A JOYFUL NOISE

If you know me, you know how emotional I can get. I cry during some movies, I cry because I'm happy that a friend has gotten married or engaged, I cry over the rejoicing birth of my nieces as well as other friends' children; I cry (rejoice) over God's Love for His Children and how unworthy we all are for His Grace and Mercy; God's never-ending love and amazing grace to me. I cry when I'm hurt by people or suffer physically when I have one of my "bad" health days; I cry over sad times---the death of friends or loved ones or the aching heart that a friend is experiencing because I hate to see people in pain, even if it's emotional. This month has been an emotional roller coaster for me. I have rejoiced over the birth of my co-worker's first child, mourned over the death of our dear friend Lillian, felt sadden by the death of one of my clients. Rejoiced over new steps and new things I hear that my nieces are doing and/or saying, rejoiced ove...

........to the UVA Emergency Room Department. Yes, I got injured at work and eventually had to go to the UVA Hospital. Imagine my being in the hospital and seeing doctors all my life; yet HATING the hospital, esp the ER dept. The story? Well, sit back and get a cup of tea........... So I was in the kitchen at work getting my lunch ready and getting my plastic silverware. So I got into the cabinet to get some extra supply of plastic forks to put into my homeroom's drawer. So, the cabinet is not really above my head, but it's about head's length for me and the cabinet itself is probably about 2 or so feet above, nearly touching the ceiling. So naturally, being short, I didn't see anything above me. I go and open up the cabinet and KLUMP---a HUGE pack of paper plates whack me in the head. I lost my balance for one second and my head started to hurt, but I weighted it out to see how I feel later. One of my coworkers heard the KLUMP and helped pick up the ...

For real justified reasons, I have had a really hard past week. Last week, as I had mentioned, a family friend past away; just four years earlier, her husband past away. There is not one day that goes by that I do not remember them or think of them. On the day of Lil Searson's viewing, I received another bad news; a client of mine that I have worked with passed away. Granted, of course, I'm not close to this client as I ever was to Mr and Mrs Searson, but still it broke my heart to hear of this client's passing. Today, we ran into a old family friend of ours from our very first church. I was four when we left Wayne Hills; but I remember Mike B; I remember his kindness and compassion and his high spirits. Today, we reminisced about the times we were all at Wayne Hills; my parents threw out names to Mike to see if any of those people were still at Wayne Hills. Oh, the memories of some of the names I remember. Of course, we couldn't go on the conversation ...

1. A Car Ride and laughing at yee-yee, paw-paw, and gong gong who sat in the back seat making silly noises and faces! 2. Eating Dim-Sum with paw paw and having a good time 3. Dim sum with the whole family (I'm the one taking the picture, so I'm not in it!); and enjoying yummy food. 4. Having paw paw read stories to you My niece Caitlyn turned 6 mo old this month!! WOW!! Time flies by so fast. She's growing up and she LOVES to gives hugs and kisses to me (and her grandparents)! She loves to laugh out loud and giggle. I love to make her laugh; it makes me laugh. Miranda seems to really enjoy her sister and whenever she cries she will on occasions say "it's okay, Caitlyn" and if my parents and are areat their house, she will run and get one of us. She's getting to be a really great BIG SISTER!! I'm proud ofBOTH of my nieces! Stayed tune for more added numbers to "Sweetness"! and it may not just be about my nieces!

This evening, my Dad and I went to the viewing of our family friend who died on Wednesday night. We saw a lot of people there at the church, including friends who also knew Mrs. Searson. I got the detail of what had happened to Mrs. Searson. She had been doing very well from the surgery and the morning when she died she was "doing great" per the doctor. She suddenly went into renal failure, her BP dropped, and her breathing was labored. Drs did all they could, but God's timing was to take Mrs. Searson. I rejoice over the fact that she is with her Lord and Saviour as well as with her dear husband who passed away in 2004. Both couples were dear to our family and I've missed Mr. Searson a lot and now I terribly miss Mrs. Searson. I was talking to a friend of ours who also knew Mrs. Searson for a good while. Mrs. Searson knew me since I was FOUR years old! FOUR! She's known me for over 20-some years. What a blessing she was to me when I was in and o...

Well, today is the first day back to work after a 8 day vacation (6 working days and weekend). My time off was refreshing. I was able to rest and relax despite the busyness of making a quick trip to NYC for my dear cousin's wedding. Having a week off from work is refreshing and good for the soul; but I do admit it is good to be back at work because I cringe at the idea of my workload at work is piling up! I guess I'm a very "on task" person and I like to get things done before the deadline; but thankfully, I didn't worry about that during my time off. I loved my time off, but enjoyed getting back to the swing of things at work. Today, I received some very sad news about a family friend of ours. Mrs. Searson knew me since I was about 4 yrs old---I'm almost 29 which means she's know me for over 20 yrs! She had surgery on her gallbladder on Monday and had complications that arose along with the gallbladder surgery. Last night around 10:00, th...

This past weekend, Friday Aug 1-Sunday August 3, my family and I went to NY to visit my grandmother and also attend my cousin's (dad's side of the family) wedding located in NJ at the Valley Regency. It was really good to see my cousins on my dad's side. Sadly we don't keep as good contact with them then we do with my mom's side, mainly because they are so much busier and a lot of time our schedules never really match with them since they are so busy. At first, the wedding was supposed to be outside in the Rose Garden, but it suddenly rained! They did have a back-up plan and had chairs set up inside as well. From L-R: Caroline and Jared (m y cousins), Un cle Wharton (my dad's youngest brother and Caroline and Jared's dad), my Dad and Mom. The Bride, My Cousin Wendy and myself ...