Remembering Redeemer

I've been in contact the last few weeks between Anna's graduation and a few other instances, with people from our old church. The hardest thing for me to do when we left was to leave the people we loved. My kids had so many grandparents and I had so many people who just watched out for me that was most certainly hard to say goodbye and I am sure it was confusing to them. I was expecting my seventh child at the time. Well one of the grandmas called again recently. She has actually called a few times this summer. The first time she called to share with me that her daughter's youngest child got married. This might seem a little out of the blue as lots of people's grandchildren get married but Carly was special to the Horners and especially special to Charley as when she was a toddler Charley just stared at her sweeetness and thus......we had Anna. Carly's grandma knew that as of course Charley had to tell her over and over how cute Carly was and how badly he wanted a little girl of his own. Well, now Carly is married and her grandma was sweet to remember that.

Anna plays the organ the last Sunday before she goes at Redeemer and at first she seemed regretful as she loves Emmaus (there is a Divine Service on Monday though :o)) but then she remembered all her 'grandparents' at Redeemer who still love her and are proud of her and stop us on the street to tell us how much we mean to them. Sigh. This part is still hard. It is not wrong that we switched but we lost contact with a lot of Grandparents as a result. There were many members who did offer to lend a hand to make sure I got a break or whatever. Needing a break is not quite as critical as it was as my oldest kids are pretty reliable. I still am not able to just go to events such as last weeks conference very easily as I hate burdening my older kids with the little kids so that I can 'go have fun or soak up a seminar.' This will not change for quite a while I have no doubt. My leaving the home with older kids and the baby is also not always the best as my dear husband appreciates me being home for a reason.......he does get a little overwhelmed and my vocation is not his vocation so it is still not 'simple' to just leave. This can be sort of frustrating. I think I leave some sort of impression on people that I can just handle life all the time but I frankly am not that good at it all the time. I want my older kids to gain the benefit of the social times with other like minded people but am torn by the burden at home and the inevitable neglect of my little people. Too bad there isn't a train like Hogwarts has to transport them where they need to go. I am not sure if there is a Marshall retreat this year so haven't even started agaonizing over that but maybe I can figure out something. Boy.....that got a little off topic. The funny thing and good thing about Emmaus is that we are not the freaks with tons of kids as there are many large families. We don't stand out as people who might need help. There is no easy solution to that except to perhaps ask around and see if there are other families who might need help when it comes to these special events. I still will struggle with not always going with but I am also struggling with my own kids puppy eyes when they wish they could go too.