let the wild rumpus begin!

all 41 of us, in the same place, at the same time. 4 generations of wickline (and some other last names). starting with grandma pat who just turned 82 and going to heidi who is not yet a year old.

i dont know if any room on the planet can handle that amount of crazy.

but it is happening.

this weekend!

thanks to brooke initiating the idea and facebook for allowing us all to message back and forth to find a date that worked and make a plan.

3 days of cousins and aunts and uncles and playing games (all sorts).

i dont know that i have ever been this excited to go home since i flew the coup (almost) 6 years ago.

im sure i will have stories and pictures to share upon returning. but here are some classic wickline family pictures to get you started:

grandma pat and grandpa buck circa 1948

 

our parents circa 1960

 

our generation circa 1988

the last time all the cousins were in the same place at the same time.

(emilee and alex didn't exist yet, let alone the 17 in the next generation)

think we can still all fit on a porch swing?

 

dont miss our cousin alf, he is sitting on brooke's lap.

christmas 2008

missing the cali cousins and any new additions since then.

cant wait to see everyone all at the same time! it has been way too long. im sure a good time will be had by all. i cant wait to laugh til i cry, cry til i laugh, tell old stories, and just enjoy the craziness that happens when a whole lot of people all sharing the same gene pool spend time together.

they call me aunt hanny

dylan started it. about 5 yrs ago.

she couldn't say hannah. she said hanny. and we sort of trained her to keep saying it that way even when she grew into her words.

maggiecphotography.com

this is dylan now. not 5 yrs ago.

she is growing too fast. much too fast.

 

it seems many little ones call me hanny of their own accord. (the keiglets do it on occasion as do the woods) but as much as i love it from any little ones, the ones i love to hear it from and that melt my heart the most are dylan, eli, and zeek.

maggiecphotography.com

i mean really, how cute are they?

and in one week. just one short week. i get to see them! and hug them. and cuddle. and play. im going on 4 months without going home to OH. and this trip im sure will be well worth the wait.

(i also get to see my entire wickline extended family in one place at the same time. this has never happened, chaos will ensue. but more on that on a different day)

one of the best moments at home is always when i walk in and without fail dylan is waiting anxiously for me to arrive and she runs and jumps and i catch her and we spin around. and always, she asks to play ring around the rosey. this is not typical ring around the rosey. this is playing airplane, but im ok with her thinking its ring around the rosey. i pick her up, we spin around until i almost fall over and she says 'let's do it again!'

and then there are these two:

maggiecphotography.com

they are almost 3. almost. (cousins, not brothers)

and my goodness, i can only imagine the trouble they will get in.

 

eli warms right up and just loves his aunt hanny. zeek however likes to play hard to get. but im ok with that. i love their unique personalities.

 

and i am so excited and ready to spend sweet time with them. (and with the rest of my family)

 

things have been rather non-stop busy here for the past 2 months and i could not think of a better reward at the end of the crazy than to go home and spend time with my (possibly equally crazy) family. 

mondays with harry

mondays with harry are something like tuesdays with morrie. except harry wasn't my professor, and he isn't terminally ill. but he is full of wisdom and good questions to help those around him think more deeply about the life they live.

this is harry.

harry is a coworker of mine who is close in age to my parents. he has come in and out of the look up lodge world over the past few years working in maintenance to begin with and now in leader care.

he is a person with much wisdom and life experience to share.

mondays at work begin with a directors meeting for many of the office staff. i, however, am not a director. nor is harry. and lately i have been feeling a little spiritually dry with no real direction to study or delve into the Word. then one day harry accidentally printed a sheet of questions he used for his small group to gauge their knowledge of the Bible.

for someone with a degree in Bible, i didn't do so well. and this gave me an idea: mondays with harry.

every monday harry gives me a new question to think on and find the answer to. sometimes there is a definitive answer. like the first week the answer was 70. and sometimes it just leads to more questions. like this week.

this weeks question isn't really a question so much. it is: compare and observe closely the passages about spiritual gifts in Ephesians 4 and Romans 12. so far it has led to more thinking and more questions.

but it has also led to me being outside of my own thoughts and needs and learning more about the heart of God and how He communicates with His people.

i think mondays with harry will be a great learning experience. and if you have someone around you that you recognize as wiser and more experienced than you, i think you should pick their brain to see what you might find.

being a Reds fan

something i have learned and become accustomed to, being a lifelong fan of the cincinnati reds is this:
come october, more likely than not, they'll break your heart.

 

(reds game 1990, the last World Series year)

often it happens long before october. but not this year. no. we clinch the division a few weeks from playoffs. things are looking bright.

we win the first two games in san francisco. spirits are high.

then we head home for what we hope will be a sweep.

and then no sweep. not even a light dusting.

3 games later around 5:15pm on a regular thursday afternoon, there it is. the end of another season. 

until today i had no idea how much i love the reds.

the last 15 minutes of the game i refreshed the gameday screen on my computer more times than i could count. i wasnt even watching the actual game. but my heart was pounding. i couldnt wait for the next pitch to be thrown. they had runners on base at the end of the last 4 innings.

it was so close.

but then.

another season comes to a close.

my heart fell, my head hung low. another season over and no NL championship or world series.

but.

as much as it saddened me, it doesn't matter. bc although they may break your heart year after year, they will be there next spring. looking bright and hopeful. ready for another shot.

and to be a fan of the hometown team isnt about whether they win or lose. it's about the love of the game and the comraderie of the fellow fans.

and the hope that maybe. just maybe. next year is the year.

the busy-ness of life

since my last post i have pretty much been working non-stop, with a little fun thrown in around the edges.

we had 2 of our biggest fall weekends here, 2 overnight weekday school group retreats, and sandwiched in the middle our annual staff retreat.

i will write more on the details of work in the fall soon, but for now let's stick to the fun around the edges!

the staff retreat, although work related was pretty fun.  we stayed at a cabin in Gatlinburg that can sleep 28 people. it was a really great cabin. we went for an easy hike all together to a waterfall you can walk behind and with many rocks to climb on. we played an intense game of kickball. went to a really nice restaurant (nicest i have ever been to). played putt putt (which i forgot how terrible i am at that game and would be ok if i never played it again.)  and just hung out and enjoyed each other's company for a few days.

after arriving home from the staff retreat i almost immediately got in my car to head to atlanta for a braves game. (making this my second new stadium this year) my friend and former staffer, stacy, accompanied me. she had never been to a baseball game of any kind. and we were met by two more former staffers, maggie and kinsey, to enjoy one of chipper's last games and a braves win. and we sat in the best seats i have ever had at a game thanks to stubhub.com . i got 4 tickets in the 200 level for less than the price of one including all the processing fees.

within a 1 week period i saw briefly or got to hang out with 15 different summer staffers from my two summers. that's a good week in my opinion.

i started a course called CERT. it stands for community emergency response team. the classes teach how to appropriately respond in emergencies until the professionals arrive.

we had our 3rd volleyball league night. we won both games. our team is actually pretty good for having only played to together one time before.

i started weight watchers. not that this is a fun thing right now. i'm more looking forward to the fun part a few months from now when my old clothes that fit 10 yrs ago fit again.

yesterday i framed some wall at habitat. it's like riding a bike. each time i go, i can't remember at the start, but then once you start swinging the hammer, it all comes back.

so although i'm run a little ragged from working 12 days straight. i'm glad to think a little of the run ragged is coming from the fun i'm trying to squeeze in around the edges.