Hank and Marike

Dearly Beloved,
As requested, we, too, will add a short account of the weal and woe (mostly weal) of our nuclear family.

As we write these lines, it is a rainy Saturday afternoon, the 24th of July. In 2 days we hope to celebrate our 41st wedding anniversary. Many years, many blessings, many memories!

We got married in 1969, the same year Hank graduated from medical school. The first 2 years we lived in the Interns & Residents quarters of St. Joseph's Hospital in Hamilton, after which we settled in the Freelton/Carlisle area of Southern Ontario. While we've moved a few times (1 year in the little house next to the feedmill in Freelton, 3 years in Carlisle across from the Palomino Ranch, 9 years on Conc. XI in Freelton, and since then on Centre Rd @ Flamborough Centre), we're still in this same general location.

During these 41 years, the Lord has blessed us exceedingly. We have 8 wonderful, healthy children, 7 solid in-laws, and 26 grandchildren; again, blessings beyond compare! Peter and Diana and their 4 children live in Hamilton, Toni and Anthony in Gormley with their 5, Nick and Jocelyn near Freelton with their 5 (soon to be 6 D.V.), Hilary and Jelle in Paris with their 3 boys, Harry and Jolene in Beamsville with their 2 daughters, Lisha and James in rural Flamborough with their 5 children, Klarie and Bruce in Beamsville with their 2, while Rebecca is at home at this time. We won't go into details about what they all do for a living, they can either write their own accounts for the blog, or you'll have to ask them at the reunion.

We are still contentedly Canadian Reformed. We still worship with other sinners, and weekly hear the good news proclaimed to us, the good news of salvation through Jesus Christ alone. We have stopped looking for the perfect church, one without music wars, Holy Communion wars, as we've become convinced we won't find one. We don't mind singing the psalms to the tunes our forebears also sang for 4 centuries, and weekly enjoy doing so.

After she taught school for 3 years, Peter arrived, and Marike has been a stay-at-home mom ever since, managing the home affairs during the turbulent years of 8 kids in the house, with boyfriends, girlfriends, joys and tears, etc. Things are quieter now, and she has time to attend Bible study, CAS educational sessions, garden, and paint, especially paint. We have a house full of paintings, and all of you are welcome to visit her blog to see all her masterpieces. Or come by, see them in person, and purchase one or more. In fact, she'll likely give them away free, just to make room for new ones.

Hank remains active in the practice of medicine, now as senior partner at the Carlisle Medical Centre. Even after 39 years, he goes to the office every morning with a spring in his step, still enjoying the challenges of family medicine. We live on a small farm, where we have chickens and sheep, so that keeps him busy too, as well as his vegetable garden, big enough to feed an orphanage. The annual sheep shearing is an event enjoyed by the children of many nieces and nephews, as are the little lambs, once they start arriving in the winter.

We are grateful to be able to serve our Lord and our fellow man in other ways. For the past 11 years we have been foster parents with the Hamilton Children's Aid Society. Over the years we've cared for many children, for shorter or longer periods. As long as the joy of having them, outweighs the pain of seeing them go, we will continue to do this, health permitting D.V. We currently have a little 9 month old, Danika, whom we've had since her birth. Just a joy to have around.

For the past 8 years Hank has been going on short-term medical mission trips, usually to South America, but also to the Caribbean (twice to Haiti in the past year). Marike has come along as a General Helper on a number of occasions. While we know that the impact of what we do there is limited, these trips provide wonderful occasions to reflect on how good our God is, and how marvelously blessed we are.

There are also times when our hearts ache. We miss Opa and Oma dearly. How they would have loved to be at the reunion!

A number of us have health concerns. Albert's decline and current condition grieves us, and seeing the pain this causes Liz and her children, makes us so sad.

May they, and we all, find comfort in the Lord's promises of forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the dead, and life everlasting. His ways are not our ways, His thoughts not our thoughts, so let us be still, and accept, and continue to pray for each other.

Look forward to seeing you all in August.