“It takes a noble man to plant a seed for a tree that will some day give shade to people he may never meet.”

– D. Elton Trueblood

It takes a noble man …

There is more to this article at the link.  And it resonates with me as a teacher.  However, I looked up trees in the connection of someone having a vision of a tree that he was looking for, found, and then passed away into heaven.  This happened to our Papa last Sunday October 6, 2024.

Papa’s obituary

Roger’s story:

“Lisa and I and my mom were visiting him on Friday, a couple days before he had passed.  And he told us he was looking for a tree, then he could go home.   Lisa and Mom and I were confused by this and didn’t know what this meant.  And he told just us, the immediate members of the family present in the room.  He told each of us individually about this tree.  Sunday, the day he passed on, not long before he died, he said to my mom, who was the only one there that day, “I found the tree, and I am going home.”  And it was only five minutes later that he passed on.  That is why I wanted to plant a tree in his name, because this will be Papa’s tree here on earth.”

Roger is getting a tree in his name.  And thememorial tree site will plant it where it is most needed.

And papa’s tree will give shade to those who seek it.

Roger and Dorene Humphries

 

WE HOPE YOU ALL HAD A GOOD CHRISTMAS 2023!  HAPPY NEW YEAR 2024!

Picture Page 2023

My “Mary, Did you Know” video and my singing

• EMAIL DORENE: transcribing.mom@gmail.com, daehumphries18@yahoo.com

• EMAIL ROGER: thedodger1@att.net, thedodger64@gmail.com

• FACEBOOK

• INSTAGRAM:  Criscollrj

• Family web site: www.criscollrj.com

• Business web site:  WWW.LINE-BRIGHT.COM(my legal transcription, Roger’s court research, listing of our local parks, my “book” in HTML format, and more in very slow progress!

• 

(https://www.thetruthstandsforever.com/god-is-the-rock-of-the-believer.html) 

Reminisce with my 2000-2005 newsletters mostly all restored now!!!

A fun thing this year, still in process here and there — I had to tweak my old web page coding some, and did get a lot of these showing up again!  Old Christmas Newsletters early 2000s!  You should be able to see a lot of 2000 – 2005 at this point.  There still may be some dead links but I plan to look at them the next few weeks…

THIS is my “snail mail” newsletter – copied below.  Written by approx. 12/20/2023.

Christmas Newsletter 2023

As we still are on the earth, doing our duties and being with our loved ones, we still see illnesses, and just like last year we see COVID going up again, and also flu and other illnesses.  All our prayers to all!!!  Last year our family had COVID in various times:  Roger’s parents had right at Christmas ‘22 and then Roger, Chris and I had mid January ’23.  March of 23 Norovirus got just my mom, me and Roger!  We managed to stay healthy then for a while!

Continue reading “2023 Christmas Newsletter” →

www.facebook.com/1191271319/posts/10226621720347806/

testing this…

And it’s hurricane winds.

But hoping it will all end up good.  Some of the prayer requests lately were about this as we didn’t know where it was all going!  Being in the dark, or going around a curve not knowing where you are going, is so scary.  But it seems God is working things out!

After 6 years at his waiver house Chris is moving to a new house!  This was years in the making and finally happened suddenly when we heard of an availability too good to pass up.  (Everything had been too expensive!!)  We needed to cut his rent in half and have just about done so.  It is a cute place and I hope he adjusts well.  Prayers appreciated!  He also should be able to eventually have a roommate.  We never successfully were able to get one where he was because the rent was just too high.  “But the legend of the rent, was way past due.”  Or about to be. (School of rock reference, haha)

Chris is doing very well right now, as he was when he moved 6 years ago, so hopefully with all our support and love and good staff he will do very well.  He is still thriving at the workshop he started in September of 17.

On top of this change (4 days earlier!!) Ryan is moving to a new school.  This came as a shock but is all part of planning for his transition years to vocational.  This will have more music and art opportunities for Ryan as well.  They even brought a guitar to class for him to play.  They had an opening and thought it was a good time to transition since Ryan will be 17 soon.  They have opportunities to work on job skills even making some money ahead of his post-high school years.  We weren’t expecting to do this so soon but felt the opportunity was great for him.  So he had orientation today and will be starting Thursday.

Please pray for him in this transition as well, and that our move for Chris is smooth as there is SO much to do and so much furniture and items to juggle!  May our boys be blessed in this new season….

And in the middle of that our daughter’s store closed and she got transferred to a new one.  THIS just happened a week ago.  We are praying for her as well, so far it is going fine.

After working with Chris every weekend for SIX YEARS I did not proceed to get a position with his new provider in this house.  it will be very strange but Roger and I are missing each other over the weekend, and this way we can all visit Chris together without me being gone 48 hours a weekend.  As soon as we adjust to Chris’s move and Ryan’s new school I’m going to be on the hunt for a new job in my educational bachelor’s degree field. Not a regular teacher, as I don’t yet have license, but I have seen a lot of cool opportunities on the job boards!!  I also signed up for a few freelance jobs that look good that also use the bachelor’s degree — one for tutoring and one as a web reviewer of some sort.  I haven’t started either one, plan to look at that in November as well as start doing more data entry with roger.

As always, busy busy!  God’s blessings and happy autumn!

Around October of 2009 I was still planning to go and get my AAERT certificate for transcription, and start my own transcription company. There was a time around then that I found out with all the years I’d already been transcribing, that I probably wouldn’t have much of a pay raise by making this change. I was also already happy with the transcription company I was working for, and I didn’t really want to change. Additionally, we were concerned with Chris’s placement then, and had a dream of eventually owning a group home and having it be for our boys eventually plus other clients.

This led to my signing up at community college to work my way back up to getting into a speech pathology program. I started in January of 2010 and by Fall of 2011 was at Kent State starting the pre-speech pathology program. Then this happened: https://criscollrj.com/2011/09/09/minor-changes-or-major-changes/

Continue reading “Eight and a half years —” →

Of course I never did a Christmas newsletter with finishing my semester on December 31 on the deadline and then jumping right into emergencies after that!  So I do wish a happy 2018 to all reading!

We are grateful for many things right now and just wanted to offer that in writing – thanking the Lord, all the people that have been “rocks” to us in the challenges and changes we had the last few years, and everyone that had been praying.  All your prayers are still appreciated!

Also, this Christmas, we received a very special gift from an anonymous “Santa.”  If you are on Facebook and/or on my blog, just know that we forever will appreciate it!!!!  Thank you!!!! You gave us an immense blessing.

After about two years of extreme struggles and challenges, Chris finally is in a very stable situation with both workshop and home staff and situations.  This is a blessing from God and everyone can see the better place he is now in.  It has been many years since he has done this well.

Colleen moved out with friends in November of 2017 and is doing very well.  She can finally enjoy all her animals in her own apartment.  She still is working at the pet store and I believe she is in a peaceful contented place.  Prayers are appreciated of course as she sets out on her own journey and discovering who she is.

Ryan turns 16 today (and I turn 53!) in a few hours and he is doing very well at school as always, and he still will be coming with us on our work trips a few times a year.  It will be neat to see what he will do vocationally in the next few years, another road map unknown.

I graduate FINALLY sometime this summer – as fast as I can write a major research paper with accompanying tasks and do a 60 hour observation course with accompanying tasks.  I see being done probably by July.  I’d love us to go to Washington DC for that commencement ceremony but will see….  And Roger is still looking to go back.  We still do our data entry and just recently got a nice typing job for a printing company through a friend.

Blessings to you all!!!

February 4, 2017

I TYPED THIS January 1, with the expectation of having it done in a few days.  I never finished it.  I have not finished most of the things I am doing right now!  So I figured, what the heck, I will post this, and will probably give it a nick name of the Unfinished Post!  I truly wish you all a blessed 2017, here in early February, and pray you all will have all you need and love.  God’s blessings to you all!  I didn’t want to wait any longer to post – so understand all the pictures are not even on this newsletter – going with the theme of this being unfinished!  But what I didn’t want to do is break my approximately 25 year record of doing a newsletter every year!!  I don’t seem to get them mailed anymore, but getting them on this blog (before it was my web site) happens every year (since about 1998??).  Lastly, those of you that sent us Christmas cards, THANK YOU — I truly appreciate it and enjoy them so much.

January 1, 2017

First wanted to share this from a friend’s facebook wall…of course changing her items to mine…

I’ve seen LOTS of memes and lots of posts decrying how horrible 2016 was. There were some strange things, some bad things, the deaths of a lot of cultural icons, but the year itself was no worse than any other year. There were also a lot of good things!
I think that social media likes to focus on the negative, so I want to change that here! I’m going to focus on the positive! here are some GOOD THINGS That happened in my life:

1. with all the changes that happened with Christopher’s housing and staffing, we have ended up with a new fantastic company and staff for his care.
2. with further changes in our self employment situation, we were able to put a very part time job from the back burner to the front burner, giving us more full-time work that disappeared from our former major company.
3. roger had a full year of better health, and even though learning about his diabetes was a new challenge, we had an early warning to attack it head on with better eating plan, more exercise, and time to turn things around and lead to even more weight loss!
4. Our Christmas season was not as hectic as last few years – even though it was still hectic!  We had time to watch our beautiful tree and take the kids to see lights.
5. We were able to meet friends and family for a few dinners and gatherings, even though we didn’t go to Kraynak’s or Christmas world.  there are plenty of great light shows to see right here in our neighborhood!
6. Colleen made her wonderful buckeyes after a few years of not getting to make them 🙂
7. I’m now just months away from my bachelor’s degree.  (February 4 note – this has changed a bit — I will soon do an update on this, but I actually now believe my main teaching degree is done in October, then I will have a semester of research writing (instead of doing student teaching) that will take me probably Jan – June.  So probably graduating June of 18, but without the license.  (One step away from that license then, if I do it then… I may wait a bit, so much going on!)

There are lots of other good things too! These are just the highlights! As we go into the new year, let’s focus on the blessings! PLEASE COMMENT AND SHARE SOMETHING GOOD THAT HAS HAPPENED IN YOUR LIFE THIS YEAR!! Or share on your wall!

To risk being repetitive, two years later we are all still so grateful for Roger’s health.  We continue to approach new wellness approaches, trying to follow a Mediterranean more healthier carbs eating style, and Roger has lost some weight.  I have a bit of a struggle as I can’t seem to stop the sugar, but will try and cut back more and more this new year.  I luckily have not gained any weight back that I lost the past few years, and am grateful for that.  We continue to visit a few courthouses together, and have added some online courthouses as our focus of work has switched from one company to a different one.  We also had a new experience begin this year, as Ryan has become older and more calm and able to focus pretty happily on his photo programs on a tablet or phone, we began to travel with him along to courthouses.  We were able to have 4 trips with him this year along with us, where he enjoys Pizza Hut or Wendy’s after work day.  It’s been wonderful to see our towns in the hills again!

Had a solid year of college this time — as I was planning to start student teaching in either Sept. of 17 or Jan of 18 any more term breaks would have messed up my schedule to get into those programs.  However about 3 months ago I made a new tentative plan, and am still in the midst of making a decision.  An option that I most likely am going to do is to obtain a degree plan called a BAES (Bachelor’s of Educational Studies).  Then I can obtain a waiver to receive a master’s (I am looking at either educational technology or instructional design (writing lesson plans) where I can do my student teaching afterwards, in a few years.  with everything going on right now I do not feel ready to commit to 4-6 months of full time student teaching!!

I am planning a term break then most likely in March or possibly March and April, to hopefully finish cleaning out our basement, also recovering from a brief plumbing problem we have had, and completing the move of Ryan to his new room (no that did not happen yet!!).  One huge accomplishment I had a few months ago was I was able able to clean out ALL my file folders in five file drawers, plus a large file bin.  I burned or shredded many boxes of papers!!  I just have to file what I have saved – that does take up a large bin and I’ll have to get going on that filing stack soon!

2016 was a rather difficult year with Chris’s care team, with many changes and challenges.  A long story short, however, we ended up with a team starting in August that we have been very pleased with, with loyal workers at this time that we feel are a good fit for Chris and very hard working.  Please continue to pray for Chris’s communication to improve as we face struggles as well with his day-to-day comfort and peace as he continues to try and learn to communicate more.  We are praying for more answers for his medication and other needs as we progress in this continuous journey.

Colleen is still working at the pet store and has a lot of hours and responsibilities.  She continues to love her animals and has been pet sitting (temporarily!) some ferrets.  She was able to go on vacation with her best friend in March and visited Virginia Beach and also took a side trip back to Cooper’s Rock, our favorite park in West Virginia.  I was glad she was able to go on such a nice trip.

Ryan’s halfway through 9th grade and does well in his autism class in the high school.  He also has been attending basketball, football, and soccer with a local special needs organization and also takes special swim lessons, where he is swimming in the deep water now!  Basketball starts in February, football in May, soccer in July.  They all last about 1 month each.  (www.specialsportsinc.com!)

Getting Christmas decorations out early was a nice accomplishment this year, as I haven’t done that in about 3 years.  We enjoyed looking at our lights and others’ lights on their houses as well, as I took a lot of rides especially with Chris looking at all the neighborhood lights.  Even though with a lot of working hours we didn’t have a lot of hours together, I was glad to be with Chris a lot sharing the Christmas season with him.  It was also wonderful enjoying Thanksgiving and Christmas at Chris’s house.  We also enjoyed time with the rest of the family, visiting at Gayle and Chuck’s new home and at my mom’s home, and visiting my uncles.  A large snowfall in early December gave us about 32″ of snow to wade through, then most of it melted by Christmas, giving us a white AND green Christmas!

 January 2016 February 2016
March 2016 – giving away old possessions! and the Aquarium visit!

April 2016 Ryan swim, Chris walking at park

May, 2016 the rainbows that appear on Chris’s walls from the window cut on the front door — but I take them as signs that God and the angels are with us!  May started a whole lot of new struggles, but God is always with us!  Ryan’s football camp.

 

February 4, 2017

And there, the pics end, as I never finished entering the pictures for June-December, which I had planned to do before posting this, but as I’m trying to finish my semester by February 15 I’m slammed…   God Bless…