~Happy Sigh~

Today has been wonderful. Laundry, house cleaning, changing of sheets, schooling children—about the usual, but it was just a NICE day. Then this afternoon it started smelling just like a holiday in my house. It was almost magical—though I hate that word. ;-) I made a big ham dinner tonight (hams were $5 off at Aldi last week) with mashed potatoes & gravy, corn, green beans & bacon, buttered carrots, crescent rolls, and pineapple upside-down cake—all homemade except for the rolls. I walked through the house this afternoon and the smell of the ham baking along with the apple scented candle I was burning made the house feel like a holiday. ~Aaaahhhh~ It was soooooo nice! I LOVE FEELING SO AT HOME HERE!!! I’m so, so, so, so, so thankful for the home God gave to us and so, so, so, so, so thankful that we have the whole first floor finished and conducive to normal life. And I’m so, so, so, so, so thankful for the year+ that we spent NOT having a home of our own because I know I could never be appreciating all of it this much if I hadn’t been without it for a little while. I’m just amazed at how HAPPY it makes me to LIVE here now. It’s silly, really. I had every possible comfort living at the Powell’s house last year. But somehow it’s still sooooo exciting! I notice it most of all when I bake. I LOVE my kitchen. It gets crowded when there are two or three people in there at a time, but I just love how I’ve been able to arrange the storage spaces in there so that ALL of my baking supplies (flour, sugar, spices, cake pans, measuring cups, etc.) are all RIGHT THERE within reach—without having to go GET anything. It just makes me happy every time I bake. Which I’ve been doing lately. And loving. I’M SO HAPPY!!! I made a strawberry bundt cake with strawberry glaze and a mandarin orange cake for lunch at Convention this past weekend. It made me so happy to be able to do that! :-) Katie’s been making brownies and cookies and all manner of goodness, too.

Life is good aside from food, too. ;-) We had a good Youth Convention and I truly felt the Lord working in my life there. We really enjoyed having the Lamberts from North Carolina as our guest speakers. They were a great blessed and I’m so glad they were able to come. I was also very blessed by Brother Brandon Keel’s message—but don’t tell him I said so, Kimmi! Ha! I so appreciated his spirit and the good, solid things he had to share. It was our first time hearing him preach, but I’m sure not the last. When Convention ended and the guys FINALLY got out of their "45 minute meeting" (ha!) we went with the Zaxby's crowd: Jeremy & Emilee Wallace, Will & Kristal Cox, Butch & Stephanie Booth (who managed a surprise visit from Mississippi that day), and Brandon & Kimmi Keel. We had a good time and even got a few impersonations out of the evening. :-) Afterward Brandon & Kimmi came to the house for a little while. They'd taken the tour when they were in town last December (is that when it was?) and NOTHING was anywhere near livable, so we wanted to show them the improvements. It's fun to show the house to people who saw it when it was truly horrid. Ha! We had a great time with them and they ended up staying way later than they should have, considering the drive they had ahead of them that night... but I'm so glad! I can't wait for their next visit, whenever it may be. :-)

Let's see... in other news, Joe found a turtle out back today. He was so excited! (Don't judge his enthusiasm by the picture--he really was excited! Ha!) He named him Raymond, as he does with most of the reptiles he catches. He says that it was his great-granddad's name (he never met him) and he just thinks it's a great name. I never know whether to feel touched or disturbed by the fact that he uses it for all of his creepy creatures. ;-) Anyway, "Raymond" was cute, but I think he was a girl. From what I could find today, when box turtles have a very round domed shell like that (instead of being shorter and flatter) they are usually girls. Anyway, the kids had a great time tormenting the poor thing off and on all day long (at one point poor Raymond was riding around the yard in the bed of one of Sam's remote controlled trucks--Ha!), then turned him loose late this afternoon. It makes me so happy that there are great critters in our very own yard for the boys to find--just like at the Powell's house! We had a little green frog sticking to our bedroom window a few weeks ago. The boys were thrilled to hear that, but haven't seen any for themselves yet. They have, however, been catching lizards (of course), shooting at squirrels and collecting fireflies. How blessed they are. I wonder if they really realize it. :-) Too much rambling. Here's Raymond.

Joe wanted to help peel potatoes tonight. He's a huge help. HA!

And James wanted to make a stained glass window for his office tonight. :-) Brother Brandon said something about a stained glass window the other day and it must've reminded James that he wanted one.

And that's it from here. Oh, wait! I DID go upstairs today, Mom! I didn't spend much time there (!), but I did go and do a quick sand job on all of the doors with that horrible slick paint. (I think there are 42 doors up there. At least. Ha!) I hope to accomplish more up there tomorrow, but at least I WENT today! Baby steps, you know. ;-) It's just so tempting to stay busy on THIS floor with things like laundry and ham dinners...