~Whoosh!~  

Posted by cokelady

Boy, what a whirlwind of a day! Everything is such a blur. And it's a bad day for everything to be a blur, but more on that later. Right now I'm sitting in the laundry room here at the motel. I've never been to a laundromat before, so this is kind of cool. Four washers, six dryers (explain that?!) and only one great big burly guy that was kind of scary, so far. Everybody else has looked just like me. Regular, worn out people who had a long day and will feel much better once their things are fresh and clean again. ;-)

I'd tell you what we did on Saturday, but that's all a blur, too. I honestly can't remember. I think we must have driven around Rio Rancho some more, checking out neighborhoods and scoping out any more possibilities. We found a for-sale-by-owner house and had the guy show us through it. Nice, but just wouldn't work. Went into a big house that was having an open house. It has all of the space we would need, but I remember seeing the listing for this house a few months ago and it might have been a possibility if they hadn't raised the price on it. Like, $21,000! Is that nuts, or what?!

Yesterday was a bittersweet day. We had good services and God really blessed and helped us. It does feel so different now that we're really here to stay. I've always felt like a visitor before, but it's already beginning to feel like home. I've been a little worried because I haven't really felt anything for this Albuquerque church (I hope that's not misunderstood) and have been praying for God to really give me a burden for these people and this place. Yesterday was a great step in the right direction for me. I feel certain we're in the right place and I am glad to be here. That's the sweet part of the day. The bitter part is that James made our local church appointments and had to remove somebody from a teaching position who isn't a member of the Church and really doesn't qualify to be a member at this point in time. She was very hurt and disappointed and we're praying that God will help us to "mend" things with her and that in time she will be qualified to be a member and be used in The Church of God. But for now it's a really tough situation.

Sam asked for some money to put in the offering yesterday. I have his envelope of money in my purse and sometimes he wants to give his very own money in the offering and asks for his money. This time he didn't specify and I just grabbed some of my coins and gave to him. He took them, then swung around and asked if it was his money or my money. I told him it was mine and he said, "Good. I don't wanna spend all my money!" Then when Katie came by to receive the offering Sam put his coin packed fist behind his back, grinned, and said, "I don't have any." !!! He immediately received a good thump in the back of the head (the priviledges of sitting directly behind your children) and presented his fist. I heard the coins chink into the plate, but several seconds after Katie was gone he turned around and grinned at me, holding up one shiny nickel he had withheld. What a rat! That kid is a perfect heathen! Proving himself to be selfish and greedy, a liar, and a theif--all in a matter of 30 seconds!!! ~sigh~ I can't wait 'til my kids get saved!!!

Today was another wild and crazy day of house hunting with Jason. We had him take us all over tarnation and back again. When we first began considering our housing options in the Albuquerque area we had hoped to end up outside of the city, up in the east mountains somewhere. I am sooooo much a mountain girl at heart and would just love to be there. But it looked like all of the doors there were closing, so I really surrendered that to the Lord and felt like I had really placed my heart in the city--and was almost excited about living here. But in the past week or so some new mountain properties have become available and some of the old ones have lowered their prices, making them possibilites for us. So we asked Jason if he'd take us out there one last time. We knew we would either stumble across a new option out there, or our searching today would further confirm our decision to make an offer on "my" house or "James" house here in town. Well...

The first house was in a great location--in the mountains, but only a few minutes away from Albuquerque. It had some issues, but we thought about considering it anyway. Second house was a bit further out, but a definite NO. Third house was 1400+ sq. ft. two bedroom house, log sided, with fantastic views off the front porch. Fourth house was a darling little 3 bedroom stone house with 2 acres, entirely fenced. A beautiful home and we might could have made it work, but not for the price considering the changes we would have to make. The fifth house... well, we never actually found the fifth house! We tried and tried, but to no avail. Jason actually grew up in the area, but he was just as lost as we were. There was lots of mud and snow and slush and we almost got stuck or hurt several times, but managed to come out unscathed. When we finally gave up on looking for that house (who wants a house that nobody can find?! I want to have COMPANY, for goodness' sake!), we went back to the third house to take another look. To make a long story short (think I can do it??? Nah!!!), we went to Jason's office and filled out the paperwork to put an offer in on it. And now...

I'm scared to death!!! I've had this miserable, sinking feeling in my gut all night long. This is the 4th house that we've put an offer in on, but I really think we're going to GET this one. It's priced much, much lower than the others we've tried for and we can afford to come up--really, to the asking price if we need to--and still be able to afford to do what needs done to it. It's not that I don't like the house, it's just that buying a house is so... BIG. I remember this same terrible, nervous feeling when we went to sign the papers on our Andrews house. It's just scary to buy a house, you know?! And besides that, we saw this house for the very first time at 2:00 this afternoon and at 6:00 we were signing papers!!! Whoa!!! That's just a wee bit fast for this girl! I never have handled change very well and this is like total whiplash. I was all set to have a house in Rio Rancho (northern Albuquerque), in the city. And then *POOF* we're landing a house in the mountains--in a matter of just a few short hours! Deep down, I know I'd really rather be in the mountains. But I had surrendered that and just didn't expect for it to happen, you know?! And it seems to be happening so fast! That's another thing. I don't know this house! We just barely met! Does it have a pantry?! Beats me! I can't remember! How many kitchen cabinets are there--will I have enough room for everything I have now? Who knows! And for some reason, I didn't take a single picture of this joint. I usually keep my camera tied around my neck when we're house hunting and take multiple pictures of every room--every possible angle--so I can go back and answer all of the questions I think of later on. Not this time. Scary!!!

Actually, that's how I felt for the first few hours, but I'm feeling much better now. I know that we've done a whole lot of praying about this move for the past several months and I trust that God will work it out according to his plan. And there's still no guarantee that this offer will go through! The guy could just say, "Whoa, Nellie! I don't think I'm ready for this!" and just yank it off the market. After all, he only listed it 4 days ago (really!) and this might be a little overwhelming for a guy who has no idea where he's going to go next! Anyway, God still knows best and I still trust him. And James is soooooooo excited. I think I will be too, once I get it settled in my heart again that God may actually let me live in the mountains after all! :-)

So let me tell you about this place...

It has just over a half acre of land, fully fenced. Like I said, it is 1400+ sq. ft. and only has two bedrooms, both of which are very large. It has two full bathrooms, the guest bath needing new floors and some serious cleaning, but hopefully nothing more. The master bathroom is... interesting! It's very, very big and... empty! Ha! I mean, it has a sink, a toilet and a tub (boy, does it ever have a tub!), but there's lots of great big empty space in the middle of the room. I'm not sure what to do with it! Ha! Anyway, the tub is really something. It doesn't have any jets or anything (I'm happy about that--I've heard they get clogged up all the time), but it's HUGE. It's a great big oval thing that the kids could probably swim in. Ha! Seriously, it's got to be 7' long. Bizarre! And then there's all this open floorspace in the room, a toilet, and the little itty-bittiest pedestal sink you've ever seen in your life! Ha! Crazy. It's like the tub was fashioned for King Kong and the sink for Tiny Tim. Anyway...

The master bedroom is very big, too, and even has a wood stove in the corner. Kind of weird, but very cozy! There's a nice sized closet and a linen closet as well.

The living room has a wood stove, too, and a tile floor. I always prefer carpet in living rooms (it just feels more cozy and comfortable), but it's nice tile and I'll be happy with some big cushy rugs in there. It's actually a living room/dining room combo thing, next to the kitchen. I think it's what they call a "great room" when they're all smooshed together like that. The kitchen is rather small and needs a little work. There are some dippy tiles all over the one wall (white ones with blue birds and such craziness) that will have to go, and we could stand for a new sink and new counters. The cabinets will be fine, but I'll probably paint them. Something very country. :-) I am a wee bit concerned about cabinet space, but there's a small area over to the right of the kitchen that has hardwood floors that I will probably end up putting some sort of table or something at which to do school with the kids, and there might be some room for extra "storage" over there. I'll just have to do lots of thinking to come up with HOW I want to do it.

The laundry area is down the hall from the kitchen, which is much better than actually IN the kitchen! The second bedroom is very large, which is a very good thing since all three kids will be sharing it for a while--along with some office stuff, too, probably! It has a nice sized closet as well.

And that's the entirety of the house! BUT... it also has a two car garage that is already insulated and finished out, ceiling included (even a sky light), all except for the side with the garage door. So we plan to put up a couple of walls and create a third bedroom and a den area. AND...

There is a little storage shed outside that already has electricity running to it, so it would be relatively simple (we think!) to finish that out for an office for James. Perfect! So there you have it--all the rooms we would need! There is room behind the house for a carport if we ever decided we needed one.

The house is located up in the mountains and while there are neighbors quite close, it doesn't really feel like it because of all the trees and mountainish stuff around you. There is a deck on the front of the house and the views are just gorgeous. Although the "yard" is mostly just the mountain that it is, there is an area out front for a nice little patch of grass (would God bless me with mountains AND grass?!) and some nice landscaping touches like rock steps in one area and wood steps in another--even the beginnings of what will eventually be a little stream and fountain going under a mini bridge, of sorts, that you walk over to get to the front deck! Wow.

Truth be known, there are a lot of things I don't know what to do with in this house and it's going to take some serious thinking and planning to figure it all out. But I'm sure it will work, in time! (And after living in a motel room for a few weeks it will feel like a mansion to have two whole bedrooms!) And there are so many things to love, just as it sits. Namely: location, location, location! :-)

So there you have it. We went, we saw, we put an offer in House #4, we at Schlotzky's for dinner, I did all the laundry, I blogged and now I go to bed. It's been a full day. :-) It was great, but hopefully tomorrow will be a little less eventful. I'm hoping for breakfast (hhmmm... what's for breakfast--we ran out of milk today!), devotions, school, and ironing. Maybe a nap. Ha! Not with three kids and a dog, all hyper from being cooped up and not able to run! Anyway, that's the latest from around here. Please help us pray for God's will, and that alone. I'll be posting again soon!!! I hope. :-)

~Bushed Becki~

3 comments

Here We Go Again...  

Posted by cokelady

I just spent the past two hours or so writing a post detailing everything that has been going on in our lives for the past week or two and hit one wrong button and *sha-zam* it's GONE!!! That is just sooooooo wrong!!! ~sigh~ It's 10:00 right now and I'm not tired yet, so I guess I'll start over--but I'm not going to last another two hours, I know that much! (You lucky dogs! Ha!)

~sigh~ Where do I start??? Earlier tonight I posted what I had written about a week ago, but never had a chance to post. You might want to start there. Only if you're interested in a lot of reading, though, between that post and this. :-)

Last Saturday we had a very long day of driving and stopping and driving and stopping, in an attempt to find an office center that could receive e-mails, print them out, let us sign them, and fax them back to our realtor--all for the sake of placing a counter-offer to the owner's counter-offer on House #3. In the end, it was a waste of time anyway since it doesn't look like we're going to be able to negotiate a price that would suit both us and them.

We got to Aunt Sue & Uncle Jerry's house that evening and were so grateful to have a nice, quite place to relax. Quiet, that is, until we brought in three children and a dog who had been cooped up in a van for two more days. ;-)

We had a really, really good church service on Sunday and I was soooooo ready for it! Travelling takes it out of you and you feel especially worn when you've had to do without church for most of the time! I was so grateful for such a freedom in the spirit and everybody really seemed to get in an truly worship and get involved. I felt an especially heavy burden for Uncle Jerry--like I haven't felt in a long, long time--and was able to really pour my heart out to the Lord for him. He so desperately needs to be saved! Please say a prayer for him, whether you know him or not. :-)

After church we drove down to Odessa to meet Sam & Tammy and Steven (a new guy they have coming to church now) for lunch at the Olive Garden. Our very own "last supper," if you will (ha!) before moving away. James and I shared the Tour of Italy. Yum. Best fettuccini alfredo I've ever had. The company was great, we had much better service than last time, and we all got our Andes mints before Brother Sam had a chance to steal them all. It was a good day. :-)

After lunch we all went to Christopher & Banks so Tammy and I could check out the sales. We both found a couple of good ones! I really needed some, too. You see, when I packed for Pennsylvania/Tennessee/motel-life-until-we-find-a-house, I thought I had thought everything through well. But remember I was in the middle of frantically packing up the entire house and scrubbing it down (all in nine days, mind you!) and just didn't have TIME to think of everything! I realized after we left Tennessee headed west that most of what I have to wear are sweaters, some of which are a bit on the Christmassy side. That will be a little awkward as we move into February or possibly March before we're able to get settled into a house and get our clothes out of storage again! Ha! Anyway, I was able to find two shirts on sale at C&B that can work as dressy or casual. Perfect! I'm going to need 'em! :-)

That night we had a nice, leisurely evening with Aunt Sue & Uncle Jerry. The kids spend most of their time in front of the TV while we're there, which I hate. But Aunt Sue has several seasons of I Love Lucy on DVD, which they all enjoy, especially Katie. (Any why not? She has a lot in common with Lucy, you know!) Uncle Jerry has such collections as Gunsmoke, Have Gun-Will Travel, Wanted: Dead or Alive, and Rawhide. The kids just love it! As must as I hate them vegging out so much, I love it that all of their favorite shows are black and white ones from the 50's and 60's! Ha! Katie loves Dean Martin's Christmas album. I told her today that most kids her age have no idea who Dean Martin is. She was truly appalled.

While the kids watch TV, James visits with Aunt Sue or dinks around on the computer, and I get into some serious competition with Uncle Jerry. He has a pool table in his den and I make the most of it while I'm there! We played about 15 games of 8 Ball the first night, I think! Ha! I won the first game, he took the second, then me, then him, then I stole the fifth. I should have stopped right then when I had the best three out of five. I think I lost the next 4 or 5 in a row after that! Ha! Oh well, it was fun anyway. I've never had much opportunity to play (although Uncle Jerry insists that I sneak out and go to the pool hall regularly or I wouldn't be able to keep up with him! Ha!), but I just love that game. Fun, fun, fun. Uncle Jerry doesn't pull any punches, girl or no girl, which is the way I like it. He does, however, gripe incessantly throughout the game and accuses me of playing by "Smith rules." I'm always sure to inform him that any Smith is proud to be a Smith and no amount of badgering on his part would have any affect on me. :-)

On Monday James had some business to take care of so the kids and I spent the day over at Tammy's house. How great is that?! A whole day with Tammy! It was fun. The only bad part was having to monitor the dogs all day long. Archie is such a puppy (a BIG puppy!) and--I never thought I'd see the day when Hershey could be out-puppied--Hershey is now officially the grumpy old man. Archie pesters him constantly, just wanting to play, and Hershey will have none of it. So we spent most of the day switching out the dumb dogs, one in the house, the other out, then back. Tammy and I got in lots of Eternal Rummy, which was nice, and I think she gained about 4,000 points on me--enough to get real close and maybe even pass me. We don't know for sure, of course, because the official score pad is stored safely in a box somewhere. But Tammy kept the scrap of paper we kept score on and rubber banded it to the fry sauce in her fridge. When I finally get a house and return to Andrews to retreive my fry sauce (and other important belongings, of course), she'll see to it that I have our updated score to add to the official book. :-)

Tuesday we went down to Odessa for some much needed haircuts from Aunt Stacey. The boys were looking really shaggy, but she got them fixed up and now they're looking great. Stacey didn't have time to go to lunch with us, but we enjoyed visiting with her while she clipped anyway!

After the haircuts we drove to Midland so we could stop by Mardel and James could say goodbye to his old boss and co-workers. We ended up staying there for a long, long time, but it was great. I know everybody really appreciated him coming by and James really enjoyed it, too. Even though he hasn't worked there in months you could tell everybody was really sad to see him go (especially his boss!) and were glad we had come. It was fun. And (you're never going to believe this) we came away with 18 boxes of Christmas cards. Is that dumb, or what?! Brian (the boss) was desperate to get rid of them because the guy was coming from coorporate hq to check on the store this next week and it looks bad on Brian and his store to have that much Christmas stuff left. They were 90% off regular price, so that made all of their Legacy cards (those really cute ones with cute envelopes that come in a cute boxes) $1.29 a box. You can't beat that, but still... I kept trying to tell Brian that we have no HOME--we don't even have a place to put these things! Besides that, I already have several boxes of cards that I didn't have a chance to send out this last year!!! 18 boxes. I wound up with 18 boxes!!! ~sigh~ I was able to peddle 4 or 5 to Tammy and Mom said she'd take some, too. So three of us will all be sending out the same cards next year, I guess! Ha! Oh well. It made Brian happy, anyway! :-)

That night Sam & Tammy came over to Sue & Jerry's to enjoy some chicken and dumplins with us (Aunt Sue makes the best!) and play games. We ended up in the den with some more fierce competition over the pool table. Uncle Jerry & Sam took on Tammy & me in 7 games of 8 Ball. Believe it or not, Tammy and I almost pulled it out! We were tied at three games apiece and I had a chance to sinch it up and blew it!!! Sooooo frustrating. But still fun! Sooooo much fun. :-) Then Sam & Tammy and I sat down and made James and Aunt Sue play a game of I Buy with us. What a great night!

Wednesday morning we stopped by our storage units to drop off a few more things (such as bags and bags of Christmas cards!), then took care of some other business before meeting Sam & Tammy for yet another last supper ;-) at Cassidy's. That was nice, too. Then it was off to Albuquerque! Again. But this time it was our "move" to Albuquerque. :-)

We got here at about 6:00 that night and got all settled into our very own place. Kind of. :-) "Our very own place" is room 132 in an extended stay motel, for now! I must admit, it's a little less than what I was hoping for--even for a motel. I guess I just expected a little more than your typical motel because it is advertized as "extended stay." Don't bring it up to James though, since we probably would have been in a different (and better equipped) extended stay motel if it wasn't for the dumb dog. Not very many motels of this nature accept dumb dogs at all and the ones that do want to charge an arm and a leg for them, so this was really our only option. James has really coped with the situation amazingly well. I know he'd really rather just shoot the dumb dog. But he knows how much the kids and I love the dumb dog, so he set us up here without any complaint. What a guy! And knowing that to be the case, I've tried really hard not to complain much myself! To him, that is. So I'll do it now, here, to all of you. Ha!

I was really hoping for more storage space. You'd think that "extended stay" motels would be set up for people who might actually stay more than a day or two, you know?! There is one small dresser (large enough for the TV to sit on) with three drawers, and the nightstand. It's a little tight, but I sorted through our 4 suitcases (two large, two small) and picked out the clothes that we will wear the most at this point in our lives and packed the rest back into the suitcases. James and the boys' each have a drawer in the dresser, Katie has the drawer in the nightstand, and I have the shelf under her drawer. It actually worked out pretty good! There are two little cubby holes in the room where you can hang clothes, so that's nice. We've got both racks full! The corner near the kids' bed is the toy corner. There is a little kitchenette, for which I've very thankful. It has a tiny sink, a little microwave, a mini-fridge and two burners, along with a little bit of cabinet space. There is a pot, a pan, and a tablesetting for three. (We bought plasticware so we don't have to eat in shifts! Ha!)

There's not much storage space in the bathroom either. It has one of those sinks that just attaches to the wall and has NO countertop surrounding it. Even so, I've been amazed at how well we've been able to arrange things and it really hasn't been that big of a deal. The two biggest let-downs were definitely the lack of a bathtub (can you imagine an extended stay motel having only a shower?!) and the lack of an oven. I had really hoped there would be a little miniature oven here. I had envisioned baking miniature cakes and casseroles and cookies. And most importantly, Totino's pizzas! Ha! It's been weeks since I've had them now and I think I'm going through withdrawal! ;-)

The whole room is your average motel size--actually smaller than a lot of rooms--and has a lot less storage space than I would have hoped for. But in the past two days we've found that we have everything we need and I really don't feel inconvenienced at all. It's great! God has blessed us soooooo much! Everytime I look around this room I just have to stop and thank God that we have a good, clean, warm place to stay. A roof over our heads, clothes to wear, beds to sleep on, food to eat and even a little area to prepare it in! We're in a good place.

We went out the first night to do some grocery shopping and stock our kitchen. I think the first thing to hit the shopping cart was a carton of Whoppers! Ha! We picked up just a few things to get us started: bread, milk, eggs, cereal, donuts, popcorn, peanut butter, jelly, dog food (left Hershey's at Aunt Sue's house--she told me I was going to do that!) and such things. We even found a really nice toaster oven on sale half price, so we picked that up. (I gave mine to Tammy, remember?) I was so excited because now I'll be able to cook Totino's after all! Of course, as we were driving away from the store we realized that we forgot to buy any Totino's! Ha! So we stopped at the store just two doors down and James ran in to get some pizzas and some ham and cheese. He wouldn't eat a peanut butter sandwich if his life depended on it and we had forgotten to get any sandwich fixin's for him, too.

On Thursday... Hhmmm... that was yesterday, wasn't it? I hope I can get my days straightened out sometime soon! We did some more looking around at houses and had good ole' Jason take us into two new ones along with one we'd already seen once and wanted to refresh ourselves about. Now we have a real dilemma. James likes one house, I like another. They are exactly the same price. His is much bigger and has a terrific view, but would need lots of work inside including two total bathroom remodels (the WORST!) and lots of new flooring. Mine is smaller, but still very adequate for our needs and has a great kid-friendly back yard. But it is truly dog ugly on the outside. We have very strong negative feelings about the house the other likes, but we've only come to blows a few times about it. Kidding--I'm just kidding! We're both doing our best to be open minded and talk through all the pros and cons and just pray and let God guide us. Jason took us to see two more houses today and they served to strengthen the opinion that the first two (the one I like and the one James likes) are really our best (and only?!) options at this point.

We did drive out to the east mountains again today, just in case. We found a few houses that, although much smaller than what we've been looking at in town, MIGHT be possibilites. I'll call Jason tomorrow and see if he can take us out there on Monday. I'm going to tell him that we are going to work him to death and make him show us every house within 40 miles of here, just to make sure he earns that crazy 6% he'll be splitting with the other realtor. ;-) It's great that we've spent soooooo much time with him now (I wish I knew exactly how many houses the poor guy has taken us to!) that I'm comfortable to truly be myself with him. After trying to follow him through Friday afternoon traffic today I had a few words for him when we finally reached our destination. I slapped my hand down on the top of his shiny burgundy car as he was getting out and said, "For future reference, not all of us drive a BMW, and a van doesn't have the get-up-n-go necessary to catch a guy in a BMW who likes to accelerate rather quickly!" And so on. He just sort of grins sheepishly and giggles. I'm guessing his wife isn't very fiesty because I'm not sure he knows what to do with it. No matter, it's fun and helps me to relax. :-) He really is a great guy and we've enjoyed getting to know him while he's working like crazy trying to find a place for us to live. He was up at 12:30 last night e-mailing us more possibilities. Crazy.

Anyway, I think that gets us all up to date, right?! The only thing I failed to mention (right!!!) is that we bought new school books for the kids yesterday. Katie got a 3rd Grade book, Joe got 2nd, and Sam got a Preschool book. Katie and Joe are completely ready for their new books, but I would like to introduce some history and science kind of stuff, too. And I need to get working with them so they can learn their addition and subtraction tables. They both do pretty good at math, but still have to figure everything instead of just knowing the basics. We have discovered that Joe is an excellent speller. He's 5 years old, but he spells words such as skeleton, telephone, and museum correctly on the very first try. Amazing. Katie still enjoys school for the most part and does very well at all of it--when she takes her time and concentrates instead of trying to rush through it to get to the next thing! Sam, on the other hand, has never learned anything! Ha! That kid. One of a kind, he is. He was influenced by peer pressure when we were picking out the school books and desperately wanted one of his own. I told him I'd buy him a book if he'd promise to learn his letters. He agreed. We'll see! We did school today before going out on the town and he seemed to enjoy himself, so that's good. We'll see how long it lasts!

Okay, I think that's it! If I wrote about anything in the post that I lost I can't imagine what it was! This seems pretty complete to me. Maybe even beyond complete, hu?! ;-) I'm going to TRY to post this without losing it, then join the rest of my slumbering family. Not sure what the plan is for tomorrow, but I know it includes school! (We have some serious catching up to do after the past month or two!) I'll do my best to start posting more regularly now that we're "settled." Or at least in one place for a while--I hope! G'night all!

~Rebekah~

RATS. Wouldn’t you know it. “Limited or no connectivity” is preventing me from actually posting all of this!!! ~sigh~ Sometimes I just hate computers. I’ll try again tomorrow morning. For now I’ll just save the whole shebang in Word to make sure I don’t lose it all. It is definitely bedtime for me. Later, ya’ll!

5 comments

On the Road Again  

Posted by cokelady

Just can’t wait to get on the road again… Traveling gets rather tiresome after a while, but we’re all coping amazingly well.

I haven’t blogged in the last… week? That’s because we’ve been at Mom & Dad’s house. I don’t get much time with Mom & Dad anymore and I’m not about to spend my time on a computer when I could be spending time with them! We’ve had a great time.

The last few days in Pennsylvania went well, but I can’t remember much about them now. I know the kids spent lots of time outside with their grandparents, mostly “up the hill” at Grandpa’s barn building houses and riding bikes. They always spend so much time outside there—there’s just so much room to run and play. It’s great!

We went to cousin Steve’s house for our usual “singing” and even managed to talk James’ folks into going with us, which was fun. We had some visitors and did some visiting and a little extra visiting one day when we were looking for the dumb dog. Did I already blog about that?! It’s been so long I can’t remember! (And we’re on I-20 headed west through Mississippi right now—I can’t get on the Internet to check my blog.) Anyway, at least we had some adventure while we were in Pennsylvania. And we found the dog. Again. I always pray so hard God will help us find him and keep him safe and all that, and then when we do get him back I feel like killing him!!! He tried to run away the next day, too. I saw him take off at his usual breakneck speed and I flew out the door and gave my fiercest you-get-back-here scream and it actually worked. He stopped cold and looked at me, the dropped his ears and tail and started slinking back to the house. A major victory for me, I assure you. Maybe in another year or two he’ll quit trying to exert his independence altogether.

We loaded up the van and headed for Cleveland on Sunday. I hate it that we were traveling on back-to-back Sundays instead of in church, but James just can’t bear to go to his “home” church anymore. They’re not with The Church of God and the changes and compromises that have taken place there are half heartbreaking and half disgusting and James just can’t take it. So we left that morning to head south.

We got to Mom & Dad’s house at about 9:00 that night, I think, and we had a really great time there this week. I can’t give you a daily play-by-play because I simply can’t remember all of the details. But I know that the kids went boating in the pond with Granddaddy a couple of times and shooting the bb gun and other such things. Mom whipped out three desperately needed skirts for Katie this week (THANK YOU, MOM!!!), so that was great. Mom and I managed to find time to put together three puzzles this week, so that was fantastic! We played a few games, too, and even talked the guys into playing with us one night. Balderdash again. My Mom hates that game, but somehow she managed to win! It was fun, in spite of that fact. ;-)

Hhmmm. I’m blank. That’s all I can think of! We enjoyed church at Zion Hill on Wednesday night. It’s always such a blessing to be in service again after being away from church for a little while. I feel like I just soak it all up and go away feeling sooooo renewed. It was a good service with good worship, good prayer, and a good “I’m not going to preach tonight” thing by Brother Carter. :-) Afterwards we went over to pray for Sister Gayle, who has been very, very sick for quite a while now. Please remember to pray for her—she really needs the Lord to touch and heal her and renew her strength.

We took Mom & Dad out to eat for their Anniversary (which was actually before we got to Tennessee) and Brother Carter, Brother Dupre, and Grayson Kent went with us. We had a good time there, then Dad and James went to visit Brother Covey while Mom and I took the kids to the Bath & Body Works sale and then to Hobby Lobby.

We met up with the men again and James and I went to find a fax machine so we could fax some paperwork to our realtor to put an offer in on House #3! That’s right, we’re taking aim a third time. We’ve made a very low offer on the log cabin that needs lots of work and are praying for God’s will. If He wants us there, I would LOVE to make that house into a home (it would be sooooooo much fun, even though it needs a ton of work). If that’s not what He wants, I’m completely fine with that, too. There are pros and cons to every house you look at and all I’m really concerned with is God’s will. We are supposed to hear something back about that house in the next 2 or 3 hours. The folks may just laugh at our offer that’s soooooo much lower than what they’re asking, they may counter offer, or they may just say, “Sure! Why not!!!” God knows best, so we’re just taking it one step at a time and we’ll see what happens.

Right now we are somewhere near Vicksburg, I think. The plan is to make it into Texas tonight, as close to Dallas as we can get, but if we can just get across the border we’ve done pretty well. We’ll make it back to Andrews tomorrow night and stay with Aunt Sue. Then we’ll be able to be in Church there on Sunday and take care of our last business in town on Monday. Then we’ll head for Albuquerque on Tuesday or Wednesday and move into an extended stay motel. I probably won’t have a chance to blog again between now and then, but you never know. I’ve never played around with the Internet connection at Aunt Sue’s house. Anyway, that’s the latest from here! Hope all is well out there and having a great 2008! More later…

~Becki~

P.S. – Made it to Terrel, Texas, about 30 miles east of Dallas. We’re tucked away in our Motel 6 and although I can see the great big La Quinta sign right outside my window we’re just far enough away that we can’t get a good Internet connection. Oh well. I’m going to go take a bath (another Motel 6 with a tub!) and read for a while. I never take the time to do that. –OH! We heard back about House #3. The guy didn’t exactly sound like a “motivated seller” like his realtor had indicated. I’m so tired of hearing the term “motivated seller.” Anybody who puts his house on the market is a motivated seller—they’d all like to sell their houses. What we need is a desperate seller! One who’s actually willing to negotiate the price a little bit, you know?! Anyway, we’re still praying and we may make a counter offer to this guy’s counter offer tomorrow. Keep praying! :-)

4 comments

Christmas In Pennsylvania  

Posted by cokelady

Katie and Joe woke up at about 6:30, I think, and excitedly began waking everybody else in the house. This is the first year I recall the kids actually waking up first, so it was kind of exciting! This is the way it's supposed to be--not us dragging the kids out of bed at 7:00 or 8:00 and trying to get them awake enough to open presents like in years past! Ha! Kate and Joe were plenty awake and excited this year and it didn't take too long for Sam to join them.

We went into the living room and the kids were in awe of that ridiculous mountain of presents I mentioned last time. In our family, we always sort the presents and pass them all out, then open them. Around here the kids are supposed to just tear into 'em! So I left the camera work to James this year (I haven't looked to see what he got pictures of yet) and I kept my notebook handy. Still, it wasn't easy keeping up with three kids tearing into to things and writing down who got what and from whom! (It's difficult to send thank you cards if you don't know who to thank for what, you know!) Anyway, the kids had a truly grand time, of course, and got way more stuff than any kid should be allowed. Actually, it wouldn't have been that bad if it wasn't for cousin Frankie. Those 10 or 15 gifts pushed it over the top, I would say! Ha! (She is SUCH a nice person and I know she means well... but I really wish something could be done about this!) James' mother gets LOTS of stuff for the kids, but at least a whole lot of it is practical. They all get new winter coats and pajamas and shoes and stuff like that, then toys, too. I always get the same excess/materialistic feeling with all of the "extra" presents, though. It's just not a good thing, you know?! There are so many of them that the kids run from one to another and then another, all in 3o seconds. There's no time for them to even appreciate any of it because there's just TOO MUCH. I can see why kids in "the good old days" felt soooooo blessed and soooooo lucky when they got their one or two Christmas presents--what a special thing to get a gift! But when you get 20, what's so special about it?! Anyway, this may sound terrible, but James and I actually picked out several things and set them aside to give away to charity before they're ever even out of the package. It's just not good for kids to have so many toys! They've still got way more than they could ever need, I assure you. And it's not that we're ungrateful for the gifts... we just want to do what's best for the kid-o's. And 28 new toys in one day ain't it. ;-)

Another weird thing they do around here is keep all of the presents under the tree. After they're opened, I mean. Now that I think of it, it's rather ironic. They don't put any of the presents under the tree before Christmas, but after you open them, then you have to shove them all under the tree and leave them there--for days! They say it's because in the days following Christmas all of the family around here (and there are TONS) will sort of mill around and visit from house to house and you can show them what everybody got for Christmas 'cause it's still right there under the tree. Drives me nuts. Not that I don't get the concept--that's what they do around here and I'm glad they have traditions of some kind!--but the mess just makes me batty. It seems especially bad this year, maybe because I've been in nothing but mess for the past few weeks with the move! Who knows. Anyway, we piled everything back under the tree (which wouldn't be so bad, but "under the tree" doesn't take long to be "strewn all across the living room and throughout the rest of the house!" and THAT'S what gets to me!) and I started the hot rolls at about 8:00, I think. James went back to bed (of all the nerve!) and left me to spend the next hour or two helping kids get stuff out of dumb plastic packaging requiring a chainsaw to penetrate (don't you HATE those?!) and dippy wires strapping every little thing to a second layer of cardboard hidden on the inside of the box and digging out screwdrivers and installing batteries and all of that fun stuff. We worked on the house and dinner and ate at about 12:30, I think. It was good, even without gravy. (Another weird thing up here! Ha!) We had a really, really good ham, potatoes, noodles (which they put on top of the potatoes in lieu of the missing gravy--I told you, they're weird!!!), corn, stuffing, leftover chicken, and my hot rolls. And I made cinnamon rolls, too. James' mother had made apple pies (she makes the very best) and pinwheel cookies and chocolate chip drop cookies and something else, so there was already plenty of desert... but it always helps it feel more like Christmas if you have some of the things you're used to having! Thus the hot rolls and cinnamon rolls. And punch.

The kids played long and hard all day long and James' folks spent quite a while "up the hill" with them. They kids each constructed their own "house," so I hear, out of miscellaneous stuff from the barn. They were gone long enough for me to get a good nap, which I was thankful for! And by the excited chatter when they got back I know they all had a great time. :-)

The boys both crashed out on the couches by about 6:00 that night. Katie managed to stay awake long enough to help me make Christmas cookies. (Another one of those things we didn't NEED, except to make Christmas feel "right"!) They turned out great! Yum. I've eaten way, way, way too many of them in the past 24 hours!

Sam woke up just a few minutes before bedtime (creep!), but Joe just slept right on. I got him into his pj's and carried him in to bed. Sam apparently couldn't get sleepy enough to go down easily, so he stayed up being bad. I know that because in the middle of the night sometime he woke up and decided to haul his blanket and pillow into our room to sleep on the floor, as he sometime does. But it wasn't the pitter-patter of little feet we heard coming to our room, it was the CLOMP-CLOMP-CLOMP of cowboy boots! I knew the sound instantly and told him to take those crazy boots off. It wasn't until this morning that I realized he was dressed in full cowboy garb--jeans, cowboy shirt and the new vest he got from Auntie Em for Christmas. That turkey! He had apparently got all his duds on after being sent to bed last night.

Due to his adventuresome night, Sam slept in until about 9:00 today! Wow! Katie and Joe were up bright and early though. It was a pretty quiet day around here today. Except for about an hour of it when that dumb dog ran away. Ggrrrr!!! Sometimes I could just KILL him! Long story short: Hershey ran away while no adults were around to stop him (he actually stops and comes back to us nowadays) and we looked all over tarnation for him for about an hour. Uncle Don came stolling in with him after about an hour. What a pain!!! But at least Hershey acts remorseful now. He used to come home from running away all giddy and proud of himself. Now he slinks around all hunkered over and won't look straight at you, just sort of glances up out of the corner of his eyes. And if you start telling him what a bad dog he is he drops flat on his back and puts all four paws in the air and looks away in that "please don't beat me" thing of his. Pitiful. Anyway, God brought that dumb dog back home AGAIN. And I'm thankful.

That was about it today. Nothing else exciting. Tim Reitler, a CoGoP guy from up here that James used to be pretty close to, came to visit today. I know James really enjoyed that. And that's it! I'm really wishing I would have brought a cross-stitch with me. It would be nice to have some handwork to do. Katie got a potholder kit for Christmas (two of them, actually) and she whipped out her first two potholders yesterday and another one today. She sold the "hunter one" (orange and green--because every hunter wants a potholder! Ha!) to Grandpa Norman for $2. Ha! What a racket! I made two potholders of my own today, too, although I don't intend to sell them for $2 a whack. ;-) It's actually kind of fun. We told Katie she can make a whole bunch of them and donate them to the Mission table or something. She was really excited about that. :-)

Okay, that's it from around here. I wanted to post before I got too far behind and couldn't remember anything. I know how this goes! More in a day or two, I'm sure.


~Bec~

7 comments

Christmas Eve  

Posted by cokelady

...and boy am I tired!!! We got a pretty early start today and had a good, non-eventful day of travelling, which was nice for a change! We stopped along the way to do our last minute shopping with the 8,000 other idiots at the Dollar Store and Wal-Mart. DUMB. But we just hadn't had a chance to take care of some things. Such as...
The kids' gifts for each other. Every December we let the kids "work" to earn some money so they can buy a present for the the other two. This year they've done lots of extra work (!), but we didn't have to pay them anything since they already had enough money. Sam just had a birthday, so he has plenty. Katie had a couple of dollars already, then she helped Tammy deliver papers a couple of weeks ago and earned $5 more. And all three kids got $10 in their Merry Christmas/Farewell cards from the Andrews church! Crazy. Anyway, we took them to the dollar store for the annual fiasco. Katie and Joe are starting to do much better about keeping secrets, but Sam is the worst we've ever had. He picked out a toy for Joe and hadn't even put it in the basket before he was yelling into the other aisle, "Hey, Joe! I got you a ternade (grenade)--will you share it with me?!" HA! It was only a few minutes before Katie was informed that she was getting a jump rope. The rat. Anyway, they got their shopping done and we were able to get some stocking stuffers, too.
Then we had to stop at Wal-Mart so I could pick up a few ingredients to make some things so it might actually feel like Christmas! I haven't been able to do any of the traditional baking this year and it's just wrong! But now I'm equipped to make hot rolls, cinnamon rolls and Christmas cookies tomorrow. I've got the punch mixed up and in the freezer so it'll be ready for dinner tomorrow. Those things should help.
We finally made it to James' folks house at about 4:00 this afternoon. Praise the Lord!!! It is soooooo good to finally land somewhere solid for a few days! James' Mom had a nice chicken dinner ready for us when we got here, so we enjoyed that then worked on getting the van all unloaded and cleaned out. I got everything looking good in the van and got all of our suitcases unpacked and everything in its place in the house. Gave baths to all of the smelly kids, then we hopped in the van with the whole crew (Grandparents included) and drove around Mount Union to look at the Christmas lights. We stopped by James' Aunt Grace's house and went in for just a few minutes to say hello to the crowd there. That was nice. I like Aunt Grace a lot--and I love her crazy daughter Amy!
We came home and let the kids open the gifts they had bought for one another (the only things they are allowed to open on Christmas Eve!) and play with them for a little while before having devotions and putting them to bed. Ooooooh, that's what I've been missing. In all of our travelling we haven't had a chance to really do devotions (our regular devotions, that is, with the usual Bible reading and prayer time) the past several days. I hate that! I miss it so much. I'm always so ashamed when this happens. I was able to get some "alone time" with God last night while I was driving and everybody else was asleep, so that was nice. I'm excited to actually BE somewhere and hopefully be able to find the time and a quiet place for the truly important things. :-) Anyway... Don't know where that came from!
We put the kids to bed sometime after 9:00 and I went to take my shower. A good, long, hot one. :-) Mixed up the punch and stuffed the kids' stockings. You want to hear something weird? When we got here today, there wasn't a single present under the tree. Not one! They were all piled up in James' folks' room. Weird! They wait until after the kids have gone to bed and then drag them all out. None of them are "from Santa," they're all just from Grandma or whoever, but for some reason they can't be under the tree until after everybody is asleep. We don't really do the Santa thing either way, but still... it's weird! Oh well. I saw James and his Mom make trip after trip into the living room with armfulls of gifts a few minutes ago. I guess that means the kids are finally asleep. And there is a mountain of gifts under the tree now. James' Mom just can't help herself. There are always wa-a-a-a-a-a-a-a-ay too many gifts when we come up here! --James has got this cousin that shops for the kids and gets each of them 3 or 4 things usually!!! A cousin!!! It's so strange. I really wish folks would cut back. It's not that I'm ungrateful (really!), but it makes me feel terrible that they get so much for the kids--and it's just so unnecessary. Oh well. There's not much that can be done about it I guess!
I am sad that I don't have my diary. I used to actually write in it a little bit, but never could be faithful to it. Except on Christmas Eve. I always get it out and write for a little while on Christmas Eve after everybody else has gone to bed. But this year it's packed away in a box somewhere in a storage unit back in Texas! Oh well. At least I have my blog! I guess that will have to do this time.
I hope and pray that you all have a very, very Merry Christmas!!! I'll be looking forward to reading all about what you all did--and seeing lots of pictures. :-) Love you!

~Becki~

2 comments

Are We There Yet???  

Posted by cokelady

~whew~ What a trip! Yesterday was possibly the worst weather day we’ve ever had to fight. It was just nasty all day long. Things were already pretty slick in Amarillo before we got out of town. (We heard there was an 80 car pile-up there after we left.) We got a late start because… well, because we are TIRED! We got up and went down to the courtyard area and got our free breakfast. Eggs cooked to order, hash browns, sausage, toast and juice. Not bad! Especially for a $31 ratty motel! It’s much better in the daylight. ;-)

We had to stop at the Post Office so James could mail the car title and info back to Aunt Sue in Texas because she’s got a buyer for it. Got onto the interstate and discovered that James had forgotten to send the keys with the paperwork! Ha! I love it when he does things like that!!! :-) Oh well—we’ll have to worry with that later. Then we drove. And drove. And drove and drove and drove. Very slowly. The roads were slick all day long and we were in blizzard type conditions, but not good blizzard. There was never any accumulation on the ground, just whirling, swirling snow and whiteout conditions and very, very slippery roads. We kept praying and trudging on and FINALLY made it out of Oklahoma (that state felt every bit as big as Texas yesterday!) and into Missouri. Almost immediately things cleared up, the roads were just wet, not icy, and the snow stopped. We could actually SEE! Wa-Hoo! We stopped in Joplin for dinner at Steak and Shake. ~aaaahhhh~ What a great husband I have! Frisco Melt with extra Frisco sauce to dip my fries in (then Sam and Katie’s leftover fries, too) and an orange freeze. So it turned into a good day after all! ;-)

We filled up the tank and hit the road again, but only made it to Springfield because we were so worn out. So we stayed at a really nice Motel 6 there. It even had a bathtub (they usually only have a shower), which was a good thing since Hershey Dog needed a bath. Got the dog scrubbed up, dried off, and combed out, let the kids watch the non-scary parts of the Wizard of Oz and a few minutes of the Ewoks fighting the stormtroopers (again, gotta go non-scary! Ha!) before hitting the hay.

This morning we were on the road by about 8:00 and have had a much, much better day. It’s been nice and clear and dry, but because of our bad weather yesterday there is no way we’ll be able to make it to James’ folks’ house tonight. Unless we get a marvelous surge of energy that sees us through ‘til about 2:00am! So we’ll get as close as we can tonight, then ease on in tomorrow. It’s so strange to travel on a Sunday and not be in Church. It just doesn’t FEEL like Sunday, you know?! I read through two Evening Lights this afternoon so that helps a little, but it’s just not the same! It’s about 4:00 now and we’re driving through Indianapolis. Another 5 or 6 hours should get us within 4 more hours of the Horne home for tomorrow. We’ll see what happens. Until next time…

~Becki~

P.S.—Did I say this has been a good traveling day? HA! I take it back. Almost immediately after I wrote the above post we came to a dead stop on Interstate 70 just outside of Indianapolis. About 25 miles out, I think. We waited for over two hours before finally giving up and turning around and heading back a few miles to Greenfield. We grabbed a bite at KFC and filled up with gas again and now we’re trying to take Highway 40 east to the Ohio border. Us and about 1,000 other people who have given up on the Interstate, too! It is 8:46 right now. I think it was about 5:15 when we got held up. That’s quite a delay! So now we’re just hoping to make it to James’ folks’ house before Christmas Day!!! Still, we have sooooo much to be thankful for. All we know about the accident on I-70 is that at least 3 people were killed. We knew it had to be pretty severe to have traffic held up for so long, but I had been praying that somehow there wouldn’t be any fatalities. We saw cop cars galore heading to the accident and James says that at least three helicopters came and went while we were waiting. How awful to be in an accident anytime, but especially at this time of year. There are so many people on the roads headed home for the holidays. God is so good to keep His hand on us and I’m thankful that although late, our family is all safe and sound. I’ve been praying for those in the accident and their families. How awful. Wow—from where we are on Highway 40 we can see I-70 running parallel to us about 4 miles north. It is still completely clogged up with taillights as far as the eye can see. That must’ve been some accident! Please be in prayer for the survivors and the families involved. They will all need special grace from God. Perhaps souls can be saved through all of this tragedy.

P.P.S.—Made it to Zanesville, Ohio. It’s nearly 1:00am now. Would have driven on in to Wheeling, WV but the kids were shot. We’re checked into our hotel with “free high speed Internet,” but you have to go sit in the hallway next to the lobby in order to access it, so says the man at the front desk in a very thick foreign accent. At least I think that's what he said. No big deal. I’m going to bed anyway! I’ll post this when we get to Pennsylvania—hopefully sometime tomorrow!!!

1 comments

Take Two  

Posted by cokelady

I spent the longest time typing up a post yesterday while we were driving, only to lose the whole thing. So I’ll try again. We’ve been having issues with the laptop, so I hope I’m not wasting my time again!

Let’s see, the last time I blogged was Monday night. I think. Tuesday was a long and grueling day. James rented the U-Haul so we could empty the house and get everything over to the storage units on the edge of town. Everything started out well enough. I have discovered that I really like packing the truck. It’s like a giant puzzle and there’s a strangely fun and rewarding feeling when you can get all those boxed to fit just right. Furniture is a different matter entirely. It ended up being the kind of day where you are working and working and working, but when you look around there is still SO MUCH to be done and you just don’t feel like you’re accomplishing anything, you know?! I can’t remember what time we gave up and called it quits for the night. Tammy was there helping again, of course, and Aunt Sue took the kids home and fed them and gave them much needed baths and all the things their mother has been failing to do lately!

Hhmmm… There are sooooo many things I’m forgetting! My brain gave out a day or two ago and I can’t seem to remember anything or read a map or tell my left from my right or nuthin’! Ha! Anyway, Wednesday was another long, hard day of hauling stuff over to storage, but it went much better than the day before. Or maybe my spirits were just better! I kind of crashed on Tuesday and was just so DONE with all of this madness!!! But God helped me to recover quickly and we had a good day Wednesday. Aunt Sue and Tammy juggled the kids so James and I could work without distraction which was nice. Sam & Tammy left for their Christmas trip to Washington at about 3:00 that afternoon, I think. The kids helped us load some things up and Sam had a wonderful time riding his Big Wheels bike down the ramp of the U-Haul! Ha! I meant to get the video camera out and tape him for a minute or two, but never got around to it. It looked like such a blast though! If my knees weren’t so sore I would have wanted to try it. ;-)

I spent a large part of the day cleaning. I got the refrigerator all cleaned out, threw lots of stuff away and bagged up lots of other stuff for Tammy and Aunt Sue. Then I took all of the shelves and drawers out to give everything a thorough scrubbing. It will feel so nice to have a nice sparkly clean fridge whenever we get a new house! Same thing with the microwave. I had gotten mad at the toaster oven the day before and given it to Tammy. We were running low on boxes and it was an inch sort of fitting in every box that I tried. “Do you want this thing?!” “I don’t know what I’d do with it…” “It’s a toaster oven! You can make… TOAST! Or… bake… little things!” (Long pause…) “Okay.” “GREAT—I’ll put it with your stuff!” ;-) It felt good to be rid of it.

Moving is not conducive to marriage. I just thought I’d throw that out there in case anybody didn’t already know it. I’ll spare you all the gory details, I’ll just share what I told James. “If you ever die, I’m going to go find a nice, tidy, well organized garage… and I’m going to marry the man who owns it!!!” You can put the pieces together. ;-)

We finally got the very last load into the storage shed and James dropped me off back at the house at 12:15am. Then he went out to join the sleeping children at Aunt Sue’s house while I stayed and did all of the cleaning that only I can do. I’m sooooo glad we’ve been cleaning all along the way—or else I’d STILL be there working on it! Every time we would get a room totally packed up, we’d move everything out of it and I’d clean the ceiling fan and work my way down, walls, closet, windows, baseboards, then vacuum and shut the door. :-) All of the bedrooms were already done, and several other rooms were real close, so that helps. I had finished up in the toy room, my office, the den and both bathrooms earlier in the day, so all I really had left to do was clean the bottom half of the kitchen (cabinets inside and out), the kitchen floor, and the living room. I spent about 45 minutes scrubbing the kitchen floor, then collected all of the trash and set it by the back door, then got the living room all cleaned up and ~voila~ I was done!!! …At 2:15 in the morning. I was sooooo tired, but it felt sooooo good! The house looks fantastic. I wish other people would clean their houses when they move out like I clean mine when I do. I remember how gross that house was when we bought it. Nobody should have to move into a house like that! It feels so good to have it shining for the new owners. Makes me feel like a good steward or something!

I made it out to Aunt Sue’s and took a nice hot shower and slipped into bed just a few minutes before 3:00am. Boy, did I need that shower! I was sooooo achy! I counted bruises just for the fun of it. 25 on one leg. Then I was curious to see how many were on the other leg. 25! Weird. 50, just on my legs. I stopped there. James and I spent all the next day moaning and groaning and hobbling around. My back was killing me, my knees hurt, one ankle was giving me fits, the toe I kept stubbing at the storage unit felt swollen, my arms were sooooo tired and achy and my hands are banged up and dried out and ready to crack and bleed. James has his own list of ailments and I’m sure Tammy’s is probably just about as long! Ha! Pitiful. I’m glad it’s over!!! At least the first half is over.

We got up at about 8:30, I think, yesterday. Aunt Sue took James to return the U-Haul while I got the kids ready for the day. Then we went to Aunt Sue’s store to pick up a housewarming gift for our buyers. I found a little plaque/sign with a flower that says “This is Where I Belong” and a tiny little thing that has two sheep and a little house sitting on top of little letter blocks that say “Home Sweet Home.” We wrote out a card welcoming them to Andrews and told them that we hope they’re happy there and that the house will soon feel like home to them and provide lots of good memories for their family as it has for ours. We took it over to the house and left it on the kitchen counter, then went out back and gathered up the last of the trash and vacuumed out James’ office. Then we went back inside and walked through the house one last time. We laughed one last time in the house. We cried one last time in the house. We kissed one last time in the house. Why not?! We had fought one last time in the house the day before! Ha! It’s such a bittersweet thing. It’s exciting to go some place new and think of what all God may have in store for you there, but it’s always so sad to close a chapter of your life. I’m going to miss Andrews and I’m especially going to miss Sam & Tammy and the family I’m leaving behind. That part is sooooo sad!!! But when you follow God you’ll be happy, no matter where that takes you. And if you refuse to follow, you won’t be happy anyway—even if you stay right where you think you’ll be happy!

We ate lunch at Cassidy’s, my favorite sandwich shop in town, then ran by the bank and out to the storage place to dump off the vacuum cleaners. Then we hit the road! Headed west!!! That’s right, we’re going to Pennsylvania for Christmas… by way of Albuquerque! Ha! A slight detour. ;-) It just seemed like the wise thing to do to go look one more time for a house before heading east. After all, we are officially homeless now. :-) So we got in last night, used our Chili’s gift card and had a great dinner (thank you, Andrews church!!!), then went to the motel and crashed. We checked the online listings some more, but I really think we’ve pretty much exhausted all of the house possibilities around here! We have worked that poor realtor of ours to death!!! Jason has taken us all over Albuquerque and back several times and taken us in probably 20 houses or more (James thinks closer to 30) and spent untold hours doing research for us as well. Realtors get a fantastic commission when they sell a house, but this is the first guy I’ve ever seen who actually WORKS for it! Ha! He’s the best.

So this morning we got up and enjoyed our continental breakfast and headed out to meet Jason and look at the last of the possible houses for us. We looked inside 4 houses in Rio Rancho (a suburb to the northwest of Albuquerque), one of which is a definite possibility. Then we drove out to Edgewood to look in four more. One of them… well, it would take way too long to describe it in detail, but it is a log cabin in need of some serious TLC. Perfect!!! We’re having Jason check into some things and we’ll see if it’s a possibility. It’s the kind of place that would look scary to most folks. But it’s the kind of place that would be sooooo fun to fix up! It’s just so… ME! A very rustic log cabin up in the mountains… It was even snowing. ;-) Anyway, we’re still praying. Whatever God wants is most important. The houses we had originally considered to be possibilities in town seem to be falling through, so that means God must have something else in mind. I’m trying to keep myself from getting my heart set on the log cabin—but it’s tough, I’ll admit! Ha! Strangely enough, neither of us are feeling any pressure or anxiousness about the house situation. Even though we’re homeless. :-) It would be terrible to rush into a big decision like buying a home! So it’s an extra blessing that God is keeping our spirits calm and patient and… trusting. There are some nice extended stay motels in Albuquerque, so we may be calling one of them home for a little while until we can get moved into whatever God has for us out there. :-)

Okay, I started this blog hours ago, on the road. We’re now in our motel room in Amarillo. We had hoped to make it a little farther than this, but it’s been a very long couple of weeks with no break at all and we are wiped out! We’re staying at a motel that is strangely reminiscent of the Free Breakfast Inn from our BTI days. Only Erika and Mandie will understand that statement, since they were the ones to share that memorable experience with us! “Number 4 is ready, Ruth!” Okay, so we’re at the La Kiva Hotel and it’s just a little scary. Not as bad as the Free Breakfast Inn… but real close! Actually, I think it might have been an Embassy Suites in it’s former glory… but that was a long, long, long time ago! Ha! We usually stay at Motel 6 or La Quinta’s when we travel with the dog because they actually accept pets—with no extra charge. The La Quinta in town was full and the Motel 6 looked rough. We found a coupon in our travel guide for this place for $31 and it said pets were welcome. What were we to do?! I told James that it’s GOOD to have experiences like this every now and again. Life gets so mundane if you don’t experience a little adventure (and danger?!) on occasion. ;-) We’re locked securely in our room (that's one thing this has up on the Free Breakfast Inn--we had to shove a chair under the doorknob to "lock" the door there!) on the third floor (after lugging two suitcases, pillows, blankets, my purse, camera bag, laptop and miscellaneous other items up two flights of very rickety and rattily carpeted stairs) and expect to close our eyes to all around us and sleep well tonight. I think I’ll forego my shower in the morning and wait until the next motel. ;-)

Don’t know how far we’ll make it tomorrow. Map Point says we've got 1518.6 miles to go to get to James’ folks house. That equals about 22 more hours. We’ve come 670 miles from Andrews to Albuquerque to Amarillo. Good thing our kids are good travelers! I’ll check in again when I can. Until then…

~Becki~

7 comments

Too Tired to Think of a Title  

Posted by cokelady

~whew~ What a day. ~WHEW~ What a week! This has been a long and tiring, but strangly rewarding week. (By "week" I am referring to the past 7 days since we officially started moving.)

Sunday we... wait... was that just yesterday?! GOOD GRIEF! It feels like at least 3 days ago!!! Okay, so yesterday was a good day. !!! All I did in the morning was clean some things up. Like the kitchen that had previously been DEEP in... stuff. "Put it on the counter, Katie." "What counter???" It was bad. Then we all got cleaned up and went to church. That was sooooo nice! It felt so good to get everybody (me, most of all!) out of the grungies we've been wearing and into something NICE and have nicely fixed hair and actually feel clean for a little while. And church was so good. It felt sooooo good and relaxing to go and worship God for a little while. I've been very careful to not let this move "take over" and push God out of the way and have sat down with the kids every morning to do our devotions. I'm sure that's a BIG reason why I'm coping with all of this chaos so well! Speaking of chaos...

We found out Sunday morning (yesterday, right?!) that house #2 isn't going to work out either. That means we are homeless as of next week! Wow! I've never thought about being homeless before. The really, really strange thing is that it doesn't bother me in the least. I am sooooo not worried about it. Right now I am focused on one thing and one thing alone: get this house packed, everything moved into storage, and get the place shining for the new owners. That's three things. I'm focused on three things. :-) (Speaking of the new owners, I found out today that they are "a wonderful Christian homeschool family" from upstate New York and they sold their farmhouse to come here and were worried about what west Texas would have to offer. This was the second house they looked at and the wife said, "Show me no more--this is the house I want." They LOVED it and don't plan on changing a thing! WOW!!! It makes me sooooo happy! And it makes me sooooo glad that we took the time to pray for "the right buyers at the right time and all that." :-) Anyway...) Back to our being homeless, it's kind of like a new adventure for us. Neat, in a way. I'm sure it will get old, but maybe by that time God will have opened something else up for us! I was telling James how that I have a tendency to be so critical of other people and if I knew of a family in the situation we are now in I would be thinking, "Let me get this straight... You sold your house, you're uprooting your family, and you have NO PLACE to go?! That is sooooo irresponsible?! How could you have not PLANNED better than that and have SOMETHING lined up by now?!" Ha! Well, here we are! We've been TRYING to work something out, but nothing has panned out yet. We're doing the work! We're not slackers! ;-) In God's own good time. In the meantime, I'm kind of enjoying the novelty of it all. Fun! It's definitely going to be a Christmas we'll always remember. :-) And I thought of the scripture yesterday that says something like, "And having food and raiment, let us therewith be content." Shelter is optional apparently and not necessary in order for us to be content! Jesus didn't have a house and He was happy. We have food. We have clothes. And boxes. LOTS AND LOTS of boxes. (Optional, too!) And I feel sooooo... content. :-)

Let's see, where was I? Sunday. Yesterday. After church we grabbed a bite to eat, then headed home to get back to work. I honestly can't remember what all was accomplished last night and what happened today--it all runs together and feels like at least 4 days worth of work at this point! Ha! Sam & Tammy came over to help again and we made great headway in the living room and den.

Today has been another long, hard one, but with great things accomplished. Tammy was here for about... oh, 9 or 10 hours, working away again! She packs circles around me. I've always been sooooo bad about THINKING too much. I'll look at what needs packed and stand there and stare at it and work the puzzle in my brain of what needs to go where and in which box and with what else... And Tammy will have three boxes already done! Ha! (It's kind of like the lists I always used to make, right, Mom?!) Between the two of us, we got ALL of the living room and den finished, ALL of the Christmas stuff taken down and packed up (including the lights on the roof), and 95% of the kitchen. At this point there are just a few things left in the kitchen to pack up, then the computers and a couple of stereos and whatever miscellaneous junk is still lying around here and there.

We worked until nearly midnight tonight and only stopped then because we ran out of tape. Again. James bought 4 rolls this morning! We need one more. And we actually used that whole roll of newsprint!!! So now we're using my bathroom towels to "wrap" the rest of the kitchen stuff in! Ha! Guess we can't take showers at the new house (assuming we get one! Ha!) until we unpack the kitchen. ;-) We ran out of boxes earlier today and James went and picked some up from the dollar store. We ran out again tonight so at 9:00 James and I were rummaging around behind the Dollar General gathering up Depends underwear boxes and such. Homeless and already rummaging through the dumpsters! HA! In the morning we'll need just a few more boxes and packing material (and tape, of course) and we can finish up. James has a U-Haul reserved for tomorrow, so we plan on getting this house EMPTIED! Wa-Hoo! Then I intend to make sure everything is spotless for this "wonderful Christian homeschool family" and I want to fill all of the nail holes and get out all 14 colors of paint to touch up with. It's no doubt going to be a long day tomorrow! We'll be staying with Aunt Sue & Uncle Jerry. She's already promised us stew and cornbread for tomorrow night and I can't wait. I'm so ready for a nice homecooked meal! We've been living on sandwiches and pizzas for a week now.

When Sam & Tammy left tonight (Sam came over and helped, too, later on) I decided to make myself take the time to go soak in a nice hot bath. ~aahhhh~ It was sooooo nice. In my wonderful, marvellous, sparkly-clean, deep bathtub with the little ledge perfect for resting your elbows so you can hold your Reminisce magazine and read... ~sigh~ I knew I would always regret it if I didn't take the time to enjoy one last bath in there! I'm REALLY going to miss that tub. And everything else about that bathroom! That's the one we totally gutted and remodled and it's bright yellow and blue (sounds tacky--it's not, it's gorgeous!) and, and, and... I love it. :-) If James would let me I'd rip the tub out of there and take it with me. Ha!

And now I'm taking the time to blog. Not very smart, probably, but since this has become my diary, of sorts, I figured I would some day appreciate all of these things that I won't remember unless they're written down. But now it's nigh until 1:00am and I've GOT to get some sleep. Whatever the hot bath did to alleviate my aches and pains has now been lost due to sitting on the hard floor in my office typing away! My back has been getting a little more sore each day and I'm REALLY feeling it tonight. Tammy has been having her own crop of aches and pains, too. I accredit hers to "just getting old," but I choose to claim mine to be "an old plane crash injury." Ha!

Okay, I'm going to get some shut eye. Keep praying for us! God's been sooooo good and sooooo faithful through all of this and it's so wonderful to know that HE CARES for us and that He moves in answer to our prayers. We are just so very, very blessed. No proof reading again tonight and there are several words that my brain just blanked out on tonight. Don't laugh. Or do, but don't tell me about it! G'night all!

~Rebekah~

3 comments

The Most Wonderful Friend in the World  

Posted by cokelady

(Sung to the tune of "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year." Now if only I had time to WRITE it, we'd be in business. Ha!)

I'm referring, of course, to Tammy. What other friend would spend all day crying because you're moving away and all night helping you pack?! That's probably a slight exaggeration. I'm sure she doesn't sit and cry all day long about losing dear old me, but she has mentioned that she's had a weepy day here and there over the issue. (Me, too!) She came over again last night and worked like a Trojan (what exactly does that mean? How does a Trojan work, anyway?) for about 5 hours. She was working in the kitchen and she got all of my dishes and glasses packed up (we're living off of paper and styrofoam this week anyway), as well as all of the signs and Coke paraphanalia from the walls and shelves. Wa-Hoo! That enabled me to get Katie's room totally packed and scrubbed down. It put me far enough ahead that Tammy and I took time (while the kids were having a pizza party and watching The Toy that Saved Christmas) to have some Totino's and play a few rounds of Eternal Rummy. It's been a few months since we've had a chance to do that, what, with all the craziness. For the first time ever, I actually felt bad being 5,000 points ahead of her--simply because she is just the most amazing friend in the world and I feel like a heel blowing her out of the water month after month. She did gain about 1,000 on me last night, so that probably made us both feel better. Ha!

James has set to work out in his office and has a pile of boxes full of BOOKS, BOOKS, and MORE BOOKS stacked by the door. I think he's making pretty good progress out there.

We put an add the the paper to sell some of our furniture and such. The paper came out yesterday afternoon and we've already sold over half of what we advertized! Somebody bought our small table and four chairs (James has had it since college--we've recovered the seats on it twice and used it for a kitchen table, a computer desk, and everything in between) and the washer and dryer (--they evey agreed to let me keep it for a few more days so I'll have a chance to get some things clean and ready for our uncertain future!), and a wagon wheel they happened to spot outside. It wasn't advertized, but HEY, they offered. :-) We also sold the entertainment cabinet that we had bought from Alco, sanded down and painted green when we first moved here. We even mixed our own green for it because the green I BOUGHT for it was GREEN. I mean, like, PRIMARY green. The color of green you get in a set of fingerpaints for 1st Graders. So it needed some tweaking and we managed to come up with a tone we were happy with. ~sigh~ It's kind of sad when I think of all of the memories we've created in this place. I've managed to keep myself from thinking about it too much (being super busy helps!), but every now and again it creeps up on me. I do my best to shove it out of my mind and tell myself I'll have time to cry later. ;-) We also sold my great big clunky desk. ~sniff~ I love that desk! (There I go again!!!) But we're getting the same amount out of it that we paid for it, so it's served me well for the past four years. For free. :-) We were going to sell the changing table/dresser we bought when I was pregnant with Katie, too. That was making me sad, but we really have no use for it anymore. I feel much better about it now that Tammy has decided to take it off our hands. At least I know it's going to a good home. :-) And don't get any funny ideas--Tammy has no NEED of a changing table at this point in time, or even nine months from now as far as I know. No need to start calling her and slinging excited questions, okay?! I'm sure she'll let you all know if/when she has something grand and glorious to tell you! And I know she would appreciate your prayers that she WILL have something grand and glorious to tell you! ASAP! :-)

Okay, I'd best be going. The people are coming to pick up the entertainment cabinet today and the other people are coming to pick up my desk this morning. Then it's off to church! I think I'll enjoy church DOUBLE today. It will be so refreshing in the midst of all of this! (And it'll be great to just get out of this messy house for a little while! Ha!) Then it's home again and back to work. No rest on this day-of-rest! Ha! Actually, I may actually try to slip in a nap today. I could really use one.

I'll let you go. Keep us in your prayers--and have a wonderful, blessed Sunday!

~Becki~

No time to proof read again--just bear with me! :-)

4 comments

Wiped Out... Already!  

Posted by cokelady

I am soooooo tired! But I'm feeling good about my progress. :-)
Toy Room: CHECK
Office: CHECK
Bedroom: CHECK
Bedroom Closet: CHECK
Boys Room: CHECK
Boys Closet: CHECK
It probably seems strange that I'm counting closets just like regular rooms, but I've come to discover that they are at least as hard to pack as the rooms are! Probaby because of sorting through everything and making piles of clothes to donate, clothes to pack in boxes, and clothes to keep out and have on hand for the next however long until the boxes get unpacked who knows where. ;-) I also got Katie's closet sorted through tonight, but that's all. Just huge piles all over her room. I had to do it though because James is going to take the BAGS upon BAGS of "bless-somebody-else" clothes down to Goodwill in Odessa tomorrow morning. It feels sooooo good to have that out of the way! It feels GOOD to be rid of all the stuff we don't need and it feels GOOD to know that perhaps somebody else will get some use out of it. Oh--I'll have another little bag of the extra-cute stuff for Abbie, Em. :-)
Today was Tammy's solo bake sale. I helped her get set up this morning, then left Katie to help while I came back home and packed. Went back when she was ready to close up shop and we got everything loaded up and took the left-overs to city hall where Katie was THRILLED to find the city manager, Glen Hackler. She simply adores him and he seems to think pretty highly of her, too. And he's always very generous with his purchases and donations for the Church. :-) After that we headed over to the newspaper office where Sam works. In the end I think Tammy said her grand total was $310!!! WOWZERS! And all of that without me! She is AMAZING!!! Sara was able to help out with this one, but her folks were really itching for her to get on the road and get home, so she wasn't able to stay and help as long as she otherwise would have. Still, it was a great help! I know that Tammy just knocked herself out over this one and God truly blessed. Wa-Hoo!
Hhmmm. There was more I was going to say, but I can't think of what it was. Oh well. I am sooooo tired. It's only 9:30, but I'm completely wiped out. James ran to Sonic to get me a cherry-limeade, just because that's the kind of guy he is. I think he mentioned something about cheesesticks, too. I think I'll sit down and watch It's a Wonderful Life or something. Or at least I'll START watching it. Don't know how long I'll last!
Anyway, so far so good! :-)
Oh, and Mom & Dad and company made it to Costa Rica just fine and everything seems to be going great. Keep them in your prayers! God is sooooo good--I know He'll bless this trip as He does all the others. ;-)
Later!

~Bec~

--Too tired to proof read. Sorry about the mistakes--I'm sure there are a truckload of them! Ha!

4 comments

I'm Going to Regret This...  

Posted by cokelady

But I'm going to take the time to blog anyway! What about that?! :-)

I thought I'd stop by to give you a little update and hopefully post some pictures of our Albuquerque trip. Actually, I was packing away when I suddenly ran out of boxes and I didn't want to go out to the shed in the cold and dark of the night to get more, so I figured it was a good time to stop. I'm sure I'll have some late packing nights in the next week, but this ain't one of them. :-)

Yesterday the plan was to get up bright and early, unload the van from the trip and get everything put away, then start packing like a mad woman. Nope. We all slept in until 9:00, for starters! By the time I got everybody fed and dressed and had done devotions with them, there was a knock at the door. The inspector. (Insert "doom" sound effects there.) This is the guy who looks at every tiny little thing in and out of our house and decides what all we need to fix before selling. He actually turned out to be a very, very nice guy--with a terrific Texas accent, so I kept him talking all I could. :-) The kids have a hard time staying out of folks' way, so we thought it best to load up and go get lunch so the inspector could finish his job without so much distraction. We were gone for 30 or 40 minutes and the guy was still here when we got back! He was VERY, VERY thorough. Made me VERY, VERY nervous! Ha! He told us that there weren't any major problems, just a few little "easy" things here and there. We'll find out what that means later, I guess!

By the time he finally left it was after 1:00 and I had accomplished NOTHING. So I went to the toy room and dove in. Game closet first. I got it all sorted out and boxed up, then all the boxes stuffed back into the closet. Except three. I kept out I Buy, Catch Phrase and Balderdash. Just in case we have nothing to do this next week and decide to sit and play a game. HA! Things were going much, much slower than I had anticipated, but that's probably because the toy room is the one and only room of the house that I intend to "sort through" and GET RID OF stuff from. We have way, way, way too many toys and right now is a really great time to donate them, with Christmas coming up. Tammy came over and helped me for a couple of hours. WOW. That girl is a packing machine!!! She accomplished more in the two hours she worked than I had done all day! Ha! I finished up in the toy room while she started in my office. She got most everything packed out of my closet (you can't possibly know what a feat that was) and everything out of that huge desk of mine, too. WOW.

At about 10:00 I decided that I was totally burned out and was DONE working for the night. James ran to Sonic for dinner (I had fed the kids sandwhiches earlier, but didn't want to stop to eat) and Tammy called Sam and asked him to come over and play games for an hour. Can you believe that?! Ha! I'm SOOOOO glad I took the time for that, though. I needed the break (already--that can't be a good sign! Ha!) and the fellowship with Sam & Tammy. I am going to miss them soooooo much. I've tried not to think about it too much, but when they left Sam came back to the door and told me that they're really going to miss me. Oooooh. That did me in. I closed the door and just cried and cried. ~sigh~ I HATE this part of moving. But I have no right to complain. God has blessed me sooooo much by allowing me to live near my very dear friend and her great husband (who has become a very dear friend, too) for TWO WHOLE YEARS! We never expected that and it's been sooooo great. But now we've gotten spoiled on it and it's so hard to think of not being with them! But God knows. He'll help us all, I'm sure.

I got to bed at about midnight last night, then we all slept until 9:00 again! WHOA! That week in Albuquerque really did us in, I guess! We had devotions right away, then I got to work out in the office. And that's where I remained throughout the rest of the day! James took Joe to Odessa to do some running around (he got me a HUGE end roll of blank newsprint from the newspaper down there for only $5--I don't know how anybody moves without it!), so that left Katie and Sam here. They watched some Christmas shows and played some video games since they were going to receive no attention from their mother whatsoever. They seemed okay with that. ;-) I was able to get the office TOTALLY finished, packed, emptied, and cleaned from the ceiling fan down to the baseboards. :-) That feels sooooo good! The only things still in the room are my computer and stereo (on the floor now, but staying until the very end, I assure you!), the desk James is making me sell (I know it's huge and clunky, but I love it!) and the hide-away sofa that we can't decide if we're going to sell or not. Oh, and the changing table/dresser that we're going to sell, too. So here are a couple of pictures of The Move: Part One... :-)



This is the toy-room-turned-storage-room..


Our goal is to be done packing and have the house emptied (we rented a couple of storage units today) and shining by the 20th. If we can do that, then on the 21st we'll load up and head back east for Christmas. It's really our only chance of HAVING anything that feels like "Christmas" this year! I don't know how likely it is that we'll accomplish this goal, but we've got to try. :-) My current speed seems to be one room a day. I still have the kitchen/dining room, the den, the living room, the bathroom, Katie's room, the boys' room, our room, and the other bathroom. I'm scared to add 'em up--I don't think it would add up too well for our "leaving on the 21st goal." Actually, I have NO IDEA what the date is today. That's probably a good thing. I'm not going to look either. At least for a few more days. JERK! That creep was reading over my shoulder and just blurted out, "It's the 12th." Ggrrrr. I SOOOOO did not want to know that!!! I'm still not going to add up the rooms, though. :-)

Tomorrow morning after devotions I'm going to start packing up our bedroom, then the boys', then Katie's. I really have no idea what to anticipate. I'm hoping (or maybe it's just positive thinking?!) that the office is going to end up being one of the harder rooms to pack. Surely bedrooms can't be that bad. Right?! I guess I'll find out tomorrow!

Then tomorrow night we're going to be having the Christmas ABM Service/Party here. Yes, you heard right--I said HERE. I had forfeited that idea until James mentioned it today and indicated that he thought we could go ahead and do it. Wow! I'm soooo excited! I love having things at my house and this will give me one last chance to "host" before we leave. :-) That makes me sooooo happy! The living room, den, kitchen and bathroom are still intact (and decorated for Christmas, of course!), so it should be PERFECT since those are the only rooms we'll need for a "party." Wa-Hoo! ~sigh~ Life is grand. Makes me a very happy girl. :-)

Well, I told myself I wouldn't stay up too late (especially since I'm only blogging instead of working!), so I should probably post my pictures and call it a night. So here we go...

Brother Dustin preaching

Some of the Hatch folks who came and were SUCH a blessing to us!

When we got to the zoo, this was the first thing inside the gate. It's a, um..., a..., I think's it's an... Hhmmm. I don't have any idea what to call it. It's the most souped up nickelodian I've ever seen! Ha! It had a TON of instruments and James was in heaven. He LOVES stuff like that. We had to listen to three or four songs before we could even start looking for animals! Ha! It was pretty cool. We listened to a couple more songs before we left that day, too.

This is the other part of it--I've never seen one that would play a guitar and banjo! James had it play the Beverly Hillbillies theme and it was great!

Okay! Looking at some animals!!! Aleah was SO excited when she saw the orangutans (James spelled that, if it's wrong! Ha!), but by the time I got the camera ready it was just everybody else who was enjoying the moment!

Koalas! Very cool.

This is amazing--ALL of the kids are actually looking at the same time! And smiling!!!

Sam making faces at a monkey. Oh wait--or is it a monkey making faces at Sam?! So hard to tell! :-)

I never could get a good picture of this baby zebra, but he was awfully cute. ;-)

Ha! This ended up being the best part of the whole zoo--the playground! We had the place all to ourselves for 20 or 30 minutes and we made the best of it, even the big people. :-)


There was a terrific slide--a FAST one--but Joe was too gutless to go face first like all the other kids, so this was his alternative approach...

I missed the actual SLIDING, but from the looks of it I think it must've been fun!

Aleah enjoyed it as much as all the other kids!

Joe finally got it figured out!

I didn't get a picture of James coming down, but I think Jamey did. I guess we'll have to wait for her to post some pictures on her blog. HINT, HINT, HINT. ;-) I did get this one of Dustin though...

Halfway through the zoo we got on the train and rode over to the aquarium. Checking out the stingrays...

Neat tank, hu?!

Jellyfish...

This shark had the gnarliest teeth I've ever seen in my life!!!

Outside the aquarium there is a terrific botanical garden area. We didn't have time to go through all of it, but we did take the kids to the Fantasy something-or-another. Everything is HUGE. The kids love it. So do the adults. :-)

Here's Sam measuring himself...

Jamey checking out the giant bee hovering over her. It makes a buzzing sound when you walk under it. Creepy!


Inside the giant pumpkin. Gross, hu?!

In the giant vegetable garden...

Gingerbread kids...

Gingerbread... (ahem)... men???

James taking a nap on the train ride back to the zoo.

I LOVE the baby giraffes. So cute!

And this was one of the very, very cool parts of the zoo. This lion was roaring, ever so "softly." It wasn't exactly soft, but you could tell it was just a little roar compared to what he was capable of! I kept wishing he would just let a great big, mighty roar rip through the zoo, but he never did. No matter--it was still very cool!

Back to church--had to take a picture of Brother Dustin and Joe in their... stripes. I have a particular name for this type of suit, known to a select few people who will see this blog, so they'll enjoy it extra. :-)

Ah yes--this is a page in a notebook that I found a week or two ago. I thought you might enjoy it. I know Mom and Dad will! Ha!

Ha! What a rotten kid!

Well, now it's very late. But I got the pictures posted!!! If I didn't do it tonight they never would have made it to the blog.

Keep praying for us! The guy rejected the offer we made on house #1 and we don't feel like we can go much higher on it, so we're praying about Plan B. We're just wanting to be patient and take this one step at a time and make sure we're following God and using wisdom, not just rushing into a huge decision because we feel pressure, you know? I still feel totally at peace, although we have no idea where we're going to end up. God already knows and if He's got it covered then there's really nothing to fret over, right?! Besides, who has time to fret?! We're MOVING!!! :-)

I'll try to post again before 2008. :-)

~Rebekah~

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