She Sent Me an E-Mail!

February 27th was a special day for us! Hope has her own email account now and she sent me an email. She was excited to send it and I was so happy and VERY surprised to hear from her in that way.

She doesn't remember the Mandarin Chinese that she was speaking when she joined our family all the way from Beijing -- just "Mama" and "Baba", the Chinese version of "Mommy" and "Daddy".

The picture here is from the night we celebrated Christmas with her, Kevin, and Barbara. Nadean was sick that night, so we missed out on that part of our Christmas visit.

Here's Hope's email to me (I love it!):

Dear grammie, guess what? I got a email address.So now i can write to people.And people can write to me.I am having fun sending emails to every one. So how are you ? Well if you ask me i am doing pretty good. Well i hope you are doing good yourself.So how is grammpie and grammie Ruth? Well i hope they are doing okay.  Baba thinks he knows every thing except 23 things. So every time he says that i  ask him questions. The number of things that he does not know always goes up.And he thinks he is a spy.But i know he's teasing me. And when i think that he really tries to trick me.Well he has not told mama yet i don't think. Well i am having fun writing this letter to you! I still want to have another game day/ night. Tell everybody i said hi.bey!

Grampie emailed back to Hope and told her there are actually 26 things that "Baba" doesn't know, and one of them is that "he doesn't know what he doesn't know".

We owe Hope a game night, so we have to get that on our itinerary!

P.S. (In case you haven't noticed, we think our grandkids are wonderful.) And they ARE!!!

"Just Ripening For The Great Harvest"

People ask us what it is like to be retired. And we give some answer that translates, "we don't know. We're too busy to find out."

This is a new phase of our lives -- and I want it so much to be the most beautiful of all. After all of these years, we are now able to be together most of the time. It is my deepest desire that things will settle down enough for us to share the deepest thoughts of our hearts, to live in harmony with the LORD, who is the head of our home and our marriage, to gracefully age and continue to work on the legacy that we will leave to those we love so dearly -- from the oldest child, down to the tiniest life now being formed in the warmth and depth of its mother's body, we love you more than we can even begin to say.

Dearly loved ones, the greatest joy we could ever imagine will be to stand arm-in-arm with all of you before the thrones of our Lord Jesus and our Heavenly Father. Right now we are "just ripening for the GREAT harvest". But while we are getting ready for the greatest journey of our lives, we are praying that when we get to the "end of the way" that our "circle" will NOT be broken. We don't want one of you to be left behind!
This is our prayer.

89 Years and Counting!

EIGHTEEN of us had such a nice time celebrating Mom's 89th birthday on February 19th at our home in Glenburn.
Here she is with three of the younger guys: Eli Cain (Zach's and Holly's son), David and Samuel Buza (Stephen's and Jeannie's sons).

Folks tell me I look older than she does (true, since I have almost pure white hair and she is just sporting a few gray hairs here and there).

There was a lot of love to go around, cards, gifts (flowers, blouses, an orange, chocolate). And she even got a Kindle. Now we are wondering: how many 89 year old folks have a Kindle?? It is a great gift for her, since books tend to be a little heavy and burdensome.

Some of you had to miss this party for various reasons -- you were too far away, etc. We are hoping to have a BIG splash for the 90th!

I'm thanking the Lord for allowing me to keep my Mom for so long -- it's been almost 68 years for the two of us. What a blessing to have her in my life.

So "Happy Birthday, Mom" -- I love you!

We have a future and blessed hope

As we look to a New Year, it is impossible for us to know where we will be on December 31, 2011. We do not know the joys and sorrows that will come our way in the meantime. Even so, Christians can remain totally confident that no matter what circumstances we face on this earth in 2011, we have a future and a blessed hope that extend for ever and ever beyond this life.

This belief in our future life is not a new idea. In Hebrews chapter 11--termed the "Faith Chapter of the Bible" -- is an account of a man who lived about 5,000 years ago. It says that God promised him a new land. The Book of Genesis recounts how God called Abram (Abraham) to leave his city called Ur (probably in Iraq) and move to the land that we now know as Israel. It was probably a hard trip. There was no "Google Earth" or "Map Quest" and there were no four-lane highways. There was no way to text-message his family and friends to keep them up to the minute on his trip. It was a journey into the unknown, but Abraham believed God and trusted His promise. He willingly followed God, not knowing anything about Canaan. But his hope went beyond this world and his circumstances! In his heart, he knew that his new geographical location would not be his final destination. Here is part of what that that faith chapter tells us about Abraham's life:

"Even when [Abraham] reached the land God promised him, he lived there by faith—for he was like a foreigner, living in tents. And so did Isaac and Jacob, who inherited the same promise.  Abraham was confidently looking forward to a city with eternal foundations, a city designed and built by God."  

Abraham was certainly looking forward to Heaven! And so am I. There is an old song that says, "This world is not my home, I'm just-a passin' through." Your Grandma Buza believed that, too. She agreed with the Bible, that tells us the Christian's "citizenship is in Heaven". Here, in one of her many poems, you can get a glimpse of Grandma's thoughts on that topic:

Lessons From Life

Several years ago, I was asked to write down the important lessons I have learned in life. Here is what I said at the time:

1. The LORD loves me and He is concerned with every, little detail of my life.
2. Even if we have only a tiny amount of faith He will honor our trust and bless us abundantly.
3. Don't "sweat the small stuff". In other words, try to think "what difference is this going to make in a hundred years?" Much of it doesn’t matter, so try and focus on what does.
4. There is joy in serving Jesus.
5. Family is SO important! I’m so blessed.

While all of that is true, I think the list was made to look pretty. Only the positive lessons were shared. Now on reviewing it, I've thought of others:
6. I have not "arrived".  As the years pass, it is becoming abundantly clear that life is not long enough to "make me what I ought to be".  That initial list was TRUE, but the question that remains is this: how much of that have I REALLY learned?
7. No experience in life is ever wasted! In times of grief and pain, there is the temptation to wonder, "is it worth it?" The resounding answer is "YES". Through the troubles and challenges of life, character is formed. Those times can make a person more patient, more understanding, more compassionate, more focused on what is truly important in life, and more loving, and less selfish. This may sound odd, but the necessary suffering of life is to be valued, cherished! The Bible says to "count it all joy" when we fall into trials and temptations. Why? Because God is there to love us, to strengthen us to overcome for His glory and to continue making us into the image of the Lord Jesus!

And there is more . . . so much more, until this life is over. Until then, He is "the Potter" and I am "the clay".  He is working in my life. He is preparing me for my Heavenly home. Then and only then will I be what I "ought to be". Then and only then will there be perpetual joy and peace. Hallelujah!

An Apple A Day!

Your grandfather looks forward to apple picking in the fall. He likes to watch online to see when the various varieties of apples will be available. Then he picks a good day and finds somebody to go with us. To Grampie, there is something special about picking a ripe apple to take home! Some of you have made that trip with us and others haven't yet. More opportunities lie ahead if God wills. Hopefully we get to share one of those days with YOU if we haven't already!

We like the company, the scenery, the fresh air of fall, and -- of course -- the taste of freshly picked apples. We also like to make up applesauce seasoned with a little vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Mmmm. We don't make a puree applesauce, but the chunky kind. Having a few chunks of apple and a little of the peel left on for color just lets us know these were freshly hand-picked by us from the trees.

Of course, part of the routine is to have the camera along to keep some lasting souvenirs of our day. The pictures above represent three different apple-picking days and a visit to a corn maze.

Pictures left to right / top to bottom:  Joshua; Amber; Uncle Stephen; Erika, Grampie, Aunt Marcia; Aunt Bethany; Uncle Chris; David and Samuel; Rachel and Aunt Beth; Kyle; Grammie; Grampie & Erika; Emily & Jeffrey; Apple (held by Grampie & Erika); Joshua; Timothy; Uncle Stephen & Aunt Jeannie; Timothy & Kyle; David; the fruit of our labor!

Simple joys like picking apples together are so important -- those are the times that we make memories. We are so blessed to have a wonderful family to enjoy these times together. Sometimes after apple picking, we stop off for lunch. Here are a couple of examples of those times:

Here in the first picture, Amber, Erika, and Marcia are enjoying lunch at Governor's on Broadway in Bangor. (In case you wonder about the decor, I "painted" some other clients out of the picture.) 











David enjoyed the computer games along with his Happy Meal while Samuel worked at discovering his toy at McDonald's in Bangor.

It Was a T-Shirt Birthday Party!

In 2010, we bought very special T-shirts for some of our family members. These shirts featured original artwork by Aunt Barbara Buza. The first lot went to Valerie's family. Each one picked from a wide selection of paintings done by their aunt. And what fun when the packaged arrived.



Left to right and top to bottom: Amalie wearing the peace rose; Erik wearing a hyena; Katelyn's shirt has a sunflower and bee; Gunnar's features a "Westie"; Kelsey's is a yellow lab; Heather is wearing wild irises; Alicia's has the sunflower and bee; Heidi's shirt features an elephant; Kristen's has Easter lilies; and I don't know the name of the pretty, little flowers on Rebekah's shirt. The only one missing from the collage above is David. His had a handsome beagle on the front!

We all admire the incredible art work Aunt Barbara does -- check it out for yourself if you wish at livingworddyed.com.