Jeff asked me to invite you all to toast Anne today!  Let’s lift our glasses as we remember how Anne kept multiplying gift-giving. With all of her challenges, at the end of her life Anne quoted what her father told her during the 7th year of his dialysis. “Anne, we’re just called to play the cards we’ve been dealt, the best we can”.  After quoting Paul Sullivan, Anne went on to say “I want to pass on to my sons this attitude-gift I received from Dad!”

Mindful of generational love that gains size like a snowball rolling down a mountain, I treasure the ring I’m wearing that Grandpa Bert gave Grandma Lillian to celebrate Dad’s birth 103 years ago today.  This diamond ring proclaims: a gift gains value each time it is re-given with love. 

Mindful of the Palmer Homestead’s arrowheads and what that demands of us, we gather grateful for the land from which we come. We gather especially grateful for the care that Mike and Alex have most recently been giving that soil.  We gather, grateful that as Mike and Gord expend their weakened health to care for their land, the land reciprocates by revitalizing them.

We gather, thankful for other soil of our roots. The Lyle Reek Palmer memorial maple tree at Reek School is filled with vitality.  With Mia Palmer in seventh grade and her father Alex as School Board president, that center of education flows love and knowledge to the community. We’re grateful that after Mia’s graduates with the 175^thgraduating class, that Reek’s maple syrup spirit will continue to flow beyond the 7^th generation of our family.

We look on the table and we’re grateful for all the recipes that have been gifted to us.  I didn’t know if my achy wrists and joints could make mom’s potato salad today.  But aware of mom’s motto “Use it or lose it!” I said “Of course I can do it.”  Granted I got help from Tom, my sous chef, but there it is!  Enjoy!!!  And may that potato salad be a reminder of our debt of gratitude for the recipes we have been given to create lives lived with purpose.

We say thank you to our Loving Creator for mother earth and all her lavish gifts represented on the table spread before us.  We are grateful for all the seeds that sacrificed to produce a hundred-fold. We remember our dear Anne, our most recent family member put to rest. In her name and the names of all the Palmers and Reeks who have gone before us, we recommit to reciprocating-loving care for the earth, and faithful response-able compassion toward our extended family all over her!  Yes, “GOD IS LOVE!” Raise your glasses, “TO LIFE!”