The West vs. The South

Sounds like the kind of a post where I could get myself in big trouble and make some serious enemies for myself, doesn't it?! HA! I'm hoping to avoid both of those possibilities.

I've noticed a thousand and two things that are different "down here" from how they were "out there"--some good, some bad. In the end, each location has certain things that are a credit to them and make them quite desirable, and others that are not so hot.

The South definitely gets points for friendliness. You can just get out of the car to pump some gas and chances are that within five minutes you're going to know all about Leroy over at the next pump, where he's coming from, who he's related to, and what his plans are this afternoon. Out West strangers just don't mingle like that. People are more suspicious and aloof. Sometimes downright snobbish. Ah yes, to add to their score, the South gets points for people being much more polite and respectful. "Yes'um."

The South immediately looses the points just earned for having friendly people because they have sooooooooooooooo many of them!!! It's great that they are friendly, but good gracious--why on earth do they all have to pile up in one spot?! There is a great big world out there just waiting to be inhabited (I think it was one of the first orders God gave, isn't it?!) so why, oh, why are there 8,000 people on one little stretch of country highway, gomming up the works all the time?! Really folks, some of ya'll ought to head out to Wyoming. They've got room for ya'. ;-)

The South gets some more points for just being laid back instead of always rushing around trying to accomplish things that don't matter anyway. People here have a more "ah, whatever" approach to life and are content to just mosey their way through and enjoy the ride.

The South loses said points because they're always moseying in front of ME when I'm ready to GET somewhere!!! HA! It would do us native westerners well to learn to relax and slow down a bit, but for real--35 miles per hour in a 55 zone??? When 55 is sooooo rare already (you're usually stuck with 40)--that's just madness and it does NOT help to calm me down and relax, I assure you. And it happens all... the... time. Weird-o's.

The South gets points for so much lush greenery. It is beautiful here and the greens are so bright and vibrant--I'm pretty sure I've seen more GREEN in the past three months than I've seen the whole rest of my life put together. I love that it's bright and happy.

The South then loses the points for all that growth because of everything that is living IN it. We have been itching and scratching and being eaten alive ever since we arrived--even those of us who do our best to live indoors with the air conditioning all the time. The man to bug ratio here is completely out of control. You lose points for that. A LOT of points. ;-) Not to mention all of the poisonous plants--what's up with that, anyway?!

The West.

People in general are not nearly as friendly and neighborly in the West, so that starts them out in the negative. But they recoup those lost points and then some for the amazing unity of the Church folks there. I've never seen such a tight-knit group of people who make such amazing sacrifices for one another and The Church of God, and think nothing of it. Where else are you going to find people glad to drive 6 or 8 or 12 hours just for the privilege of being together and worshipping God with one another? It's a strictly western thing--and not just from our old region either. It's like that in Brother Bock's region in the Dakotas and out in the Northwest Region--it's just normal out west. The life and the land was rough and it took a tough, hardy, rugged group of people to settle there. It seems like some of that tough get-'er-done mentality is still around and people are willing to make great sacrifices--though they don't consider them to be sacrifices. I love that about them. :-)

The West gets points for the Rocky Mountains--tall, majestic, rugged, snow capped mountains--the real McCoy. And brilliant blue skies with puffy white clouds. Crisp clean air. And--something I've found to be truly invaluable--WIDE OPEN SPACES. Feel free to dock them some serious points if you're the kind of person who doesn't like desolation. I personally throw some extra points in for that. There have been a few times when I've felt a little big claustrophobic in the South. There are so many PEOPLE and CARS and TREES and BUILDINGS and you never really leave civilization, you just move from one town to the next without knowing it. What I wouldn't give to drive through Wyoming some days! Ha! Hours and hours of... nothing. :-) Did I already mention Wyoming? I've always loved that state but it hold a whole new appeal now that I'm living as far away from "the middle of nowhere" as can possibly exist. Sometimes the middle of nowhere is a nice place to be, you know? ;-)

The West gets serious points for clean restrooms. For the first two months here we were fully convinced that there is not a clean public restroom in the entire state of Alabama. The West has gross restrooms too, but there are plenty that are well kept and clean. We miss them. Ha! Maybe most people don't think of things like that but when you do a lot of travelling, well... We've finally located two clean restrooms--both in Jack's (a fast food joint) in different cities here in Alabama. I don't know what we order there, but I know we're not afraid of the restrooms. Hence, we like Jack's.

The South and the West both get points for Blue Bell ice cream. :-)

The West gets points for cowboys. Real, true-blue, dust covered cowboys in boots and spurs and Stetson hats that don't look like Stetsons anymore.

The South gets points for the best bar-b-que.

The West gets points for best Mexican.

The South gets points for some really great white cheese dip with their Mexican food that we never had out west.

And now the real reason I started thinking about all of the differences. The South is much easier, in so many ways. I'm referring to outreach and stuff like that. The South, in general, is so much more churched than the West is. I've never seen so many church buildings in my life--one on every little corner! Most people here grew up going to church and even if they're not serving God and not intending to, they'll still attend on occasion and are much more OPEN to spiritual or religious things. Out West it is much, much, MUCH more difficult to get visitors to come to services or even to pass out tracts or talk to people about God. So many people out there have never been churched and have no interest in those things. It's like you have to work and scrape for very little results out there--including fund raising. We have washed cars and baked until we're about to drop, sold candy bars door to door, worked for weeks collecting sponsors for Walk-a-thons (in which some walked 24 miles in a day), we've stood on the corner with Krispy Kremes--all kinds of stuff like that. You have to work yourself to death for every penny that comes in, and sometimes the pennies just don't come in--you never can tell.

Then there's the South. We had a fundraiser today to try to help our Bessemer folks go to Family Camp. We didn't bake anything. We didn't wash any cars. We didn't knock on any doors. We didn't do any working or walking or selling of any kind. We just panhandled. No, it's not a joke--that's what we did. A whole crew showed up with buckets to collect the money in and poster board signs that said "Please help us go to The Church of God Family Camp." We went to a busy intersection right down the road from the church, split into 5 or 6 groups to cover cars coming and going different directions, and... STOOD THERE. That's it. That's all we did. Just like all the dudes with the cardboard signs saying "Hungry--Please Help". We just stood there. Just stood and smiled and waved and watched the dough roll in. Okay, so it didn't seem like it was really rolling in at the time and there were some long lulls (at least for my group), but still. The plan was to meet at 8:30 (though our family forgot about it until 8:15 this morning and thus arrived an hour late--that's another story) and stay until about noon. After four hours of panhandling (admit it Bessemer folks--that's exactly what it was!) we went through some drive thru's and headed back to the church to eat lunch and add up the loot.

Are you prepared for this?

No, really--are you sitting down? You want to sit down.

$952.00

COULD YOU DIE?!?!? There is NOOOOOOOOOOOOOO WAY you could do something like that out West--people aren't going to just give you money like that. I still can't get over it--it's CRAZY! A good, wonderful sort of crazy. I mean, as long as it's okay with God for us to be just begging and all. Ha! We did hand out over 300 tracts today and invited several people to church, so I think it's all good. ;-)

Brother and Sister Ridlespurge were there with their four grandkids, Sister Kristal and her two kids, Sister Dudley and Joshua, Brother Chris and Sister Stacy Parker and their two, our family, Brother Hopkins and Brother Booth. I LOVED IT that Brother Hopkins and Brother Booth were both there! I love a pastor who supports and takes part, even when he doesn't necessarily have to. And Brother Booth--he's in his 60's (I'm guessing) and he was there the entire time and never took a break to get out of the heat and sun like most everybody else did. I think I heard that he lives a good ways away, so he had to drive a while to get there--and I don't think he even goes to Camp! But he was there to help us raise money. HOW SWEET. And he just looked so cute out there in his cowboy hat--he got all of the truckers' donations for us. :-)

So we stood around and roasted and came away with terrific sunburns (I might even peel--and I never peel) and a thousand dollars. Brother Booth had been praying for that much so when we got back to the church and discovered we were less than $50 away we split up the difference three or four ways and made it just over the hump. He'll be so thrilled when he finds out tomorrow morning at church. :-)

Grand total: $1,003.00.

Amazing.

We are soooooo thankful and simply astounded at having come away with so much. Praise God!!!
The bad thing about it is now we're never going to want to WORK for anything again--it's like a welfare system. Stand around and do nothing and expect other people to pay your way. Why in the world WOULD you kill yourself over a bake sale or something when all you have to do is spend $10 for some poster board and markers and *voila* you've got $1,000 in four hours?! HA! I'm sure God will keep us humble and focused and probably make us actually WORK to earn some money next time. But for now, we're thankful that He so abundantly blessed our panhandling. ;-)

We hung out and visited at the church for a few hours, either because we were having so much fun, or because we were in shock over how much money we'd made, or because we were simply too hot and tired to go home. In any case, it was GREAT. There was a bit of a snake scare, but in the end we think we've discovered that the six footer is a chicken snake (had to look it up when we got home--even Joe didn't know it by that name; the same snake is also known as a rat snake or a corn snake) and harmless. Harmless meaning it can't kill you if it bites you. No snake is truly harmless however because you can severely hurt yourself when you see one unexpectedly. ;-) And "harmless" or not, I'm relatively sure this snake is enjoying the last few days of it's life right now. I learned today that some of our church men are capable of producing machetes on command (What--do you keep that thing in your back pocket?! Where did it come from???) and others are only waiting for an excuse to run and get the shotgun. I'm really not sure if the South gets points for that, or loses some... HA!

So there you have it. Our exciting day. We left the church at 3:30 or 4:00, and MOSEYED our way back home, stopping by Hobby Lobby to pick up some water color paints for Katie and some Balsa wood planes for the boys--both of which have already been broken, I think. We also stopped to pick up some rubbing alcohol (advice for getting rid of chiggers that Joe has been attacked by--10 point penalty for the South) and something to sooth red, sore, sunburny skin. We also had to grab a few groceries, including the best and sweetest watermelon I've had in AGES--it was soooooo good. (Point for the South!) Now we're home, the kids have been showered and alcoholed (ha!) and are fast asleep. I've been awaiting my turn for a nice cool shower and it looks like that time has come. ~Aahhhh~ I can't wait. :-)

Disclaimer: Texans are extremely friendly. I need to clarify that both because it's true and because I know Tammy Kaufman will be ready to defend them after reading the "southerners are nice; westerners are rude" part up above. Ha!

Nothing is in the Box

But it seems like it's time to blog anyway.

I can't think of a whole lot to report around here, except house stuff and I know that gets boring after a while. Oh well. It's what I have to talk about!

We had the inspection done yesterday. I think the report will be a mile long, but will contain mostly what we were expecting to find. Nothing new that was major. There are some mold issues in the crawl space--we already knew of it, but still don't know how serious it is. It's just one of those things that is brand new to us and so we're extra cautious about it. We're used to treating our wood because it's too dry, not because it's soggy and growing things! And the termites. I'm not used to having to worry about bugs eating my house or carrying it away. There are no termite issues at this house, but we will have the mold to deal with. I expect that would be the case in 90% of the houses we would try to buy around here, so it's not a deal breaker.

We've been trying to do some research today, trying to get rough estimates on the cost of adding a garage and perhaps upstairs living space above it--just to see what our options are and make sure that we can still afford this "cheap" house when we add up everything that we want/need to do to it. ;-) I think we're still feeling confident about things, though we may have to do a chunk of the work in the beginning and then finish off a little bit at a time like we've always done before. James does all of the math and carries the burden of balancing the money stuff. As for me, I have decorated and redecorated the house a dozen times. Still struggling in the kitchen, but I've already got the pictures and shelves hung on the wall in the living room. In my head, that is. ;-)

In other news, Joe caught a bullfrog tonight. Like that's really "news" anymore. Ha! This is "The Big One" that they've been after for weeks now. They always see him in the pond but have never been able to get to him until now.



Speaking of Joe, he developed a rather nasty cough about a week ago. It was REALLY bad for a couple of days, then lessened quite a bit (after being prayed for at church) but has still lingered. Now Sam has started coughing. "I think it's because I hang around Joe a lot, Mom." Neither have ever acted SICK, they just sound like they are.

We also have some poison ivy issues going on. At least that's what we think it is. We're novices at this, you know. Poison oak? Poison sumac? It's all the same to me. Itchy rashes that come from greenery. I've looked up pictures and we walked out the front door and immediately found some poison ivy, so I know they've been exposed to that. I've had a few spots myself that I assume come from petting Charlie after he's walked through it or something. Joe has the worst of it and it just seems to move from one place to another on his body. I'm thankful that nobody seems to have severe reactions to it (nothing like some of the pictures I've seen or cases I've read about), just enough to be a nuesence. And everything you read says to "watch" for the plants so you can avoid it. HA! That's so funny. The entire world here is blanketed in green growing things and they all mush together. There's no way you can actually take note of the characteristics of each leaf or group of leaves (stay away from groups of three!) unless you stop and take the time to diligently study them. If you're just walking, all you can see is a blanket of LEAVES, lots and lots and lots and lots of leaves--all the same color and same basic size. The only sure way to avoid the bad stuff is to stay inside. No chance of that, so I guess we'll just have to live with the itchy rashes for a while. Comes with the territory, right?

I was grading the kids' school work today and happened to look at the calendar on there. Next week is their last week of school! Whoa--how did that happen?! It's a good thing and a bad thing. We're fixin' to head into really crazy, busy, hectic times (more than usual), so it will be nice to not have to worry about a full school load every day. But they don't do well without any structure to their day and usually end up fighting and getting in trouble more when they don't have school! Of course, we don't give them the summer off entirely. We still have them do school here and there (math drills, book reports, stuff like that), but it's spotty, not rigid. I guess it's coming at a good time for us. Had we not taken that trip to Pennsylvania last month TODAY would have been their last day. They don't know we tacked on an extra week to make up for that trip. ;-)

Guess that's about it. I'm still waiting on a definite answer from James on whether we'll be at our local church this Sunday or visiting another church or churches. For planning so well in advance for some things he sure is a fly-by-the-seat-of-his-pants kind of guy with others. Particularly the things that require laundry and ironing and packing in advance. Ha!

Have a great weekend!

Slow Start

That's what we got off to this morning. I'm still moving slow. As evidenced by the fact that I'm sitting on the couch helping a kid with school (instead of at the table) while I blog, surrounded by piles of laundry. Just can't seem to get it in gear today. ~yawn~ Is it nap time yet?

The kids played outside pretty much all day on Saturday, soaking in all the glories of a non-school day. They sprayed each other down with Off! (they've finally sort of overcome their fear of "the chemicals"--spoken in the most ominous and foreboding tones they can muster) and made several trips down to the creek and back. It was decently hot that day and they were sooooo nasty and sweaty! We brought them in and made them all shower and put some fresh clothes on before we headed to town.

On our way into town James suddenly said, "What were we supposed to bring?" ~GASP!~ Sister Dudley had asked us to pick up a couple of things and I had COMPLETELY forgotten! I had asked if she needed anything else and (though she said no) had fully intended to make some snacks or finger food or desert or something to take along. Somehow I totally spaced it. ~sigh~ It worked out okay and we ended up having time to stop by the store. :-)

We had a good time fellowshipping with everybody, as always, this time in celebration of Thomas Dudley's graduation from high school, and Jacob Parker's graduation from Kindergarten to 1st Grade--something completely new to us! Ha! Sam had a good time tormenting Dudley boys while there. At one point, somebody came running inside hollering that Sam had TACKLED Joshua Dudley. I immediately felt severe conflict on the inside. "Sam--knock it off!!!" Then in proud but hushed tones to those at my table, "My son just took out a Dudley boy!!!" Ha! Turns out Sam and Zack (age 6) were working together and caught Joshua off guard. Nonetheless, it was quite an accomplishment for the rugrats. Of course, at some point in the evening I saw Sam with three teenage boys. One of them picked Sam up and threw him over his shoulder, then they all started into the men's restroom. I usually let our kids get whatever they've got coming to them and try not to get involved, but I figured it would be a really bad night for a swirly. HA! The boys were giving Sam a hard time, ACTING like they were going to dunk him but I think they'd already let him go by the time James got in there to break it up. Sam is so lucky. ;-)

Yesterday was another good Sunday for us, though we went our separate ways. James got up early and left for Anniston to cover the services there for Sister Bishop who was guest speaker at a Ladies' Retreat this past weekend. I love to go with him to visit the churches, but we also feel a pull to support our local church. And, perhaps most of all, we feel like our kids really need to feel like they've got something solid and consistent in the midst of all of these recent--and upcoming--changes. Specifically, we want them to feel like they have a home church and are part of this local Sunday School and things like that, instead of just wandering nomads. ;-) We've been to Anniston a couple of times already, so we decided the kids and I would just stay home this time and let James go it alone.

We got to church plenty early (we've made a very good habit of that, at long last) and I got my chance to teach Sunday School for the very first time, ages 3-7. I had three boys: Sam, Zach, and Devon. I was a little nervous going in, but ended up being amazed at how good they all were and how much fun we had. :-) It might have helped that I agreed to let them wrap me up in toilet paper if they could tell me everything we'd learned. Ha! (The lesson was about Lazarus, so we took turns wrapping everybody up like mummies at the end of class.) It was great fun and I think they actually knew what we'd been talking about. That's always a plus.

After service the kids and I went out to eat with the Ridlespurges and their daughter Misti, her four kids, and the Cox family. I ended up with all the boys in my van (Joe, Sam, Dalton, Michael, and Zach) and Katie ended up riding with all the girls in some other car. Fun for everybody. I enjoyed eating at a new restaurant (something different) and, of course, just hanging out with the crowd. I love spending time with everybody and feel like I get to know them better each time. It was great fun. Even though I almost had to tackle Brother Ridlespurge at the end of dinner. HA! That guy. He paid for our family last time we went out and then yesterday he grabbed my ticket and ran from the table before I had a chance to stop him. I was sure to thank him sincerely for feeding my family once more... and warn him of the repercussions if he tries it again before we have a chance to treat his family to dinner. ;-)

It was 2:?? when we left the restaurant. Church doesn't start until 6:00. What to do... what to do... Drive by "our" new house again, of course! HA! Actually, the Washburns had invited us once more to come and spend the afternoon at their house if we ran out of things to do, so I just chose the route to their house that would take us by "our" house. The quotes are in place because I realize it's not official yet. It won't be truly OURS until we close on it and we're doing our best to not count our weasels before they've popped. But... I can't help but be excited!!! We looked at the property and I tried to imagine where James wants to put the shed for the riding mower that will be one of our first purchases (!), tried to imagine the garage in place, how and where the new lane/driveway will go, visualized the house and shutters the colors that they'll be when we're finished, how the stairs will be positioned to up to the front porch... Then we thought, Well, fooey--let's just go look in all the windows again, too! ;-) I stood on the back deck and looked through the dining room window into the living room, trying to visualize where we would put stairs to the imaginary upstairs I've created in my head. Ha! James has given me no hope of our being able to finish out living area up there and I really am fine with that if it ends up being the case... but I can't get my brain to stop "seeing" it until we actually get an outrageous estimate from somebody who knows about that stuff. The estimate that makes us say, "HOW MUCH?! What, are you CRAZY?! No way--we'll just live downstairs, thank you." Until then I keep arranging and rearranging the imaginary upstairs to the house that does not yet belong to us. It's so fun. :-)

We enjoyed a nice, leisurely afternoon with the Washburns once more, visiting and teaching the kids how to play dominoes. Then they drug out the checker board. Brother Washburn beat Sam, but had no idea what he was getting himself into when he took on Joe. It's really a lose/lose situation. Sister Washburn says that he gloats something awful about his ability to beat people, but he can't be as horrible as Joe. He beat Brother Washburn in the first game and I think it surprised him a little bit. Naturally, he challeged Joe to another game. And it had the same outcome. ~sigh~ All the way to church I had to hear, "BOW to me! BOW to the King of Checkers!!!" coming from the back seat. HA!

After church last night I was telling Sister Kristal that we were just going home--I wasn't hungry and it's dumb to pay money to eat out when we can just drive the hour home and eat left-overs for free if we're hungry when we get there. I told her that, walked out the back door, and was immediately attacked by a swarm of children. They have learned that I'm the push-over. After each service, EVERYBODY'S kids come to ME to ask if we can go out--and if I'll ask their parents or grandparents for them. Ha! Last night it was Michael who got to me. His eyes were all lit up and he had this HUGE grin as he was begging, "We're going to Taco Bell--can you guys go? PLEEEEEEEEEASE???" I groaned and stuttered for a minute before caving in, at which point the huddle broke into victory whoops. About that time Sister Kristal walked outside to hear the kids yelling, "The Hornes are going! The Hornes are going!" It hadn't been 2 minutes since I'd told her we were NOT going out. Ha! She told me that I was a SUCKER. She's so right! But I can't help it--I KNOW what it's like to be the one who's dying to go out and to have your fate resting in the preference of another. I wasn't thinking of James when I wrote that, but I thought of him when I reread it. Ha! I remember being a young teenager at the Assembly and my Mom being soooooo tired after the evening service, but we would all beg and plead with her to pleeeeeeeeeeeease let us go hang out. I can still see her sitting half-asleep at a table at Shoney's, not because she wanted to be there but because she knew how much it meant to us and how important it was for us to have that fellowship and build those friendships with other church kids. How can I do any less for my kids--and all the kids at church?! These years pass way too quickly (my kids are growing up sooooo fast--it's like I can feel them slipping right through my fingers) and they NEED these friendships and memories.

And I like to go out, too. ;-)

So it ended up being the same crowd we'd had at lunchtime, minus Sister Misty. As always we had a great time, the boys at one table, the girls at another, and the adults at yet another. The girls were perfect angels (except for when one of the klutzy Katies--I'm pretty sure it was mine--knocked over a cup of soda), but the boys probably had a little too much fun over at their table! Ha! Things were especially entertaining when the very strange Taco Bell guy who took our order earlier came out to clean the floors... and was singing along with the music... and dancing with his mop while using it for a microphone... Some people are just SO COOL.

James was already home from Anniston when we got here. The kids headed straight to bed, but James and I stayed up talking way, way too late. I don't even know what we were talking about, I just know it was sometime after 2:00am before I finally fell asleep! So I'm blaming James for my total lack of productivity today:

I stripped the bed and washed the sheets... though they have yet to be put back on the bed.

Made sure the kids did school--though I haven't checked their work.

Gathered laundry. Washed one load. It's still in the washer.

Hung up dress clothes.

Sort of cleaned a bathroom, but not really.

And that's about it. Pretty sad, hu?! I'm not even cooking tonight. I've been so proficient in that area that we've got lots of left-overs on hand, so we're all set. I really ought to at least finish up on the laundry. Surely I can gather enough gumption for that.

But any minute now I'll need to go pick up the guys who are FISHING right now. :-) James and I loaded up Brother Powell's fold-up boat (the name always makes me shudder) and took it to the lake just down the road. He and the boys hopped in with all the fishing gear and James said to come pick 'em up in an hour and a half. I think we're getting close to that time now. (I obviously started this post earlier today, while still working with Sam and his school.)

Before I go, pictures! :-)

Sister Powell, I thought you'd like to see this. Or maybe not. Ha! The Charles has claimed your chair as his very own. He's too lazy to jump up there himself, so he goes and stands by it then lets out one tiny bark and looks around to see who will come running, saying, "Aaaawwwwwww! Look at him--he wants up. That's so cute, Charlie!!!" Pitiful.



And I can't remember if I've posted a picture of this or not, but this is one of my very favorite things about the Powell's house. :-) This is the view from Katie's bedroom window, thus the reflections on the glass. I didn't want to open the window and scare away the frog on that lily pad. Do you see him?! I think it's soooooo cool--I've never seen frogs actually sitting on lily pads before. :-)



Neat, hu?!

Okay, it's now a few hours later than it was before those pictures ;-) so I have pictures from the fishing trip tonight.

Here's the lake/pond. That little speck of white in the trees is a white heron that flew up there just as we arrived. It was soooo neat!







Brady can't bear to miss out on the fun. He gets sooooo excited when he hears Brother Powell's truck start up. He's used to getting rides in it, I think. We load the boat into the back and Brady tears off toward the lake, racing along side the truck all the way. He just looks SO HAPPY. Then into the water he goes, following after the boat. He's the coolest dog ever. :-)



And coming back to shore so he could follow the truck back home. Katie and I left the guys at the lake and Brady followed us home. But James said we'd only been gone a few minutes when Brady showed up again and went for another swim.



Sam had more fun splashing than fishing, it seems. :-)



And this is what Joe looked like when we arrived.



And here he is, "petting" his fish. Ha!

Company and Home Cooked Food

What could be better?!

Thursday was a great big CLEANING DAY around here. We didn't even do school. I just haven't been able to get all of the things done that have needed done and decided to devote the day to making THAT the priority. The motivation, of course, was that we had people coming over. Nothing gets you movin' on house work like the thought of people seeing how you really live. HA! I got all of the things done that I had hoped to, but the biggest success of the day was getting all of the bathrooms clean at the same time. Wa-Hoo!

I had gotten up at 4:45am to put the brisket in the oven, but the rest of dinner didn't need tended to until evening. Brother Rob and Sister Missy and Brother Rob's mom, Mary, came for dinner :-) We had met Mary 10 or 11 years ago when she'd come to Colorado to visit the Hawkins and we had a wonderful time with her, so we were excited to be able to see her again. Dinner turned out great and Sister Missy had brought a lemon-pineapple pie that was a delightful addition. After dinner we visited for quite a while, then played a game of I-Buy like we had last time we were all together. It was great. I just LOVE listening to Mary talk. She's from New Jersey and has a TERRIFIC accent, and she's just so blunt and so funny. I'm so glad we were able to have them over! It's the first company we've had since we've been here (that's just wrong!) and it made me very, very happy. :-)

Yesterday was a long day of school. Double school for everybody since we had missed Thursday. Poor Katie. She worked a-a-a-a-a-all day long trying to get caught up. She's got a heavier work load than the boys anyway, but she's also been struggling with her History & Geography and her Math (adding and subtracting fractions and mixed numbers, simplifying and reducing them--all the stuff that I had completely forgotten how to do until having to help her with it!), so she ends up having to re-do a lot of stuff right now. She'll be glad when this school year is over! She had worked so hard all day (literally--up to dinner time, then some AFTER dinner to get caught up!), so I let her get up after the boys had gone to bed and come watch a girl movie with me. :-)

~sigh~ I'm in love with the Powell's Jenn-Air range top. It is the coolest thing EVER. James agrees, but says we're not going to have the money to buy one for our own house. Bummer! I'll be checking Craigslist. ;-) It has two burners on the right side, but the left side is a griddle (though you can pull it out and put two burners on that side if you need to) and we have learned to lo-o-o-o-o-ove the griddle. Last night I made parmesan chicken on it and James declares it was the best he's ever eaten. Maybe if I do that a few more times he'll decide we can afford a Jenn-Air of our own after all. Ha! Mostly it just feels good to be enjoying some nice home cooked meals. Brisket with cheesy potatoes, corn, green bean casserole and brown-n-serve rolls on Thursday, along with a raspberry cake and Sister Missy's pineapple pie, then some fantastical parmesan chicken with spaghetti last night. Makes me happy. We've eaten out sooooo much since we've lived here and I'm so tired of "that" food. Eating at home has become way too rare, but it's WAY more appreciated when it does happen. :-)

The kids are THRILLED that today is Saturday. It seems like we're on the go all the time here and they "haven't had a day off in ages," they declare. We were at a funeral two weeks ago and in Anniston last week. They LOVED the day at Sister Bishop's house, but they still feel gyped because they can't remember the last time we were home at the Powell's house and they could just play and romp in the woods all day long with no school to interfere with the fun. We will be going to town tonight, but we won't talk about that until they've had plenty of time to play. :-)

Catchin' Up... Again

Story of my life, right?

And I don't have any blog notes to go by this time. Scary.

But I do have a few pictures. That helps. :-)

Every day the boys try to rush through school so they can head outside. We had a few red letter days around here last week. The spent one afternoon catching scorpions (yes, you read that right--YOU try talking sense into them) in bottles, and then were thrilled to capture this nasty little worm snake. Sam thought he was terrific.

They named him Squirmy and kept him in a cardboard box with dirt and leaves all day long. They spent most of the day giving him elevator rides from the balcony down to the ground. Here's Sam hoisting him back up.




The following day was much better. Joe caught two frogs that were mating, he assumes. He was sure to put them back right away in hopes of soon having a goldfish pond full of tadpoles.

And Sam found a turtle. It is SO COOL living at the Powell's house. :-)

The turtle found a home in the cardboard box for about three days until we had to leave town. Then Sam released him, making sure he hid him in the woods where Brady wouldn't find him. He was terrified that Brady would eat him. But even though Brady is a threat to the other pets, he is much loved and greatly enjoyed by the kids. And the Mom. :-)




He is SUCH a good dog. Though he does sneak into the house on occasion when we're all entering. He usually just flops over on his back and begs for a belly rub for a minute or two before obediently heading back outside when told to.

We had Ladies' Prayer Meeting last Thursday (though we did more visiting this time than praying--shame on us! Ha!) and James and the boys were there, as always. But this time Katie Farr came with Sister Ridlespurge and we went and picked up Madison. James kept all of the kids in the back, the boys playing with their $4 mini- air hockey table and the girls all doing crafts for the Mission table with James' assistance. I love it that James is heading up the Dorkette Club (you know, like a Dorcus Club for little girls--great name, hu?! Ha!)--and the kids are doing a great job raising money for Missions. And having lots of fun.

We stopped by Wal-Mart on our way home so I could get busy making some goodies for Easter dinner. I'm sure you remember our horrific Chef-Boyardee Easter dinner (ha!)... Well, Mom was in Africa and didn't have a proper Easter dinner either so we decided we would have to get together to have one. Dad was preaching a Revival in Anniston this past weekend and our family was going over to join them for Friday and Saturday night, so that got us all together. = Easter dinner. :-) When we got home from Wal-Mart I threw together a fantastical mandarin orange jell-o salad sort of thingie.

The next morning I got up and made some Almond Raspberry Kiss Cookies. I had clipped the recipe from a magazine and wanted to give it a try. WOW. I have a new favorite cookie! They were sooooo good--and the purtiest little cookies I've ever made, with raspberry icing drizzled over the top where a Hershey's Almond Kiss was sitting. Mmmmmm. Could win a blue ribbon somewhere. :-)

We got all packed up and headed to Anniston. We got there in time to haul our stuff in to Sister Bishop's house and get changed before service. We had a good song service, then a great message by Dad on the 23rd Psalm, followed by a wonderful altar service. The Ridlespurges and the Hopkins had come over for the service as well, along with some folks from the Lebanon church... and maybe some others. (I'm still sifting through and trying to figure out who belongs where!) It was such a blessing to have them there!

I can't remember much about that night, but I'm sure we had a great time. We were at Sister Bishop's house, you know. :-)

The next day was beautiful. The kids spent lots of time with Sister Bishop, as she is one of their most favorite people in the whole world. :-) Joe spent most all of his time with her, helping water and fertilize her trees and flowers. She is such an amazing woman. So knowledgeable and informative. I can't figure out of she makes me smart or if she makes me feel like an idiot. HA!

Sam found a dog to play with...
While Katie was coloring Easter eggs, Mom was working on Easter dinner, and Dad was fixing a lamp.
I didn't get any pictures of the Easter egg hunt (yes, we really did), but it was lots of fun. Not nearly as fun as the kids had with Sister Bishop though, just hanging out on the swing.
And here we are--having Easter dinner several weeks late. It was sooooo good. Ham, potatoes, gravy, corn, green bean casserole, hot rolls with strawberry jam, pea salad, orange jell-o, sweet potatoes, broccoli and cheese (okay, so not ALL of it was good--ha!), and Easter eggs. Then my almond cookies and Mom's key lime pie for dessert. Mmmmmmmm. :-)
By the time we got dinner cleaned up it was time to start getting ready for church again. We had another good service with a wonderful spirit from the get-go. Dad didn't even really preach, just sort of exhorted and opened the altar. I felt distracted to begin with but the Lord was so gracious as to help me to enter in to the spirit that was working there. I felt such a spirit of gratefulness for the pure pleasure of being able to seek the Lord. I love the contact that we have with God and how our relationship with Him is real and alive and always growing. I love how He has plans for us that we can't even imagine and how blessed we are to be able to get down and pray and pour our hearts out to Him, never expecting what He might have in store for us "this time."

After service we cut into the watermelon that Sister Bishop had insisted on buying. After Easter dinner that afternoon she loaded all three kids into her car and disappeared for a while, returning with a GIANT watermelon. It's not that we needed it. We had tons of food already. But they had to buy a watermelon so they'd be able to have a seed spitting contest that night after church. Ha! Shooting. Sister Bishop insists you don't "spit" the seeds, you "shoot" them. Either way, it was great fun to watch.

We stayed up late visiting that night, then finally went to bed--a real bed this time. HA! Ah, yes!!! How could I have forgotten this?! The first night we were there the bed collapsed! If that doesn't say "diet time," what does?! Ha! James just sat on the edge of the bed and the whole sha-bang gave way. Sister Bishop heard the commotion and came running, but Mom & Dad (in the room right next to us) managed to sleep right through it. Amazing. We just put the mattress on the floor for that night and James got busy on the bed the next morning, fixing it up properly. It's obviously had some issues before, judging by the 28 nails he pulled out (!) but he was able to get some good screws put into place so it should hold just fine for a great many years. Or at least we hope so. :-)

We got up early on Sunday morning, enjoyed a great breakfast that Sister Bishop insisted on making--even though we'd told her we'd just eat watermelon and left-over jell-o and lime pie. ;-) We enjoyed the tasty home cooked breakfast, then loaded up and headed to Lebanon. That was GREAT. :-) The drive was nice and we loved the area where the church is located. The last several miles were just beautiful. Then you turn onto a rough dirt road and wonder if you're going to need a four wheel drive to continue on. Ha! We've got a little church tucked way back into the woods, sitting in a nice little clearing. I loved it. :-) We had a good service there and enjoyed meeting some more new people. There were a few visitors that day and we were surprised to hear later on that they were from a snake handling church nearby! HA! THAT'S something we never would have run into out west, for sure! They were very kind, holiness believing people, and they seemed to enjoy the service. Maybe they'll be back. And give up their snakes. ;-)

After service the Cooks took us out to a very popular (judging by the crowd) Mexican joint called Don Chico. James had "the best shrimp quesadilla I've ever had" and I had a really great chimichanga. And we had good fellowship. :-) The Cooks seem to be really sweet people and we thoroughly enjoyed being with them.

From there we drove around a bit, gassed up, went into an antique store, found the church in Collinsville (only about 12 miles away from the one in Lebanon--I know all of the westerners reading this are thinking, "WHAT?!" Ha! True story through!)... then drove on a mile or two and found a cemetery to park in so we could take a little nap before service time. It was a beautiful, cool day and we found the cemetery a quiet peaceful place, if a little unusual for a nap location. ;-)

It was nice to meet the folks in Collinsville that night. I was surprised to learn that the pastor and wife were so young! Like, our age! I don't know why, but I'd somehow expected that they would be much older like all of the other pastors--except the Booths. I know I'd been told differently, but it just didn't click until I met them. He and his wife seem very nice. Out west we had almost exclusively young ministers and pastors. It's sort of flipped around here. I'm loving all of the old people, but it's exciting to find some young ones in there too. :-)

After service we drove home and got here at about 10:00--earlier than we usually do when we go to church in Bessemer! Of course, we lost Sam on the way. He NEVER makes it home awake.

Monday we went and picked up the very lonely puppy that we had boarded over the weekend (I hate doing that!!!) and the ingredients I would need to make corn chowder--since it was CHILLY! Wa-Hoo!!! Came home, did some school, then headed back out to go to the library. Made the chowder that afternoon and it was sooooo good for dinner that night!

Yesterday we got the news about our offer being accepted. That was a good way to start the day. :-) I had felt disappointed when Monday came and went, but still not convinced that it wouldn't work out--still thinking that perhaps they would contact us after all. Lo and behold, they already had contacted us--we just didn't know it yet. ~sigh~ I'm so excited and so thankful to have found a house with such potential, with such a nice lot, and so very close to the church. And so CHEAP. God has truly blessed us. :-)

The Washburns had told us that they wanted to take us out to celebrate whenever we put a contract on a house, so we headed up to Hoover to meet them for dinner last night. :-) They took us to a fantastic Mexican restaurant with great ambiance and very tasty salsa. We loved it and had a great time visiting with them. After dinner we walked next door to the Mexican market where Brother Washburn bought a couple of mando doughnuts for the kids. They were HUGE. "They've got food as big as your head!" Then we went back to their house for Blue Bell and some more visiting. What a great night!!! We loved it! And I loved the thought that we'll be able to do that sort of thing much more often whenever we end up actually moving into our new house. We'll be 10 minutes from PEOPLE. Makes me very happy just to think about it. :-)

Today we got school done early so we could leave at about 1:30. We met Laura and James signed all of the paperwork, so now we wait for "them" to sign the papers. Then we get the home inspection and apply for the loan.

After we met with Laura we decided to do some more celebrating. We went to Krispy Kreme and ate hot, fresh doughnuts and drank chocolate milk. Can't get much better than that. :-) Then we took the kids to 2nd & Charles (the used book store that they love so dearly) and the Christian book store. Then James was hungry for--of all things--the really greasy pizza they serve at Sam's Club. Ha! So we went there for dinner. I gotta say, it is cheap. Fed all five of us for less than $10. Not bad. The price, anyway. The food on the other hand... Ha! No, I don't mind it--I just like to give James a hard time.

Tonight was Brother Carpenter's CPMA service. He's a sweet man and has a good spirit. :-) We visited for quite a while after service, then started home only to realize that we had Sister Hopkins' orange sodas with us. (She loves the old fashioned orange sodas in glass bottles, so we like to get them as part of their "pounding.") We headed back to the church to deliver them... and ended up staying and visiting with the Hopkins and Sister Kristal for a good while longer! I so enjoyed it though. We delivered our good AND got to hang out. Good deal. :-)

~whew~ That gets us back up to date. Tomorrow will be a busy day. The house is a wreck and we've got COMPANY coming for dinner! (Oh, happy day!) Lots to be done, so I'd best call it a night.

Shades Creek Drive

Well, we put that offer on that house (on Shades Creek Drive) last Monday. Our contract "expired" this Monday (yesterday), so the seller had until then to respond to our offer. We knew that there had been multiple offers on the house (the house that is--unless inspections would show serious problems somewhere--worth more than the asking price), but we really felt like we should stay at the price we'd prayed about: $6,000 under asking price and requesting the 3.5% toward closing costs that the company had offered.

I've been praying all week. God's will. I've prayed that if it IS God's will that He would move mountains to have the other offer(s) pushed aside for one reason or another, and to let our offer be accepted. And of course, I've prayed that if it isn't God's will that our offer would be rejected and that He'd lead us to the right house at the right time. Either way, I've been praying for Him to order our steps and lead us into His will for us.

Yesterday was deadline day. Yesterday came. Yesterday went. Offer expired. End of story.

Sort of. :-)

This morning we got an e-mail from Laura saying it was too late to call us (she'd been working with other clients), but that she'd received an e-mail saying they had ACCEPTED our offer pending corporate approval!!! ~gasp!~ She's hoping to get the corporate approval today as well as the addendums to sign so we can have a signed contract and get the ball rolling. Wa-Hoo!!!!! I know it ain't over 'til it's over (buying and selling houses is shaky business!), but it sure looks like God has answered our prayers in the affirmative. :-) I'M SO EXCITED!!! I love the openness of this house, and I love the 3 acres it sits on, and I really, really, REALLY love that it's 6 miles from the church!!! We're weary of the long drive to church (I don't know how the Powells do it--we're too old for this! Ha!) and soooooo excited about being nearby. Not just for our convenience, but also so we'll be able to host people! Have company! Invite folks over for Sunday dinner! Keep people with us during Conventions and such! Location. Love the location. ~sigh~

I'm so happy. :-)

So now we're praying for God to let everything go through smoothly. Closing date is supposed to be June 15th. That's less than a month away! Then we start figuring out what we're going to do to this house to get it livable. That'll take a while. The dreaming it up is the fun part. :-) We'll probably be able to move in sometime this fall. How exciting!!!



THANK YOU to all who helped us pray. God bless you all. :-)

Update

We still know nothing except, of course, that it would really have to be God's will in order for this house to work out. :-)

Laura called yesterday morning and said that "multiple offers" had come in on that house on Monday. It could be just ours and the other offer we knew about, or there could be others as well--she was sort of led to believe there were more than just the two. At that point, anyone who had made an offer was made aware that there were "multiple offers" and had to sign a paper saying they knew, and also were allowed the opportunity to change their offer before they were all submitted to the company. The goal, of course, is for everybody to up their offers in hopes of not losing the property to the other guy(s). James signed the paper, but we didn't even consider changing our offer. We had prayed and felt so confident about the amount we offered to begin with and just didn't feel at all like we ought to get freaked out and get into a bidding war over anything. So we stayed put: $6,000 below the asking price. We feel the house is worth every bit of the asking price and logic says the other folks would agree and have probably offered much more. So it's not looking good. We're not concerned about how it looks though. Either this is the house God has for us or it isn't. I think it's cool either way. If this IS the house God has for us, I think it is so great that He's making things so "impossible" so we can know beyond all shadow of a doubt that He worked it out, if He does. And if this ISN'T the house God has for us, I'm so thankful that He moved so quickly to save us from the wrong thing! Though we would love to have the beautiful 3 acres only 10 minutes from church (that would definitely be the greater loss--much more than the house itself), I can honestly say that we don't care--we just want what God has planned for us. He knows all of the things about his house and the future that we don't know, and if this is not the house for us then we trust that He has something else already picked out for us and just isn't telling yet. ;-)

So that's the latest. It could take up to a week before we hear anything, but we're hoping it's not that long. Help us pray for God's will, whatever that is. 'Tis so sweet to trust in Jesus... :-)

Yesterday was a successful day around the house, completing school (even double days with Katie & Sam who mad missed the day before), finishing all of the laundry, getting all of the floors cleaned (evil rug vacuumed two or three times throughout the day), made a delightful dinner of fried bologna and hot dogs (HA!), and even went to bed at a decent hour. All this while James was in town to take the Charles to be groomed. ~sigh~ Poor Charlie. This is his first grooming here and he looks hilarious. The lady shaved his mustache off completely, so now he looks like a little girl dog. Like it's not embarrassing enough already to be a poodle.

Lots to be done today--gotta get busy. Thanks for the prayers! :-)

You'll Never Believe This...

Or perhaps you will. But we'll get to that in a minute.

We had a great Sunday. Enjoyed our Sunday School class about behaving yourself in The Church of God :-) then a good worship service and message by our pastor.

After church we accidentally went out with the Ridlespurges. Ha! We've been wanting to go out with them for weeks, but never seemed to get it together. But when we walked into the Mexican restaurant, there they were! :-) We really enjoy being with them. So much that we sat and talked for 3 or 4 hours! Ha! It was great. I was blessed and felt like I'd learned so much about their family. :-) And Brother Ridlespurge is gracious and defiant all at the same time (!) and insisted on treating us. What a guy. And now James still owes me a nice Mother's Day meal sometime! Ha!

When we left there, we drove past that same foreclosure we'd driven past the day before. Looked in all the same windows and had all the same thoughts: this is a real possibility. Laura was back in town but wasn't able to get in touch with the listing realtor. After all, it was Mother's Day. So we just looked in windows once more and did some more thinking and brainstorming about the possibilities.

We were only there for a few minutes, then headed on to the Washburn's house to hang out for about an hour before going back to church. The kids were thrilled to find that Sister Tammy had filled her candy machine and had a mug full of coins which to retrieve it. Doesn't seem right to be that she buys the candy AND provides the money to get it out with, but you just can't talk sense with some people. ;-)

We got to talking to the Washburns about the house we were interested in and they realized that they knew that house--they knew the people who had it built years ago! Ha! Crazy. He called the lady up and I talked to her and asked lots of questions. Still seemed like a good possibility to us, though we hadn't been inside yet.

I was so tired at church again that night. Sunday nights are always so hard for me! It's just feels like such a long day and by the time church starts, well, sitting still and being quiet is not the right thing to do if there's any hope of staying alert and coherent. Ha! Once I get up and get to moving around again I feel fine. I've been praying for God to PLEASE help me to FOCUS... and I can only believe that one of these days He's going to do it. ;-)

We actually got home at about 9:00 last night--which is an hour or two or three earlier than usual! That was sooooo nice.

This morning we got up and ready to face the day, then sort of waited on a phone call from Laura to see when she could get us in to see that house. The call came and we left here at about 10:00. We spent quite a while there, walking from room to room, checking out the crawl space, climbing up and peeking in the attic space, and thinking through and discussing all of the what-if's. I'll spare you ALL of the details, but even the short version is rather complex.

We decided to put an offer in on this house. We had originally planned on offering way under the asking price, though we feel that the property is well worth the price that's on it. You never want to pay more than you have to. ;-) But Laura told us today that with this type of foreclosure, it is either accepted or rejected--there is no counter offer. Besides that it could take 10 days or more to get an answer, during which time other people might present offers--and no doubt would on this property because it's priced so well. Besides that, they only look at one offer at a time. If they reject it, they look at the next one in the stack--you don't have a chance to make another offer. Anyway, we went to the church to hang out and wait for Laura to join us with the paperwork. We got the kids and went to the altar and had a real good prayer, asking God for wisdom and direction and for His perfect will to be done. We felt very confident about upping the amount of our offer considerably from what we'd initially thought, but still several thousand dollars under the asking price. James and I both had the same amount in our minds and just really felt like it was the right thing. Got all the papers signed and headed home so James could get online and get the pre-approval we would need to submit with our offer first thing in the morning.

We were on our way home when Laura called and said that somebody else had put an offer on the house TODAY!!! Ha!!!!! What did I tell you?!?!? This is my SUPER POWER, that's all there is to it. ;-) Laura and the listing realtor both felt that if we could get our offer submitted before 5:00 that the company would consider both offers. Of course, you have to have your pre-approval in place in order to submit an offer like this. Unfortunately it was about 4:30 when we got this phone call and we were still about 30 minutes from home! HA! I remembered my prayer at the church earlier. Along with praying about how much to offer, I prayed for God to work all of the details out if this is His will for us, and to close the doors quickly if this is not his will. Somebody else making an offer on the house today very well could be a door slamming, right?! Ha! We prayed and tried to figure out the right thing to do. We finally decided to tell Laura to go ahead and submit the offer along with a memo explaining that the pre-approval would be there by morning. Not technically the proper way to do things, but it's the best we could manage! It's one of those do-the-best-you-can-do-and-trust-the-Lord-for-His-will kind of things.

So we got home and waited to hear if Laura had, indeed, been able to get the offer in before 5:00. Last I talked to her it was about 5 minutes 'til and she was doing her best to get it completed so she could push the button! James didn't want to get the pre-approval until he KNEW that the offer made it in by 5 o'clock and would have a good chance of being viewed along with the other folks' offer. (He's been pre-approved twice before and each time they do that they check your credit--which lowers your credit score! So he didn't want to get a third pre-approval until he knew we were ready to make an offer. It's a vicious cycle. Ha!)

Finally got word from Laura at 6:00 or 7:00 that she was indeed able to get the offer in by 5:00. So James hopped online to get a quick pre-approval. HA. It was so fast and easy the last two times! But this time it was more complicated because this house is a foreclosure (makes a difference, for sure) AND because we no longer have a physical address of our own since our house sold--something that can't be worked around online. James made some phone calls, but it was a little late in the day to be able to get much help, you know?! Still, I never felt the least bit stressed about any of it. I felt good about making an offer on this house, I felt good about the price we offered, and I feel totally at peace knowing that it's in God's hands. If this is what He's got for us, He can work it out in spite of all the craziness that ensued this afternoon and evening! Ha! And if it's not what He's got for us, we don't want it. Anyway, we kept praying and asking God to direct and low-and-behold, the bank guy called James back and went through everything over the phone, and e-mailed a pre-approval letter to him immediately! So James sent it on to Laura and she sent it in to the other realtor so it will be there along with our offer first thing in the morning--when they present the other offer (and ours, Lord willing) to the whoever-they-are who owns the house.

So that's it. Our very long, very full, very exciting, very uncertain, very faith-filled day. :-) We are hoping this works out, but I really do feel perfectly resigned to the whole thing and don't think we'll be too disappointed if it doesn't. If this is what God has for us, we would be closing on the house mid-June. But the house needs lots of work before we would/could move in. With VBS and Camp and Convention packed in there then the Assembly just a few weeks later I'm guessing it would be a little while before we would actually move there. Which is fine with me. I have always hoped that we'd be able to "help" the Powells (ha! Isn't that crazy??? They are the ones who are helping us!!! They just don't seem to know it!) by staying here at least 6 months and taking care of things so they don't have to make other arrangements or worry about it. I think Assembly time is exactly 6 months. (I'm really hoping James remembered to e-mail the Powells about all of this so they won't have to learn about it here on my blog! Ha! Come to think of it, it might not be wise to let them know at all right now... Brother Powell might un-pray everything that we've been praying! HA!)

That's where it all stands. It could be a week or more before we hear anything, but at least when we do it will be a definite YES or NO. I'll keep ya' posted. :-)

Two Days in a Row!

It's been so long since I blogged two days in a row I thought I'd try it again and see how it feels. :-)

It's been a good day today, but a long one. I'm bushed. We got up and left early--in our new van--to go to Hueytown. That's where the funeral was for Brother Jeremy's grandmother. We felt bad about missing the visitation last night, but several Church folks were there so that's good. Today we were the only Church folk to make it to the funeral, so it probably all worked out just right. It was good to see the Wallaces. I feel bad for Brother Jeremy, grieving over this loss. And I feel bad for Sister Emily, having to wear that giant neck brace while she recovers from surgery!

We had taken a list of several houses to drive by, two in Hueytown to begin with. We punched the addresses into Sean and headed out in search of our dream home. HA! Riiiiiight. Besides, could anything really be a dream home with an address of "Hueytown," Alabama??? Ha! We hadn't gone far when we came up to a big "ROAD CLOSED" barrier and cop cars diverting traffic. There was plenty of tornado damage visible even from where we were--and there was no going down that road, so you know it was far worse out that direction. We asked the cop about it and told him we were out looking at real estate. He looked at us like we were bazerk, then sort of grinned and said, "I'm sure there'll be plenty of houses for sale out here about a month from now, but you ain't gettin' through here until then!" Ha! We really don't want to live in Hueytown anyway. But when you find houses that might work and are in the right price bracket you just gotta go look, just in case they're perfect.

Next stop was Bessemer to stop by the Post Office and then one house. HA! It was a NO WAY house purely because of it's setting... and the fact that you had to take a horrible dirt road through other people's property to get to it... and when you finally did get to it, it was backwards! Ha! There's no way to see the front of the house unless you get out and walk around. Dumb.

After that we headed south. And we've done it again. We've found a house we're very, very interested in. You know what that means, right? It'll sell to somebody else by Monday. That's how it works. As soon as I get all excited about a house and we start kicking around the possibilities ~WHAM-O!~ it sells. It's a little freaky. This one probably really and truly will sell right away. It's a foreclosure that just hit the market on Thursday. It's got 3 acres, plenty of square footage, is in a nice location (the PERFECT location for us--only 6 miles from the church!), and it's priced way, way low. We walked all around it, peeking in windows past the "NO TRESPASSING" signs (ha!) and it's got a wide-open floor plan, which I LOVE. It means company can't be on the other end of the house--I get to be with 'em all the time, even when I'm cooking. :-) The house needs lots of work, but it's got a ton of potential and with the low price you could afford to do what needs done--and (if God favors you) probably make a decent profit or at least not lose anything--when you go to sell it. Of course, there may be serious problems we're not aware of that would cause the price to be so low. But we'd love to check it out. We're hoping we can get in to look at it right away, but the realtors around here just aren't like Jason! Ha! Our realtor has been out of town all week. She always returns our calls, though she's not always very prompt about it. ;-) While she's been away we've contacted two or three other realtors about different properties, and none of them call back. Crazy! Don't they want to sell houses??? There. I just e-mailed Jason to tell him we miss him and ask if he could please come show us this house. HA! I've been praying all afternoon for God to have His way. If this is His answer for us, I'm praying that He'll give us direction--and not let somebody else nab it! Ha! And if this is not His will, I'm praying that He'll give us the wisdom to know it or close the doors... by selling it to somebody else, most likely. ;-) The right house at the right time at the right price... Only God knows what that is. I love it that He knows. And I love it that He'll let us know when He's ready to. :-)

We drove past a few other houses after that one, but none that really interested us. I can't say that. We drove past a gorgeous house and the owners were there doing some touch-up work (they've already moved out) and graciously gave us a tour. They were sooooo nice--and the house was immaculate. We loved it, though it was a little too fancy for us (we're more rustic, you know?!) and it had a very private and very, very nice in-ground pool in the backyard (part of me thinks it would be nice; the bigger part of me thinks it would be a headache!), it was a little farther away from the church than we'd like to be, AND it was at the tip-top of our price range. Actually, I think it was beyond the top of our price range. And after meeting the really nice people and knowing they forked out some serious dough on the house you'd feel like a jerk offering them $40K less than they're asking! It doesn't seem so horrible when you're offering an insultingly low price to somebody you've never met--or especially to a bank on a foreclosure--but I don't think we could do it with these people! We liked 'em way too much. Bummer. ;-)

Finally got home this afternoon and were exhausted. Made some phone calls, then James decided we would cook breakfast for dinner. :-) Fried eggs, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, and pancakes. We had a very happy Joe tonight! Though heavily laden with grease, it was terrific. Or perhaps it's because it was heavily laden with grease... ;-)

The boys are now nice and clean and no longer smelly AND I don't think anybody had any ticks when they stripped down for their baths tonight! Wa-Hoo!!! That's the first day in I don't know how long. Nevermind the fact that we were gone all day long and they didn't have a chance to romp through the woods as usual--I'm still going to rejoice over a tickless day. :-) Joe had SIX ticks on him the other day--then found another one later on that night. ~Bleagh~ They've got to be the nastiest little bugs in the world!

In other news, I love our new van. James wasn't feeling very well this afternoon, so I did the driving from house to house. I'm amazed at how different this van feels from the last! Who knew?! It just drives sooooo nice and feels good and tight and solid, it handles well and accelerates and brakes nice and smooth. It's as fun to drive as a van possibly could be. Not as fun as, say a certain Pontiac Grand Prix that I dearly loved year ago (~sniffle~sniffle~), but for a van, it's terrific. And a BIG plus is that I never did get sore all day long! Ha! (The seats in our last van were miserable!) And I think I actually like the leather seats--something I've always thought I would hate. Of course, the weather was beautiful today. When it's miserably hot and the leather seats burn me, or when they're ice cold in the winter time, I'll probably change my mind. ;-) For now, I think I love everything about this van. :-)

It's 8:30 now. Katie has been working on crafts for the Mission Table at church, Joe just sat down and read The Mouse and the Motorcycle in it's entirety, and Sam has been building paper boats and airplanes. Time for devotions and bed--and I think I may go to bed pretty soon myself! I'm sooooo tired. I hope I don't get my second wind before I get a chance to hit the sack. We'll see.

Wednesday morning we got crackin' right away so we could be done with school and ready to leave by noon. We went and drove a couple of vans, having narrowed our possibilities down to a Honda Odyssey or a Toyota Sienna. Last time I liked the Honda best, this time I liked the Toyota best. That means I no longer have a preference. :-) I've just been praying for God's will and for Him to give James the right answer--on whether to keep our current van, or trade it in for a longer lasting one. He was feeling more and more confident about upgrading, but the prices just weren't working out for us on Wednesday.

So we switched to houses. :-) We had a list of about 8 super cheap houses to drive by. The goal is to find the perfect setting, then fix up the hunk-o-junk sitting on it. No such luck, of course. I love this part of moving. It's so fun to look at houses and consider all of the possibilities, especially when you're in no great rush so there's no pressure. By the end of the day we had marked everything off the list except for one house, and it's a "probably not" like all the others we've seen so far. And we're cool with that. And we feel like we're learning more all the time about the areas we'd like to live in. And those we'd really NOT like to live in. :-)

We had VLB service that night and Brother Chris Parker had asked a few of us speak about a time or times in our lives when we've experienced fear. Dalton shared how he was scared when he put a fuse ear when he was younger and couldn't get it out. Sister Kristal shared several instances of God healing her and Brother Will, miraculously sparing their lives. And I shared about the fear I experienced a few years ago. The fears I have struggled with have always seemed to involve my kids. What if I died and wasn't around to teach them and train them to love God and The Church of God? Or what if they were taken away from me because we homeschool or something like that--and placed in a sinner's home where there would be no godly influences? The times when the devil has been able to trouble me with fear have always been fearing for my kids' souls if I couldn't be in their lives to help direct them. During those horribly miserable times (there is nothing more agonizing than living with fear in your heart--it is sooooo not of God!) I found victory in prayer, in confessing the fears, and in the Word of God. He reminded me of my favorite verse, Psalm 127:1, "Except the LORD build the house, they labour in vain that build it: except the LORD keep the city, the watchman waketh but in vain." No matter how hard I try to raise them right, I can't save my kids' souls anyway. I do my best, but ultimately I have to trust GOD to build this house and keep watch over this city. And I remember so clearly when I had struggled for months with an awful fear and dread of the unknown and the thought of my children being taken away. One night in prayer God spoke to me so plainly just as He did to the disciples, "In the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world." I remember how the words just flooded my soul and washed every trace of fear away and the amazing peace and joy and freedom that I hadn't felt in so long--oh, it was wonderful!

After service we all waited for a very long time for the pastor/overseer conference to end (ha!), and then we went to Burger King with the Cox family. It was great. We so enjoy being with them and visiting. And the kids think Dalton and Madison are pretty great. Well... the boys think Dalton is great and Katie thinks Madison is great. I hope it stays that way. Ha!

Yesterday we worked on school and house stuff. I went down to the basement and dug through our boxes until I found a tablecloth. I had shortened the Powell's table by one leaf the day before. They have an amazingly long table and I love it, but I don't want the kids leaning on it way out at the ends and thought it would be safer if it was a little shorter. I also decided it would be safer to keep it covered at all times after our little mishap a couple of weeks ago. I'll explain sometime, but not until we've had a chance to talk to Sister Powell about it first! Ha! Anyway, now Sister Powell's dining room has a definite splash of color with my red, orange, yellow, green, brown tablecloth. Ha! Everything in her house is so neutral and subtil and soft. She's a classy lady. Seems like the longer we live here the more of my stuff I get out and mix in with hers. It's going to be a jumbled mess whenever we do move out--there's no way I'll find all of our stuff and there's a good chance I'll accidentally take some of hers, not remembering who's is who's! But the tablecloth, well, I'm pretty sure it would be hard to forget it was mine and not hers. ;-)

James was out running errands all day long yesterday... and came home with a new van! We are now the proud owners of a light blue '07 Honda Odyssey. It's a year older than our other van, but has lower mileage and (we're trusting!) will last much, much longer. It hadn't been here a whole 10 minutes before being christened with a Church flag sticker. :-)

Joe had a real hankerin' for his favorite dinner last night (tostada casserole) so I told him he could make it. Joe's not real good at thinking just yet (ha!) so I stuck around to help him out and give directions. He did great and the casserole turned out perfect. No left-overs from last night. They always scarf that meal down. Then, due to our gloriously cool weather, I had a sudden urge to make gingerbread. In May! How weird is that?! I had two jars of molasses in the cabinet and it was driving me nuts (don't know why--just seems like it's a one-jar item), so I made a very autumn-ish dessert. (And now I'm down to one jar of molasses and am very happy. Ha!) I used to wait to make certain food items until the proper time of year. The "proper" time of year isn't going to last nearly long enough for my taste here in Alabama, so I'm going to capitalize on any cool days we get, regardless of the date. :-) The gingerbread turned out GREAT, by the way. Especially when you warm it and put whipped cream on top. :-)

Today we had devotions and school, of course, then I grabbed a roll of paper towels, a rag, a sponge, a pitcher of soapy water, a flat blade, a screwdriver, Goo Gone, some spray cleaner, and some needle-nose pliers. Time to scrub up the new van and remove every trace of grime belonging to someone other than my own family. It's not like the van was nasty or anything--it's a nice vehicle--but it's amazing what all is left behind when "they" clean it, including a deeply hidden straw wrapper, a piece of a pretzel, and a half-melted crayon. I worked for an hour or more and now the van even smells nice and clean and new. ~Aaaaahhhhh~ I love that. Now is where we go through the "new vehicle" stage, not allowing the kids to eat or drink anything in it and fretting over putting miles on it. It's a miserable stage to go through when you get a new car, but it seems to last a much shorter length of time than it used to. It was horrible when we got our first van. I thought James wanted to put it in a glass box and just look at it, but never use it. Ha! This is by far the nicest van we've ever had so that might prolong the worrying-about-the-new-car stage a little bit, but I'm guessing we'll be comfortable in it within the month. ;-)

We came in and had lunch, then I got busy giving the downstairs bathroom a good scrubbing, baseboards and all. ~Aaaaahhhh~ I've had lots of cleaning satisfaction today. :-) In fact, I've decided to get the kids involved in my efforts to maintain a wood floor. So I threw some pizzas in the oven (been a while since we'd enjoyed a pizza party together!) and then gave everybody a job. Joe was the picker-upper, finding and putting away anything on the floor. I followed him with the vacuum cleaner. Sam followed me with the spray bottle of Mop~n~Glow, and Katie followed him mopping up everything he was spraying. It was great and we had the whole downstairs completely finished in 15 minutes. :-)

The kids enjoyed their pizza party and are now asleep. At least I hope they're asleep since we'll be leaving relatively early in the morning. Jeremy Wallace's grandmother passed away on Wednesday and we'll be going to the funeral tomorrow. I feel so bad for that family. They have been through sooooooo much in the past year, just one thing after another. If you think of it, please say a prayer for all of them. They could surely use some extra strength and comfort from the Lord about now.

That's about it for me. I need to make sure everybody has dress clothes ready to wear tomorrow (ah, yes--I got all of the laundry done today too! Yeah!), then I'm going to map some more houses to drive by. I really should've kept count from the beginning of how many we've checked out. We're gonna be settin' some records, I'm sure. :-) Like I said though, it's so much fun to look. Much better than actually moving in and getting to work. Ha!

Let's see now. It's been nearly two weeks since I "really" blogged. The first thing worthy of mention is the Easter egg hunt at the church. It was on the Saturday before Easter we all went to the church at about noon. We had pizza, chips, and some really great punch while we visited with the adults. Sister Dudley had done all sorts of special little things—like making Easter cupcakes with green “grass” frosting and Peeps on top, and some jell-o Easter eggs, stuff like that. The teenagers (the two Dudley boys and Kody) had way too much fun hiding the eggs while all the kids worked on crafts in the fellowship hall. I think I heard there were 460+ eggs hidden. Can you imagine?! I think there were probably 15 or 20 kids there, so there were plenty of eggs for everybody and they all had a blast. Katie found more eggs than any of the other girls, so she won the girl prize—an Easter basket with a little stuffed bunny and other goodies. Joe “found” the prize egg (a great big plastic egg with lots of candy), but only because Joshua Dudley is a cheater. ;-) The teen boys arranged a special egg to give to one of the girls and Katie was the lucky gal. Unfortunately for the boys, Katie wasn’t the least bit bothered by the live frog she discovered when she opened it. Little did they know she handles frogs and lizards all the time. :-) Here's a picture of her with her prize basket.

And a picture of the boys riding a Dudley. My kids LOVE the Dudley boys. Maybe almost as much as I do. :-)



We had lots of fun, then enjoyed watching the kids practice for the Easter program. When we finally left the church we went to a Parent-Teacher Supply store in Hoover. It’s a GREAT store and I was able to find everything I needed to teach Sunday School the next day. :-)

On Friday I had some strong pain in the middle of my back, perhaps a little higher than mid-back. I felt only very minor discomfort on Saturday, but by that night the pain had returned. I had a terrible time sleeping, unable to find a position that didn’t hurt. I got very little sleep and when I finally got up at six-something Sunday morning I was in horrible pain. When I stood I could just barely breathe and it was just tiny little itty-bitty shallow breaths, which is an acutely miserable condition to find yourself in. I spent a few excruciating minutes gathering my clothes and begging God for mercy. I stepped into the shower and the moment the water hit my back I felt relief. Praise the Lord! I can’t imagine the heat from the water would have had a chance to affect me that quickly; I truly believe God just touched me. ~sigh~ I love serving God. :-) I was still unable to take deep, full breaths, but the improvement from my previous condition was wonderful! I had Brother Hopkins and the men pray for me at church later on. I continued to improve throughout the rest of the day and by that night I was able to take the deepest breath I can manage—with no pain at all! My back felt great and I’ve been thanking the Lord ever since. :-)

That was Easter morning. We all got dolled up in our Easter garb (Katie’s the only one who had anything new to wear—and her’s was a hand-me-down! Ha!), Kate and I put on our corsages from James :-) and we headed to church. Though I was on to teach Sunday School, I had no students—they were all in play practice, going over the program one last time—so I sat in on the adult class. We had a good service and the kids’ program turned out great, though I failed to take a single picture of it. I saw all of the good mothers taking pictures and I figured I’d get ahold of some of theirs. ;-) I did, however, take a picture of our kids when we first got to church that morning.



Brother Ridlespurge saw me taking pictures and was offended that I hadn't asked him to be in them, so I made up for it. I love this shot. :-)



After church it was time for Easter dinner. If only…! I can’t remember eating out on Easter EVER in my whole life. Probably because it’s just wrong to eat out on Easter. ;-) You’re supposed to go home to a nice, home cooked ham dinner with all the fixin’s. Currently however, we don’t go home in between services because we are not living very close to the church. So if we were going to eat, we had to eat out. James figured all of the restaurants serving a traditional Easter dinner would be packed out and we should go someplace non-traditional. I don’t know why, but we ended up at Carino’s. I already hold a grudge against them for the lame no-refills-on-Italian-sodas thing. Jerks. ;-) And perhaps I went in with some subconscious glitch about having to eat out on Easter when we should be enjoying a nice ham dinner at home. All I know is, “This is the worst lunch I have ever had.” That’s a movie line from some movie I’ve never even seen, only heard about—but it is quite fitting. The bread was fantastic—always is. I’ll give ‘em that. From there, it went downhill. ~sigh~ We try to teach our kids to be thankful and to not be so picky—to not complain if they have to eat something that they’re not so crazy about; just eat it without making a fuss and quietly hope for something better next time. I set a horrible example for them that day! I’m usually so good to bite my tongue when I don’t like something at a restaurant for three reasons. #1 – I truly want to be thankful. #2 – I want to set a good example for our kids. #3 (or perhaps this should be #1—ha!), I know James paid good money for the food and I don’t like to gripe to him about what he just spent money on—it’s rude and ungrateful. On Sunday I held out for as long as I could, but it finally all came spilling out. “Okay, I’ve got to say it. This meal tastes like it came straight out of a can, James!” The noodles were rubbery and the sauce was horrible. I don’t mean not great, I mean really and truly horrible. Bad enough that I was forcing myself to eat it and doing my best to suppress the gag reflex. ~Bleagh~ So rare is it that I actually make a fuss about food at a restaurant that it became quite the joke, the kids all joining in and mocking all of my gripes and happily pointing out the hypocrisy of my rules vs. my example. Oh well. You can’t win ‘em all. ;-) I had just finished a rant about how awful my food was when the waitress appeared and said, “How is everything? Are you all enjoying your meal?” “Excellent, thank you. Please give my compliments to the Chef… Boyardee!!!” Naturally, I didn’t say that until after James had already covered for me and she had left the table. Actually, I would have preferred a bowl of Spaghetti-o’s to what I had that day. I enjoyed Carino’s out west (could it be entirely due to the Italian sodas? Was the food awful and I just didn’t notice or care because I was happily floating amid the raspberry cream delight in front of me???), but this one is terrible. We sing this Veggie Tales song around here sometimes when somebody is complaining: “My life is a disaster, a sea of endless pain; A picnic promising the sunshine, but giving only rain…” On Easter, “My lunch was a disaster…” So on the bright side, we were almost in tears laughing over the entire experience and will have some terrific memories of our first (and last—please!) Easter dinner OUT. :-)

About the time we left the restaurant I received my first ever phone call from South Africa! How cool is that?! They had reception for the first time, so Mom called on Brother Hawkins’ Skype account. I was able to talk to her and to Dad for a few minutes, so that was great. They were having a good time over there and the Lord was blessing in the services and Conventions. The following day was their “off” day so they were going to be able to do a little sightseeing—perhaps some elephants or lions or giraffes... It is SO WILD that my Mom and Dad went to AFRICA!!! I think it’s the coolest thing ever that the two of them were able to experience this. Better than that, they’ve were able to become acquainted with some of our own brothers and sisters and fellow members of the Body of Christ from Africa, as well as establish The Church of God in a brand new country! :-)

As I was talking to Mom & Dad on the phone, we were on our way to drive by two more houses. The first was another “Hhmmm… who knows—maybe it would work,” the second was a definite “Hu-uh.”

Then it was on to the hospital to visit Sister Christine Douglas. She is one of Brother Staggs’ daughters and she is one amazing lady! She has her father’s mind, that’s for sure. I didn’t even realize until just now that that’s where she gets it from, but I was blown away today at her memory of every tiny little detail about things that happened yesterday and things that happened 50 years ago. It was fascinating to listen to her. She fell recently and broke her left arm and leg and will have some serious recovery time if the Lord doesn’t heal her. We look forward to visiting with her again, whether she’s in the hospital or not. :-)

After that we headed back to the church. It was 4:30 and James was needing to do a little more prep for the message he was on to preach at church that night. I took a pillow in with me, laid down on the pew, and got a little, tiny nap, but one that was desperately needed after my painful and sleepless night. The kids played basketball outside, then Katie and I went to the Sunday School room and made the craft that I had intended to do with the class that morning had I had a class. I think it worked out for the best. The craft was great, but probably a little too difficult for the younger kids. But Katie and I enjoyed it, so it’s all good. :-)

That night we had communion and feetwashing service. It was much more formal than what I’m used to. Nobody telling anybody else, “Them’s purty feet” or instructing them to scrub between your toes or anything like that. ;-) The table was elegant and beautiful—they put so much thought and effort into making things special here. It’s strange to be in a whole different world and with different people who do things differently… and to enjoy and appreciate it just like you did the other way. :-) I feel like I’m learning a lot through the differences.

After church we grabbed dinner at McAlister’s (kids eat free on Sunday nights), drove home, got the kids to bed… then had a crazy impulse come over me and I cleaned out the laundry room, emptied everything out from above and below the sink in that room (it’s rather disturbing, Sister Powell, to come across large dead bugs preserved in Tupperware when you’re not expecting it—just so you know. Beautiful moths or not, they’re a little creepy when they take you off guard!), did a few loads of laundry, bathed Charlie and who knows what all. It was weird to have so much energy that late at night (I know it was after midnight when I was washing the dog) and after such busy days, but my back was feeling great and I was able to breathe deep, full breaths without pain and I just felt like accomplishing something!

Monday morning James and I got up early, sat down and talked it over, and decided we needed to make a trip to Pennsylvania. Like… right then. So we spent the next 3 or 4 hours getting packed and cleaning the house up, then left for Pennsylvania at about 10:00am.

The thing that necessitated this trip is that James’ Dad, who is 70 years old, fell off a ladder last week. He broke a rib and banged his arm up pretty good. He’s okay, but having a hard time getting around and certainly unable to do some of the things that need done around their place. So we decided we would spend a few days helping out around the house.

I’m not sure how far we made it Monday night before finding a motel. I know we were somewhere in Virginia and ended up at a very nice, clean, and pet friendly Howard Johnson.

Tuesday we finished our trek to Pennsylvania, arriving just after noon. James was hoping to mow the many acres of grass, but it was too wet due to the recent rains. Our first job, then, was to go pick up a tool box (a big Craftsman one with lots of drawers—loaded with tools) that James’ Dad had bought off a lady, but was unable to lift. When we got home from that little trip I got to work on dinner. I tried to take care of the the cooking and housework so James’ Mom wouldn't have to worry with it and could better direct James in the big chores. After dinner James and his Mom went shopping for a few necessities and came home with them, plus a whole lot more. I did some laundry and ironing while they were gone.

James spent most of the day on Wednesday pressure washing the house and spraying for bugs and stuff like that. I was able to get the living room completely dusted, baseboards wiped down, furniture vacuumed behind and under—everything completely clean. AND I made chicken and noodles for lunch and then smothered deer steaks (some of the best ever, nice and tender—yum!) for dinner. How come I can’t be that productive at my own house?! All that while making multiple trips down to the bridge to try to kill snakes with a shovel so we could investigate and find out if they really were Copperheads or if they were just water snakes. I’d really like to know for sure if my kids are going to be fishing down there, as they were doing all day long! I never was able to kill one. They’re too fast, I’m too slow, I didn’t have the right angle, or any combination of the above.

That night we received a phone call from Sister Bishop, checking on us and updating us about all of the storms in Alabama. I felt guilty to learn that all of our folks there were enduring such horrible weather and we didn’t even know about it! There were tornadoes all over the place, reports of dozens of people killed (that number is well over 200 at this point, just in Alabama) and extensive damage in several locations. We immediately got to praying and started checking the news to try to keep up. Part of me was glad to not be there in the midst of all of that mess. The other part felt horribly guilty that we weren’t there hiding out in a basement like all of the other Church folks in the state! We just ran off and left ‘em to weather the storms themselves—that’s horrible!

Though it couldn’t possibly compare to the devastation caused by the storms down south and is not to be compared, we had our own minor little tragedy that night. The kids were all playing on the swing set and somehow a swing came back and hit Joe in the face, breaking his front tooth. I mean really breaking his front tooth. Like, nearly half of it is GONE. ~sigh~ Poor Joe. He came in with tears in his eyes, not from pain but from the knowledge that this was a permanent tooth and he’s going to “look like a freak” for the rest of his life. I couldn’t get any information out of him because he was choking back the tears, but when I saw he was holding his mouth and didn’t appear to be in pain though he was obviously deeply upset I wondered if perhaps he had broken a tooth. I’m glad I realized that possibility before I saw it or he was able to tell me about it—it allowed me a minute to prepare a proper reaction. What, by the way, IS the proper reaction to that?! I didn’t want to freak out and cause him more alarm, but it takes a mighty good game face to be able to pull that off! As a mom, it gives you a horrible, sick feeling inside to come to the realization that your kid’s front tooth is half gone… forever. ~sigh~ Poor Joe. He amazes me though. I told him to go into the bathroom because I could see a little blood on his hand (his nose was bleeding a bit) and I could tell he didn’t want to talk about whatever happened with Grandma Wanda there. When we got in the other room I asked if he broke his tooth and he just nodded his head and the tears started streaming down his face. I felt sooooo bad for him! I hugged him and told him it was okay, that we’d work through it and everything would be fine. Within just a few moments he was trying to make jokes and find a bright side to it… in between those moments when his eyes would well up with tears once more. For the first day or two afterward a sort of sick feeling would wash over me when I think about it, but then it settled back into rational thought. We have so much to be thankful for. My son could have been in an accident and lost and arm or a leg or something; all we’re dealing with is a tooth. Or what if it was a serious head injury or something. We are so blessed to have a broken tooth! And then there’s “the big scheme of things.” In the scope of eternity, this is so insignificant. And yet, God uses so many things to work in our hearts and lives and form us into who He wants us to be. I’m sure He has some purpose for even this. So we’re praying that God will help us to come to the right decisions. Here's picture I took of the little trooper that night.

Thursday and Friday were spent working, working, and working some more. I managed to get all three bedrooms completely cleaned, everything dusted, ceiling fans cleaned, walls wiped down, baseboards, all that jazz. It felt GREAT. :-) James worked with his Mom on getting the closets cleaned out; something that has needed done around there for, oh, probably 20 or 30 years. HA! It was AMAZING what all was crammed into those little itty-bitty spaces. After putting the “keepers” back in the closets, there were two HUGE piles filling the living room: stuff to be donated and stuff to be thrown out. Two trips to Goodwill took care of the donation pile.

I can’t remember what else we may have done up there, I just know that things are in much, much better shape than they were before. James’ Dad is still in a lot of pain and actually the last day we were there seemed to be his worst day. He seemed to be in more pain that day and he did lots and lots of sleeping. On the whole, he’s doing well and we’re all trusting and expecting a full recovery.

Saturday we loaded up and hit the road by about 7:30am. Here’s our goodbye picture.


We drove all through the day and made it to Cleveland in time to meet Mom and Dad for a late dinner at the Pizza Hut/Dairy Queen/Daylight Donuts/gas station (talk about multi-tasking) at Exit 20 near their house. I hate it that we couldn’t stay longer, but I’m so thankful for the time we had with them there. It was so great to see them and to hear a little more about their trip to Africa. They had just gotten back a day or two before, so it was especially nice to be able to see them.

We left Cleveland after dinner and drove the 4 hours or so back to the Powell’s house. We were sooooo tired! But we made it and got everything unloaded before crashing for the night.

Woke up a little late Sunday morning, but still managed to leave early for Church. We’ve been doing much, much better about being there early instead of rushing and being stressed out and sliding into our pews moments before the opening prayer. :-) Anyway, it was good to be back in our home church, especially after all of the tornadoes this past week. So good to see all of the folks still alive and well!

After church we went to a Mexican restaurant (pretty good, but not as good as the one in Russellville), Penney’s (I found black dress shoes--been searching for two or three years-- and Katie and I got a couple of shirts on clearance from $1.97 to $4.97--wa-hoo!), stopped by the Post Office, then the car wash, did some shopping, stopped by the pastor's house and visited for a little while, then went back to church. Brother Hawkins preached a great message about the "pillow or pillar" and ground of the truth. After service James went to pray for Sister Washburn's niece or cousin (can't remember!) while I waited at the church with some of the other folks. The kids all enjoyed playing kickball in the parking lot and the adults enjoyed visiting. :-) We went to McAlister’s with Washburns, Coxes, and Hopkins later on. It was GREAT. I love having people to go out and visit with. :-) We got home late, but I took time to bathe the smelly dog after he'd been in the outside pin all day. I sleep better knowing my dog doesn't stink, even though he usually sleeps with Katie!

Monday was the day I scrubbed the Powell's wood floors down to saw dust. You already heard all about that. ;-)

And then there was today. We did school this morning, then James said we were going out. Get this--I was able to don a SWEATSHIRT and BOOTS before we left! WA-HOO!!! Great weather right now, let me tell you. :-) We went to the Chinese buffet then to the library in Montevallo. We had stopped in there before, but hadn't gone to the trouble of getting library cards because we know we're only living here temporarily. It cost $15 for a card since we don't live in the county. It seemed crazy to PAY for a library card, but the kids have really been missing the weekly library trip and fresh books. And there's no telling how much longer we'll be here. Apparently Brother Powell’s prayers are better than ours. Ha! We came home and enjoyed the rainy afternoon. James took a nap, I tried, but then gave up and played a game with the kids up in the loft room. Katie cooked dinner tonight and cleaned the kitchen (I owe her--maybe a girl movie night one of these days after the boys are in bed), then I scrubbed (no--gently rubbed a damp cloth across) the remainder of the floors while kids watched a video from the library about American legions. I cried during the John Henry part. Joe got up and started playing with the dog to distract himself and try to keep from crying. Sam pelted me with questions about WHY he died. Who picked this show out, anyway?!

At the end of the day, ALL of the wood floors in the main area are nice and shiny and clean. ~AAAAHHHHHHHHH.~ That feels so good. :-) We let the kids stay up and read books after devotions tonight while I looked through several Taste of Home magazines James' mother sent home with me. I pulled out some recipes that look worth trying. We'll see.

And there you have it--I'm ALL CAUGHT UP!!! :-)

Ah, yes. I almost forgot to post this clip. This is my pastor and his wife singing in church the other day. I do love my pastor. I love his sincerity and pureness of heart, and his true worship. And his raspy voice and old guy adorableness. :-) They are a blessing to me.