Nearly New Friday Five

Over at RevGals, Sally writes:

A simple Friday Five for a busy part of the year; indulge me by sharing two fives:

As you look back over 2011 share 5 blessings; they can be as grand or as simple as you like; if your year has been like mine, they are probably a mixture!

As you look towards 2012 share 5 hopes- again, anything goes!

(Yeah, I went on to six.) 

B-L-E-S-S-I-N-G-S

1.  Ordination on October 30,

2. A congregation which stuck with me despite my diagnosis of breast cancer just as I was called ("It never occurred to us to do otherwise," one of the call committee members told me a couple of weeks ago),

3.  A husband, children, friends, and readers who have stuck with me through the good, the bad, and the ugly (and there have been a lot of the last two!),

4. A son and a daughter whose resilience and strength are getting them through law school and grad school in excellent shape,

5. Their studies in Russia and Guatemala and our family trips to Florida and North Carolina, all of them signs of the slow healing we are experiencing where we can, and


6. My week on retreat at Wernersville!

H-O-P-E-S

1. Mostly, I hope that all the members of my family who are alive today will be alive a year from now.  But also,

2.  I hope that my daughter graduates and finds employment,

3. I hope that my son hangs onto his scholarship for his third year of law school,

4.  I hope that my mother-in-law recovers quickly and fully from her holiday heart surgery,

5.  I hope that my congregation thrives, and, oh yeah . . .

6.  I so hope that the day comes soon when I never have to see the inside of a hospital as a patient again!



Image: Our Nightly Cedar Key (FL) Sunset a year ago.