2011 Joldersma Family Newsletter

Dear Family and Friends                                12.16.11

Hello to all of you. We hope this letter finds you well. 2011 is coming to a close. It is still amazing how fast time flies. It is time again for the annual catching-up-with the Joldersmas.

Martin is well and was busy with work as always. A lot of concrete got poured in southern Ontario. Our monthly concrete bill is often more than we paid for our first house. There are a number of household projects I have waiting for him during the cold winter days. I was thinking how badly we need to replace carpeting upstairs and a little disappointed that it had not stood up very well and then I realized that it was over 20 years old. Lots to do but Martin also deserves some 'down time' and we look forward to some lazy days this winter. Last March in Connecticut Martin got the chance to play a Casavant organ and it renewed his passion for playing. Our organ was on the fritz so Martin searched the internet (yes he did) and found a Conn organ that he very much enjoys playing. We got a new (to us) vehicle this summer. We picked a silver Honda CRV.

Last December 21 (the day before her birthday) Shirley and Jeff had a baby girl named Isabel (9 pounds 2 oz) She is so different from Alexander – he is cautious and she is daring – he first walked at 1 ½ years and she started at 10 months.
When Alexander  sleeps over we enjoy it a lot. It is also fun to see him pitch a fit when it is time to go home because our children used to stand at the door begging my mother not to leave. The circle of life.

This fall was particularly busy because I spend a lot of time with Anne and Ken's twins. Ethan John Martin (5 pounds 12 oz)  and Moriah Catherine Anne (4 pounds 9 oz) were born 5 weeks early by a last minute c-section on September 16.
They were in the hospital for three weeks getting their feeding sorted out. Both of them are over 10 pounds now and doing well. After so many years of waiting these two children are truly blessings. I love to be over there spending time with them.

I am well as well. I turned 50 in October have no real complaints. A touch of insomnia now and then but, all in all, the old girl is doing ok. I have stayed busy with various things and I never feel bored. We ran two sessions of Home with a Heart – one in the spring and one in the fall – I always enjoy that work immensely. I lead a women's bible study on Wednesday mornings and am on the outreach team at church. I so enjoy it when I can spend time working on the photo albums or jigsaw puzzling.  I try to do some writing but the best I seem to be able to do is to blog – and I am sporadic at best. It was fun to reconnect with some gals from my old writing class days.

Over thirty years ago Martin used to leave his Rymal Road East home and go down Upper Ottawa to pick up a cute girl (me, if you were wondering) and now his son Henry makes the same trip from his Rymal Road East home down Upper Ottawa to pick up a girl named Brittany.  She is a nice girl and I knew Henry liked her when he cleaned up his room before she came over. Henry still works for John's Concrete Forming and enjoys the work. His vehicle was stolen and ruined at the end of 2010 but he likes the replacement he has.  He is still involved with his band.

Andrew is finishing up a year long co-op at Westcam and he likes it there very much. In January he will be back at Mohawk College for a last semester.
He still plays bass for the praise team at church and also does some of the singing. One highlight this year was when Christian songwriter Robin Mark surprised our congregation by stopping in during a service and playing some songs with the praise team. It had been planned ahead of time but we had to keep it a secret. Andrew was playing bass and Anne was on the piano. What excitement that was. The picture is of the pre-service sound check.  Andrew played ultimate frisbee on two teams this summer and he loves the game.

As for getting out and about...We went down, with my parents and Arlene and Henry, to my cousin Ron and Michele's in Connecticut this past March for the memorial service of my Tante Paula. Despite the occasion it was good to connect with family again.
Martin and I were so happy to go up to the Soo in May for my cousin George's son Jeffrey's wedding to Laura. Jeffrey stayed with us a couple of years back and we just love those guys and treasure any time that we get to spend with them. I even got up and sang at the reception. Hard to believe, I know, but I did. It was apparently memorable.
We visited an organ museum in Michigan this summer and got up to the Boven cottage.
We also enjoyed time with the relatives at the Joldersma Cousin's Day at Martin and Jenny's. Again, wonderful people we love to spend time with.

We pray that you feel blessed in your life. Keep in touch.

For Martin, Henry and Andrew
Anita Joldersma                anita@eleveld.org

E-Man and Lil' Mo

I have been spending quite a bit of time over at Ken and Anne's helping with the twins Ethan and Moriah. It is pure joy to watch them grow. I put them into sleepers that we used on our kids when they were itty bitty.

Here is their mom wearing the one that Ethan is wearing in the picture above.
Funny to think that the sleeper is over 30 years old.

my brother Jeff

My brother Jeff has always been able to entertain me.
This was a game we were playing. Jeff was trying to get us to guess a baseball term - I think it was 'homerun' - he wasn't allowed to use any words or actions - just sound effects.

We shoulda' guessed but we didn't.

red cabbage

Don't know that I particularly like red cabbage 

but I like the picture

                                    can you tell that I have been busy?

but not creatively 

but houseworkly, 

burping babyly, 

HomewithaHeartly,

and soon to be baptismly 

and Christmasly.

beyond this place there be dragons

One of the items on the list of 'things to do before I die' is to see the phrase  
HC SVNT DRACONES on the Lenox Globe in person. 

Hic sunt dracones means 'here be dragons' in Latin. It is a phrase used to denote dangerous or unexplored territories, in imitation of the medieval practice of putting creatures in uncharted areas of maps.



The Hunt-Lenox Globe or Lenox Globe is the second or third oldest known terrestrial globe, after the Erdapfel of 1492. It is housed by the Rare Book Division of the New York Public Library. So there is a chance that I might be able to see it one day.

The Hunt-Lenox globe was prepared around 1510 by an unknown artist and it was purchased in Paris in 1855 by architect Richard Morris Hunt, who gave it to James Lenox.   This small hollow copper globe measures 112 millimetres (4.4 in) in diameter and 345 millimetres (13.6 in) in circumference. It is two parts, joined at the equator and held together by a wire strung through holes at the poles. It is notable as the only instance on a historical map of the actual phrase HC SVNT DRACONES (in Latin hic sunt dracones. The phrase appears on the eastern coast of Asia.   It is the earliest surviving engraved copper sphere from the period immediately following the discovery of the New World.  Of the two continents in the Western hemisphere, only South America is actually represented, appearing as a large island with the regional names Mundus Novus (the New World), Terra Sanctae Crucis (the Land of the Holy Cross), and Terra de Brazil (the Land of Brazil). Cuba appears as “Isabel,” and the island shared by the Dominican Republic and Haiti (Hispaniola) appears as “Spagnolla." North America is represented as a group of scattered islands. Fascinating

a favourite possession

One of my favourite possessions is this quilt made for me by my amazing cousin Arlene. She had taken a whole pile of our whole families ratty old t - shirts and assembled them into this quilt - so many memories - our names are stitched all over it and every time I look at it I see something new.
It is a piece of art and I love her to bits for taking the time to do this for us.

my singing debut

I sang at Jeffrey and Laura's wedding.
I know, I can't sing, but that didn't stop me.

When Jeffrey was living with us he left the toilet seat up
and in the middle of the night I fell in.

The song was sung to the tune of Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire.
I made up my own words.
The band tried to keep up but I was on fire.
Well, I think I was smokin' good.
Well maybe I was just smokin'.
With sincere apologies to those who had to listen......

I fell into the toilet when Jeff left the seat up. 

I went down, down, down and the water went higher. 

And I splashed, splashed, splashed, 

there in the bowl, there in the bowl, there in the bowl.

She's a walking.

Isabel takes her first steps at Grandma's house.

Over

The interview is over and it went well.
Now to wait.
I know full well that there are other very good programs that are my 'competition'.
And I pray that we all have patience and await God's good work.

Nervous

Tonight I represent Home with a Heart in an interview for a funding proposal that I am submitting.  I think I am prepared to answer any questions. Still I am nervous and want the program to be represented well. Butterflies.....

I wonder when I will get this from my kids.

I don't know that I spoil the grandchildren.
With the term spoiling comes the connotation
that they are getting something that is not particularly good for them.
I like to think that the attention or care they get from me
is just what they need.

I know it is what I need.
Each of them is dearly loved by both Martin and I.
And I always treasure any time I can spend with them.

pants on the ground pants on the ground looking like a fool with your pants on the ground

another case of a picture being worth a thousand words

actually, not as much a picture, as a cartoon

but there are definitely better ways 

that a thousand words can be wasted

(or is it waisted) 

 but I won't bother wasting mine on the subject

that is not my object...tive

Year of Jubilee

Last Saturday I turned 50. I ended up the the Old Fart Jar.
A dubious honour indeed.

We ate dinner at the Sirloin Cellar in downtown Hamilton.

We were joined by my parents and Theo and Tena. Rick and Wendy came a little later with a nice couple who they were scheduled to have dinner with, but instead, dragged them along to my birthday dinner. Bill and Pam Farrel authors (of over 30 books) and speakers on marriage.

I told Pam about wanting to write a book and she told me that since it is my fiftieth year that I could look at it as my year of Jubilee. The year of Jubilee is a biblical term regarding a year of rest or a celebration. Pam told me to actually take time to write.

A tall order indeed. Blogging is about all the writing I have been doing lately and I am terribly sporadic at best. Doing the housework and the business bookkeeping as well as teaching Home with a Heart and also leading a bible study group for women at church all take up plenty of the hours in my day. And there are a couple of cute little babies are taking up a good chunk of my time -

 Ethan and Moriah at Grandma's house

but I wouldn't miss it for the world. And that time cannot be lived again.
Only time will tell just how Jubilee-ish this year will be.

the hiccups

Ethan has the hiccups and it seems to be scaring him.

it's so nice to have them home

 This is Moriah

and below is her brother Ethan

They came home from the NICU last week and are settling in well. Anne stays busy with feeding them but they are growing at a good pace.

I am able to be there most days for a feed or two and try to be generally helpful.

Once I hung a load of washed clothes on the line and hung the socks up all matched into a state of pair-ed-ness. This idea was at first met with some mock-erage then it was conceded that it made the matching of the aforementioned socks much easier when they were hung on the line that way.

Sometimes the old broad knows what she's doin'

new grandbabies

Ethan and Moriah
Ethan on the right and Moriah on the left

just one of the 200 pictures I have taken in the first week of their life

Ursus Wehrli

way funny guy I saw on TedTalks

he likes to create order out of chaos especially in art 

but he seems to see art in everyday stuff

 and in nature

I like this guy

way happy - in fact - happy x two

So happy that Ethan and Moriah have arrived safely to Anne and Ken.
5 pounds 12 oz and 4 pounds 9 oz. on last Friday morning.
There are in the NICU for feeding difficulties
that will hopefully be resolved soon.
Such joy - it is actually true that words are not good enough.
They have actually created a bubble in me of pure joy.
Ethan has peed on me twice.
And still....such joy. God is good.

regarding cats

Thinking about the cat reminded me that when Karen saw that Moush was developing that saggy bit of skin that hung below her belly ( and it would wiggle back and forth when she ran ) Karen wanted us to send her to a plastic surgeon for a tummy tuck. Karen thought that Moush shouldn't have to walk around like that and be all embarrassed. I figured if I could do it - so could the cat.

More about cats - the pickles-y kind

When I was a teenager we had a cat named Pickles.
White and fluffy (fluffy of fur and fluffy of body)
She started out pretty nice.

But in her old age she became miserable.

No this isn't a picture of her.
But it could have been.
She became a miserable old cuss.
Some of my kids hated cats because their only experience with cats was Pickles. For most of them that changed when we started to foster kittens from the SPCA.

Come to think of it  - sometimes I feel what the above cat looks like.
Meeoowwer

Moush

Karen's cat, Moush, was a 'free' cat that we had been fostering for the SPCA
that only cost us about 900.00 but we sure liked having her around

Her favourite spot was sitting on a pile of clean laundry when it was still warm from the dryer.

She also loved waiting for Andrew to come to bed and would wait at his bedroom door until he appeared so he could let her into the room to sit under the bummel chair.

A number of people in our family were allergic to her - all that black cat hair that would defy vacuuming (once tried to vacuum the cat - didn't work out so well)

But she loved to stare out at the window at the squirrels and birds that dared to come close enough to her kingdom.

She bravely whined when there were bats in the house.

Sometimes I miss her but I do not miss that cat hair and changing the litter box.She lies somewhere in the backyard under some newly laid sod. RIP

more bugs

We found a dragon fly on the flowers out front.

but you can hardly see it... but it is there

I am so glad it stood still for me and my camera.

bugs and weeds and plants and stuff

When at the Boven cottage I took some pictures down by the lake.

There are ants crawling all over this plant.

And there is a bumble bee at this one

No bugs bugging this one

And I don't know what could land on this prickly thing.

I do enjoy taking pictures. I am not a good picture taker and know nothing about exposures and apetures and I only really use one setting (the picture taking for dummies setting) but the camera's nowadays can be pretty much foolproof.
As the pictures above testify to.

optical illusion

When driving home from the Boven cottage we were on the highway
coming over a hill and the clouds and the sky played tricks with my eyes.
What I saw was the road going down to the water -
perhaps a large lake or an ocean.

What it was was just the clouds above the blue sky
but once I thought I saw the water
I couldn't convince my mind that it was just the sky.

Alexander plays teaset with Andrew

even though Andrew is not fully co-operating

 but that doesn't stop Alexander

no, it doesn't stop him

"Andrew, did you want some tea?"

"Maybe just a cup"

Alexander loves his Uncle Andrew

"stinkende vlees te koop"

When I was a little girl my father would put me on his shoulders and parade me around the house. We went from room to room and he would always carefully duck when we reached a doorway. While he would parade me around the house he would chant a Dutch phrase - "stinkende vlees te koop"

As a little girl I did not know what it meant. 
I thought it meant that I was a princess. 
The words didn't change much during our march around the house.
But I just knew that my daddy was singing my praises.


I thought that the words could have been translated to mean this:
"Here I come with the princess, isn't she beautiful?
Let us sing a song for the princess and clap our hands 
and be happy for the princess"


And so our royal parade continued through my little girl years.
It wasn't until many years later that I found out what the translation was.

Apparently my father marched me about the house chanting
"stinky meat for sale"


'Nuff said?

sometimes we just don't fit

Sometimes we just feel like we don't fit
and other times we really don't fit.

I don't fit into my wedding dress.
Too many loaves of bread, bought on sale, won't fit in my freezer.
I don't fit in with a tattooed and pierced biker gang and
I don't fit in with the champagne and caviar crowd.

Sometimes we just don't fit.

Organ Central

For our mini vacation this summer we went to Hanover Michigan (small village south of Jackson). This past winter Martin found an organ museum (on the Internet) with piles of pump organs that you were allowed to play. So off we went.

Lots to look at and Martin sat and played at a couple of them.
Many of them were really old but it was fun to watch him play.
I didn't even need to get the book out that I had brought along.

There was a historical school museum in the attached building
that was interesting to walk through.

It was called a mini vacation because I didn't unpack. I have only had one vacation where I unpacked. When you stay for one or two nights it doesn't seem worth the effort of unpacking everything only to put it in again so soon. The exception was when I was on the cruise with my mom - I unpacked clothes into drawers and hung up outfits. It made sense because I was there for more than two days.

The map for Michigan we bought was not very good and I was thankful for the compass on the new car because we would not have been able to tell what direction we were going in if not for the letters NES or W plunked above the steering wheel.

We ate at a place called Cascade Park that was quite lovely.
I even found a friend there.

Since Martin doesn't like travelling the same road twice we wandered and meandered our way through the hiways and the biways. We passed the BunkerHill International Airport with a piddly little landing strip that looked like it was mowed a couple of times a year. We saw lots of tree covered lanes and a couple of roads took us in all four directions before we went on the next road which, of course, was no where on our map.

We found an antique in one of the places we stopped at.
It was strange to see a shaving mug for sale
that was just like the one we bought on our honeymoon over 30 years ago.

He was nice enough to stop at a couple of used book stores so I could hunt for some Airmonts. I actually found three of them so I was happy.

I always enjoy any time that I get to spend with my wonderful husband and we seem to still enjoy each other's company after all these years whether it is at home or wandering and meandering across the country.
Looking forward to going back someday.

diaper cakes

Years ago I heard Whoopi Goldberg talk on The View about giving a diaper cake as a shower gift. I think I saw a sample and then decided to create my own.
I found forms and ribbons and diapers and then figured how best to put them all together.

The first one I made was for our Youth Pastor and his wife. The shower was  decorated with an American/Canadian theme for Heather and Mark's home countries.

I found the whole process quite complicated to replicate every time I wanted to  bring a diaper cake to a shower - so now I just buy a package of diapers to give as a gift and keep the main cake. I decorate it as I see fit.

Here are the diaper cakes that I made for Anne's shower. To these ones I added white silk flowers and the toppers were two yellow duckie piggy banks with a stuffed animal to keep the duckies company on the top of the cake. Duckies can be afraid of heights so the company was welcome.

There are two cakes because she is expecting two babies - twins.
We are very excited and looking forward to meeting the little ones.

Long awaited get together

It was like time had not passed at all. 

We picked up where we left off with some filling in 

of the stuff of life that we have been living. 

Some great, some not so. 

But it was so great to get together with these gals.

I had met Brigitte and Deb in a writing class 

and then Sue was in one of the other classes. 

We sometimes pretend we want to be writers 

but not one of us is really incredibly serious about it. 

We have good intentions but life does seem to get in the way.

Deb is trying to get the umbrella up 

it is not working.

Sue tries to help but it is still not working 

maybe Brigitte will help

Or maybe not

Maybe she'll just laugh at them 

until Deb's earring falls off.

Well the earring did fall off and 

Deb rinsed it off in her drink and put it back on.

 Terrific food and great conversation. What fun.

The time flew by so fast and

we will just have to do it again.