Gotta Blog

I don't have the time or the energy, but I've got to start blogging SOMETHING or I'll never get caught up! So here goes. All the way back to... who knows when! I've got notes from the last few weeks, but I think there are a few weeks that are completely lost forever. It's probably best that way. ;-)


On Thursday, February 2nd the Shulers headed to Moulton for revival and our family headed to the Powells’ house to work, work, work. It was our last two days there and there was TONS to be done. I was worried about getting all of our stuff out of there (what it it took several trips?!), but on Friday morning we loaded up the truck and the van, drove to the Monstrosity and unloaded, came back to the Powells' house and spent the rest of the day packing up the final boxes and cleaning. It took until about 8:00 that night, but when we finished we were able to fit everything else into the van with us (though Sam's head was framed by the dolly like the face mask on a football helmet--ha!) to drive back to town. When we got home I had another couple of hours worth of work unpacking and sorting and trying to find places to stuff all of our stuff.

Saturday the 4th we got up early and drove to Somerville for the Altar Ministry Workshop. There were so many good things shared. I took lots of notes. We enjoyed lunch with everybody and torpedo ball afterward. We left there and got a motel room in Decatur, got some rest that afternoon, then went to Revival in Moulton that night. Philip preached that night (first time I've ever heard him--I loved it!) on the Holy Ghost. The folks in Moulton are good to go to the altar and spend lots of time seeking the Lord. After much prayer and pressing, Josh Anders received the Holy Ghost! SOOOOOO EXCITING! Liz had received it a few months ago, for those who hadn’t heard. :-) We visited for a while after service, drove back to Decatur and stopped to get a late dinner at Steak ‘n Shake (wa-hoo!) before calling it a night.

Sunday morning, the 5th, we were back in Moulton and enjoyed another GREAT service. Jacob preached on growing in the Lord and being faithful to read the Word of God and pray every day. I can't really explain what was it was all about (I don't know!) but cried my heart out and sobbed in the altar for a while. ~whew~ It felt sooooo good. I’m so thankful that God loves us enough to give help and strength and grace and relief, even when we don't know what's going on and why we're feeling the way we are!

They had a wonderful pot-luck lunch after church and I loved fellowshipping with the girls (Liz, Kimmi, etc.)—and giving Brandon a hard time. :-) We ended up in the sanctuary after a while and James had a ball jamming with the Shuler guys--if you can call it that. He was teaching them all sorts of old church songs--all of the really corny ones that have no rhythm, to rhyme, and very poor or week lyrics. But they were written by Church members and they all mention the Church in one manner or another so James thinks they're all fantastic. Ha! The guys laughed a LOT. James even hopped in and tried to play Phil's big stand-up bass, then strummed a mandolin the way Uncle Colin does. It was great.

We finally left Moulton and made it back to Bessemer for service that night. We are going through the Body of Christ course--which I love--but I was soooooo tired. I had a horrible time bringing my mind into captivity for that one!

That day was our 12th anniversary, but we managed to make it through the day without being paraded up front and sang to or anything (I HATE things like that—ha!) – I threatened James profusely if he dared tell anybody it was our anniversary. ;-) Maybe someday we’ll get a chance to celebrate. There’s just way too much going on right now.

Monday and Tuesday, the 6th and 7th, were the only two days the Shulers didn't have anything booked so we hauled them over to the Monstrosity and put them to work. :-) Uncle Colin spent both days replacing all of the water shut-offs in the whole house (18 total), getting rid of all of the heavily corroded copper and sweating new copper in its place. He showed us how to do it and James and I both gave it a try. Very fun. :-) James also had him replace the water heater. Jake and Phil were busy painting and staining trim throughout most of the first day. After that Jacob worked side by side with James trimming out the kitchen, installing the freshly stained chair rail and door trim. It is soooooo pretty!!! They did SUCH a good job. Jake seemed to really enjoy it and said he thinks he could do finish-carpentry for a living. He’s a perfectionist and a quick learner. He’d be great at it. Philip kept ending up with all of the unpleasant, unrewarding grunt work—sanding down rough sheetrock, scraping multiple layers of paint off of a door, scrubbing wood with oil soap, things like that. He also ended up with a nice splinter deeply embedded in his finger. He was just grateful it wasn’t his plucking finger or he would have been in big trouble trying to play that giant bass of his! Anyway, we got a LOT done with the guys’ help. In between running around trying to find things for everybody (!) I was able to get the denim-looking wallpaper up on the bottom part of the half bath. I had papered the top half the week before. I LOVE THAT ROOM. It looks sooooo great! I just LOVE the yellow wall and the bright plaid wallpaper above and the denim down below. Blue and yellow always makes me happy. This will be far better than our blue and yellow bathroom in the last house. It’s closer to what we had in Andrews—my favorite bathroom ever. :-) Anyway, I also faux painted one wall in our bedroom, using green for the first time. It turned out really, really pretty but I’m not sure it really matches the wallpaper. Ha! It was perfect when I mixed it, but dried very differently. You'd think I would expect that. I think it will be close enough that it’ll work out okay. We’ll see. I might have to darken it or add some other color to it to make it work.

On Wednesday the 8th I painted my first really dark blue wall--in the foyer continuing way up high into the stairwell. I LOVE IT! In fact, it’s the first wall that I’ve painted or papered in this house and stood back and just wowed over. There are plenty of things that have turned out really nice and that I’ve been really excited about, but something about that blue wall made me almost giddy! I just LOVE it. It’s exactly what I had in mind—and things seldom actually turn out that way, you know?! You see something in your mind and it looks GREAT, then you try to do it and it’s horrid. Not this time—I think it’s FANTASTIC. I’m excited to finish the foyer and the stairwell now. And the half-bath and the master bedroom and the kitchen and the dining room… that’ll just be the main floor. Then we get to start the fun all over again upstairs. HA! Things are looking better and better all the time on this floor and we’re into the fun FINISH work now, so even though there’s still lots to be done, it’s finally the kind of work that shows results. I love working on the house and then at the end of the day being able to look and say THAT’S what I accomplished today and it looks great! We need more days like that. :-)

The Shuler boys worked with us through the morning, then left at about noon. We stayed and worked until about 3:00, then stopped to get ready to go to Collinsville for the service the Shulers were singing and preaching at there. We had a horrible time getting there, leaving a few minutes later than anticipated, getting all jammed up in bad traffic a few times, and then programming the GPS for County Road 5 instead of Country Road 3 (oops—my blunder!), landing us there about 20 minutes late! We felt sooooo bad. But we enjoyed the service, the singing, and the message Uncle Colin preached on forgiveness. So good.

Thursday, the 9th was sloooooooow moving. We intended to get to the Monstrosity bright and early, but spent the first few hours of the day in our pj’s at Sister Fender’s house! James worked on his stuff for the state paper (he was already 4 days late) and other miscellaneous things. We finally took the Shulers to Taco Bell for lunch, then went our separate ways—they to Alex City to preach and sing that night and the following, and we to the Monstrosity to work, work, work and see how much we could get done. Unfortunately, we didn’t have any more motivation once we arrived at the house than we had had at Sister Fender’s house that morning! James had errands to run and I had great intentions of getting lots done at the house while he was away. Instead, all I managed to achieve was getting the second coat of blue paint on the fantastic foyer/stairwell wall (I still love it!) and patching the wallpaper in the utility room where Uncle Colin had cut a hole in the wall to replace some pipe. When James got home we hung the light fixture in the stairwell, I had an epiphany about what to do with the rest of the stairwell and then spent some time with a tape measure, a level, and a pencil, doing some math and drawing some lines on the wall to see if I’d have enough wallpaper to do what I’d like to do. I’ll check my math one more time before starting just to be sure, but I think I’ll have enough wallpaper and that it’s going to look terrific. I love it when something just sort of slaps me in the face and I think, “THAT’S what I want to do there!” :-)

That’s about it. James hung some mini-blinds in his office. Joe and Sam talked to Isaac Hays on the phone, then James talked to Brother Dustin. They seldom do that and it’s good for all of them, so it made me happy. I joyfully went to bed early.

I had typed this up that night: "I am LOVING having the Shulers here and part of me wishes they could stay forever. But the other part of me is ready for the next phase: being able to be back down to just one house (our very own this time, even unfinished and all sleeping on the floor in one room! Ha!) instead of having to use Sister Fender’s house, though it has been a marvelous blessing to us during this time. I’m still having a great time working on the house (especially when we’re working with the Shulers... We laugh all day long when we’re with them--they are CRAZY!) but I’ve noticed that I’m beginning to wear down. I feel emotionally wiped out every two or three days… and I’m not an emotional person! I look forward to leveling out here one of these days. Hopefully sooner than later. The kids have been such troopers through all of this. Our lives are never rigidly scheduled anyway, but I’d say it’s been pretty much utter chaos at least 90% of the time for several weeks now. Even Sam told me a few weeks ago, “Mom, I need to get back to a normal life with a normal bedtime and stuff like that!” Proof of just how crazy it’s been. Ha!

Last Friday (one week ago today--look, I'm catching up!) we tried to get some more done on the house, but it seemed like we were just sort of spinning our wheels again. I hate days like that! The phone guy come out and got us all set up with our very own home phone again (wow—it’s been a while!) and Internet, so now I’ll be able to blog more often. Maybe. ;-) I think that’s the day that I put a coat of satin Polycrylic over the semi-gloss Polyurethane that we had decided we hated. Uncle Colin told me that there were flattening agents in it that would take out the shine of what was already there. Amazing! It doesn’t look perfect, but way better than it did before. Gloss finishes just showcase all of the flaws—and there are LOTS of flaws on these cabinets! I’m trying to find a finish that I’m really and truly happy with before I start doing the doors. It would be horrible to spend as much time working on something as we have those crazy doors and then have a splotchy finish when you’re all done, but I’m struggling (both with the regular Polyurethane and with the Polycrylic) to get a good, clean coat on. I keep seeing streaks and brush marks. I’m going to have to keep experimenting on the utility room doors until I find what will work for us, then I’ll do that on the kitchen cabinets.

We had hopes of making it to the service in Alex City that night, but just couldn’t pull it off. It sounds like they had fantastic attendance down there and a really good service. I think the Shulers said they sang 13 or 14 songs—some of them by request at the tail end of the service.

Sunday morning we got up early and drove to Goodwater to join the folks there for service. We really enjoyed it. We had a special sort of service with lots of prayer. The Hoffmans have been through so much physically and it was so good to be with them and all of the folks there. Fellowship is so good for all of us.

When service was over we learned that they were having a Valentines dinner in the back. I hate it when we bumble into a meal that I can’t contribute to! Seems like it's happened a few times here lately. Everything was sooooo good. We just LOVE eating food that somebody actually made in their own kitchen instead of burgers and chicken like we seem to eat all the time now! Ha! (Can't wait to have a kitchen again!) I really enjoyed visiting with the good folks there.

We stayed quite a while, but left in plenty of time to make it to Phenix City for service, even though they are on Eastern Time. (Weird-o’s. Ha!) That is, we would have gotten there in plenty of time if they hadn’t moved their service up to 5:00 instead of 6:00! Ha! Uncle Colin had sent James a text informing him so, but we had the ringers off on our phones and never got it. Oops. So instead of getting to church 10 minutes early, we came in 50 minutes late! We were there for the last two and a half Shuler songs, then a great message by Philip on being real Christians and really living what we claim. It was very, very good. We had a good time of prayer in the altar and Katie got down and really prayed and sought the Lord. I was blessed by that. :-)

We took a different route back to Bessemer than the Shulers that night, but our family stopped in Steak ‘n Shake in Prattville. Second time in two weeks we’ve had Frisco burgers. :-) YUM.

Monday was the Katie and Joe’s birthday and we had planned to take the day off and just spend time with the kids. Things never go as planned. Ha! The Shulers and James had some things that had to be done in the morning and none of them got back to Sister Fender’s house until nearly 1:00pm. When the crowd finally showed up we all headed to Hoover for the kids’ birthday lunch at Jim ‘n Nicks. Then we went to the Hoover library so the kids could stock up on new books. Joe wanted to go to Guitar Center to look around, then Katie wanted to go to Christmas Tree Shops to get a pink and black hat she'd seen and fallen in love with. We ran into Sam’s Club to pick up birthday cake for them, then went to Wal-Mart to get the stuff for fish tacos. By the time we got back to Sister Fender’s house it was almost 7:00pm. Lee Bear and his daughter showed up shortly thereafter and we all enjoyed Uncle Colin’s fish tacos. Well, not all of us enjoyed them. I think Joe started gagging before anything even touched his tongue. That kid got ALL of his taste buds from my Dad, I tell you! Meat and potatoes. Anything beyond that is weird and exotic and he has no interest in it. Sad. At least Katie tried hers and—for the sake of the Shulers, I’m sure—really tried to like it. She didn’t, but I appreciate the effort. Sam surprised all of us by truly LIKING them—especially the cabbage. Whoa! I think he had three tacos.

The kids migrated to the living room to try to watch Kung Fu Panda—the Shulers had insisted that we must see it and found it at the library earlier that day. Unfortunately the DVD was so scratched that it got stuck about half way through. I went downstairs with Jake and Phil and Lexie (Brother Bear’s daughter) and the kids and we all played Ninja for a little while. It was great. :-) We tried to watch the movie on a different DVD player downstairs, but it wouldn’t work either. Brother Bear and Lexie finally left sometime after midnight and the rest of us hit the hay shortly thereafter.

Tuesday morning we said our goodbyes to the Shulers… then went back to bed! Ha! Then we spent the day washing sheets and towels and vacuuming and doing dishes and trying to get everything at Sister Fender’s house all cleaned up and fresh and clean. I shouldn’t say we “spent the day” doing that. We did that off and on throughout the day, when we weren’t lounging around taking naps or watching Snowball Express—the other movie we had picked up at the library. Monday hadn’t been nearly as relaxing as we had hoped, so Tuesday seemed to be the day to catch up on some rest—though we still don’t feel caught up! It feels like we're still draggin'.

That afternoon we loaded up the last of our belongings and headed to the Monstrosity—TO LIVE! We hope. :-) I spent the rest of the evening working on my VLB service for the next night.

Wednesday proved to us that we are STILL not recovered from having been running full steam ahead for the past few weeks. We are having the hardest time getting motivated and finding the energy to work and get things done around here—and we so desperately need to! I touched up the red paint here and there where it was needed, sanded, re-stained and caulked around the new sink in the utility room that James and Uncle Colin had put in (yea!), toyed around with the Polycrylic and put a coat on the utility cabinets and shelves, then put the second coat of paint around all the trim areas in the bedroom… before crashing and taking a nap!

I was sooooo nervous about the VLB service that night. It was crazy. I’ve done this sort of thing lots of time and I always get nervous, but I felt almost sick this time. It was dumb! It was my first time to do anything like this here in Bessemer—maybe that’s what it was. I’m hoping I’ve made it past the hump and it won’t be so bad next time. ;-) Anyway, aside from my nerves, I think it went okay. I was so blessed by Kody playing a piano solo for us—he’s so shy and it was a HUGE thing for him to be willing to do that! It was beautiful. I led songs that nobody knew. All four of them, apparently. Ha! I really thought that SOME of the people would know SOME of the songs! Oh well, I think it was okay anyway. I have such strange feelings about teaching. I get nervous and I never, ever look forward to it. But when it's all over with I usually feel a sense of fulfillment and satisfaction or something--like I'm really glad I made myself do that and the hope that somehow something said was a blessing or a help to somebody. I like to feel purpose in my life. :-) Then there's moderating. I hate moderating! I'm horrible at it and I am utterly miserable the entire time--and never feel any sense of satisfaction afterward, just sheer relief that it's all over with! I should see if I can hire that part out next time... ;-)

After service we invited everybody to the back for cake and ice cream. We had half of Katie & Joe’s birthday cake left, along with a death-by-chocolate cake and butter pecan cake that Lee Bear’s wife had sent with him when he came to the house the other night, AND some red velvet cake Sister Robinson had sent home with us from the Valentines dinner in Goodwater on Sunday. And we had some left-over Blue Bell that we’d brought from Sister Fender’s house—so we had PLENTY for everybody to enjoy. It was the first time we had seen the Powells since they got back from Korea and we so enjoyed visiting with them. It’s so strange. We’ve spent so little time with them, but feel like we know them so very well and just love them to death. It really is like they are family. Such wonderful people.

Thursday was another slow moving day at the Monstrosity. I touched up paint here and there, tried some more methods of poly-ing cabinets, picked the one that we hate the least (it's sad when that's youre best option) and finished the upper doors from the utility room along with a few other odds and ends. James pulled away from the house projects to take care of our tax stuff for the year. I pulled away to proof the March edition of the Evening Light. There were some hilarious blunders in there this month and they gave us some good laughs. I'm hoping we caught them all and got them fixed. Dad found the very best one. In Brother O'Dell's testimony about his trip to Nicaragua he said that the people there gave him "a hammock and a Nicaraguan plague"--instead of plaque. The next sentence said that it left him absolutely speechless. Hahahahahaha! I think I'd be speechless, too. HA! I love it.

Today we got the doors hung in the utility room and hung three or four of the kitchen cabinet doors as well, touched up some more red paint (there will be TONS of touch-up to do in the coming days!) and... other things that I'm forgetting. Then we loaded up and headed to Hoover. We had several stops, but the biggest thing on the agenda was shopping for a washer and dryer. We'd been doing some research online and after checking out the sales and going to two or three stores I think we've settled on what we're going to get. The set priced really good right now but the sale goes off tomorrow morning at 10:00, so I think James is going to head down there in the morning. They will have to order the set in, but I think they said they will deliver them next Wednesday. That's exciting! Ah, yes--James also layed the carpet squares and the little clothes rod in the utility room today, so when I finish poly-ing the doors in there that room will be FINISHED and ready for a washer and dryer! Wa-Hoo!!! Life will feel sooooo much better when we have a washer and dryer. :-)

We had to hurry back from our afternoon errands to be able to make it to the kids' Valentine party at the Church tonight. It was lots of fun. I'm pretty sure the parents enjoy hanging out and visiting as much as the kids enjoy "their" party. :-) We had pizza and lots of adorable snacks ala Betty Dudley, then Sister Washburn had a devotion on love and lots of fun games for the kids to play. I think everybody had a blast.

We came home tonight, put the kids to bed, then spent quite a while hanging cabinet doors in the kitchen... six of them. Ha! It takes forever to get them adjusted just right where they look even and close smoothly and don't rub against each other or the cabinets themselves. And it's a little discouraging when I think of how many hours have been spent working on the cabinets, sanding, sanding, sanding, cleaning, painting, painting, painting, then painting trim (3 or four coats), James doing all of those angle cuts and attaching the trim... and after all of that there are soooooo many flaws!!! Ha! I'm almost ashamed to say that I sanded the doors and worked hard on them--there are problems all over the place! When you're working on them and hanging them you see ALL of the drips and runs and splotches and yuckiness. Then I stand back and look at them as a whole... and I love them. :-) It's just sooooo pretty! I worry about all of the extra lights we're putting in (four of them--that will shine down directly onto the cabinets)--I know they'll highlight yet more flaws and imperfections. But I still think I'm going to love them. I'm reminded that we're not professionals (our cabinets are proving it way more than I'd like--ha!), but I will still think they're terrific and will love them. At least I hope so. HA!

Well, lookie here! I'M ALL CAUGHT UP! Except for the pictures and videos I've been trying to upload all night. Can't get it to work at all, so I'll have to try that again another day. Right now I'm so tired I almost feel sick so I'm calling it a night!