Story of my Life

Yesterday was a great day. :-) Jason had scheduled an Open House from 11:00-2:00, so we spent Friday night and Saturday morning getting the house all spic-and-span. That always feels so good--to have both bathrooms and the kitchen all sparkly and all of the floors vacuumed and mopped, things dusted and all of the clutter put away... Nice. I have a hard time getting the whole house clean at the same time except when I have proper motivation. So far the only things I've found that motivate me sufficiently are knowing that company is coming or that we're going to have a showing/Open House. Does that mean I'm more concerned with how clean other people THINK my house is than I am with how we actually live??? That could preach, if only I was a preacher. ;-)

Jason came and we left. Ran to town and stopped by K-Mart for a few things we hadn't been able to find anywhere else. We were in search of leggings for Katie. That girl's legs are beaten and bruised and bloody all the time. She doesn't exactly waft gracefully through life, you know. She more stumbles, bumbles, trips and splats her way through. ;-) Anyway, her legs are looking sooooo bad right now. She's started picked at the perpetual scabs, too, so we were hoping that perhaps if her legs were shielded by leggings (instead of her usual baggy bloomers) perhaps they'd be protected a little better and have a chance to heal. We'll see. I found a pair of leggings for myself, too, since it's COLD in this house nowadays! I prefer it that way, but the leggings will be nice. :-)

We took Charlie with us because we couldn't leave him at the house with Jason (I guess we could have... Ha!), and I made a little nook for him in the back of the van. He was sleepy when we got to K-Mart and was still curled up sleeping when we came back out. Good, Charlie! :-)

From there we went to the Clarkson's house (a.k.a. the Sandia Courtyard Hotel--are you praying they'll get into a house soon???) and let all the kids play in the grass with Charlie for a while. Then we went to eat together at Boston Market. We were there for a good, long while and then we were successful in talking the Clarksons into coming up to the house for a little while. :-) The kids played on the trampoline, the boys played cowboys and cops (with their official police dog--poor Charlie!) and all sorts of things, the girls sculpted with clay and had a tea party and all manner of girliness, and the adults sat in the living room next to a crackling fire (it was COLD outside) and visited. And we all enjoyed some of James' fantastical homemade hot chocolate. What a great afternoon/evening!

I don't remember what time the Clarksons left. I'm sure it was still pretty early in the evening (7:30ish?), but I was soooooo tired! Puppy care has been robbing me of my usual amount of sleep, you know. ;-) The boys had their showers and we all had left-overs for dinner. I went to bed sometime between 10:00 and 11:00 (that is quite early for me!) and Charlie slept solid until 3:00am. Good Charlie. :-) He went outside for a little while, then was playful--just like babies who wake up in the night! ~sigh~ I got a couple more hours of sleep before starting the day.

We had a good service this morning, but I felt distracted and had a hard time concentrating. Brother Clarkson preached such a cool message about the Good Samaritan--in a way I'd never heard it before--the Samaritan symbolizing Jesus, his beast being the Holy Ghost, the inn being The Church of God, the two pence being the price Jesus paid... So many interesting things I never would have considered. I love to hear Brother Chris preach--he's one of my all-time favorites. He has such a way of digging out deep things from the Word of God and the Holy Ghost helps him to deliver them with such power and anointing. Good stuff.

We had arranged to swap out kids today, so the Clarksons have all of the boys this afternoon and we have Katie, Naomi, Sadie and Karen. We took the girls to McDonalds for lunch, then came home. We had a very distraught puppy in the tub when we got here. ~sigh~ The girls all sculpted and painted for a while, then headed out to the trampoline. Katie made sodas for all of them and right now the four of them are piled up on the couch, crunching on popcorn and watching the Sweetpea Beauty Veggie Tales. Charlie is sleeping in my lap right now, storing up his energy so he'll be able to cry the whole time we're gone to church tonight. Ha! Crazy dog. We have a lot of work to do with the contentment thing with this pup, but I've been amazed at how well he's doing with the house training--and that's the MOST important thing to us around here! I know you'll think I'm crazy, but he seems to be "doing his thing" on command nearly every time we go outside! Whoa! What a good, good puppy! :-) We're a long way from being DONE with the training (even though he goes outside, I don't think he knows he SHOULDN'T do it inside--I just never give him a chance to! Ha!), but he's sure been easy to work with these first few days.

Tonight is ABM service, then tomorrow is back to the same old grind: laundry, ironing, all that stuff. We're still hoping and praying for God to do whatever it takes for us to find His favor and land ourselves in Alabama where we belong very, very soon. It is soooooo my heart's desire to be there! I find myself struggling to really enjoy things here. It's weird... The other day I was standing in my little log cabin up in the mountains, next to a crackling fire in the fireplace, and watching snow flakes flit through the air outside... and I couldn't even feel excited about it! I should be bouncing off the walls with giddiness, right?! But I'm supposed to be in Alabama, wishing I could have a fire and snow and mountains and all that! Ha! It's a strange feeling. I am supposed to be in Alabama, yet there's nothing that I personally can do to change the situation, so surely God wants me to be content right where I am for as long as I'm stuck here... but it feels wrong to try to be content here when deep down I want and need to be there. It's confusing. I just keep praying for God to work whatever miracles He needs to work (in hearts, minds, lives, circumstances--WHATEVER) to get us to Alabama. I honestly don't know how to pray anymore, but the Holy Ghost knows how to pray for us when we don't know what to pray AND we're assured that God knows what are needs are before we even ask. Good thing, 'cuz I'm at a loss at this point. ;-)

It's 'bout time to head back to church. I need to round up the girls and get them looking decent, then go put poor Charlie back into his bathtub prison for a few more hours. Sundays are going to be long, hard, lonely days for that pup. He'll survive though--and maybe wear himself out so he'll sleep even better tonight than he did last night! Nah, probably not. ;-)