Our Family Knows What It Is Like When A Family Member's Body Is Never Recovered. I Just Checked That The 7 Year Missing Is Still In Place. It Will Be 50 Year Anniversary This Year.

What does one do on a 50 year anniversary of a loved one that's body has never been recovered. I know this ... time may soften the blow a bit but the hurt and wondering are always back there in the back of your mind. I wonder if that jet black hair would have been all gray or a touch of gray now.  Would my children have adored their uncle and found him to be fun because he was fun when he was alive. I have shared before how in my opinion my brother, Ricky, had a resembled of the the handsomeness of JRK Jr. No matter how much time passes by there still is the emptiness in one's heart of what would have become of them if they lived longer than 22 years old.

I wonder if the 4 survivors of the boat wreck are still alive. I wanted a few times to interview them since they were the last to be with my brother before that tragic accident near the Bermuda Triangle region is what we were told. I have the Coast Guard report my mother requested because she felt something just wasn't right with this story.

I remember that day like it was yesterday. I believe it was close to Good Friday and my mother received a phone call from my father swearing and using curse words telling her it was her fault Ricky was dead because she allowed him to go on that trip. Terrible, terrible, terrible can you only imagine what my mother experienced through finding out her son was missing via a cruel, cruel phone call like that. There was a tiny little blip in a newspaper looking for the family of him. For some reason they thought he was from another city in Ohio over an hour away from us. Then, because it was over the Easter weekend no Catholic mass could be held until whatever they said for a mass of resurrection could be held. There were about 500 people that attended that mass. We were all in some sort of shock. This death is not an average per say type of death a family experiences. Being interviewed in our home by local newspaper; receiving cards of consolation from his friends and people that he touched their life. My mom said they would tend to come in the mail when she just needed some hope and solace. I think 1 person said he talked a person down from jumping to their death if my memory serves me correctly.

That year I started college and would daydream of the day he knocked on my college dorm door and said he was on an island somewhere with amnesia and then found us again. That never happened sorry to say. See, when there is no body recovered it does leave some sort of hope in your heart but at the same time there is no final closure like when seeing a body in a casket or cremated and placed in an urn and experiencing the funeral burial. My mother eventually purchased I think it was a weeping cherry tree and a placard recognizing my brother's life. We would go and place a wind chime in the tree. One of my family members figured out how to tie the windchime a certain way so the winter winds didn't blow it away.

On special mile marker anniversaries of his death, my mother would give a donation to the local Croatian music radio program and request a special song be played for him. It was by Abba, "I Have A Dream." Eddie Bucar would honor my mothers dedication request even though the song was not a Croatian song that one would tend to hear on his radio program. When my mother went to be with Jesus, one of my children wanted a few of their Nana's music cassette tapes. One Christmas they were put into individual shadow box type of frames and guess which one I was blessed to receive. You guessed right, the song by Abba.

Then my father had a small life insurance policy on my brother and this is where the 7 year time frame comes in. You had to wait the time period of 7 years before one could declared legally dead of someone when there is no body recovered. I remember going to sign paperwork attesting it had been 7 years back then before a policy could be paid out, regardless of how little or large the policy amount was. I just checked and I think it showed that same time frame is still in place. Now, there may be different circumstances and states may have different time frames. I see the purpose in this so as to give proper time for one to possibly return or show up somewhere and people just can't go out there claiming all sort of things just to cash in on life insurance policies, selling properties, cars etc. Does that make sense to you, it does to me.

Can you see why I have empathy with the families and continue to pray for the family of Sebastian Wayne Drake Rogers and other children in that same category when I am made aware of them similar missing children via Dolly Vision, JLR Investigates & Bullhorn Betty (recently for her since she came to TN for the 2 year anniversary of him not being found.) I have also been praying for the family of Nancy Guthrie and for her also. It is so important in my opinion that a family receives some sort of comfort in knowing the where about of their loved on.

There is a good ending to my story if there can be one. I led my father to Jesus 3 weeks before he died. I led him in the sinners prayer and he asked forgiveness in sins in his life by Jesus and invited Him into his heart. Please do not judge so harshly but show empathy to the family because this will be something they will have in their lives until the answers are given and they could then find some sort of peace if that makes sense.

Several years ago I was not too far from possibly where his boat may have sailed in the Bahamas and I purchased a bouquet and my former husband and I went down to the beach and released it into the water as a final goodbye of some sort. I wonder if that is why I want to take a Disney cruise so I could not have a fear of this large body of water where my brother drew his last breath and then was no longer heard from. The mind can be a bit cruel at times and cause one to wonder if they had been eaten by some sort of shark, etc. in the water. Guess what the good news is ... God knows exactly where Ricky died in that vast body of water and when the trump sounds and the dead in Christ shall rise up and meet Jesus in the sky and the believers will then join them, my brother Ricky will be there and to that I say PRAISE GOD FROM WHOM ALL BLESSINGS FLOW.

IU never got to dance with my brother @ my wedding, but just a few months prior to his trip we danced together @ debutante ball

An aunt had a sculpture commissioned/created for our mother. Representing the 3 surviving children @/by her feet and my brother she is holding.

Here is the cassette tape I shared about.

I Was Quite Busy Yesterday Baking & Cooking. Would You Like To Know What I Made?

Yesterday was a day experimenting with a few new recipes I never made before. I made thousand island salad dressing and rustic rye bread, yes I did. A few days ago I went to the Mennonite bulk store thinking surely they had rye flour but they did not. I actually found it closer to home and purchased it. That's okay because the weather was pretty nice that day to take a drive into the country type of setting. I did get some Swiss cheese slices and a few slices of deluxe bologna also.  Did you ever have a small slice of bologna with a slice of cheese before, no bread? I think it tastes better that way in my opinion. Oh, it was Amish brand I do believe.

It was not hard making both new recipes yesterday. Just following recipe instructions. I also made a corned beef in my electric pressure cooker and vinegar/oil potato salad. When growing up we distinguished it from regular  mayo based potato salad by calling in Croatian Potato Salad or Croatian Potatoes. You boil and peel the potatoes, add lots of  raw onion and I like to add some minced dry garlic, along with salt and pepper to taste. I also had some freeze dried chives I added for some color and flavor also. I used a garlic infused sunflower oil and a mixture of apple cider and white wine vinegar.

You probably guessed by now that I was making a corned beef themed meal. I baked the rye bread loaf to use as the base of a corned beef sandwich with the sliced cheese and dressing. The dressing was better suited putting on the side on the plate so it didn't run off of the sandwich and you could dip the sandwich into the dressing if you wanted to.  You can also make an open face type of sandwich with just 1 side of the sliced piece of bread by placing it in the air fryer to melt the cheese. My mom had a tradition of after the corned beef was cooked to make a glaze and place in the oven for it to brown on top of the corned beef. Well, I got a little creative yesterday and blended the yellow mustard with a bit of brown sugar and I added grated horseradish to the glaze and it was fantastic. Instead of heating the oven I placed the corned beef on a air fryer liner and browned it that way in the air fryer and it turned out nice.

That was my full day of cooking/baking and I am glad that I did. Why don't you try making a new recipe today. I look @ it this way ... if it is good I save the recipe for making another time and if it is not quite what I expected or way too much work to make I toss the recipe and say I at least tried it. When I made homemade butter mints a few weeks ago that was 1 of those recipes I told my neighbors, enjoy them now because too much work in making them and they probably won't see them from me in the future and we laughed about it. God bless the people out there that have the patience to make those mints because they really are yummy tasting and melt in your mouth while eating it. Even when I froze some to stay fresh until I needed to make up Valentine's Day care packages they did  not get a solid as a rock type of texture and still remained with a softer texture.

Please Listen To The 2nd Last Song In This Video With Joseph Larson & Mark Lowry

I recently viewed this video by Mark Lowry. His guest was Joseph Larson and he sings a song called "I Believe." If you go to the 2nd last song he sings you will hear this beautiful song.  A great testimony he shares also in this video.

The other day I woke up hearing 2 words on 2/7/2026. I jotted them down in a prayer book. I wonder why I would have heard them? You know a few years ago I had a series of total of 5 dreams throughout the course of months warning me of a ministry that was stealing. I tried to share them but to no avail so maybe I am wondering why and if these were prophetic words I heard.

What do you think ... I jotted down Wang, Asia and further wrote down that it was Wong or Wang along with the word Asia as I notated that I wondered if it was prophetic.

The video is around the 54 minute mark in the video and be blessed.

JOSEPH LARSON is with #MarkLowry right now on #JustWhenever

In My Opinion, Chocolate Peanut Butter Fudge Is Far Superior To Peanut Butter Fudge. May I Share.

I just wanted to try making the peanut butter fudge recipe but using creamy dark chocolate fudge frosting and Reese brand peanut butter. I also added more honey roasted peanuts to this recipe. There is such a nice and richer flavor to the fudge. May I suggest trying it yourself. The basic recipe by The Hillbilly Kitchen is posted so follow that and enjoy the fudge. Don't forget to share it with others also because that would be a lot of caloric intake if you decided to eat all by yourself. Please know this is not a health conscience recipe by far. All you have to do is read the ingredient contents of all packages and you will see why I share that, in my opinion, that is. 

Well, I Did Make 1 More Recipe I Recently Saw On "The Hillbilly Kitchen" Video Of How To Make Peanut Butter Fudge. I Sampled It & Gave To Others To Sample Also. So Far, The Reviews Are GREAT.

I was inspired by a video I recently viewed of the Hillbilly Kitchen making an easy peanut butter fudge so I tried it out. I did add a small snack sized package of honey roasted peanuts to it and the reviews so far are looking very good. See, I bake to bless my family, friends and those that have been kind to me. Here is the tutorial video and hope you find this recipe easy to make also. When it came to heating up the peanut butter in the microwave I did not want to take a chance of any sort of mishap because I could not get all of the seal off that contained foil in it so I removed the peanut butter from the container to a bowl and that worked just fine for me. Oh, I found starting for 1 minute in the microwave then stirring the frosting container or the peanut butter needed somewhere between 15-30 seconds more time in the microwave. Now, your microwave strength may vary from mine so test to see what works best for you when melting these 2 ingredients. I also found that mine needed more than 1 hour cooling in the refrigerator so I let it be there for approximately 24 hours. I found that just maybe the 1 hour may have worked fine in knowing it is a fudge with a softer texture and not the same texture like other fudges you may have made before.

2 Ingredient 2 Minute Peanut Butter Fudge - Easy No Fail Recipe - Gift Idea - The Hillbilly Kitchen

Here We Go Again With Another Video ...

Here we go again. Another revealing video exposing potential things dealing with a Paula White Conference Coming Up In A Couple Of Weeks. This is brought to you by "Real Talk with Jordan Riley.

Paula White's UPCOMING Conference is Pure EVIL!

I Was Reading My Bible Today & I Am Wondering Why James W. Goll Winked @ Me From A Pulpit & Then Pointed @ Me With A Word That Was No Word @ All?

I was reading my bible today and was in Proverbs 6 and something caught my attention and then while reading it, it jogged my memory to the time James W. Goll did this type of situation to me in a ministry setting. I had to then deal with the "clean up mess in aisle" situation, I think that is how the saying goes. This may be dating myself but when you were in a grocery store and a customer dropped a glass jar and it broke and there was a mess to be cleaned up in the aisle. They would go on the store loud speaker system and say there was a clean up needed and they would state the aisle number in the store. For someone to clean up the mess.

Proverbs 6:12-13: "A good-for-nothing scoundrel is a person who has a dishonest mouth. He winks his eye, makes a signal with his foot, and, points with his fingers."  Well, I experienced 2 of the 3 things listed in this scripture verse. It was the weekend of February 12th, 2022 @ Global Fire Church (in which the church split I believe already took place) when Bonnie Jones & James W. Goll were ministering that weekend. It was a paid registration event. So, James is in a laying back relaxed sort of position on the platform steps facing in my direction. Please note that in this facing position the people seated in the center or to the left were not able to see the winking because he was facing in the direction of the section to the far right of the platform. He looked right at me and winked then he pointed his finger at me and states, "You know how to sow." Of course he knew that because  I was giving to both to his ministry and his personal support. That was no prophetic word at all and when I think about it, for the few years I followed his ministry he never brought forth a prophetic word for me. How odd is that. I can share the words he spoke to me because I wrote them down in a journal I used to take notes when @ church. I think I gave his personal assistant that weekend $50.00 donation to pass onto James. The guy asked my name and I did not give it to him just said the lady with the red hair.

So, it is the next day and James Goll is not in attendance or speaking that day but Bonnie Jones speaks in the morning service. After the service I was speaking with a couple that I was seated by the night before and I thought it was rather strange that she asked me if I knew James Goll. I responded that I knew him from taking a mentoring class with him. Isn't that an odd question to ask one. Not if you happened to see him directly winking at me the night before. How do these people get away with this sort of shenanigans baffles me.

I am so thankful that Holy Spirit opened up my eyes to several phony baloney type of ministers out there that I followed at one time or another; believed in; and made donations to. I am thankful better now then never when the blinders came off my eyes and heart too. Praise the Lord from whom all blessings flow.

"Melania" The Documentary Was BEAUTIFUL, BEAUTIFUL, Simply BEAUTIFUL. The Theatre Audience Applauded @ The Conclusion Of The Film.

This is my observation and experience I am sharing today about the documentary that debuted this past Friday. I purchased a ticket to the first showing of the day. The theatre was not completely full but it was also not just a handful of patrons either. The portion that touched my heart the most was when she shares about how she misses her mother and she had to attend the funeral of President Carter on the anniversary date of her mother dying. What a faithful young woman First Lady Melania is that she came back to NY that day to light a candle in her mother's memory & say a prayer @ St. Patrick's Cathedral. That brought tears to my eyes. You know, I was not aware that the anniversary of her mothers dying was so close in days from my mother's anniversary of her dying but my mother died I believe a year or two before her mom. Death of a loved one is never easy even though people may try to comfort you with words letting you know the pain of death eases up as time goes on. No, I do not think so in my opinion because I still bake a recipe, see gifts my mother gave to me or even cards or notes of encouragement she gave to me and in those moments I wish I could just make a phone call to her to see how she is doing.

Even when I gift someone with a $2.00 bill it reminds me of her because she always would bless the children now and then with tucking a $2.00 bill in a card for them. So, the sharing of $2.00 bills is a small tradition that carries on with my mother starting that kindness within our family. Are parents perfect? Absolutely not but being a parent myself we do try to do the very best we can for our children.

I think I am done creating my Valentine's Day candy making. I made yesterday milk chocolate mixed with sweetened regular coconut, honey roasted almonds & dried strawberry pieces. I then finished up using my dark chocolate melting discs combined with salted peanuts. Do you think I should continue to keep baking or not. I do enjoy baking, I really do but I have to be in the creative mode in order for me to be creative in the kitchen, does that make sense to you.

The same with creating Lego & Lego type of flowers. I started a project yesterday of building a lavender flower and it was frustrating at times because when I would be placing the sections together another section would fall off. So you know what I did? I put down that project at the end of the day and said to myself tomorrow is a new day to finish working on it. I think I have to get out the heavy duty  glue for projects & repairs and glue a few pieces together so it will stay this time. So far I put together a white lily, cherry blossom and working on the lavender. 

All in all, the point of today's blog entry is to sing the praises of the documentary. It was done in good taste and lets the public see behind the scene the lead up days and all the preparation it takes to arrive at Inauguration Day of a President. Maybe because I am a woman I truly appreciate the story shared  through the eyes of another woman, our Great & beloved First Lady. Stay until the very end of the documentary to read the accomplishments she has attained so far while being First Lady of the USA. Impeccable taste she has in clothing and an attention to details even when it comes to designing the very wardrobe for these events. I sure do wish our President would let his wife do the interior decorating/designing on projects in The White House. She has an attention to details and does not tend to over decorate a room but brings in the appearance of refined decorum if that makes sense. Uh oh, there I go thinking out loud again.

I am still perplexed as to why her office was torn down in the East Wing for remodel construction but the Faith Office located in the West Wing is still in place. Why don't they just dissolve that office since we see no great improvement in Christianity related things going on in our country to better it for Christians and just give that office space to the First Lady and her staff or better yet. If they don't want to dissolve that Faith Office, possibly get a true Jesus loving/follower of Jesus that walks in biblical ways in my opinion person as a director. Possibly a gentleman that truly walks with God. Is not having YouTube videos exposing grifter style ministry and is not afraid to speak biblical truth to the President of the USA pure biblical truth. Or if they want to still insist in keeping the current Director in that position, how about moving their office to a broom closet type of location somewhere else in the White House and giving the honor of a fine office location to the First Lady in which she then has access to her husband since she would be located in the West Wing. I sure am thinking out loud again aren't  I.