Merry CHRISTmas!!!

No I havent dropped off the face of the earth lol. Here are some more random pics from this year

Here is lil Charity w/ her kitten, Shadow.

Here is another kitten, Misty, who were were trying to tame.

Another kitty, Daeso, loved to sleep on our plants lol

Cloud was another kitty that we had. FYI, all of these kitties have either died or disappeared so now we are left w/ one cat (not pictured).

She loves books so much she even takes them to bed w/ her lol

Charity w/a new shirt :)

Daniel turned 17 this year & he got some Justin's from Mom & Dad.

A family in the church had some wild sunflowers growing in their backyard & since they knew my mom loves sunflowers, the girl's would bring some to church for my mom ever few weeks.

This summer we had another animal added to the Strickland "Ranch" lol. Our neighbor asked if he could board his horse w/ mine in exchange for feed so now we have another horse around the place. Btw, Wyoming is the one in the back.

On the 4th of July, we had many games going on & here the lil ones did not want to be left out so they're playing their own version of Phase 10.

The young men played Risk.

Well, here we are before the games started lol. Food & Fellowship is always fun :D

For our Father's & Son's outing this year, the guys all came over to shoot @ our new shooting range.

Also, this summer William, Daniel, & I were involved w/ a group called CYIA, Christian Youth In Action. Here William is telling the story at one of the 5 day clubs.

Here's Daniel singing a song w/ the lil ones.

Lastly, Daniel, Hannah, & I are all involved w/ a small band called the Stars & Stripes Band. Here is a pic of the band after performing at the Korean War Veteran Ceremony.

Well, sorry for such a hodge-podge group of pictures but I am using my brother's comp so I went thru his albums trying to find some stuff to add since a few of you have actually asked if I would update this thing. I will try to post more frequently unlike this past year, but we'll see since I'm staying pretty busy. God bless yall &, in case I dont post before then, Happy Thanksgiving!

Just for Miss Brookie :)

On our way to Heritage Home Farms we had to stop @ WalMart & we got board so we took some pics :)

Here we all are :)

Here are the pics of the girls for this years Old Fashion Day @ the church

Krista, Brookie, & Deborah on the porch

Another major activity for the past year has been teaching @ Good News Clubs @ on post schools. The Lord has really opened up the door for us to work w/ the military families w/ the chaplains. The very last day of clubs alone I was able to lead 14 of my kids to the Lord & that does not count the other groups that the others were able to talk to! God is good!

Here I am w/ my group of 3rd graders

Another thing to to keep me busy has been giving music lessons. Here are some pics of my students.

Here's my lil sis Hannah w/ the piano.

Here's Brookie w/ the piano.

Becky & the piano.

Debbie & the piano.

Debbie & the violin.

Before they moved to VA, I was able to teach lil Manny his first lessons on the piano :)

Lil Josiah had to copy his big bro & play some piano lol

I'm back :)

LOL Dont know if anybody even checks back here anymore. I have been sooo bad about keeping this up-to-date. I'm sorry. I will try to do better but I doubt it lol. It will probably stay pretty sporatic due to my busy schedule but I will try. We have had a whole lot going on in our lives- besides the norm we've had a death of a close friend, the travel to the funeral which was in TN, and my surgery on my neck.
Many of you may have heard of all the surgeries that I have had on my neck due to a recurring infection. Well, I was finally referred to a ENT doc who specialized even more with the neck. Praise the Lord! He seemed to have a better idea of my problem then any of the other docs. After it had gotten infected for the 4th time this past winter, he decided to try a special x-ray which was actually a CT scan with some extra features. To make it simple, some dye was injected into my neck at the exit site; then a CT scan was done. He decided to do an exploratory surgery to try to remove the abnormalities that he found. Well, I had the surgery a little over a week ago & am so glad to be back in the land of the living. I slept most of the week away due to recovery & the vicodin that the doc had me on. Well, I went to the doc yesterday & had the drain removed and he also explained what all he found during surgery. There was a whole on the side of my voice box which he cauderized in hopes that scar tissue will develope. There was also a little sac filled w/ vegetation (so like some food had accedentally gotten in there somehow lol) somewhere in a cavity in my neck. Plus the 2 tracs that they had found during the CT scan were removed and found to have "big cells" in them which didnt belong up in my neck. Not sure what all that means except that the doc found a few dif problems & is in hope that he was able to fix the problem. So now instead of one large scar I am going to have 3- one large one from the incision, one small one from another incision to get one of the tracs, and the whole from the drain. I'm just gonna be all decorated now lol.
Well, enough about me lol. My family is doing good. My parents & Hannah just got back from the funeral up in Tennessee and Hannah has been fighting either a cold, strep, or the flu ever since they got back. Little Charity is growing like crazy & copies us all the time so we have to watch what we do lol. William started his own business a lil while ago & is trying to get that up & running. Daniel is completing his junior year & of course is as smart as ever. Mom & Dad are just staying busy w/ whatever.
We still have a lot of animals around. Its like the strays find other strays & tell them that we'll feed them lol. We have 2 kittens, 2 or more cats, 2 dogs, & 1 horse now. Talk about a big food bill lol.
Well, I'll try to get some updated pics up soon. Take care ya'll!