Joel's Journey: An okie reception!

Monday, September 24, 2012

An okie reception!

My heart was full this weekend! Why? Because ALL my children, except Joel, and my new and beautiful daughter Kristen were here, at home, on our farm!! We had an okie reception for Caleb and Kristen on Saturday at our farm! Also Kristen's parents were able to join us too!! After it was all set up, I thought it looked like a flea market! Ha! It was soooo much fun borrowing, gathering, strolling through antique stores and getting little treasures to add farm love to the theme I wanted to create for them! Andrew, made all the signs for me and I painted them, he helped me soooo much and I appreciate his diligence! Hosanna, josh and jeremiah came along side Andrew and pulled their share as well! Mercy just enjoyed the seem like pumpkin patch at "our" house!!! We cooked up close to 40 pounds of BBQ, 120 hamburger buns and 5 gallons of ranch beans, 10 giant size "family" bags of potatoe chips, 120 bottles of root beer, 64 pint jars of lemonade we made up!! For the desserts, the request from the groom was magic cookie bars and I made pans and pans of them!!! Choc crinkle cookies.....dozens!!!! Peanut butter clusters..... pounds and pounds of choc over pounds and pounds of peanuts!!! oh and about 80 little orange topped cup cakes!!! I delighted in all the work knowing it would bless the dear newlyweds!!

A day I will treasure because I know it will be rare to have everyone here in the days ahead!!!

A few country farm wedding reception photos!!!

6 comments:

Jen said...: Looks like you had a fabulous time! We did the same for Brooke and Adam-wedding reception and then another reception in Indy! So much fun! Congratulations to all!; September 24, 2012 at 11:46 AM
Sarah said...: It looks like Micah is none-too-happy with the dog in the family photo ;); September 24, 2012 at 12:46 PM
Unknown said...: It looks like so much fun and a lot of planning! Mrs. Cindy you are so creative!!! Caleb and Kristen are going to have many babies and be happy the rest of their lives. Caleb has had very good examples nd I am sure Kristen has too just don't know them. I am so glad Kristen's mom was able to even come!!!!! God Bless y'all!!!!; September 24, 2012 at 2:48 PM
janicerichard04 said...: Wow, wow and wow again! It sure looked to be tons of fun (and tons of work!). Good on you Ms. Morris for always outdoing yourself. You are soon going to have to get a wider, wide angle lens to fit ALL the family in your great family photos. May God bless you and yours!
~ The New Brunswickers ~; September 24, 2012 at 8:05 PM
Teena said...: Beautiful pic! Love it. You always do a great job....

Hugs; September 25, 2012 at 4:14 PM
sarahdodson said...: nice decorating!! looks so good!; September 28, 2012 at 7:48 PM

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Joel's Story

Joel, our 11th of 13 and a twin of Josiah, at age 3 was diagnosed with Neuroblastoma, a childhood cancer, on December 6th, 2006. Joel had three perfect years of health and he and Josiah celebrated their 3rd birthday Sept. 13th, 2006. The first of Oct. Joel started having unexplained fevers for a few days and would return to active play. After the fourth round of fevers we took him to our family Dr. which they said his iron was low, so we treated that for a few weeks and took him back only to have his hemo. showing lower than before. We were referred to a hematologists and saw him a few weeks with blood checks twice a week. At a visit on Dec. 4th we showed the Dr. the bumps, (which were tumors but we did not know at the time) on Joel's head and he was very concerned and we were told we needed to admit him immediately and start extensive tests the following day. Joel went through rigorous testing and then the dreaded results were given. Joel was at a stage IV the most extensive stage, but we were hopeful that the Lord would use the means of Chemotherapy treatments to restore Joel's body. Joel endured 8 1/2 days in the hospital, came home for Christmas, and returned for his second round of chemo Jan. 3, 2007. Joel had a seizure that night after midnight and went into a coma due to a tumor bleeding in his head area and causing his brain to swell. After tests the following days, the Dr. declared Joel "brain dead" and took us to court to force us to take Joel off life support, as we did not agree with the medical field's definition of death. Our family sought to stand with the scripture, "life is in the blood,"and until Joel's heart quit beating naturally, he was living. We were making arrangements to bring him home and on January 23, 2007 his little heart stopped beating and he went to be with the Lord Jesus in heaven. Our lives are changed forever. God is faithful in the midst of this trial and we look with great hope to be with him someday.