Carrie Goes to Mexico

Yesterday our Carrie said her goodbyes to us and girl cousins as she was heading out to fly to Mexico on a mission trip with my other brother Fain and family and a friend.

Here are our four girls and Gabriel's three.

 The two Carries. Gabriel has a Carrie, too! She's their third girl, age 14.

 Carrie has tried hard to take it easy on herself since her fall from the horse so that she could go on this trip without her crutch! Here she is about to catch one of the little boys!

 I got a picture of her and her luggage.

Little did Carrie know what a tough day lay ahead. Her plane in Denver was delayed, but she arrived okay in Houston, where Fain's family met her as soon as she debarked from the airplane. The next flight was delayed as well, then delayed and delayed and delayed some more.

 There was a storm somewhere and the airline captains who were to pilot the flight did not arrive.

In the end, the airlines put up for the night everyone who was on that flight to Mexico.

(Below Carrie is getting a hug from sweet Baby Aaron!)

 Then the next morning (this morning), Carrie and Fain's family missed their flight due to a combination of circumstances which Jonathan didn't quite understand over the phone. 

Thankfully, they were able to catch a second flight and arrived in Mexico--minus Carrie's suitcase!

So that is the last we have heard!

Here Bryn and Benjamin have successfully completed a floor puzzle while the rest of us did school.

 Snowball fight across the pasture during break time!

 I helped Benjamin with a sticker book while planning lessons and making a school schedule for my younger children for the days I am away next week.

(Jonathan and I are flying to South Caicos Island with a Mission Helps crew to roof an HIM mission church whose roof was destroyed last year in the hurricane.)

For science class, the boys set up a microscope our friends the Frenches gave us, and they figured out how to get it working, and looked at pollen, etc. on glass slides.

 The girls are such a help. I was sick all day with a cold, but managed through most of the day till I collapsed in the evening on a recliner. Andrea gave me a foot treatment.

I'm thankful to be better today, so I was able to shop for my brother's birthday this evening and shop for supplies for our trip to Caicos. 

This afternoon, I heard 3-yr-old Benjamin crying downstairs. He had been put down for a nap.

I knocked and went in to see what was the matter. He was bawling for his mommy.

So I showed him a book that I would read to him, and pretty soon, he stopped crying as if you had turned a switch off! He cuddled right up to me, and I decided it would be best if we both lay down while I read to him, so he could just close his eyes later and go to sleep!

 I read slowly and made the book last as long as I could. It was about a baby bear that kept thinking it was spring, and his mommy would tell him to just go back to sleep!

Finally, spring did arrive, and Mama Bear got up, but where was Baby Bear?
He was asleep out in the flowers!

 So I told Benjamin,"He was sleeping, just like we're going to do!"

And I closed the book, and got real quiet, and just like that, little Benjamin plopped his little head against my arm, and closed his eyes, and within minutes he was fast asleep!

That was really special!

 More pics coming later hopefully of Gabriel's birthday party which I am about to help the children get ready for.

Babies in the House Again!

 It's fun having babies in the house again!

Here, we set Aaron on the counter so he could "help" spoon salt, and shake pepper and spices into the meatballs.

With 15 children in the house, it's been a bit of a circus at times,

and with two litters of puppies right now, it's also been more than a bit of a zoo!

Right now there are puppies just about everywhere you look at our house!

Carrie is giving Baby Aaron a bit of cheese that she was putting on top of the open face turkey sandwiches we had for lunch yesterday.

The oven still wasn't usable--till the heating element finally arrived last night which Jonathan had ordered with express shipping last week! Thankfully they refunded us the express shipping since it took a week to get here!

So we used the broiler.

I think there is more than one puppy dog around here that likes to get into the trash bag!

We got a big kick out of that!

It was time to bundle him up and take him out to look for eggs.

As we went down the deck steps, Aaron's 3-yr-old brother Benjamin saw a dog coming up the steps and asked,"Does she lay eggs?"

Gotta get those boys around the farm!

Gotta keep an eye on this little feller, too! He pulled the bottle brush from under the kitchen sink and started sweeping the floor with it!

I got some paints out for the children to do some projects for their daddy's birthday. My brother Gabriel has a birthday this week. Timmy had an extra birdhouse he'd built, and Andrea painted trailing vine and flowers on the sides, as well as painting a three-heart wooden plaque.

Benjamin is so sweet, wanting to be in the middle of everything.

During break from school, the children snowballed each other outdoors.

Carrie helped with forming  meatballs after I mixed them.

Hannah had made jello, with which we let the little boys and her make cutouts.
We used cookie cutters, and yes, this kind of thing doesn't seem as important as being a missionary somewhere in Africa, but somehow, down deep inside, I believe it is just as important.

You can make disciples (and maybe future missionaries) of your little nieces and nephews by valuing them as small children and doing jello cutouts and making a big mess with paints and blocks of wood.
Then when you talk about Christ's love and commandments that He wants us to keep, they will listen better.

You can make friends forever by taking them to find eggs in the shed, and letting them put the brown, white, and green eggs in the carton.
You give up "accomplishing something" this week, and welcome the opportunity that God hands you--
molding a soul and making children happy.

Finally the heating element arrived and Jonathan had Timmy help put it in the oven.
Yay! Now we can make cookies and gingerbread.

Here are a couple pictures of raising our puppies. As they got older, we tried putting tiny baby socks on their paws so they wouldn't scratch their poor mommy when they nursed.

We are not exactly recommending this procedure as the socks did not stay on! :)

The children are very sure that being allowed to hold puppies helps them tremendously with school--especially Spanish class!

Here is the newest addition to our menagerie.
On Valentine's night, I was on my knees about our finances, and the next day a lady called who had this 11-week-old puppy available. She lives several hours away, but a family from the Springs was going down to purchase another puppy, and they were willing to bring it to us since we had told them about this lady.

I couldn't believe what a beautiful, mellow golden retriever (part English Cream) puppy she was!
Everyone welcomed her right into our family--

except big Durango who was so  scared out of his wits that he jumped right up onto Rosie's lap!

 All over this new little puppy!

Here are a few snaps the children took of the puppies they were selling.

Old Fashioned Woodsplitting--When We Survey the Burnt Forest

Last Saturday we had an old fashioned wood-splitting in blackened Black Forest for two different elderly friends who were in need of firewood.

Several friends and relatives got together to work and help, including Jonathan's brother-in-law Jon McVey.

We got the firewood from a property that had burned in the Black Forest Fire, where the owner wanted certain trees removed, and he also permitted us to take some logs that had already been sawed down, since it was "going to a good cause," he said. 

Ben Reynolds had made the contact for us.

Jonathan sawing down the first tree.

The guys and boys sawed and hauled logs, and so did Rose.

It was great experience for our boys to learn to cut down trees and make sure they fell a certain direction.

 But did our coats and clothing ever get blackened! And you should have seen the boys' faces when they came home!

I had extra laundry to do!

Jon McVey hauling logs on both shoulders.

Sometimes we sit on the sawed off stumps of situations in our life, and survey the burned down damage of the trees around us.

This hillside looked awful. And right across the fence and driveway was a nice property that the fire had not reached.

Perhaps fire trucks kept the fire from spreading.

Sometimes it can be uncanny how a forest fire will burn one property and not another. 

And it can seem uncanny how certain things in our lives can be destroyed or burned down or burned out, while the same things in the lives of those around us remain intact.

We don't always understand what God is doing or how He is working or what He intends--except that we know He works all things for good to those who love Him.

All we can do sometimes after surveying the burned out mess is to pick up our axe and chain saw and hatchets, and start making good use of the blackened logs.

Our blackened logs and downed trees will cheer some hearth and fill a cold and empty woodstove for someone who is shivering.
And our blackened and smeared reputations and our dreams and positions and priorities that are now sawed down to stump size will turn into someone else's comfort.

We don't understand it all now, but someday God will make it plain. 

So we don't turn our backs on the mess.

We set to work with a will to gather the dead trees to burn in a friend's stove, and we plant little saplings to start a fresh forest.

We may never see the towering trees growing from the spindly stems, but our children or our grandchildren will.

So today, we work the best we can, taking strength and comfort from the sloppy joes and clementines in the lunch basket,

and from the Bread of Life that gives strength for each new day.

And we turn the results of everything--all the blackened trees and the charred remains and the sawed-off stumps--over to a gracious Creator.