Remembering Someone Very Special

Today is a special day.  It is the 49th birthday of our son Matthew.  However, Matthew is celebrating his 49th birthday in heaven, where he has been "living" for the past almost 8 years.  I am not writing about this to ask for sympathy...mainly I just want to remember a wonderful son on his birthday. I want to continue to celebrate the life he lived and give thanks to the Lord that we were allowed to have him here with us for 41 years.  During that time he blessed our lives, and the lives of everyone who knew him, with so much joy.  His life was a constant testimony to the love and grace of God, because there were so many times that Matthew could have been taken home to heaven long before his 41st birthday. But God, in His mercy and grace, had a wonderful purpose for his life here and we were the thankful recipients of that blessing.

I know I've shared this family picture many times before, but it is the last family portrait we have of us together, taken in February of 2014, when we celebrated Matthew's 41st birthday with all the family.

This was our immediate family at that time, including my sweet mother in law, Nanny. (She entered heaven's gates in August of 2018).

Front row is my hubby John, me, Nanny.

Back row: our grandson Noah, our son Benton, our son Scott, and our son Matthew, and his wife Nicole.

It was so wonderful that much of our extended family on both sides came to celebrate with us. This picture is the Steiner side of the family. My hubby's brother Bill and his wife Peggy and their two children Shannon and Nicholaus were there too.

And this picture is the Mursch (my side) of the family. I was so pleased that both of my brothers and their wives and my sister and her husband and their two kids were also able to be there. My brother Russell (2nd row, far left), has now also joined heaven's band, in April of 2019.

Here's Matthew blowing  out the candles...

And here he is, after he blew out the candles on his birthday cake. He was always the cut-up.

I love looking at these pictures because it brings back all the happy memories of that day. We had a wonderful time together, never allowing ourselves to think  of the possibility that just three months later, on May 25th, 2014, he would end his battle with cancer and enter heaven, totally set free from the pain and suffering he had endured for the previous four years.

You can't really tell from the previous picture of his birthday cake, but this little fisherman in the boat was a decoration on that cake. Matthew loved to fish, and that's why I wanted to save this little figure to keep on my kitchen countertop in front of one of my favorite pictures of Matthew.  

Here's a few pictures of him when he was visiting us a couple of years before the previous pictures.

He was enjoying the rare opportunity to fish with his brothers:

Happy Memories.

This is one of my favorite pictures of when we went to Maine to visit Matthew and his family. This was in 2013:

John, Me, Noah, Matthew, and Nicole

We tried to take a picture at this same scenic overlook every time we visited up there.

I guess I should stop with the pictures now...I could fill up the whole internet with pictures if I keep it up. I guess this is one reason why I love to take pictures so much. Our families are important to us. And someday, when pictures are all you have left to remember them by, those pictures become pretty important.

One thing we have tried to do each year since Matthew died is plant something in memory of him in our Memorial Garden. However, we moved a couple of years ago and so we had to leave a lot of things behind. I've talked about this before so I won't go back over it, but anyway, yesterday hubby and I planted a little bottlebrush bush in memory of Matthew.

Here's hubby digging the hole in the ground to plant it.

And there it is. It doesn't look like much right now, but hopefully it will grow and blossom this spring and summer. We chose a bottlebrush bush because it will attract hummingbirds and butterflies once it starts blooming. I will keep you posted on its progress.

This is looking back toward the "Memorial Garden". It looks pretty dry and unproductive right now. Hopefully this summer I will be able to get some more flowers and things growing there to make it worthy of being a true garden. HERE is a link to when we established this Memorial Garden at this house a couple of years ago.  

Okay, it's time to publish this post and get ready for bed. It's been a long day. We actually had a very nice day, and took a nice ride to St. Augustine, but I will save that story for tomorrow's post.  I just wanted to do this today in memory of Matthew.  It's probably more for my sake than for any other reason. It helps me to keep track of the years better if I write about it.  Thank you for reading and sharing these memories with me.

Here is a favorite scripture passage that has comforted me throughout these years...God comforts all who mourn... see Isaiah 61:2-4  

"To comfort all who mourn,

3 To console those who mourn in Zion,

To give them beauty for ashes,

The oil of joy for mourning,

The garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness;

That they may be called trees of righteousness,

The planting of the Lord, that He may be glorified.”

And Psalm 30:5 says:

"Weeping may endure for a night,

But joy comes in the morning."

I am thankful for the joy that comes in remembering the good times and the sweet memories of our son's life. He will always be missed, but I know He's alive and well in heaven, and that gives me great peace.

Remember to forgive while you can...and always tell your loved ones that you love them every opportunity you can.  Make the opportunity. You'll never regret that.

Good night my friends.

 

"Pamela's Victorian Cottage" - My "Fixer Upper" Episode

If you enjoyed the little story of my "new" Victorian Cottage Doll House a couple of days ago (HERE),

then I hope you will enjoy the continuing saga of what has become a new episode

of "Fixer Upper" in miniature...or maybe even it could fit on "Property Brothers", or perhaps"Hometown"...just a few of my favorite house remodeling programs on HGTV or DIY networks.  I don't know, it might even qualify for my most favorite program, "Maine Cabin Masters", except this little Victorian Cottage is a bit too fancy for a Maine Cabin.  (That may be my next project...)

So let me take you back and show you some before and after photos so you can see the progress I've been making on this true "fixer upper" yard sale purchase...

This is how the cottage looked when I brought it home from the yard sale and all the "kids" in the neighborhood came right over and claimed it for their own new house...

This is the true version of the little old woman who had so many children she didn't know what to do...she didn't really put them in a shoe...she just moved them into my little Victorian Cottage...But did you notice that there was some gingerbread trim missing from the top of the dormer roof above the door?

Or did you see there was also more gingerbread trim missing from the gable end of the house here:

And actually it was missing from a couple of other places too, so this gal had to get to work on restoring and repairing right away. Thankfully, the missing pieces were actually included with the sale of the house...I just had to install them myself.

Now, you may think that was easy...well, let me tell you, no it wasn't. First of all, one had to get the right kind of glue to make the gingerbread stick to the roof...and then one had to find the right kind of clamps to hold the gingerbread in place until the glue dried...as this lady didn't want to sit there for an hour holding a piece of gingerbread trim in place...especially when there were several different places to glue and hold on all sides of the house...and so, after trying a couple of different glues, I discovered that plain old Elmer's Glue worked the best...and it dries clear. (don't use wood glue...it turns yellow!)  And thankfully, clothespins and little plastic clamps found at the neighborhood flea market also helped hold the gingerbread trim in place until it dried...((I forgot to take pictures of that step...my producers will probably fire me and my TV show won't get renewed for next season...)

Anyway, here is the after picture of the front of the house...

And also you probably didn't know that the front door needed a door knob!  I mean, how can one enter a "closed door" unless there is a doorknob?  ( I know what you are thinking...crawl through the "open window"...)  Well, yes...that's true, and one of the windows did need to be glued back in also...but first things first...

This picture probably doesn't do it justice, but I found a little loose rhinestone from an old ring, and it fit perfectly on this door for a "glass doorknob".    I also put a little pearl doorknob on the inside of the door! (Now it looks as if that door could use a fresh coat of paint...but that's a future job...)

Okay, back to another "before picture"...Here was the family gathered that first night for their first tea party in the new house.  They didn't care that there was no kitchen, and that there was ugly brown paneling on the wall in the space that was supposed to be a kitchen, and the stairs were also in the way...and there was also ugly brown paneling upstairs in the bedroom...and that it was actually glued on with a glue that was not holding very well, and it was coming off the wall...and so there was another project for this fixer upper gal...

Below is the after picture:  I have always wanted rose wallpaper on my upstairs bedroom walls, ever since I was a little girl visiting at my Aunt Margie's house in Crafton, PA.  My sister Doris and I always slept in a little room upstairs that had slanting walls just like this room, and it had the most beautiful pink roses all over the walls and ceiling in that room. My sister and I would lay in that bed and just stare at the ceiling and walls and dream about having roses on our own bedroom walls someday.  Well, that day has come! Doris, here's your new guest room!  Next time you come to visit, I will let you sleep in this room!!  Now, you may ask, "how did you get rose covered wallpaper in that room so quickly? You just found this house a couple of days ago...Well, this girl is the author of the philosophy that "necessity is the mother of invention"...and so is being cheap and not wanting to spend any more money on this "fixer upper". We are on a tight budget here with this renovation!

I had some lovely file folders with a beautiful rose design on the outside, and I've had them tucked in my desk drawer for many years, holding papers that probably need to be shredded...but anyway...I found them, and decided that they would make very lovely wallpaper for this upstairs bedroom...and so, with my wonderful Elmer's Glue...there you go...Oh...and did I mention that I also found a little sample jar of some paint that was a lovely creamy color that worked perfectly to paint on the garret wall and around the dormer windows?  Yes...that helped brighten the upstairs bedroom considerably...and it didn't cost me a penny!

The downstairs living room didn't really need painting...it was already a lovely bright yellow.
I did find a hand knitted/crochet dishcloth that had never been used that made a lovely rug for the living room.   The little tea table that is all set for tea time is actually the lid to a teapot. The teapot itself is too large for this room, but the lid makes a lovely table on top of a covered cap to something I found in the medicine cabinet.     The brown and yellow tiles against the wall are actually two antique ceramic tiles from the fireplace  that came from my mother's "Aunt Dode's" house in West Lafayette, Ohio.  "Aunt Dode" left her house to my grandmother, and so my mother lived in that house during her high school years.  Since these tiles came from the fireplace in that old house, they are now serving as the "fireplace" in this house, at least we can imagine that is what they are!

Oh, and did you notice there is a white crochet valance on the top of each of the windows?  Well, I found this lovely trim on something that was not being used, in a drawer in my vanity in my bedroom, and there was exactly enough to cut and fit on the tops of each of the windows downstairs and upstairs!

Morning Sunshine brightens the home where love abides...

Now, for the kitchen...this is a work in progress.  (as is the rest of the house).

There really wasn't a kitchen. Just a very small space with dark paneling on the wall and the stairs in the middle of the floor.  (See the "Before" picture up above)

In true "fixer upper" fashion, I wanted to tear down the dividing wall between the kitchen and the living room and make more space, but that would have been a bit more demo than I was ready for.  You know, if you watch those shows, they are always tearing down walls and putting up beams to support the floor above,  and building lovely huge islands in the kitchens. Well, this is just an old fashioned Victorian cottage, and I really didn't want anything modern in this house. I am restoring it to a better purpose, not remodeling it.  There is a difference.

Anyway...I did demo the old dark paneled wall, and discovered that the wall underneath was not in very good shape. The thin plywood had been shredded in a few spots, and it wouldn't do to just paint over it either. So, back to my lovely old file folders.  On the back flap of the rose covered file folders was this  lovely pink design.  It was the perfect size for this wall...but it needed some decoration.  Since the kitchen is really too small to add any real cabinetry and appliances, I am probably just going to pretend they are there by putting pictures on the walls.  Maybe I will fit in a little shelf with a sink...and the stove is something I am still thinking about and trying to figure out...again, without spending any more money!

So anyway, I decided to decoupage a few pictures of teapots and other tea time things on this particular wall, along with a cut out picture from an old greeting card of a lovely window, since there was no window on this wall.  (A man must have designed this house...whoever heard of such a small kitchen with no window on the wall where the sink should go???)

This lovely little girl dressed in her pink party dress is quite pleased with the kitchen wall and "pink rug". (again, leftover scrap from the file folder!)  She is ready for her friends to come over for another party already.

Oh, I also decided not to put the stairs back in the kitchen. Since this is my project, I get to decide what stays and what goes. These sweet people living in this house really don't care about the stairs...they have me to lift them up to the next floor when necessary...and space seems to be more needed than stairs! So there! That's that!

Well, the sun is setting on this little cottage for the night.

We will pick this story up another day and see how things are progressing.

I have decided to do a feature each week on the progress of 

"Pamela's Victorian Cottage".  Not promising what day it will be scheduled just yet, as that is up to my "producers" of this new "fixer upper" program.  

So stay tuned for more episodes of

"Pamela's Victorian Cottage".

In keeping with this season of Lent, here are some encouraging Bible verses about "Restoration" from the Book of Isaiah the Prophet regarding the Advent of Christ to the world:

Isaiah 61

1.  "The Spirit of the Lord God is upon Me,

Because the Lord has anointed Me 

to preach good tidings to the poor;

He has sent Me to heal the brokenhearted,

To proclaim liberty to the captives,

and the opening of the prison to those who are bound;

2.  To proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord,

and the day of vengeance of our God;

To comfort all who mourn,

3.  To console those who mourn in Zion,

To give them beauty for ashes,

The oil of joy for mourning,

The garment of praise for the 

spirit of heaviness;

That they may be called trees of righteousness,

The planting of the Lord,

that He may be glorified.

4.  And they shall rebuild the old ruins,

They shall raise up the former desolations,

And they shall repair the ruined cities,

The desolations of many generations."

May we each look for ways that we can rebuild the "old ruins" of our lives and receive the "beauty for ashes, the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of heaviness" as we seek the Lord and His healing restoration for our souls.  Have a blessed and beautiful day, my friends.