Janet's Blog

Today marks the 37th anniversary of our first miracle baby's birth. Happy Birthday, Erin! Bill and I married young. It was important for me to finish college, so we decided, from the outset, to postpone having children for five years, or so, until I was thoroughly educated, and we were both a little more ready to be parents.  We never expected to wait for eight years. From the time we were first married, we discussed being foster parents, and even expanding our family through adoption, but we expected it to be through choice rather than necessity. When it became evident that we were having trouble conceiving a baby, we saw several doctors, and eventually a fertility specialist, three hours away, in Grand Rapids. Some of the doctors were more helpful than others. A couple of them told us outright that our chances of having a baby naturally were slim to none, and we should just adopt. That was a problem in Michigan, where we lived then, because the average wait time to adopt ...

It wasn't too long after Christmas when my brother-in-law, Kent, invited me to join a Facebook group known as "Mystery drone swarm chasers." It started as a reaction to numerous reports of drones flying in formation after dark, mostly over northeastern Colorado and southwestern Nebraska. I had heard some accounts about the mysterious drones, but I was about to hear a lot more. A drone is a fairly small, unmanned aircraft, like this one, used by hobbyists, commercial or government entities, or the military, to take aerial photos, map the terrain, deliver packages, or even spy on the people below them. I didn't accept the invitation to join the group, but, apparently, a simple invitation was enough for me to receive all of their posts. At first, the posts came at a fast and furious pace, reporting sightings of large drones, several feet in diameter, flying after dark in groups of four to six, or even as many as a dozen. The obvious problem was that no one knew w...

New Year's resolutions? Who takes time for that? Certainly not me, not ever. But every so often, I do set some unofficial, personal goals. Here are ten of my current goals, in no particular order: 1.     Walk at least half an hour each day, and at least 10,000 steps a day, four or five days a week, weather permitting. 2.     Eat mostly healthy foods. 3.     Spend quality time with my friends and family. 4.     Reach out to the people I meet, especially those  who need love, encouragement, and support. 5.     Finish writing my untitled mental health handbook, targeted at people who work with kids with mental health disorders, and submit it for publication. 6.     Submit my newest children's book for publication. 7.     Continue to write, edit, and  record Christian songs. 8.     Keep writing this blog, and get back ...