Children have been a special blessing to us. I don't set myself up as a model Dad and I know I failed in many ways. But I have tried to bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. I do love them and each one is special. They all have different gifts and abilities and I can't say one is more important than the other.

Vince, our firstborn, has brought a lot of joy to us. We committed him to the Lord before he was born, as we did each of the others.

I remember how Cathy and I, in our poverty, had saved money for a baby carriage before he was born. How excited we were when finally we had saved $40 and were anticipating the ride to Prince Albert from Canwood to make the purchase. However, just the week we were to make the trip, one of our husky sled dogs broke out of his pen and chewed the neigh­bour's Chihuahua that had come into our yard tormenting him. The owner was outraged. He took his pintsized dog to the vetenarian and came to us the next day with the bill for $40. Cathy gave him a sob-story explaining how that was all the money we had and what it was for. He finally conceded to split the difference. His married niece who lived in a trailer next to us felt terrible and came to us crying when he bragged to her about how he had ripped us off. She knew only too well our financial state.

In time we were able to save up the $20 again and the day came when we made that long awaited purchase. It was the only thing of any value we owned, apart from the car.

When Vince was four years old, I was away on a preaching engagement and he took sick. His temperature was 104, and Cathy didn't know what to do. She knew that if she asked the neighbour to take them over to the nurse's station they would have to travel by horse and sleigh. It was very cold and she thought this would only make his cold worse.

"I had to just commit him into the Lord's hand, but the Lord dealt with me to see if I was willing to let him go," she told me when I got home.

She had always been afraid to ask the Lord to keep our kids because she had heard of situations when parents begged the Lord not to allow their child to die and the Lord honored their prayers, but the child grew up and didn't live for Him. Neither of us wanted that.

So she prayed, "Lord, he's Yours. I'm giving him over to You. If You want to take him, that's up to You." It was a difficult time for Cathy, but within a half hour his temperature dropped and he began to improve. By morning he was up and around and feeling well.

One year Cathy made a new year's prayer that went some­thing like this. "Lord, I want to make this a year when I really learn some things. So I'm asking you to teach me some good lessons."

She didn't realize what that prayer would bring, but it wasn't long until she came down with hepatitis (the episode I told about earlier at the time of the death of her mother.) She was supposed to stay in bed most of the time and for that reason couldn't keep as close an eye on the kids as she usually did.

Vince was four years old at the time. He jumped down off the back of the couch to the seat and fell, hitting his jaw against the coffee table. It looked terrible so we took him to the doctor sixty miles away.

"I don't think anything's broken," he said, "but we'll take an X-ray."

That didn't show a break so the doctor dressed the injury and we took him home. A week later we noticed it wasn't smelling good. It smelled like dead flesh so we took him back to the doctor, who found that the bone actually was broken. When he put a tongue depressor in his mouth, a piece of the bone fell out.

He sent us to a dentist who removed two of his front teeth, hoping that would keep the infection out. They gave us medi­cine and sent us home. This later required some expensive orthodontic work. When we got back home, friends of ours from town drove in. They had been following us all the way trying to catch up with us to tell us they had a phone call telling us that Cathy's mother had died.

Since he was young, Vince was outgoing like his parents, and wanted to be involved in school activities. We found that to be something of a problem because most teens, even the Christians, didn't take a stand for the Lord.

When he was a teenager, he got some material from Urbana. He was in the Inter-School Christian Fellowship at school and when he received material on it he wanted to go. The little Whitney Church paid all of his way to Urbana that year and it was great-a tremendous boost to Vince, spiritually. He heard Billy Graham and a lot of other outstanding Christian speakers and came home with a bundle of tapes and books he had bought. That conference had a tremendous effect on his spiritual life.

Not that we didn't have problems with him, too. He had a habit of driving through town too fast and the police were watching offenders. He was taking Cathy to prayer meeting one night and she got after him to slow down. He would for a short distance, but would speed up again. She reminded him of that several times.

"If you don't slow down," she said, "I'm going to take the keys away from you when you get home."

So he slowed down again, but the same thing happened. Finally she said, "Vince, that's it!" And he knew what she meant.

On the way home he started out at ten miles an hour and drove that way a good number of miles to our home. When they finally got home she took his keys and he had to go to school on the bus the next morning.

It wasn't long until there was a phone call from him. "Mom, could you come up to school? I had a part to a car that we're working on in shop and it's in the trunk. Could you bring it to

me

She drove to the school to deliver the part and she went to the shop door at the back of the building. When she got there twelve or fifteen boys were lined up outside, looking at her. When Vince came out she asked, "What are all those boys doing just standing there looking at me?"

"They want to see what kind of a mother would take the car keys away from her son."

Vince and his wife, Anne, have two lovely daughters, Ashley and Bailey. Anne is the daughter of Maynard and Elinor McBreairty whom we had known for a number of years. They have served in the lumber camps in northern Maine and New­foundland for many years. I remember Maynard visiting one of our logging camps in Maine before I was saved.

We have appreciated Anne's discreet manners and good sense of humour. She's a good homemaker and mother to the girls. She has taken some correspondence courses at home to further her education. She especially likes writing. On my fiftieth birthday she sent me this little composition:

Isaiah 61:1

"The Spirit of the Lord is upon me
Because the Lord has anointed me
To bring good news to the afflicted;
He has sent me to bind up the brokenhearted,
To proclaim liberty to the captives,
And freedom to prisoners."

As You Turn Almost Fifty

A focus word to describe your life would have
to be "full". I'd like to celebrate in ink
the fullness of your life.

Full of Pain

You learned early on that a father is
capable of bringing pain to a son's heart. Cold,
lonely, and back-breaking days were your lot.
Through this you mastered the art of hard
work and put-laziness behind you forever. You
grew sensitive to the hearts of others. These
were skills that would serve you a lifetime.

Full of Emptiness

Can a life without God be anything else?
Nothing, and no one, could take His place.
He sought and found you. Here was a Father
who would give to you the love that you
craved. Forever you would have His arms
about you.

Full of Empty Pockets

"Bible School? Doesn't that cost money?"
Limitless riches were never your first love, but
some would be nice! The fullness of God's plan
for your life would compensate for your lack of
financial resources. He wanted you at Bible
School. It would happen.

Full of Love

Catherine! What a beautiful name and
what a beautiful girl! The goodness of your
Lord overflowed. Hidden behind those just
marvellous glasses was a woman ready to
tackle the best and worst in life. Frail?
Never. You thought your heart was full to
the brim. Surprise ...

Full of Burden

God saw in you a vessel ready for
direction. Your life belongs to Christ
and He was sending you to Canada's native
peoples. You loved them. You still do.
Christ has done so much for you.
He saved you from your sin. That is
enough. But He kept on giving. You have
freedom from the pains of childhood. You
have an education in His Word. You married
the best of all women. And she loves you to
pieces! Wouldn't that be enough? Not to a
loving Messiah.
He gave you a purpose in life. Goals.
A destiny. Many spend their entire lives
in search of meaningful existance. God
gave you these gifts as a young man.
There is still so much ahead for you.

Full of Adventure

Adventure is indeed a hallmark
of your life. Not everyone has tasted
the thrill of Canada's pioneer North.
Abraham, Isaac and Carroll. Adventurers
and pioneers all. Emmanuel has given
you treasures and excitement and joys
not surpassed by any occupation.
Glamorous? Perhaps not. But decent,
honest and wild, all the same.

Full of Vincent David

A son. One to watch grow and change
and be a constant and similtaneous source
of pride and frustration. The newborn.
The toddler. The boy. The adolescent.
The teenager. The man. The husband. The
father. The missionary. The student. The
son. Your son. Forever. No matter what.
You love that one. He knows of your love.
He is equally proud of you. This I know.

Full of Roger Allan

A son. One to watch grow and develop
into your friend. A companion. Now you
work side by side. It's hard to stand
back. To let him go. Your love will
never go. Never.

Full of Charlene Carol

A daughter. Now a wife. From one
eye you cry and from the other you wink.
She is a composite drawing of all that is
good and mischievous in life. Difficult
to reach. Harder to read. Easy to love.
Your little girl - Charlene.

Full of Responsibilities

You wish it was "lawful" to speak
of your hard work. No one seems to grasp
the intensity and stress involved in your
position. So many expect so much.
God sees. God knows. Your labour is
not in vain. How do I know?
Because your patience with us has not
been in vain. We have reaped the benefits
of God's fullness in your life.
Your life is a testament to the goodness
of Jehovah.
Your treasures are in heaven. Your family
and more love you.
Happy Almost-Fifty!
Direct and in charge
Caring and giving
Trying so hard
Dad.

Vince and Anne were with the Mission for two and a half years at Yellowknife, then he went to Winnipeg Bible College and Brandon University, getting his Bachelor of Arts and Bachelor of Education degrees.

From there he went to teach.school out on the Big Head Reserve while living in the same house we had lived in at Pierceland. As Vince puts it, "This is no mere chance, this had to be divine providence." They became associate missionaries with NCEM when he went out for further training. He took up pastoral duties in the little church I preached in for three years. Vince has a compassion for people and a natural ability for counselling and teaching. He's very much a people person and leads a busy life. He has artistic abilities and paints with water­colours.

On Vince's thirtieth birthday, he asked me to pick up a rose for Cathy and told me what to write on the card. He thanked her for bringing him into the world and for always being there when he needed her. He's been an encouragement to both Cathy and me over the years.

Ashley and Bailey phone us from time to time and enjoy coming to spend time with us.

They are fascinated with the things Grandma Cathy is able to do. They are waiting for the day when they are old enough to knit and they sit, entranced beside her when she sews dresses for their dolls on the sewing machine.

"Grammie," they say every few minutes, "when will it be done?"

One night we were babysitting them when they were ages 4 and 6. Cathy had told them some Bible stories and when it was Bailey's turn to pray, you would have thought you were hearing a lecture from a theologian. She prayed something like this:

"Dear God, I'm so glad you sent Jesus to die on the cross for our sins. And I'm so glad that when Jesus was out on the mountain he didn't listen to the devil. I'm so glad He didn't jump off that rock when the devil wanted Him to, but He listened to the Father. And if He had jumped off that rock, we all would have followed.

"And when he was hanging on that cross, they laughed at Him and made fun of Him, but Jesus said, `Father, forgive them for they don't know what they were doing?' "

That was the prayer of a four year old.

Ashley is a very sensitive little girl and reminds Cathy and me of her dad in a lot of ways. At the age of 8, she told Cathy about a friend of hers at school whose dad had died. "My other friend and I try to encourage her. Sometimes we all join hands in the school yard and pray for her. The other kids see us, but we don't let that bother us."

Ashley and Bailey were the first of the grandchildren to get a ride when I got my pilot's license.

When I became Eastern Field Director I was away much of the time, which left the main responsibility of raising three teenagers to Cathy. She was glad to have them home with her during that period but it was often difficult for her. In many ways the boys weren't hard to handle and were a great help to her, but she had to make some tough decisions.

When Roger was a child, he was very small. The Indians called him "Waapakisees" which means "mouse". His nature was quiet and gentle and normally easy-going. In spite of his size he had a habit of lifting heavy things even as a toddler. He loved the outdoors and seemed always to find something to do whether it would be building a huge snowman, hauling blocks of firewood on his sled or helping me build things. He has a creative mind.

Besides getting his bronze medalion in swimming, he also got his private pilot's license at the military base in Nova Scotia.

As a teenager, Roger had a reputation for being a demon on the roads, something that didn't seem to fit his personality. He had a big old Cadillac that looked funny when he drove it around to collect on his paper route. Once Cathy was cleaning out his dresser drawers and found two speeding tickets he had paid, that we had never known about.

She asked for an explanation and he said that the chief of police stopped him. The chief was a fine Christian man and a friend of the family. I don't know whether that had anything to do with it or not but he was lenient with Roger.

"If I ever catch you speeding again, I'm going to call your parents." That sort of straightened him out a bit.

Roger has always been the one to give in the quickest when something was asked of him. He doesn't try to argue his way out of things, nor does he like to cause trouble or dissension of any kind. He is a skilled cabinet maker. He took three years of carpentry in high school.

He and his wife, Janeice, are missionaries and manage Arrowhead Native Bible Center. Janeice is outgoing and is right with him in his work. She enjoys crafts and is a good mother and homemaker. She loves to laugh and has many friends. We also appreciate her folks, Allan and Anna Kaye. Allan a fisher­man from near Digby, Nova Scotia.

Roger and Janeice have three handsome, brown-eyed boys, Cody, Todd, and Tyler.

Both Vince and Roger and their mates graduated from New Brunswick Bible Institute, the school Cathy and I attended. Roger and Janeice lived with us the first nine months of Cody's life. When they came out West for NCEM Missionary Training Camp, they joined the Mission as career missionaries and Roger became the Headquarters maintenance man. They later moved to New Brunswick to be involved with Arrowhead Native Bible Center.

One Christmas when they were out to see us, Cathy cut her finger using an x-acto knife. Five year old Cody went and got her a band-aid. Then he delivered a piece of wisdom. "Grammy," he said, "where is that knife?"

She showed it to him and he put it back in its case. While he was doing this he said, "I thought I told you that grammies and grampies are too old to be using a sharp knife like this. Now I'm going to put this away. Don't you touch it again."

On another occasion, we gave them some toys we had brought from Cathy's niece. Among them was a pedal tractor. He climbed on it and announced, "Let's play farm. I'll be the farmer. Todd, you be the school bus driver. And Grammy, you be the scarecrow."

Todd is a little quieter, but he wants to be a carpenter like his daddy. He is a thinker. Before entering Grade 1, his mother was spelling out a sentence so the children wouldn't know what she was saying. Todd said, "Grammie, would you spell that for me please, in the lower case?"

Tyler is a little fellow who knows exactly what he wants. He's small for his age, like his dad was at age three. He's a pleasant little fellow that everybody enjoys having around. Recently someone was having a difficult time understanding what he was trying to say. After several attempts, he exclaimed, "Just relax, just relax!"

All the grandkids enjoy having me swing them in a blanket. It's a big thing with them when we go to see them or when they come to our place. It's a wonder the neighbours don't think we're killing them, with all the screaming and laughing that goes on when I swing them high in the air and throw them as carefully as I can on the couch or a chair.

Once when we arrived in New Brunswick to see Roger and his family, they all came out to greet us, except Todd. When we went into the house he was lying on a blanket on the floor waiting for me to swing him.

"I want to be first!" He said.

Our boys were roughnecks from the time they were old enough to play outside. The native boys tried them out to see if they were tough enough to stand the test. They could take all the wrestling and rough and tumble play any of the others could take.

Even Charlene was the same. During our trailer ministry on the reserve she wasn't around one afternoon and we went out to check. She had borrowed a kid's bike and they were playing crash-up derby. They would head straight for each other and crash to see who could stay on their bikes the longest.

When we moved to Newcastle, the boys in the neighbour­hood would come to the door and ask if she could come and pitch ball for them. She always played on the boys' teams.

On one occasion when we lived in the East, she had a small operation. The day she came home from the hospital she begged to go outside.

"You can go out on the porch and visit with your friends there," Cathy told her.

A few minutes later Cathy heard a commotion in the back yard. She looked out and there was Charlene running around all bent over, holding onto her incision with one hand and with a stick in the other she was playing cowboys and Indians.

Charlene was born in High Prairie, Alberta, when we were working at Atikameg. Though she was only three years old when we left there, she had made herself at home with the people in the village. She often went to the neighbour's house and helped herself to bannock. She is one of those friendly girls who has to know everyone. Roger, who is more reserved, hated to go places with her because of it.

"I'm never going to the mall with her again, Dad!" He would say to me when they came home. "She's yelling at everyone, no matter how far away they are."

When Charlene was fourteen she was going through some struggles. We prayed the Lord would bring something her way to strengthen her in her Christian life.

A group with a singing and drama ministry came to our area while Cathy and I were away and a friend was staying with Charlene. They invited some of the girls to stay in our home with them. Charlene was enthralled with what they were doing and they encouraged her to apply to be with the group for the coming summer, which she did.

She didn't hear from them for months and we were deeply concerned. Finally, in June, I had a phone call from Friendship Ministries.

"I have to apologize to you. I have your daughter's appli­cation here on my desk. It was under a pile of correspondence and I didn't even notice it until today. It's really too late to accept her but we're making an exception. We want her to be with us."

That summer did something for her. She phoned us in August just before she was to come home.

"Could you either send me to a Christian school or give me correspondence at home? I know I'll get in with the wrong crowd if I move to high school this fall. I'm too easily influ­enced by my friends and I don't want to do that."

We were thrilled. We didn't have the money to send her to a boarding school and we wanted her home with us as long as possible, so for two years Cathy worked with her at home. Then she went to Devon Park Christian School for her final year. It was tough for her because the home schooling program didn't take her as far as regular classes would have, but she graduated with several honors.

Charlene is still a going concern. She married Peter Knightly, Ron and Marge's son. The Knightlys have been with the Mission as long as we have. Charlene and Pete worked at Liard Hot Springs on the Alaska Highway and now live in Kamloops, British Columbia where he works in the Sheriff's Department.

He made a trip to Russia once representing Canada in arm wrestling. He took along $300 worth of Bibles and Gospels of Luke that he distributed. Pete has a fine array of trophies he has won for arm wrestling.

Charlene loved to get together with the other missionary kids. During one of our Missionary Conferences she organized and took the M.K. teens on a special outing.

She and Pete have two charming little girls, Talitha and Meagan, and a boy, Trevor.

Talitha is a little chatter-box. At the age of three, she had an outstanding vocabulary and there's nothing that didn't get re­peated after she's heard it once. When she and Meagan and their mother were traveling by bus from Kamloops to Edmonton to meet us she announced to the other passengers, "I'm going to see Grammie and Grampie."

Some on the bus seemed to be half asleep and didn't act as though they were listening. She went right up to them and kept repeating her message until she was sure she got through to them.

When Talitha was four, Cathy was babysitting her and Meagan. Noticing they were taking a long time in the bathroom, Cathy decided to check on them.

"Grandma," Talitha exclaimed, "I don't think you should be in here."

"Why," asked Grandma.

"Don't you know a girl needs a little time to herself once in a while?" she replied as she continued with her play. Meagan at a year and half could have entered the 500 yard dash against just about anybody. Both girls are rough and tough, but with both Knightly and Hill blood, what else could we expect?

Trevor, at the time of this writing is a newborn and looks like his sister, Meagan. At the age of two and a half months, he was able to stand by himself, leaning against something for support. And we saw him with our own eyes at that age, walk across the floor to his daddy, gripping Charlene's fingers. Like all other grandparents I know, our grandchildren are the joy of our lives. Each one is different and each one is special to us.

When we meet old friends they ask about Charlene. They want to know where she is and what she's doing. She has a way of getting into people's hearts.

Randy is the Indian lad we took in when he was eight years old. At the time Vince was only a year and a half and Roger just a baby. Randy's mother died of cancer and his dad was an alcoholic. The kids had to fend for themselves much of the time. Randy came and asked if he could stay with us. He seemed like a quiet kid and we liked him a great deal and decided to keep him. As we think of it now, it must have been a great culture shock for him coming into our home that had different rules and expectations than he was used to.

We bought Randy new clothes and other things he needed when we thought he would be staying with us, but it only lasted two weeks and he packed up and went home. He only stayed away two days and back he came. Of course he didn't bring any of the new clothes with him.

"Randy wants to stay with you this time," his sister assured

us.

"He can come back," we said. "But if he decides to stay with us, he'll have to stay. We can't keep giving him new clothes and having him take off."

He had been with us for awhile when we began to notice that he wasn't listening very well. He would walk away while we were talking to him. We'd ask him to come back and he'd just keep walking.

One day I said, "Randy, do you want some ice cream?" He loved ice cream but he kept right on going, as though I hadn't even spoken. I knew then that there was something wrong with his hearing. We took him to the doctor who looked into his ears. Then, without saying anything to either Cathy or me, the doctor ran down the hall and brought three or four other doctors back with him.

They took turns looking into his ears without saying any­thing. Finally I said, "What's going on?"

The doctor turned to me. "The boy has no eardrums. They've been eaten out by infections or running ears."

He sent us to a specialist in Edmonton who transplanted eardrums for Randy. He stayed with a doctor friend of ours until they were sure the operation was a success. Then he was able to return to Atikameg. Randy was in Edmonton for a month and when he came back we had a new problem with him. He had grown so used to his silent world that he found our house too noisy. It took him several days to get used to the normal noises of a family.

We soon learned that there were many native people who had running ears and lost their ear drums because the infection was untreated. Once Randy's operation allowed him to hear and the authorities learned there was help for them, they started sending other native people out for the same procedure. I don't know how many such operations were performed on the people in our area but there must have been many.

Randy stayed with us for ten years and was almost 18 before going back to the reserve. His brother pressured him to come back to his own people. He came to me and asked if he could go.

"It's your decision," I told him. "If that's what you want, go ahead. But you're welcome to stay with us until you're finished school."

He returned to the reserve but he had to renounce his white upbringing in order to be accepted by his own people. The youth on the reserve wouldn't leave him alone until they got him involved in things that caused him some real difficulties. We all love him deeply but he made his choice to go back to his people. He now has a family of his own.

He loves us, too. He still respects and looks up to us and seems to hate to see us leave when we go there. All of our family misses him too. Once when we went to his home he gave me his favorite gun and his best jacket. His children went into the bedroom and brought us gifts that were important to them. We continue to pray for him and his family.

Baby Girl

Tiny babies grow so fast;
Soon she is a little lass,
Like the flowers in the grass,
Soon her childhood will pass.
Soon we'll miss the little cry,
And the twinkle in her eye.
She was such fun, we can't deny,
But now the years are passing by.
Then against the world she'll stand,
With her Bible in her hand,
Perhaps alone, or with a man
To live a life which God has planned.

Meagan, Trevor and Talitha.

Bailey and Ashley.	Todd, Cody and Tyler.

Vince, Ann, Ashley, and Bailey.	Roger, Janeice and the boys.

Peter, Charlene, Talitha Trevor and Meagan.	One of the very few times we've all been together as a family since we moved to Prince Albert.	Randy standing with us. Taken at Gift Lake.

	Roger and I cutting logs with the Wood Miser.