A Small Miracle is Still a Miracle

I was at my parents house for the 4th of July. All forty of us were there.

It was a fun weekend. We got there Friday and had a grand time and Tuesday I had to go home. Alex took half the kids home in the morning because Michael had to work at 11:30 that morning. I stayed because I wanted to help my parents by getting some deep cleaning done.

The kids that were left played and I got to work. I checked my phone and saw that my mother-in-law was on a plane coming in that day from Guatemala and her ride from Salt Lake City had canceled on her. This woman had been flying and dealing with layovers for almost two days. She started on July 4th in Guatemala City I’m the morning then flew to Atlanta, Georgia , then to Los Angeles, then finally to Salt Lake City, Utah the afternoon of the 5th only to have her ride cancel on her.

She was tired, hungry, and out of money.

I saw she needed a ride and ta-da! I had not left town yet. I could give her a ride up to Idaho because she was coming to my town to stay with her daughter.

Now, there are two ways to look at this. One, is just a coincidence. I just happened to be there. Or two, the way it really was, is that God timed the whole thing. I could have left earlier and they would have been left scrambling to get her a ride back. I am rarely down there and I had an extra seat because Alex decided to take the car back and left me with the truck.

In all their planning no one even considered asking if Alex or I could give her a ride (communication is not one of their strengths or this all could have been avoided). But, God knew I’d be there right when I needed to be. And they mentioned it, barely. On the family chat right when I could do something about it.

Miracle? You can decide.

The next day I started on working on the basement bathroom. I had prayed mightily for help that morning. The whole day, though hard, went smoothly. I had impressions and promptings all day on what would be the best way to do things and the work went well.

Was it a big huge miracle? No. But miracles don’t have to be big. They are awesome when they are but I’ll take the normal everyday ordinary miracles that denote there is a God. I had prayed last week to see miracles. Prayer answered.

First Day of Summer

First Day of Summer!

I guess we’re supposed to be in a drought. The weather isn’t acting like it up here. We’ve gotten inches of rain. Have you heard of the great flood in Yellowstone National Park? Kind of a big deal around here. When it first happened we’d see cars with foreigners in them either heading towards Yellowstone or dejectedly away from there. I felt bad that their plans had to change. People come from all over the world to see it and to have the whole park closed for the first time in 150 years? Pretty big deal.

Small silver lining for me? I haven’t really had to water my lawn and garden. It’s been so nice to have the big downpours once a week.

It has been a busy-ish summer for me so far. I’ve been chipping away at the garage, trying to get it all cleaned and organized. It is taking forever! I’ve finally gotten to stuff that needed doing for so long and I got lots of stuff thrown away and we can see the floor now. It’s no longer a death trap in the garage and I can find things! After pictures coming soon. Here’s a before picture. It’s slightly horrifying. So much work.

Then the weeding. So much weeding. The grass had taken over my flowerbed and I was overwhelmed. I finally just sat down and did it. It took me a couple hours.

Halfway weeded.

Done! I can see all the actual plants now.

Then to the backyard. We got rid of the pool last fall. It had a leak and was a pain to keep up with and the water never warmed up. It was too cold to swim in and the kids would come out with blue lips sometimes. So we bought a trampoline. We get more use out if it and the kids can put the sprinkler under it. I needed to cover the dirt that was left. I’d managed to get leftover sod from a city project and now the backyard is looking better. I still have a long ways to go but progress is progress.

I bought some emerald green arborvitae bushes and need to get them planted along the fence. They’ll grow 12-15 feet tall and will be a nice privacy screen/windbreak. But for now they are so small.

Little babies

We also just finished Birthday Week. Three birthdays and Father’s Day. I was so glad to see it over. It’s a lot to deal with making that many cakes and catering to all the meals and presents. I’m good until the end of September when they start up again.

There’s lots of other stuff going on. Fishing, playing, going for walks on high bridges (I was terrified because one, heights, and two it’s over a very high, fast cold river), and just general having fun.

The inside house temperature was 81° when I frosted this. Not my best work but it was melting.

She caught it but wouldn’t touch it. But she did eat it.

They caught a frog. Fun times for little kids. Not so much for the frog.

The river doesn’t look that far down but believe me, its a good 20 feet or so down. Probably more.

The bridge in the background is the one we were walking on.

It’s officially the first day of summer and we’ve already done a lot. We still need to fit family reunions, camping, day trips, parades, and lots more into the mix.

I’m looking forward to it.

More Family History

I was sitting in church this past Sunday and trying to pay attention but failing. I opened my phone and there was an email from a family history site saying to look at who of my ancestors was alive during the emancipation, it being Juneteenth and all.

We all have ancestors who were alive then. I have ancestors who were from the south. One of my lines goes back to Alabama during that time and Mississippi and Virginia before that. In the beginning of the country some lived in Rappahannock, Virginia. I was born in Alabama and my first son was born in that area of Virginia so its kind of fun to think we’d gone full circle.

I was looking at one relation in particular. Ida. She was just a little girl back during the Civil War . There weren’t pictures of her as a baby or little girl but as she grew up there were more. I might even make a copy and enlarge the photo to hang on the wall. Most pictures from back then were serious. It is very uncommon to have anyone smiling. I’m sure parents made all kinds of threats to keep the kids from smiling and “ruining”the pictures. My great-great-grandmother is smiling in a picture and looks like a kind, fun woman. It’s so fun to look at.

How cute! She’s smiling so lovingly at her daughter who is smiling so cute back. I love it!

So, this is your friendly reminder to dig into your family’s past and see what you can find. So many treasures.

Final Goodbye (For Now)

Yesterday was my grampa’s funeral. The man lived an interesting life and it was sad to see it end.

We drove down and it was just a graveside service but that was all that was needed. It was a beautiful warm October day. Just enough breeze to move the flags. I said the opening prayer, there was a 21 gun salute and Taps was played, and my father received the flag that had been draped across his father’s coffin.

We all had been expecting this day for a long time and thought we had it together but I could barely get the prayer out and was teared up the entire time. My sisters said the same thing- they all ended up crying as well. My brother read the obituary and it was all very well done.

We then headed to the church for a luncheon and to chat with whomever decided to come. It was mostly just the immediate family and a couple of my dad’s cousins. Us girls giggled and took pictures because we really don’t get together nearly as often as we’d like.

My grampa’s caregiver and two of her children came up. They had spend the last couple years with him and were very close. They had made a sideshow of pictures and videos of him and it was good to see it. The caregiver’s son (20) was good friends with my grampa and he was the one that found him when he’d passed away. The poor dear was traumatized. He kept his eyes closed at my parent’s house because my dad looks so much like his dad (and to be honest, most of us look similar as well) and he couldn’t look at any of us. It was sad.

My five year old asked if I was sad and why I wasn’t crying. (He’d stayed in the car for the whole service because he was scared.) I told him my grampa was old (91.6) and he was sick and now he is with his family in heaven. My son told me he’d like to live forever and never die. Well, if you are healthy and can do what you want and move around unassisted, then yes, living forever sounds awesome. Otherwise, not a chance.

All my grandparents are gone now and my kids only have one great grandmother (Alex’s gramma) left.

Funny story though. My grandparents grave stone is backwards. And a little too far to the south. Well, that means the names are on the opposite side of where they are actually laid to rest. My mom always said they are going to end up digging up gramma when the time comes to dig grampa’s grave. Sure enough. Yesterday they dug up gramma’s side and then realized the mistake. We had a good laugh at that. We called it. It was an honest mistake. Now that they are both down under we’ll have the headstone flipped and moved to where it should be. My grandparents had a good sense of humor so it is all good. Well, knowing my gramma, she probably would have been mortified but there is nothing she can do about it.

Picture Day

Family pictures are wonderful. They are so fun to look at. Hopefully the process is fun as well.

I planned for pictures to be taken on October 8th. It looked like rain. It didn’t rain but was windy, cloudy, and cold. My sister-in-law was going to take the pictures but we postponed them a few days. We’d already dressed up and so Alex and I went out for a trial run to check whether we liked all the clothes and colors.

I liked the colors and it was so cold.

Sunday we did pictures for real and it was warmer and we got them taken before the rain started in again.

Trying to get ten people to look in the same direction for five seconds is apparently almost impossible. It is ridiculously difficult. Especially when the teenagers don’t want to be there. I told all the kids that if they messed it up they would be paying for pictures. They cooperated for the most part so they don’t have to fork out the money.

I tried my best on the clothes. I had to order them all online and matching colors online is impossible. I figured it was all close enough. I’m happy with the results and can’t wait to do it again next year. (Insert eye roll here. )