Merry Christmas

Pascagoula, MS

 
Shepherds living out in the fields, keeping watch over their flock by night.  And behold, an angel of the Lord stood before them, and the glory of the Lord shone around them, and they were greatly afraid.  Then the angel said to them, “Do not be afraid, for behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy which will be to all people.  For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this will be the sign to you: You will find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger. And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God and saying: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill toward men!" ~ Luke 2:  8-14

We had a relaxing morning at home.  Although i did get stressed for a bit as i went to put cherry filling on my cheese cake and i only had 1 can of Cherry filling.  I got online and searched until i found that Winn Dixie’s are open until 3 on Christmas Day.  Yes, i can hopefully find a can of Cherry filling.

Good friends of Jimbo, Becca and their family are sharing their Christmas meal with us .. We are so thankful to them for inviting us. We left home a little after noon and stopped on our way to Jimbo and Becca’s and i got lucky as they only had 1 can of Cherry filling left!  Close call.  We arrived and had a great meal (thanks Becca and Jimbo) we visited for several hours and it was getting dusk so we hit the road.  We drove in rain all the way home and temps are dropping. 

Thanks again Jimbo and Becca, we had a great time and it was a great way to spend our Christmas.  We love you guys.

We got home and it was time to go to work on getting things ready to roll in the morning.  I have all the last minute stuff put away .. stool are secured down.  All i have to do in the morning is put the computers away, make our bed.  Hubby still has to empty sewer, unhook water and electric as it was raining when we got home and he didn’t feel like getting wet.  Since he hasn’t unhooked i took this opportunity to do one more load of laundry since i will be 2 weeks without my washer.  Plus they are calling for 80 percent chance of rain tomorrow and if it’s raining we will stay another day as we are not on a schedule and i do not like traveling in the rain.
We have decided to head to Pensacola, FL to Fort Pickens .. how many days we are staying we are not sure yet.  We will decided once we get there, for now we will pay for a couple of days and go from there.
Hope you all had a wonderful day weather it was spent with family, friends or just by yourselves. 

Christmas Eve

Today would have been my mom’s birthday .. she passed on several years ago.  Mom we love you and we miss you.  Even though your not here with us on this earth you are always with us in our hearts.  Happy Birthday Mom!!

We got up this morning and i was very slow moving.  In fact I was so slow we ended up being 20 minutes late meeting our friend Steve.

Once I we finally got out the door we were on the road.  There wasn’t too much traffic in the beginning

   

Mississippi has lots of marshes and wet lands and Shipyards.

 

Lots of bridges too

       

Once we got past the marsh land and bridges …

 

It was wide open road.  We finally arrived and our friend Steve was still waiting for us to arrive.  We had lunch at KFC!  We visited with Steve as this will be our last time seeing him this trip.  We have plans with other friends tomorrow and he is going to spend his first Christmas in his new home at the Armed Forces Retirement Home.

  

Steve has settled in and loves his new home which we are thrilled for him.  Of course we will still worry about him but we know he will be well taken care of and if he needs anything he always help available at any time.  He seems to be really happy and says his new home has so much room.

 

It was time to say good bye which Steve doesn’t like to do.  He always get’s tears in his eyes and has a hard time letting us move on. 

We got home and I have made a Cherry Cheese Cake for tomorrow.  The rest of the evening was spent just relaxing.  Watching the Hallmark Channel :)

In Loving Memory

We woke up this morning and received another dreaded phone call.  Our good friend Dave finally has went home to his final resting place.  No more days filled with pain for him, no more days of going for treatments, no more days of trying to be strong for everyone else around him.  He has went home to be with our father and savior.  Dave has fought the battle of Leukemia for several years now. Dave was only in his 50’s.  It’s such a shame that he was so young and only in the beginning of his retirement days.  His retirement days were spent fight a battle for his life.

Our hearts are heavy with sadness with the loss of dear friend Dave.  Our thoughts and prayers are with his wife Barb and family.  May God give you strength and love to endure this ruff period in your lives.  It’s horrible to lose someone but it’s esp horrible to lose them so close to the holidays.  It’s been a ruff week for us as we’ve lost 2 young men in our lives that were very close to us.  We are miles away and can only be there in spirit.  May you rest in peace Dave, you will be greatly missed by many of us.

This week has reminded us how much we should cherish our lives and take each day as tomorrow may never come because we do not know if it will or not.  Remember to tell the ones you love that you love them as you never know when it will be your last chance to do so.

So many people think they will enjoy their retirement years and when that time comes it does not happen.  I know that i have lived with my disability for years and for over 10 years i laid in a bed and looked at the same 4 walls. Even though i am still fighting that disability, I have been blessed that I can spend my good days doing what i love and that is getting to see this great country.

With Christmas fast approaching remember how much your family and friends mean to you and remember what  a gift God has given to all of us by bringing his son to world.  What a glorious day that is fast approaching.

A Southern Christmas Musical

Tonight was a Southern Christmas Musical.  Today was suppose to originally be departure day but when i invited to a Children’s Christmas Program we just had to stay. 

Even though i do not have a tree up i still enjoy seeing others

these are the preschool age kids.  They sang Jingle Bells, Santa Claus is coming to Town, Away in a Manager, Rudolph and We wish you a Merry Christmas.  They did a great job and it was so adorable  .. maked me miss my grandson who starts preschool after the first of the year.
    
the church was jammed pack and it was standing room as all the chairs were taken and many were standing up watching the kids.

The grade school kids sang, Christmas Time Down South, Coolest Pair, Milk and Cookies, Christmas Love, Happy Birthday Jesus and Jesus, Oh What a Wonderful Child.  It was very good and they did a great job.
  
We’ve got a busy next few days as we have plans before we hit the road.

In Loving Memory

Today we received some sad news .. a dear friend of ours passed away unexpectedly this morning.  Kevin had just turned 45 on December 17.  Kevin had been suffering with severe headaches for several years.  His wife said he had been having them more often and more severe and had been up most of the night with one.  When she got up this morning she found him dead.  Our hearts are heavy with sadness as we will miss our dear friend.  Kevin was a great person to be around, he was lots of fun and made everyone around him laugh, he had a heart that was so huge and would help anyone in need.  Kevin was our neighbor for many years and we raised our kids together.  He was more like family.  We are sadden that we are so far away and can not attend his service.  Please remember his wife and family in your prayers.

I got the phone call around 11 AM and after that i just couldn’t bring myself to do much as our hearts are very heavy.  I am so thankful that hubby and I are getting to enjoy our time traveling as our friend Kevin and his wife Jeanette wanted to travel so much.  By the time they got their dream truck and 5th wheel Kevin had come down sick with COPD.  He was doing better and looked like they may get to travel .. now that dream will never come true for him.

Times like this make you really appreciate what you have and are getting to do with your life.  We think we have it ruff at times but there is always someone who is suffering more then you.  I can’t and do not ever want to go through what my dear friend Jeanette is.  Losing your soul mate and the love of your life can not be easy.  Jeanette is going to need her family more then ever as Kevin was her world just as hubby is mine.  He was her rock, her strength, her silver lining.

We need to always remember that we should cherish today and we do not know what tomorrow may bring.  It’s horrible to lose a loved one but it’s esp hard this close to the holiday.  My heart, thoughts and prayers are with Jeanette and her family. 

Not much going on

Yesterday i spent the day doing cleaning and laundry.  I’m doing laundry again today .. i’m on my 3rd load today.  I had let my laundry get behind the past few days. When this load gets done i will be caught back up and then i will begin washing bed sheets, dog covers and rugs so that they are all clean. 

As you can see not really much going on with us yesterday and today.  We are just relaxing and trying to recoup from a busy few days.  The weather has been very nice in the 70’s!  We did have a few short rain showers this morning but the sun has returned and it’s nice outside.  I have been spending my afternoon’s outside reading a book.

Later in the afternoon i needed to make a trip to Wal-mart for laundry soap.  We went to a local grocery store called Jerry Lee’s.  Sale prices were not too bad but everything else was expensive.  We purchased a bag of chips and a loaf of bread and then it was on to Wal-mart where i finally remember a head set for my IPod, ice cream and laundry soap .. actually $32 worth of stuff … i made pancakes for lunch so i wasn’t in a mood to cook so we fought the traffic and went to Wendy’s for dinner.  Man O man the crazy people are out!  We just about were hit 2 times from idiot drivers.  One ran a red light and came flying through the intersection about 40 mph .. luckily hubby saw him before we collided and another car turned when it wasn’t his turn.  Needless to say i was thrilled to get home and away from all the crazy shoppers.  The stores were packed.  I’m so glad that i don’t have to be out shopping in all the craziness.  I got the items i need to make a cherry cheese cake to take for Christmas Dinner.

We have plans for Friday, Saturday and Sunday with friends for the holiday season.  So the rest of this week we will be spent getting things cleaned, packed and ready to roll the day after Christmas.  Right now we are not sure if we will be heading to Georgia or Florida.  Plans are in the air at this time.   We are debating on a Corp of Engineer park at Lake Seminole.  Lake Seminole borders both Georgia and Florida and has 37,500 acres of water and over 18,000 acres of surrounding land or Gulf Seashore Fort Pickens in Pensacola, FL. 

We are both ready to move on .. we have enjoyed our stay in Mississippi, but it’s time to move again.  We have stayed parked in one spot for almost 3 weeks and I'm ready to move about.

Leakesville Christmas Program

We got up this morning and went to church and then later in the afternoon we took over an hour drive to Leakesville.  We’ve been invited to attend the Christmas Program for their church.

Their program was about a school and the Christmas program they wanted to have

It was cute and they said things about if social service came in and found a baby in a feed trough they’d take the baby
 
The kids have grown so much in a year’s time .. it was a cute program and ended …

with Jesus rising .. we really enjoyed it and after the service we stayed for refreshments (i forgot to take pictures then) and visited with several friends.  They were all so surprised as we hadn’t told anyone we were coming.  Not even our friends Sylvia and Sonny who told us that they were having it and invited us to attend.  We pretended we didn’t know if we couldn’t make it.  It was great seeing the new addition to their church and esp seeing friends we hadn’t said good bye to.

We got home around 10 PM and it was time to retire as we were both tired.