It's Katie's wedding day

It's Katie's wedding day ...

When I was a small boy my mom would drive me down to Somerton train station just before dinner. A bell would ring inside the station before you could even see the train. Then I would look down the tracks and the light of the train would appear as it came around a bend. In a minute, the station would no longer be quiet, but filled with the sounds and smells of the arriving train. After his day working at the bank, my dad would emerge from the clouds of steam and I would run over to walk alongside him to “old Betsy”, our blue 1956 Dodge, for the 1 mile trip home for dinner. I love my dad.

Many years later, that little boy was a father. After my day at the computer company, I would drive home in my blue Toyota, walk in the door of our house and be greeted by a smiley little girl named Katie who would come running out to daddy to be picked up and hugged. I love my Katie.

Highlights of life with Katie -

- Using her dad (me) to get me to pick her up so she could pull on my hair, pat me on the head, or reach whatever she couldn’t reach from her own level
- Our first trip to DisneyWorld, Katie was about 2 years old -
o Katie was absolutely enchanted and spellbound with The Electric Light Parade
o Almost in tears, Katie let out this beautiful loving “Mickey ~ …”, as Mickey came over to give her a hug at a character breakfast
o At the hotel, for some reason, Katie always led us running down the hallway yelling, “fly like an eagle!”
- Kindergarten field day – Katie was winning the 50 yd dash until she turned around to wait for her friends to catch up
- Second grade. Katie was very frustrated trying to please her teacher. She was already a perfectionist!
- Katie often used her older sister Jenny to go down to the basement and get things for her
- Katie was honored to be asked to read her “Rainbow” poem at graduation from Rainbow Elementary
- Katie and Jenny were playing on the steps with the cat one day when I screamed at them for endangering the cat. They both instantly broke into tears.
- Vacations with Katie, while my wife Karen and Katie’s sister Jenny went to ASP:
o The time we went camping at French Creek State Park – Katie was so excited about the great camping site she made me write it down, it was A35.
o The time we went camping at Shenandoah National Park and saw mama bear and 2 cubs, as well as a giant buck walking across our path
o The Subaru breaking down on the turnpike on the way to Sesame Place
o Washington D.C., Mr. Roger’s sweater at The Smithsonian, The National Zoo
- Softball, Katie was more interested in talking to the base runner on the opposing team than in catching the ball.
- Eating grilled cheese every night of vacation.
- Vacation to visit Anne of Green Gables on Prince Edward Island when a deck of playing cards flew out the window. Katie instantaneously went from being a happy little princess into the depths of despair.  We went back and found all the cards along the roadway.
- The rest of the family was often indecisive, so the common question while on vacation often was, “But - What does KATIE want to do?”
- Field Hockey, Katie thought everyone was cheering for her while she took the ball the wrong direction down the field.
- Katie came running over for dad’s shelter one day on the OCNJ boardwalk when a random guy tried to hit on her at about 14 years old
- Katie was “The Nanny” a few years for some neighborhood twins and their brother
- Katie, her friend Hannah, and Hannah’s mom Elaine, were on my ASP team together at a house in West Virginia – We all fell in love with the little girl living there and remember her talking about our trip through a long long very dark tunnel on the way to the ASP picnic, “This tunnel used to have lights, but they all busted!”
- I love being used by Katie to fetch a drink when she is too tired to get off the couch in the living room
- Katie wasn’t sure how I would take it when her bike fell off the garage wall-rack onto my cherished new car
- On a trip to Boston, the police were interviewing some guys in the motel room next to ours, Katie just shook her head and called them “Losers”.
- Katie watched as I confidently kicked a giant ball over the house, except that it actually went right through the playroom window instead
- Katie was one bewildered teenage girl marching off to her Chrysalis Weekend after Angel Fran took her cell phone away
- Katie would call my wife Karen to arrange little “get-togethers with a few friends” after school and a dozen kids would show up
- We had a backyard birthday party where our deck turned into a stage for her boyfriend Andrew’s band, “Fusion 15”.  About 75 kids showed up.  Kids were sneaking in from the neighborhood to watch the show from behind the woodpile
- Katie and her friends worked Purple Door and a few other Contemporary Christian Music concerts with me
- Katie had her first car accident in the driveway at CASH, with my dad’s Crown Victoria, which she had named “Vicki”
- She went to “Doctor Camp” at Villanova – body parts and all
- Allied Health:
o Bringing home a colon stapler given her by someone in the OR with her one day
o Having the opportunity to see an autopsy
- Sitting in movie seats on the way to the PROM
- An extremely difficult Freshman Year at York
- Picking out clothes for her dad at the Old Navy in York – Katie is the family fashion expert
- The "Nurse Nerds" (Katie and her roommates for the last 3 years at YCP
- An extremely difficult tragic day at CHOP when Katie decided if she could get through the worst day in her mentor’s life, then she could handle anything she would ever have to deal with in nursing
- The internship banquet
- Katie’s pinning ceremony at York College
- The day Katie saved a baby’s life for the first time
- Katie’s wedding day, soon it too will be on this list of great times to remember


I believe that heaven is going to be the best place ever. God called my dad to that place on March 20, 2007. Now, for heaven to be the best place ever, I believe we’ll be able to relive our own lifetime experiences over and over as much as we want.


Among many other wonderful experiences, I’m looking forward to reliving –
- playing catch with my dad in the backyard of 11 Elbow Lane
- sitting on the porch with God at ASP, late on a cool Kentucky Friday night, the summer after dad moved on
- fiery moments of bliss with my wife, including our trips to Vermont, California, and Paris
- climbing Mt. Washington with my daughter Jenny
- meeting my dad at the train station
- 3-year old smiley Katie  running into my arms when I come home from work
- Katie getting married on the first day of spring, March 20, 2010


I love you Katie, you will ALWAYS be my youngest daughter,


- Dad


LET’S PUT ON A WEDDING !!!

Late Friday nite - can I still call this one day to the wedding?

What a day.
So it turns out we don’t have any additional nurses here tonight after all. Changes of plans. It’s ok, still covered by a NICU and an ICU nurse.
Got the cars washed. Various errands run. Got to do a tiny load-in/load-out roadie job for the slide show / music at the rehearsal dinner. Checked the Tux. Rented some videos for the girls to watch over the weekend.
Rehearsal was great, and so was the rehearsal dinner. I really don't know what words to use. It is really cool how I think both families are feeling blessed to become part of the others. Andrew's fam is awesome. I have a tremendous respect and admiration for them. And I cannot wait to have Andrew for a son-in-law. I love having a real musican in the family that I can talk to about all kinds of music and music production stuff.
Katie gave me iTunes card with some nice words on it tonight at dinner, as a gift - she is so cool - I did not see that coming. Gotta love that girl. :-)

This is really going to be fun tomorrow. Music by local youth. Pretty good music from what I heard tonight. Beautiful weekend coming up. Everything is going very smoothly. Thank you Jesus!

Two days to Katie's wedding

Two days to Katie’s wedding, the excitement is building.

Tonight our home becomes a Bed & Breakfast as bridesmaids begin arriving. If anyone gets hurt, we’ll be in good shape with 2 ER nurses, an ICU, and a NICU nurse. Our dog is boarded. Just can’t risk having an 80 pound Golden jumping up and licking you to death in your wedding duds. I’ll try to get some homework done tonight, try on my tux, and tomorrow, the cars get washed before the rehersal.

I’m sure there are about a million other things I don’t even know about yet. Gotta love it!   :-)

Blog Vision

I expect this to be a sort of straight from the heart place.  I don’t expect to update it every day like facebook or twitter. And it will typically be bigger than a status line.  I do expect to write about how God is working in my life, how I see God working in things that touch my life, the lives of those around me, and the lives of people around the globe.

Genesis

This is my first blog entry.  What's a good way to start?  Truth is a good place to start usually.

Years ago at the Bridge in Lionville, PA, I heard guest speaker Bart Campolo paraphrase Jesus' words in Matthew 22:37-39.  It has stuck with me ever since as a basic truth to live by, a credo, if you will  -

"Love God, Love People"

happy hiking and God Bless,

- allen