Birthdays, Versaries, and Such

Today is a very eventful day. Much to observe, much to celebrate, much to remember. And there's no possible way to put all these things in any kind of correct order, so I'll just dive in and go!

Our baby girl turns eleven today.

(That's an old picture, but it seemed appropriate.)

Eleven years old! Can you believe that?

(These pictures are from the day I first got her and from last Mother's Day. We both came a long way in a decade, yes?)

She's a daddy's girl through and through now...could really take or leave me, but she's still cute and fun (except for when she wants to play at 4 in the morning) and keeps life in our little Shafferland very interesting.

Happy birthday, Braeya Jo Jo!

ALSO in the land of birthdays, my sister Lori turns an undisclosed amount of years today. :)  These photos are from Cassie's wedding weekend last summer. (We don't get to have pictures together very often because you know...850 miles apart.)

Happy birthday, Lori!!!! I hope this is a wonderful, non-eventful day for you. Love you!

Because ten years ago today, her birthday was not uneventful. Today marks the ten year anniversary of the tornado that destroyed most of their town, including their home and church. (What a lousy birthday present, right?)

I blogged a lot about that tornado back in the day, starting with this post, where I first asked you to pray for them. I didn't know much of anything at that time except it was all just bad. 

Turns out I didn't even really know what bad was until I saw the pictures.

This is a picture of the bathroom where the three of them were (in the basement of their house) during the tornado. The green towel hanging on the piece of wood is above/behind the toilet where they were all crouched. The planks on the right side of the picture are making a bridge from the back step to the top of the stairway to the basement. The night of the tornado, those planks weren't there, but neither was the floor that used to connect the stairway to the back door. So they had to jump across that hole, in the dark, in order to escape.

 The house.

 The church.

Obviously we remain so grateful for the protection over them physically the night of the storm and we are thankful God has provided every need since then. They now have a new home and a new church building, and my brother-in-law, Jeff, just released a book recounting his perspective on the storm and the heart-recovery the followed. It's called Light at the End of the Funnel.

 While there is no real graceful segue out of the loss of their home into this next versary, today also marks one year since we officially sold our home in Marion!

This praise party was FOR REAL. Five years is a long wait for a house sale. (And I know some of you have probably waited even longer. Bless you!!!)

 Our Realtor, Cathy. She made this process amazing.

Happy sale-aversary to us!!!

And not to be outdone by our own versary, I did want to mention that this week we celebrated our 53rd monthiversary. Wow! I continue to be in awe of this life I have the privilege to live beside Ryan. He is a blessing, and I'm grateful for him.

He did have to work (crazy how work doesn't recognize monthiversaries, isn't it?) so we celebrated in the evening by eating chicken nuggets, asparagus, and a new cookie recipe I found on Dashing Dish.

The official monthiversary photo:

And the post-workout photo. Because we are so cool that we work out for fun to celebrate.

See? I told you it was a big day!!

So grateful for God's goodness and faithfulness. I think it's demonstrated well in these pictures.

Linking up with Tamar (who has a yummy looking recipe today)!!!