14th birthday.  Yes, that's from the shaving cream fight.  Like most teenagers, she spends much of her time in her room, on her smart phone or photo-shopping--not buying photos (for you old timers,) but using the photo shop program to alter photos.  I need to get her altering my photos! 


      My son Mark is still studying at Home Ed Plus.  He loves Vintage Video Games and factoids about them.  He's started collecting a few.  His favorite new place in Houston is Game Over, a vintage video store.  Vintage makes old things sound cool, right?  Mia shops for vintage clothes and Mark for vintage games.  I feel vintage these days! Ha, ha, ha! 
Here he is at U of H Tech Camp

At a friend's birthday party racing go-carts.

At Thanksgiving with Bitsy our cousin's dog (in Austin.)
      Then there's me.  I don't blog as much as in the summer because I teach writing to 2nd and 3rd graders. I lead worship at a women's bible study on Tuesday nights taught by my good friend Brett who is back from India for the year.  I teach Spanish to high school kids, and tutor writing to other ages too.  But I've reached the stage of life that I'd heard most of my friends with teens moan about--chauffering.  I take Mark to tutoring, Mia to Schola, and go though a tank of gas a week!  Spending much of the time in the car gives me time to pray, worship, listen to teachings and stories on cd.  Mark and I are listening to the Hardy Boys when I take him places.   I actually spend a lot of my time helping the others in this family to succeed.  That's a wife's/mom's job right?  It's just that it's probably one of the most time consuming and difficult jubs on the planet.  I need a lot of grace to do better. 
     
     Well if you've gotten this far, you've got more time on your hands than I do! Ha, ha...  If you want to keep up with us, then please join the blog or just come back and visit from time to time. I pray you and yours have a very Merry Christmas.  Thank you for being our friends and supporting us through this wilderness year.  We are trying to learn from it so as to not stay here much longer.  So this is my verse for 2011:
My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness. Therefore I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may rest upon me.
 2 Cor. 12:9


2 comments:

  1. Well Done! Wonderfully assembled! Glad to hear of Victor's recovery (there's a pressure-point thing that people (fishing enthusiasts)wear for motion sickness, maybe worth a look-see...will continue to pray, his activity is good/cheap medicine. Your comment about PC holy-day remarks reminded me of the story of Paul and his 'remarks' which got him in a heap o'trouble...but he never failed to come back around to "and then the Lord did this" Something I saw today that I hadnt noticed earlier is the Lord appearing to him in between beatings and telling him to hang in there that the game wasnt over...timely for him and a great encouragement for us all...Merry Christmas! Let earth receive her King!

    Steve, Shelley and the four amigos

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  2. 2Cor.12:9...that's a great one to remember.
    Nice to catch up with the family members. I pray that 2012 will be exciting and a blessing to all of you.
    from,
    David/ :-)
    Melanie
    Andrew
    Alex
    the Chickens
    the Cat
    the garden
    and the microorganisms in the compost heap...
    all wish you a Merry Christmas & Happy New Year

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