"Oceans of rain"

This afternoon we had a brief downpour that gave us a half an inch of rain. There was a huge puddle in the sandbox, and it didn't take long for Weston to discover it... He excitedly told me, "Mommy we're playing in the ocean!" :-)

"I want you!"

(Mommy escapes to the roof for a few minutes of peace and quiet...Weston spies her...)
"Mommy, I want you."
"Yes, Weston, I want you, too, but you stay down there."
"But, but, but, Mommy, I WANT YOU!!!!"

Three Years...

"Those who live in the Lord never see each other for the last time."

Dearly loved and sorely missed...

Today Mom celebrates 3 years in heaven...

Imagine stepping onto a shore and finding it's Heaven.

Imagine taking hold of a hand and finding it's God's hand.

Imagine breathing new air and finding it's celestial.

Imagine feeling invigorated and finding it's immortality.

Imagine passing from storms & tempest to an unknown calm.

Imagine waking up and finding it's HOME.

Some conversations around here...

   Yesterday Bethany was talking to me about the road being really washed out since TS Isaac:
B: "Mommy, if you went to TG today, would you roll the Husky???"
Me: "I certainly hope not, but I wouldn't take any of the children along, because the road is too bad..."
B: "Oh, that would be SO awful if someone came and told us that you died! We wouldn't have a Mommy anymore, and then who would take care of us???"
Me: "Well, Bethany, God knows all of that, and He will always take care of us and supply our needs."
B: "I know! It would be better if the children would always die first, and then the Mommies wouldn't have to worry about who would take care of their children!"

(And I wondered if the Mommies might die then from broken hearts???)

    I served eggplant to the children last night... Michael wondered, "Is this the plant that we put in the ground to get eggs???" (He does know where eggs come from, we have enough chickens around, but maybe the chickens eat eggplant to lay eggs??? :-) )

Our morning's work

Okay, this post has been sitting in my drafts for a week now, I just simply haven't taken the time to finish it up and post it... This was our morning's work after TS Isaac went through and snapped off a bunch of our fir trees...

Yeye and I took the younger children out to clean up the branches, and save the wood...

Here's Yeye, chopping off branches with the machete...

The children had a blast carrying or dragging the limbs and branches up to the house!

Weston: "Children, there's more down there!"

He would tackle the biggest ones, and then when the older ones offered help, he was quick to say, "I can do it!" But he would ask Mommy for help if it was just too heavy!

The children are already asking how soon we can make a fire, and roast marshmallows, and hotdogs!!!

Tropical Storm Isaac

Rain, rain, and more rain... My weather station recorded 11 inches, but so much of that time it was so windy, that I think we probably got more than that... The highest gust recorded up here was 79 mph. We got the first rain bands about 12:30 Friday afternoon. The wind didn't start picking up until 4 or 5 pm. By 7 or 8 pm, we were getting gusts up to 60 mph. The wind and rain was coming from the northeast, so we were constantly sopping up water at the front doors. Around midnight is when the worst of the storm hit... then the wind just roared and the rain pounded against the doors and windows with a fury! When the eye went through at 3 am, it got so quiet all of a sudden, that I believe it woke me up. Then storm returned again with a fury, this time all the wind was coming from the south side... It seemed like the north side of the storm packed the worst winds, because we didn't have as high winds after the eye went through, but we were still getting 60 mph winds. By Saturday morning it was still very windy, and pouring buckets of rain, but it was a LOT calmer... All of a sudden the 30/40 mph winds seems like just a breeze! It rained all day Saturday, through the night, and off and on throughout the day on Sunday... Today is a lovely day with sun and clouds. Still quite breezy, but oh the sun feels SO good!!!!  Here in my area, gardens are destroyed, a lot of animals died from exposure to the weather, my neighbor's house roof went, and lots of trees were snapped off, the roads are washed out and impassable. But thank God that there wasn't worse damage!!! Around here the natives almost always tuck their houses into the side of the mountain, and I definitely can see the wisdom of that in hurricane season!!! If their houses would've been exposed to that wind, there wouldn't be anything left to them I'm afraid. There's one area not far from here that they tell me looks like someone just swept it with a broom... The whole hillside is cleaned off, and there's clothing and debris scattered all over the place... I'm still hearing reports from other areas, some places got the wind and some didn't... Everywhere had rain... Some people were flooded out, houses were washed away, bridges washed out... It's very discouraging to the mountain people to have lost their crops, and to the people living in tent cities since the earthquake it's discouraging as well... Haiti needs your prayers!

Balloons and Water

 My children just LOVE water balloon fights... Anything with water is just super fun for them... I took these pictures several weeks ago, but wasn't able to post them before because I had them backed on my external hard drive while I sent my computer in for warranty service. Can you imagine the screaming and commotion that goes on during a water balloon fight, from this picture? :-)

 The balloons were gone, but they were reluctant to stop the water fun... After all now that we have a cistern, we can actually spare some water for fun!!!! Here Weston is expectantly waiting to have water poured over his head...

I think that was about more fun for him than the water balloons were!!! When I took him inside and gave him a bath a little while later, he was still talking about how much fun that was!!!! :-)