My daddy would be 85 years old today,
two days before our country's semiquincentennial.
July 4, 1976 was a Sunday.
It was our country's bicentennial.
Our church had an
"old-fashioned day"
to celebrate the occasion.
My daddy had turned 35 years old two days before then
on July 2, 1976.
We had a cake with an American flag
to celebrate the occasion.
I will always wish we had more time with him.
He was the best man ever.
So much love given -
from fathers to their children and from those children to their fathers.
So much missingness felt-
from those children of their fathers.
So many wishes wished -
that we could have had them longer.
But oh, so much thankfulness offered -
that we had them as long as we did.
33 years ago today,
I said yes when my Rob asked me to marry him.
It was such an exciting time
and a wonderful beginning!
.jpg)
Update: 1:24 pm
Anna is out of surgery and all went well!
We are SO blessed!!!
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
With permission from Anna to post,
it's a happy day!
We are here for her
chemotherapy port removal!!!
Please say a prayer.
They just took her back!
Happy 26th Birthday, Wesley Robert!
So many miles apart
but always in my heart!
I'm so thankful Alexcina
made your favorite
chocolate cake!
I love you so much!
33 years ago right now, I was on my first date with my Rob.
It was such a sweet, magical evening.
For which I will always be thankful.
What follows is what I wrote 11 years ago in 2015 about that special night:
"Joy cometh in the morning!"
My Anna rang the bell
for the completion of her chemotherapy treatments
today at 2:20 p.m.
We are SO excited!
Thank you for all of your prayers!!!
It's still surreal to type my daughter has cancer.
I don't know that I will ever completely process that.
But it's another kind of surreal to type that
TOMORROW IS HER LAST CHEMOTHERAPY TREATMENT!!!
I am SO excited!
I CANNOT WAIT to watch her ring that bell of completion!
She says that, although she is thankful it's the last one, she is not excited yet because she dreads the chemicals so much. Unless you've gone through it, I don't think you can understand what it's like to have poison pushed into your veins. I've only watched it happen. I cannot imagine what it's been like for Anna. And the side effects are horrendous. Nausea, weakness, overall feeling horrible for weeks.
But I am so thankful for that target-seeking poison.
It is the reason my daughter will live.
Please pray for a good chemo day for my Anna.
That they will be able to access her port first try to get her labs.
That she will have great nurses.
That she will not have any reactions to the chemo.
That she will not vomit.
That she will not have restless arms or legs.
And that she will have minimal side effects during the chemo
and after she gets home.
I cannot begin to tell you how much
your prayers,
your support,
and your love
have meant to me
and to her
during this journey.
Thank you.
We love you all,
Anna's mama
It is so exciting to type Chemo Cycle #5!
That means only ONE MORE!
Anna had a rough day today.
Because of nausea.
When they had so much trouble accessing her port
a few treatments back,
they ended up having to flush the IV line to the port
really fast 4 or 5 times in a row.
The sudden rush of all of the saline and the preservative in it
caused such a strong taste
(yes, you can taste it as it goes in the line)
that it overcame her and started the vomiting.
Since then, every time she gets a taste of the saline preservative
when an IV line is flushed,
she vomits or almost vomits.
They had trouble getting access to the port this morning.
Had to get a second person to try.
That nurse got the access but the saline taste at the flushing
made Anna vomit.
And the nausea just never went away.
Even after IV doses and oral doses of anti-nausea medicine.
Thankfully, some of the medicine made her sleepy today
so she was able to sleep for a good portion of the chemotherapy
but each time she awoke, she would start gagging.
She had wonderful nurses all day today.
But it was a rough day.
We were thankful when it was over.
We both noticed the beautiful spring blooms and flowers
as we drove away from the hospital.
Such a sign of hope.
For the new season in the year.
And for the new season of healing for Anna that is so close
we can almost taste the goodness of it!
Anna was somewhat hungry by the time we got home
and requested mashed potatoes.
So far, she has held that down.
Like every time, she is totally exhausted.
She fell asleep after she ate and has been sleeping since.
I pray she stays asleep all night.
Thank you so much for all of the prayers for my girl!
Please pray that she will rest well and that
her nausea will subside!
Love,
Anna's mama
Anna will have her 5th chemotherapy treatment tomorrow.
I am SO excited that she only has 2 left!
And I am SO thankful it is working!
She had a rough few days of nausea after the last treatment
but turned a corner on the Monday afterward
and was eating normal food by that Tuesday.
After that, she was exhausted but slowly regained strength
until this past week, she said she felt almost like normal.
We were even able to go to an outdoor wedding
where I took this photo of my Anna girl.
Please pray that this treatment will go smoothly
and that her side effects
during and after
will be none to minimal!
Thank you all so very much for all of your prayers
and support in every way!
We love you all!
Anna's mama
Overall, Anna's 4th round of chemo today went well!
They were able to get her blood drawn on the very first attempt!
Anna is halfway finished with her treatment plan of chemotherapy!
We are SO excited to be halfway there!
Thank you all for all of the prayers, cards, calls, and support!
It all means so much to us and it has all been so helpful!
As I said in my last post, Anna did so much better with the 3rd round.
They had the nausea medicine just right for after the chemotherapy.
She vomited one time after chemo and that was it.
She was still exhausted but so happy to not be vomiting.
Her energy level returned faster as well.
This past weekend, she even went to spend time with a couple of friends.
They didn't go in any crowds but she was just happy to have the energy
to drive and to be out of the house.
I was so happy for her!
Overall, she said she has almost felt normal for the last week.
I am thankful!
Her 4th round of 6 chemotherapy treatments is tomorrow.
And the white blood cell booster shot will be on Sunday.
We are praying the lab work goes a lot better this time
and that they get her blood on first try!
We are praying that she doesn't have any chemo reactions!
And we are praying she gets a really good and compassionate chemotherapy nurse
- that matters so much.
And we ask for your prayers, too!
Thank you!
Anna's mama
First of all,
Anna's PET scan results were WONDERFUL!
The scan shows that the cancer has shrunk substantially
and
that the treatments are right on track
for it to be totally resolved!
WE ARE SO, SO, SO THANKFUL!
Thank you for all of you who have prayed for my Anna!
Answers to prayers are not always yeses.
We know that well.
So we do not take it lightly that this one is.
And we rejoice in the fact that Anna's cancer has shrunk!
Not only can Anna breathe better because the cancer is no longer pressing on her airway
but I, as her mama, can finally breathe a little better knowing
there's a scan proving that a miracle is taking place.
Miracles come in all kinds of different packages.
And I am so thankful for this miracle that's being delivered into my child's body
through chemicals that "know" how to resolve and are "programmed" to target
the disease
that threatened her life.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Anna’s day today was
to start simple - lab work with blood being drawn from her port. Well, turns
out her port is tilted some which makes it a little more difficult for
everything. They were able to get access but were not able to draw blood. They
kept flushing it with saline – 4 or 5 in a row pretty fast. They decided to
draw blood the regular way and that didn’t go well, either.
Anna inherited my veins
that make it so difficult to draw blood! Our veins roll and they dig and dig
trying to find them. It’s very uncomfortable. During the 2nd attempt
and having just had that rush of saline, Anna ended up vomiting. They then got
the “expert” who ended up getting the blood on her 1st try. (By the
way, we do not in any way fault the nurses – it really is our veins – they said they would put a note in her file
that we can just ask for the “expert” first next time)!
So what should have been a 10 minute port access/blood draw ended up taking 45 minutes. But, thankfully, that ended up being the worst part of the day.
Anna’s 3rd round of chemotherapy went well today!
She did not have any reactions.
They added 2 new nausea medications this time and that helped during the day.
And, so far, she has not thrown up a single time since we’ve been home.
She is very weak and she has fallen asleep but, overall, she seems better this time.
I’m praying it stays that way!
Please pray that she will not have lingering side effects and her “bounce back” will happen even faster this time!
She is scheduled to get the white blood cell count booster shot on Sunday so we are hopeful that will help keep her out of the hospital like it did with round #2.
We appreciate you all so very much
and we are grateful for all of your prayers!
Thank you so much!
Anna’s very thankful mama
Update:
Thank you so much for the prayers for my Anna!
She finally felt good this past week and was even able to go outside in the snow with Luke and Lauren for about 15 minutes - long enough for some photos!
Summary of Anna's last chemotherapy:
The day of Anna's last chemotherapy went so much better than the 1st time! We were so thankful she did not have a single reaction that day! But the nausea that started that day lasted a long while. It was almost a week before she could eat without vomiting and that was with nausea medication. For a while, I was worried she might need to get some IV fluids.
As far as we know, her white blood cell count stayed up this time. She never had any signs of a neutropenic fever or any other symptoms of low white blood cell counts so the doctors didn't check her counts and she didn't have to go back into the hospital. We are so thankful for that!
However, this last round left her very weak. She didn't even really get out of bed for 2 weeks. Maybe it's because she didn't substantially hold any food down for almost a week. Maybe it's the chemicals building up in her system. We really don't know. What we do know is that she was so weak for over 2 weeks. Her strength really just returned a few days ago...just in time for the next round.
Prayer Requests:
Please say a prayer for Anna. She has a PET scan tomorrow to assess how effective her treatment has been so far and if anything new or different needs to be done. She is, understandably, very anxious about the results. We will not know those results until Friday morning at her oncologist appointment that is scheduled right before her next round of chemotherapy.
Please also say a prayer for Anna's 3rd round of chemotherapy on Friday to go as smoothly that day as last time did and please pray for her to not have as much nausea and weakness afterward. They have added 2 new nausea medications for this round so we are hoping and praying that those make a huge difference!
Thank you so very much!
Sunday, January 18, 2026
Dear my Rob,
It is hard to believe it is already time for your birthday letter again.
If you were still living, you would be 67 years old today.
One of your children joked
that the Gen Alphas could make fun of your age this year..
… 6 7
That made me smile.
I never plan what I’m going to write to you in your birthday letters.
I just sit down and type.
So here is your 2026 letter.
A lot has happened this year – some wonderful – some awful.
I’ll start with me.
I’m teaching again.
Remember when we talked about me teaching preschool
when all of the kids finished college?
That is exactly what I’m doing.
I’m teaching fifteen 4 year olds
(thankfully, I have a good assistant teacher!).
I really enjoy all of my new little friends
and it is always a joyful moment when one of them
has a breakthrough on making progress or
mastering a skill I know he or she will need
for the rest of his or her life.
It has reminded me how much I love those light bulb moments
and how much I really do love teaching.
And, just like all of my students always did,
I know my new students would have loved you reading to them
using all of your voices –
and playing your guitar and singing silly songs to them.
They have no idea what they are missing.
Maybe before the end of the school year,
I will figure out how to get the VHS tape transferred to digital
so they can watch you reading to my 4th graders in 1996.
Luke is following in your footsteps of coming to my classrooms.
You would be proud of him and his Lauren for that.
He and Lauren came and sang at one of our chapels
and my students still talk about Mr. Luke.
Our Crystol Erin is next.
We were blessed to get to see her a lot this year.
She was here for graduations,
a college friend’s wedding,
and for Luke’s wedding.
It was SO GOOD to see her that much!
She is a great mom to our grandpups
and she is still enjoying her job.
Crystol’s husband, Alan, was able to be here for Luke’s wedding
and it was so good to see him, too!
It had been 3 years since we had seen him.
He is a great dad to our grandpups
and he still loves being a professor.
In fact, he was given an award for his teaching this year.
Can’t remember the name of the award but it was a big honor!
I am proud of Crystol and Alan!
I know you would be, too!
And I just wish they didn’t live so far away!
Next is our Anna Elizabeth.
Anna is still a teacher.
She has been teaching in a multi-age classroom
at a Montessori school and she loves it!
I was so happy for her and so proud of her!
She had really hit her stride.
Until November 2025.
When shortness of breath sent her to the emergency room.
A CAT scan revealed a mass on her thyroid.
There was an eleven night stay in the hospital.
On December 4, 2025, we found out for sure that
our 29 year old Anna has cancer.
Large B Cell Lymphoma.
It’s hard to type those words.
Surreal still.
And I hate it.
My heart breaks into a million pieces every time I think about it.
She has a good prognosis, the doctors say.
They even use the word, “curable.”
I am so, so, so very thankful for that.
I really am!
But I hate the reality that it’s happening at all.
She started chemotherapy in December 2025.
Plummeting white blood cell counts causing
a neutropenic fever led to another hospital stay.
After she lost most of her hair,
we shaved the rest off last Sunday and
God led us to the perfect wig for her on Monday.
She had her 2nd round (of 6) of chemo on Friday.
She has been throwing up since.
And today, on what would have been your birthday,
we spent the day going back to the cancer center
for her to receive a white cell booster shot
in hopes that she won’t end up back in the hospital this round.
The doctors took Anna out of work.
Since her immune system is almost non-existent,
she cannot work with little children.
As much as we love those little children,
they are little germ magnets,
and those germs could literally be life-threatening for Anna.
So, to sum up Anna’s time since last year’s letter,
she was having a great year until she wasn’t.
Next is our Wesley Robert.
Our Wesley graduated from college again –
he earned his master’s degree in history.
He was accepted into
a doctoral program in
So he left for
My heart broke into a million pieces when he drove away.
Yours would have been breaking, too.
I know that because I was beside you when
Crystol drove away to
move to
What is it with our children moving to those “O” states!!!?!!!
It’s not that we didn’t want Crystol to live her life.
We just wished it could be closer to us.
That’s the way I feel about Wesley.
I am so proud of him and I know he has to live his life.
I just miss him so very much
and wish his life could be lived closer to me!
He is actually deferring for a year –
to work full time and save money for tuition
and to maybe be eligible for in state tuition.
Alexcina, the woman he loves, also earned her master’s degree
on the same day as Wesley. Her degree is in Museum Studies.
And she loves him very much.
So much so that she
applied for jobs in
She is the curator of a museum there.
I am so proud of her, too!
The other big news about our Wesley Robert is that he is engaged!
On September 8, 2025,
Wesley asked his Alexcina to marry him
and she said yes!
They are planning a 2027 wedding
and we are all excited for that!
And lastly comes our
baby, Luke Edward.
He will always be the baby, won’t he?
The one you treated more like a grandchild.
The one who called you Papa.
Luke graduated college –
earning his bachelor degree in
music – vocal performance.
His senior recital was awesome.
You would have loved every second of it!
I was so proud of him and you would have been, too!
There was a mix-up with his transfer credits
so he had to take 2 classes during the summer.
He was able to walk in the May ceremony
but his actual graduation date was in August.
God brought him the perfect job
and he was hired before he even graduated.
He is the choir director at a local church
and Lauren is the accompanist.
It is exactly what they wanted to do.
They had both wanted to work in a church setting
and their dream was to work together.
This job was and is their dream come true.
Reminds me of when you got your first appointment to pastor a church.
It was fun to watch your dream come true then.
It’s been fun to watch Luke’s (and Lauren’s) come true now.
But the BIGGEST news about Luke since your last birthday is that
he and Lauren are married!
They were married December 13, 2025.
Luke wanted to get married somewhere that he had a connection with you.
So they got married at Mt Hermon, your last pastorate.
One of the pastors who officiated wore your white stole for the wedding ceremony.
They used your communion chalice and plate for their first communion together.
So parts of you were a part of the day.
Watching the two of them watch each other was the sweetest part of the whole day.
You would have been smiling and crying as much as I was!
It was a glorious day!
As I said,
a lot has happened since last January 18th.
A lot of happy.
A lot of sad.
A lot of heart warming.
A lot of heart breaking.
So life moves forward.
And you are missed in every part of it.
We didn’t go out to eat this year.
Anna was vomiting.
She can’t really be in restaurants right now anyway
with her compromised immune system.
But I did cook some steak (your favorite food)
for Luke, Lauren, and me.
And some toast for Anna.
And we all remembered you in our own ways this year.
You will never be forgotten.
Love,
Your Janna
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I will be posting lots of photos so the kids and I can all smile at the memories.
Hope they make you smile, too!
I will also post links to what I've written before on Rob's birthdays
in case you would like to read them or see more photos.
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2013/01/fifty-four.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2014/01/fifty-five.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2015/01/fifty-six_18.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2016/01/fifty-seven.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2017/01/58.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2018/01/59.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2019/01/60.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2020/01/61.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2021/01/62.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2022/01/63.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2023/01/64.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2024/01/65.html
https://jannasview.blogspot.com/2025/01/66.html
