Happiness

As I walking through the plant today, I asked one of the production team members how their day was going. There response was, "With all the changes going on around here, it's no wonder I'm not a happy person." I responded, "I hope this place isn't the measure of your happiness", to which they responded, "It's the biggest part of it!". As the day has gone on today, I've carried out a little poll here on the production line and I was surprised to discover that many of the people on the line stated that the day to day activities at work determine their happiness.

Now I'll admit, my job greatly influences my "mood", but my happiness............maybe, I'd never really thought about it that way.

So, that got me wondering.......What factors influence your "happiness"? It is work, family, faith, etc? Is one a greater factor than the other? I don't know that I have my answer yet. Looking for thoughts from the EJK Blog's pooled years of wisdom!

EDK

Knobloch House update

Setting room in trusses

Placing attic floor through roof

Roof on

View from down the road

More of Heidi Pearl

Our New Pet

Angela commented about the deer in our yard. Here is a picture of our favorite new 'neighbor'.

You Are Invited!

(supper at our house afterward)

Big Bucks in Illinois

Mike would really like to hunt Illinois cornfields and wherever else the big bucks are hiding in central Illinois. He's read stories for years about the big deer there. Do any of you have any contacts of land where he could hunt? He might have a buddy with him and they wouldn't need housing or anything - would plan to stay in a hotel - they just need someplace to hunt. He says with all these relatives in Illinois I ought to be able to find at least ONE spot of land! If you have any possibilities for him, please email me at the address on the right. Thank you for your consideration.

Heidi Pearl Endress

Heidi was born this morning about 10 am. We are thankful mother and baby are doing well. She weighed about 7 1/2 lbs. We now have 14 grandchildren, 7 boys and 7 girls. Perry & Carol

Summer or el verano

It is always sad to see my favorite season in its last days. When I left work this morning I would have given anything to be on the beach in Evanston. I can almost hear the waves crash against the shore, feel the pebbly sand beneath my feet as the icy waves wash over me and remember sunbathing in literally a pink polk-dot bathing suit listening to my transistor radio. Right now, the Atlantic, the Gulf or Lake Michigan seem to be calling me to lie on the beach and hear the waves crash. Oh well.

Nick and Nathan have made their move to Kentucky, and Karla and her mother, Roxana, arrive this coming Sunday. I have diligently worked on my Spanish, and it is coming along. I have a collection of books, CD's and on-line sites. We leave for El Salvador in November, and by then, I will have it mastered. If only I had known someday I would have a daughter-in-law from El Salvador I would have tossed aside all that German I learned for Spanish. Meine mutter never would have stood for that! I am excited that Ron and I will spend 10 days touring volcanoes, the jungle, Mayan ruins and enjoying the Pacific ocean. Most of our friends think we are nuts, but this seems meant to be. If nothing else we will have a little warm sunshine in November.

Nathan is enrolling in Heritage Academy in Hopkinsville, and we will be there labor day weekend to check things out. Grandma and Grandpa are getting him a bike for his birthday and then will try to teach him to ride it. I am back to directing my choir and gearing up for another season. Nursing is as complicated as ever, and I don't take a single shift for granted. In all things, give thanks.

Linda

Family Reunion Slideshow 2010

Here's my 3rd attempt to upload the slideshow videos. First there were offensive video suggestions on the bottom of the screens...got rid of that, I think. Then an ad I couldn't get rid of on Part 4...tried all morning to get rid of that. Then one video went small screen. Ahhhh, so annoying. So here's another shot at it. Remember to use the 4 arrows in the lower right corner to view full screen. By the way, I had to put it on in 5 parts, but decided in the end that might be a good idea as you can watch the sections separately and not need 30 minutes to view the whole thing.

Hope it works now!

Still no house

Some of you know that we thought Ann and Mike had found the perfect home for us to relocate to Anderson. BUT the house inspection revealed several potential problems and we don't need to take on home problems knowingly. So we are abandoning house #1 with its beautiful white kitchen and are back to square one. Next Tuesday we take Rhoda to the airport early for her 7:00 A.M. flight and then plan to spend several days in Anderson searching for a place to live.

Mary has been helping sort through books, a tremendous chore now nearly completed. Rhoda flies in tomorrow evening and she has volunteered ( I hope she knows what she volunteered for!) to tackle the garage and the storage hut. So we may soon be ready to move with nowhere to move to-----


P.S. I'm praying for our three nieces/great nieces (Angela, Ethne, and Catie) with health problems. We have a Great Physician.


Love, Mim

Another Prayer Request

I don't know how many of you keep up with my blog, but I wanted to update you with a prayer request. Ethne and Catie are undergoing some testing after losing weight in the last few months. Ethne's test results are improving, but the doctor thinks Catie may have Type I Diabetes. You can read more on my blog here. We'd appreciate prayers as we confirm the diagnosis and come up with a treatment plan.

Knobloch House update

Garage with bonus room above

Second floor and porch roof going on
View from boom lift, 3 bedrooms and bathroom on right, Master bedroom and bath plus laundry room on left, bonus room at end of hall.
Gridley off in the east

Prayer Request

At the reunion, Judy urged me to have a mole on my arm checked out (and Linda seconded the motion). Now that I've done that with the help of Dr. Sam, Judy has urged me once again to put the request out for prayers from lots of people. The mole is a melanoma, and surgery is needed. Beyond that, we are not sure yet. I have met the Drs. who will be doing the surgery, and am waiting now for them to coordinate schedules. I sure hope it is soon! Please pray for their wisdom, our peace, and a complete and tolerable cure.

Love you all!

Jesse and Julia (#11 and #12)

These two cousins were fun to watch during our July family time in KC. Jesse will be 2 in October and Julia will be 2 in November. They were buddies "most" of the time. Since they look like their parents, I don't need to tell you who belongs to who. Our #14 grandchild is due by the end of the month. --- Carol

MINI-VACATION

While Angela took Kelsie to back to JU in Florida, we had Heater and Nathan with us from Wednesday night until tonight. We decided to take them to the Grand Bear Lodge near Starved Rock - so we could stay out of the extreme heat while they played in the indoor water park.

This is Heat and Nathan posing before entering

the waterfall tunnel.

Nathan was excited with the "coolest bed ever!" He couldn't figure out

how that couch was a bed, and you should've seen him light up when we opened it.

Of course, he immediately began jumping!!

Funniest thing! We were in the pool about 2 minutes when we

noticed him talking to a little girl. It was his best friend from

school, Madison! She was there with her family and they had

the best time together for the rest of the day. This was taken

on a tiger-ride at the indoor amusement park.

That resort is a great place for a family with small children to vacation, and I know some of you have been there. Needless to say, Grandma and Grandpa are exhausted tonight!!

A Few More Memories

Like others I have many pleasant memories of the Klopfenstein weekend. At one point I had a list of meaningful moments, but most have already been shared such as getting to tour the grain elevator after hearing numerous stories from Dad about working there.

Mark summed up those stories quite a few years ago by saying, "The older Dad gets, the harder he worked when he was younger."

However, one thing that hasn't been mentioned that I really appreciated was going to church with family on Sunday morning and hearing Tim's sermon which focused on the foundation on which Grandpa (whom I never knew) and Grandma K. built their family: recognition of man as a sinner; man's need of a Savior, Jesus Christ; and man's need to live a life of faith by following God's commands.

Many thanks to those who made the weekend memorable. I know there was a lot of background work by Judy, Dave, Jamie, and others that we benefited from but never saw.

The Klopfenstein reunion was one of the highlights of the summer. I only wish I had thought to take more pictures. I really enjoyed the run. There are two major events coming in my life. Melissa will have a baby boy, and he is due December 6th. My son, Nick, will have a wedding November 12th in San Salvador, and Ron and I will be in Central America from November 10th to November 19th. We have our tickets and passports and I'm learning Spanish. There is a word in Spanish, "consuegras", which translated is the fathers or mothers who marry their children together. How often we become friends with the bride or groom's parents through our child's wedding. I will begin posting to this blog at the strong urging of my cousins, and it has been fun to look through already.

While I Run...

A lot of people ask me what the little boys do while I run on my treadmill. The treadmill is down the basement so they usually play down there with their toys, ride bikes, or watch a movie. They're used to it by now and they play pretty well together. This morning when I did my run I left them at the kitchen table, fully clothed, and coloring. I think my mommy skills are slipping because I completely forgot about the watercolor paints we had on the counter from the night before. Thankfully they did not paint on the walls or furniture, but this is what I found when I was done running...

Luna Bars

Zion is crazy about those Luna Bars! Do you have any boxes left?

Good to see everyone at the reunion, even though we had to leave early.

Thanks

Thank you, everyone, for your kind reviews of the EJK Reunion. I, too, enjoyed it, plus I had the fun of the anticipation and planning of it, and I mean that. I did enjoy it. The best part was the good turn-out and seeing everyone again.

Did I get rested up? Not yet. It's been working, appointments, luncheons, working, working, working... I am still planning on getting copies of the power point presentation to those who requested one. Just haven't had enough time to sit down and do that, yet. Hoping to find a way to get it posted here, also.

There were a couple of things I would do differently. For one, I had made a trail mix party favor for everyone to take home...oops, forgot to hand those out! Also would have allowed more time at the reunion for just mingling and visiting...intended for that to happen, but somehow it all ended rather quickly and you may not have had the opportunity to get to everyone. Well...we'll just have to have another get-together sometime...maybe another K5K in the future??

Will post a few pics with the slideshow. Gotta run now...

Remembering

Well, maybe I don't have enough to do today, or am just overly sentimental due to not seeing extended family very often, but while working around the house and also listing some stuff on eBay this afternoon (jackpot at a yard sale this morning), I keep thinking about the nice activities of last weekend. It was truly a high point of the summer, and those of you in central Illinois did much to make it memorable. Judy and others, thanks again, and know that your efforts were greatly appreciated. I loved the entire weekend.

Andrew comes in from camp in Louisiana this evening and leaves early in the morning with his quartet for his first time singing with them. He'll crash on Monday. Mary Lee keeps busy winding down the summer, working almost full time at a daycare and babysitting on the side. Mike worked 14 out of the last 16 days and so is very tired today. So we keep moving along down here in the heat. Inservice for me starts next week - bleghh!

First floor done!

First floor done, ready for porch and second floor!

South side of house porch area
Looking at garage
Standing in kitchen looking into great room

Girls' Night Out

I'm in Ada's boat - didn't get any pictures of the actual dinner, so if anyone sends her some, please forward them to me as well.

I did get some pics from the night before. Don't know why the color seems a little off on some of them. Judy, it was a nice evening, and all the food was great. Gloria, I understand you helped a lot with food for that event, so thanks to you as well.

COMMUNITY SERVICE

Painting the old, worn-out merry-go-round at the city park.

All done and shiny new! Bring on the children.

Jerry wants you all to rest assured that he was NOT getting out of jail time by performing community service. A few weeks he took Nathan to the park and thought that merry-go-round was so junky looking that he decided to paint it. He did this on Monday and yesterday he could barely walk, but doing better today. :)

K5K

I didn't do very good about taking pictures at the reunion meal in Gridley, but I do have several from the K5K in the morning that I thought I would share. Above is the group of runners, just be heading out.

And the group of walkers - ready to hit the trail.

At the starting line, waiting for the whistle.


Everyone synchronizes their watches - and they're off!

The first of the walkers.

(See more pictures in the following post)

K5K - Continued

The first runner comes in - and it's Brett!

Uncle Perry finishes with a smile on his face!
It's a race to the finish between Linda and Angela

Nathan gets a little help from his Grandpa.

More reunion pictures & thoughts

We are still reflecting with great memories from the weekend and the EJK Reunion which far exceeded our expectations. It was wonderful to see so many and a special "Thank You" to those who came from such a distance -- such as Uncle Lynn's, Ann, Andrew, Rhoda, etc. etc. And thanks to Judy and her many helpers for the great agenda, program, and organization. Some of our highlights were the great fun at the Fun Run/Walk, the GREAT food, the outstanding Andrew Bailes' solo, the professional slide presentation, and the super surprise of the elevator tour lined up by Aunt Ada. That was the icing on the cake. And the weather cooperated perfectly also.
After all the my high-school years of working at the elevator, I couldn't resist including a photo of my 2 oldest grandboys standing in the "famous" one-man lift inside the elevator.
For those of you who could not make it to the Reunion, you missed a memorable time!
Cleve & Kathleen

THANK YOU, JUDY!

Judy, thank you so much for planning a great reunion. It was wonderful to see so many family members there. The slide-show was awesome and we're eagerly awaiting word that you have copies ready for us to order.

I'm so disappointed that I didn't have my camera with me, so I'm relying on others to post their pictures on here. I would also appreciate anyone e-mailing me some pictures and hopefully I am technologically savvy enough to get them into my own computer and copied onto a disk so that when I get lonesome I can pull up my own slide-show and remember the day!

Thanks again Judy. All your hard work paid off big-time!!

More Reunion Memories

A couple more photos to share. What a powerful day. I think that's the best way to describe it. It renews that spark in me... that appreciation for things past... for our heritage. It tugs on me... to think about what's really important. Was great to see everyone!