Graduation dinner and assorted stray thoughts

Posted on May 12, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Poor Jeremy! It took all of yesterday to rectify my computer issues, but he made a disk that should shorten the process if it should ever happen again. Everything is up and running beautifully, even faster than before since, in selecting files to be backed up, we got rid of several we hadn’t used in ages.

The housework got mostly done — I’ve learned I never get everything done I’d like to before company comes, so have earned to prioritize. All of the major, regular stuff got done and we were presentable. There were just some spring-cleaning type things I would like to have gotten to, but likely no one but me knew they were needed.

The visit with out of town company went well, I think. I had mentioned being concerned about Mittu’s mom’s Indian accent since I have to really concentrate when we talk on the phone, but, as expected, it was much easier in person. It was a whirlwind weekend — I felt bad for the lack of down time to just sit and visit. But overall I think it was a good first visit. I thought, between her accent and Grandma’s hearing problems, they’d have a hard time understanding each other, but that didn’t seem to be a problem: in fact, they had a real affinity for one another.

Graduation day was very. very long, but good overall. The ceremony began at 9 a.m., so to account for being 45 minutes away, needing to get there about an hour early to be sure to get on the main floor, and getting 7 people through our one shower, I had to get up about 4:30. I had some things just sitting out for breakfast for everyone to get whatever they wanted whenever they weren’t in the shower. We got there in good time and did make the main floor — there is a balcony but no handrails on the steps and I get really wobbly up there. One little personal thing I was worried about: after the ceremony starts, if you leave the building you can’t reenter, just so there is not a lot of commotion and distraction, but you can go to another building where the overflow crowd can see the events broadcast. The thought of sitting for 2 and 1/2 hours without getting to the bathroom made me nervous, but God answers even such prayers. There were a few tummy troubles, but I think they were just from “nerves.” Believe it or not, I did stay awake the whole time! I lost focus and kind of zoned out a time or two, though.

Instead of having a graduation speaker, they have various students share a testimony while diplomas are being handed out (instead of calling each name out, they have a big screen showing each student as they receive their diploma and have their name displayed, so we did get to see them “close up” at that moment.) The testimonies are always a blessing as students share something about their college experience. I wish that people who think BJU is racist could see and hear the diverse group of graduates praising the Lord for what they’ve learned there and what He has done in their lives.

After graduation we met up with Jason, took pictures, greeted several other folks we knew, met a few of Jason’s teachers and friends as they stopped by. That’s always a fun if noisy and chaotic time.

A lot of people have some kind of drop-in party graduation afternoon or evening, but since we were too far from campus for most of the student friends to come, and there were four other graduates from church each having their own celebrations (plus a wedding that day!), we just went out to a nice restaurant for a family celebration that evening. We went to a Japanese place where they cook the food right there at your table.

Jeremy said this guy at the entrance looked like a Japanese Darth Vadar.

Grandma had never been to a restaurant like this. She was taken aback — literally! — when the flame shot up at the beginning while the cook was cleaning the grill:

Our cook was great. This was the lava onion rings:

The happy couple in life…

…and on cake…

Mittu had finished in December, but she chose not to “walk” for graduation. We wanted to honor her accomplishment as well, though.

We all attended church Sunday morning, then Mittu’s mom went home that afternoon. We decided to postpone our family Mother’s Day celebration til next week since we hadn’t really had time to do much for it, but Jim and the boys did make lunch and we had cards and little gifts for Grandma and Mittu’s mom. I had planned for Monday to be kind of a “day off.” It turned out not to be that exactly, but, still, it was really nice not to have to go anywhere! Jason and Mittu worked on creating a slide show for the wedding reception, so it was fun going through baby and childhood pictures. Then they spent hours printing off their wedding invitations and RSVP cards and stuffing envelopes. Though they’ve talked about wedding stuff for hours on the phone, it helps to discuss a lot of that kind of thing in person or with family around. I feel a lot of progress was made on that front.

Mittu goes home today, and Jason’s starts a new full time job Monday while continuing to work his part time one through the summer. I had thought the whirlwind of busyness would slow down this week, but Jesse has a piano recital and spring concert on two different nights this week. But, still, it is a lot less busy than last week.

Though usually I am a pretty sentimental person, somehow I haven’t really had those teary moments I’ve heard other moms express over a weekend like this. I think it was just too busy getting through everything! I have had “those mements” throughout the last several months, realizing this was Jason’s last Christmas at home before getting married, having him share something he wanted to do next Easter and then experiencing a pang when I said, “You won’t be here next Easter,” etc. Originally they had planned to go to CA after they got married, but since finding out they are going to be fairly nearby instead, I don’t have the feeling I am “losing” them. But I am sure between now and the wedding there will be several sentimental teary moments mixed in with the joy! For now there’s just joy.

Thank you, Lord, for such a great weekend!

We have a graduate!

Posted on May 9, 2009 by Barbara Harper

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Celebratory dinner, cake, and ice cream yet to come.

I’ll catch up with you all when I can!!!

Odds and ends

Posted on May 6, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Did you see The Amazing Race last Sunday, when one teamed missed out on the finals because of a bathroom break? That so would have been me. My family is very patient with my need to stop! In fairness, this girl had chugged down 4 bottles of water to try and wash down fried scorpions and larvae and other assorted gross stuff she had to eat. That team had overcome so much, I was so hoping they’d make it — especially as one girl on the team that did make it is one of the rudest people I have ever seen and I was hoping she’d be elimnated.

Jason’s Baccalaureate service was this last Sunday. I had forgotten the joy of singing hymns with 4,000 or so other people. If that was wonderful…I’m wondering what it will be like singing with all the saints in heaven?

The guest speaker was a pastor from West Ghana whom we knew years ago when he came to the US to study, so that was a pleasant surprise. I did have a harder time understanding him, though, than I did back then — may have something to do with the sound system, I don’t know. Plus he hadn’t been back in the US for a while so he was probably more heavily accented than when we knew him. But I enjoyed hearing him.

We had lunch at Fatz Cafe. Great stuff!!!

We’ve been “cleaning for company” this week as Jason’s fiancee and her mom were coming. Funny how having someone over spurs a cleaning frenzy. When Jeremy was little and we were cleaning before someone came over, he asked, “Why do we want them to think we’re cleaner than we are?’ 😳 I tried to explain that this is really how clean it should be all the time. I usually get all those things done — just not all at the same time!

The teen fellowship we hosted a few weeks ago actually ended up helping. Many things, of course have had to be redone even before now, but some of the heavier-duty stuff wasn’t too bad since they were so recently done.

Jason’s fiancee, Mittu, did get in late last night and we were all up til after 1 a.m. — then I had to get up at 5 this morning. So I am definitely going to need a nap some time today.

Her mom comes in later this week. I’m a little nervous about meeting her for the first time, but I found out she is, too. We’ve talked on the phone before, and she has much, much more of an Indian accent than Mittu does, and I really have to concentrate to understand her — but maybe in person that will be easier, and being around each other more will help, I’m sure.

I’m enjoying catching up on wedding plans but am reminded of how stressful all that can be, especially when you have multiple varied opinions. I’m pretty much only offering mine when asked, as she has so much of that to deal with already. Jim only half-jokingly offered them $1,000 to elope, but I don’t think her family would ever forgive us if they did.

Jason has applied to grad school but hasn’t heard back yet. He does have a job lined up and a pretty good lead on an apartment that will be available in August, so things are coming together. I am glad they’re going to be close by for a while.

This Sunday is Mother’s Day already! We’ve been so focused on graduation that Mother’s Day crept up on us. We tend to do up holidays pretty big and would be willing to just postpone what we normally do, but with Jim’s mom and Mittu’s mom here, that may not be a good idea, either.

Mother’s Day is one of the times I miss my mom the most. For the first year or two I couldn’t go into a Hallmark store anywhere near May when they had all the Mother’s Day things out. I can now. I thought I’d share this clip of Il Divo singing “Mama” as a tribute. I can’t say, as the song does, I owe it all to Mom: I owe it all to the Lord. But I am so grateful for my mom’s love and support and belief in me.

Catching up

Posted on April 20, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Last week was spring break for Jesse. Jim took the week off to start on one of our biggest and most needed projects: painting the house. This is the “before” view:

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The shutters on the left of the house are faded; the shutters on the right are peeling. We didn’t know that the ones on the left were made of plastic until Jim took them down and piece of it broke off. The ones on the right were made of wood.

With a split level, there are odd little places with pieces of roof sticking out from the rest of the house and little patches of paneling. I was inside the “sun room” at the back of the house when Jim and Jeremy were on a little section of roof to paint the wall above that and below the main roof. I took this picture from inside the sun room looking out at them.

Yes, Jim is climbing a ladder on a roof. Yes, I did pray for safety a lot during the week!

Jeremy and Jesse working in the front:

This is the contrast of the new color on the left and the old one on the right:

I was a little alarmed at first because the new color looks more yellowish (though not so much in this picture) when I was trying to avoid a yellow tone. When I told Jim’s mom we were painting it off-white, she said, “Ecru?” Unfortunately there are scores of tints and shades in that color family! But when I look at a wall of the new paint by itself it doesn’t look yellowish, so I think it’s fine. Better be! It’s too late to change it! I was just frustrated with myself in my color choice, but it will be fine in the long run.

Jim working on the front:

More prayers for safety!

Jeremy did most of the shutters and gutters:

While I was walking around taking pictures, I thought the view of the sky through the dogwood tree was pretty:

This is the view this morning — the lighting is a little different because the previous pictures were taken on a sunny day and it is overcast this morning. The old is on the left, the new on the right:

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I like it. It looks a lot lighter and brighter.

When I was looking at colors, I didn’t even think about the area around the windows, but changing that from dark to light makes a lot of difference.

Jim was frustrated that he lost two days of painting due to rain at the beginning of the week. He used the time when it wasn’t actually raining to do some prep work, cleaning and scraping. He had mercy on Jesse and didn’t make him work as much as he could have so he could just relax some over spring break. Jesse did get to have a friend over one night. Jason doesn’t get a spring break from his school and had a heavy week of homework, so he wasn’t able to help much. I felt bad that I didn’t contribute more. I am no good on a ladder: one of the residual effects of TM is balance problems. I did have some extra time on Saturday and offered to help Jeremy with the shutters or gutters, but where he was set up on the patio there wasn’t much room, and he was enjoying listening to his iPod while working and didn’t really need or want help at that point. I did provide lunch and dinner. 🙂 I don’t usually make lunches for all of us: years ago when the kids discovered the joys of sleeping in, they woke up at different times and ate at different times, and if I made them each something to eat whenever they got ready, I would have been in the kitchen all day. So they usually make their own lunches. But this week they usually took a lunch break all together, and I figured having a meal ready was the least I could do. And, of course, I’m the chronicler and photographer. 🙂

The greatest majority of it is done. The wall on the left and a little patch of siding on the right is all of the “big” stuff, and Jim will have to rent a ladder to reach the peak (at least I think and hope he is planning to. He did mention the possibility of putting a ladder on top of the van. :O ) They also need to do the doors. But there is some tedious little stuff left, like the wood parts on the window panes. We’ll just have to fit that in as we can.

Today everyone is back to school and work. I sure enjoyed not setting the alarm clock last week. Funny how 6:30 is “sleeping in” these days!

This Saturday is the ladies’ luncheon at church. We got the favors mostly done at the ladies’ meeting last week, and I have a pretty long to-do list before Saturday, but, though it is going to be a busier than usual week, it doesn’t feel really pressured and overwhelming. Even so, there is a little underlying feeling of nervousness that seems to be a part of planning any event, even though things are going well and there’s nothing to worry about and it is all in God’s hands anyway. I just try to ignore it and carry on. 🙂 But I’d appreciate your prayers that everything go well and especially for the lady doing the presentation of Darlene Diebler Rose’s Evidence Not Seen as she prepares. I’m praying that neither of us is adversely affected by the pollen that is so prevalent this time of year!

I was playing around with StumbleUpon last night after noticing in my blog stats that someone viewed one of my posts via Stumble. I clicked on the link, but it didn’t show me what page was viewed: it just took me to a page saying someone had viewed one of my posts, which I already knew. I had already signed in with them but just hadn’t done a lot with it. I looked around and read several things. I didn’t know if I could “stumble” any of my own posts, and I tried it just to see if I could. I was astounded this morning to see that the posts I had stumbled had all received over 90 views just since last night via StumbleUpon, and one, When there is no hunger for God’s Word, received over 2,000 views! I guess it works!

I think that about catches us up with the goings-on here. This will be a busy week preparing for the ladies’ luncheon; next week I’ll have the ladies ministry newsletter/booklet to do; Jason graduates in May, and his fiancee and future mother-in-law are coming for that, so there are some house projects I’d like to get done before that. Jesse has a sports banquet coming up as well as a piano recital and choir concert in May. Then when his school gets out later in the month, I’ll have a breather for a while — until Jason’s wedding in August!!

O Baby!

Posted on April 1, 2009 by Barbara Harper

(My ABC Challenge post is here.)

I saw at Linda’s 2nd Cup of Coffee that Rachel at In His Hands is having a picture carnival called O Baby, asking people to post pictures of themselves as babies and little ones.

This is one of the earliest I have. I was maybe 6 months old there, with my mom and dad. In all of my “posed” baby pictures my hair is combed like that — must have been the style for babies then?

They both had all that curl and my hair is straight as a board.

Actually, here is an even earlier one with my grandparents. I wonder why I didn’t inherit their skinny genes?

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In this one I am about three. I’m told they couldn’t get me to smile for the picture til they gave me some pennies.

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I’m with my little brother here one Easter. I must’ve been about 5 or 6 or so, and he would have been 1 or 2.

This is one of my favorites from 4th or 5th grade.

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That was all before color was invented. 🙂 This one from 6th grade is, I think, the first colored photo I have of myself. I had to sleep in rollers and Dippetty Doo to get even that little bit of wave!

You can join in the fun or see others’ photos from childhood at In His Hands.

From the infirmary….

Posted on March 23, 2009 by Barbara Harper

When I bought my cookware, there was a large pan called a Dutch oven in the set. It’s probably the least used of my pots and pans. Occasionally I’ll prepare corn on the cob in it, or a big pot of soup.

Sometimes, however, it is used in a manner for which it was not originally intended. Once when we were waxing alliterative, we came up with these appellations:

Barf Bucket

Vomit Vessel

Upchuck Urn

Retch Receptacle

Hurl Holder

Puke Pot.

Forgive me — I have all boys. They’ve rubbed off on me.

When they were sick when they were little and couldn’t always make it to the bathroom in time, we kept the pan by their beds “just in case.” I don’t know about the older boys, but Jesse, at least, still likes the security of having the pan nearby. He used it once today — the other times he made it to the bathroom.

The poor guy has had a sore throat for several days, which progressed to some coughing, which today led to nausea.

Since it seemed like an abundance of mucus was the main culprit, I gave him some Dayquil this afternoon, which actually seemed to help. He hasn’t been able to eat much but was finally able to keep some chicken and rice down for dinner. He’s still feeling really crampy, though. I’m hoping he is able to get some sleep and feel better by morning — and I’m hoping all the rest of us don’t get whatever it is.

Then Jim went to the dentist to see about a filling that seemed to have come out. I thought they were just going to look at it, see what needed to be done, and then reschedule him, but I didn’t know he had told them he wanted to go ahead and get it taken care of today. And then I thought they’d just replace the filling, but they did a root canal. So he wasn’t feeling too wonderful when the numbness wore off.

So this has been not the best start to a week — here’s hoping tomorrow is a better day!

A few links and a photo meme

Posted on March 7, 2009 by Barbara Harper

I wanted to share just a couple of links of interesting reading discovered in the last week or two:

The Headmistress at The Common Room has an excellent post titled Home-Making on Purpose in response to a disillusioned, discouraged homemake who had “thought that since she had been very good at her very complex previous career, staying at home ought to be something she just took to naturally, without any thought, preparation, planning, or training” and had had visions of “doing nothing but joyfully creative things” and that “being a sahm was going to look an awful lot like Ozzie and Harriet, only with more fun stuff.” There is a lot of great advice in response.

The Nester has 10 Ways to Avoid Having a Home You’ll Love — excuses or easily-removed hindrances.

I can amen Chris Anderson’s Sweetness of Speech Increases Persuasiveness.

And I am not familiar with Domestic Felicity blog, but enjoyed this post about Falling in love through the blessing of children found through a link at Breathing Grace, detailing how married love can increase rather than be hindered when children come along.

Janet at Across the Page tagged me a while back for a 5th Photo Meme. Sorry it has taken me so long to respond, Janet — it’s been a busy couple of weeks! The instructions are to “Find your 5th photo file folder, then the 5th photo in that file folder. Then pass the meme to 5 people.”

You’d think that would be straightforward enough, but when I click on “My Pictures,” it has photo files mixed in with downloaded clip art. Then, another way of looking through them, this is the actual 5th photo — though it is also the first. I don’t know why it is repeated:

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This is my middle son, Jason, with his fiancee, Mittu.

If I count that one as a double, then the 5th photo is this one:

This is Jason and Jeremy celebrating their birthdays together at the end of last summer when Jason came back from working at camp for the summer. He had been away for both of them and Jeremy’s was, I believe, right before Jason came back, so we waited and celebrated them both together. Jason’s pointing toward the “21” because that’s his age — the numbers are reversed from the way they are sitting. I guess I could have had them reverse places. 🙂

Coming at the pictures from this post, though, I get completely different results, but I’ll leave it at that. Forgive me — I’m overly analytical. 🙂

I have seen this around and can’t remember who has already done it, so I won’t tag anyone, but feel free to do this one if you are interested!

I’ve had a very busy last couple of weeks, and next week our church has revival services which are busy in a different way, so I am planning on something of a lightweight day today, though there is laundry and such to be done. Hope you have a great Saturday!

Friday’s Fave Five and Happy Birthday, Jim!

Posted on March 6, 2009 by Barbara Harper

Susanne at Living to Tell the Story hosts a “Friday Fave Five” in which we share our five favorite things from the past week. Click on the button to read more of the details. Isn’t that a cute new spring button?

I haven’t been able to do a Fave Five the last couple of weeks, and I am glad to be able to get back into them today.

1. Snow! We got about 5″, which I know to you Northerners doesn’t sound like much, but we often only get an inch or two at most once a year, so this was a highlight of our winter. Scroll down if you’d like to read more about our snow activities and see our snow pictures. 🙂

2. Snow Days! Because it doesn’t make sense to buy a lot of snow equipment when it is so rarely needed, a few inches of snow is enough to close down schools and many businesses for a day or two. Really, that is how I like it — just enough snow to get off work and school and play for a day (only we had two snow days this time!), and then that’s it. We still had a lot of snow patches in grassy areas even Thursday, but the roads were pretty clear by Tuesday afternoon. I could list this as 2a, but one of my favorite parts of snow days is not having to set my alarm clock on a day when I normally would.

3. Lunch with a friend. My good friend Carol and I have been trying to get together for lunch for at least the last couple of weeks, and we finally made it Thursday. It’s always good to chat with Carol, and I enjoyed catching up with each other plus visiting a restaurant that I love but my family wasn’t crazy about. (I’m ready again whenever you are, Carol! 🙂 )

4. French Chocolate Pie. I had absolutely the best piece of French Chocolate Pie I think I have ever eaten at said restaurant. I am already craving another piece.

5. My husband’s birthday today! Happy 51st birthday, honey! For the next six months we’re the same age. 🙂

I post this picture of him often, but it is my favorite.

Today I am wrapping presents and making his favorite cake, Boston Cream Pie, plus baked spaghetti for dinner.

Snow aliens and rooftop snowballs

Posted on March 3, 2009 by Barbara Harper

The boys walked around and took pictures in the snow Sunday night, but it was dark and the snow was slushy, so they didn’t do much with it. Then Monday morning it was too icy. Finally Monday afternoon they got to go out and “play” in it.

Jeremy says this is a snow alien.

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I told him I thought it looked more like a pig. 🙂 The round mouth (from the ring around a juice bottle) looks like he is either singing…or very surprised 😀

Here is another view:

They made another smaller one in the back:

Jeremy (these are all his pictures) titled this one, “Morbo reporting from Earth.” Jesse was very proud of the snow hat he made.

I love this picture of Suzie running in the snow.

Other than that, and being with her boys, I don’t think she liked it much. She especially didn’t like getting hit with a snowball!

I heard Jim up on the roof — I thought maybe he was cleaning piled-up snow off this little section.

(Does this look dangerous to anyone besides me??)

But he was actually doing this:

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(Kids, don’t try this at home!!)

All in all it was a fun snow day.

The roads are better: Jim went to work and Jason went to class. Jesse has another snow day off. As far as I know right now the ladies’ meeting is on. I got most of the prep work done for it yesterday. I need to go out today and get gift bags and boxes and such. Though the road looks good, I don’t know how I am going to get out to the car due to my balance issues…I asked the guys to clear a path yesterday, but there is still iced-over slush between the house and the van. I did find we have some rock salt on hand — I think I’ll see if Jeremy will go sprinkle some out there before I try to leave…and maybe escort me to the car. 🙂 Plus when the sun gets to that side of the house, hopefully it will melt away more of it.

I’m off to get things done — hope you have a good day!

Boyz cooking

Posted on January 14, 2009 by Barbara Harper

(Updated with pictures!)

My oldest son, Jeremy, is anticipating moving out on his own some time, so for Christmas he asked for the book How To Cook Everything by Mark Bittman. Then as my husband was shopping for video games for the youngest for Christmas, he saw a Personal Trainer: Cooking Game for the Nintendo DS and took advantage of the Toys R Us sales to get this one for Jeremy. Jason liked it so well he bought one of his own. Then, Jeremy had received a gift card for Wal-Mart for Christmas and looked around but didn’t see anything he wanted. I suggested that, just as he had asked for some basic tools for Christmas and birthdays the previous year in anticipation of being out on his own, maybe he could use the gift card for some basic kitchen tools or appliances. So he bought a food processor because he’s been reading about one in his new cookbook.

One day for lunch he made homemade potato soup and roast beef sandwiches. Monday of this week he made homemade bread using the dough-mixing capability of his food processor. It was good!

The DS game is pretty neat. It narrates the instructions out loud, and because you have your hands busy, when you get ready for the next step, you just say, “Continue.” It does tend to interpret any loud noise as the instruction to continue, though. If you don’t understand a step or want a term defined, you can say, “More information.”

Jason unexpectedly got the night off work tonight, so he suggested he and Jeremy collaborate on making dinner. A night of someone else making dinner is fine by me! They’re using the DS game for a recipe, and it smells good so far.

It’s been fun to see their approach. Jeremy is analytical and by-the-book, at least when he’s new to something. Jason tends to be more experience-oriented. One time when I was out of town helping my mom after surgery, Jason had some friends over — he must’ve been about 10 — and Jim let them make mini pizzas using English muffin halves and pizza sauce and whatever toppings they wanted. They had some pretty unique combinations, but they had a high old time.

Jason also started working at Subway several weeks ago and brought home all kinds of neat ideas for sandwiches that I’d never thought about or tried. For a while there at lunch or after church Sunday nights we were all asking him to make sandwiches for us. 🙂

I had always thought it would be a good idea to have them be responsible for a meal once a week or so as they were growing up so they’d know some basics about cooking, but in their high school and college years, they were so busy, there just never seemed to be time. But I am glad they have the desire to experiment now. It will be good to know they won’t have to subsist on fast food if it is a while before they marry or if their wives are sick or away. It’s been a blessing to me that Jim is able to cook a few things in those instances, and I wanted the boys to have at least some skill in the kitchen.

I’ve even learned a few things. With Jeremy’s by-the-book approach and going out and buying the exact ingredients called for, I’ve found it does make a difference. I tend to just use vegetable oil if I don’t have extra-virgin olive oil or minced onion if I don’t have green onion. But sometimes those extra little touches do make a great deal of difference. It’s good to learn how to improvise, too, but I am going to start paying attention to the particulars.

Of course, with any beginning cook, there are mishaps…things I thought they knew or just didn’t think to tell them. Like keeping a eye on the toaster oven and making sure no food touches the heating element…because it can (and did) start a fire (thankfully very small and easy to put out)…and not to touch your eyes after chopping peppers. But we all have our stories…I won’t mention the time years ago I set a bag of popcorn on a burner on the stove when I thought I had a different burner turned on. The boys thought having a fire truck come to the house was great fun…

Finished product:

Update: I wrote most of this last night and didn’t get back to update, but dinner turned out well! I don’t remember the name of the dish — it was from Spain and was kind of a stew with chicken, ham, onions and bell peppers. Different, but good! I took pictures but my Picasa, where I download them, is having trouble this morning and I am waiting til one of my computer experts gets up before I attempt to do anything with it. Hopefully I’ll be able to upload them later! Jeremy suggested closing down Picasa and then opening it again, then rebooting the computer if that didn’t work, before following Pica’s instructions. The first stepped worked, thankfully!! It was scary opening the program to find icons in place of the photos! I have most of them backed up on an external hard drive but wasn’t sure when I last backed them up — this reminds me to do that again!!