Today is my 50th Birthday!

I couldn't keep quiet any longer...today is my 5oth birthday! I am enjoying my day immensely and wanted to share 2 of the main reasons:

2 dozen roses from my sweet husband mixed with a dozen from my sweet mother and father-in-law...

and a beautiful poem written especially for me by my father:

A Sonnet For Karen

On Birthday Number Fifty

I can't believe that fifty years have flown

Since first I looked upon your newborn face

And in my arms, with love and joy and pride,

So gently cradled you there near my heart!

But here indeed you are---to mid-life grown---

A woman filled with talent, strength, and grace,

A wife and mother---by love qualified

To turn those roles into a work of art!

So fast this half a century's slipped by

While changes, seen and unseen, have occurred

Which we now pause to note ere we move on.

And from among them, this has caught my eye:

The grace of God, alive in you, has stirred

The hearts of many and helped faith to dawn.

---J.W. (Bill) Turner,

March 20, 2008.

# 1185.

(Happy, happy birthday, sweet daughter! Every day of your half century of life has brought joy and blessings to your mother and me. We thank God for you, and we pray that we shall have many, many more such days to share with you!)

[Copyright 2008 by J.W. (Bill) Turner. All rights reserved.]

Wow!