So by the workings of providence we were invited over to the G’s yesterday for dinner. Normally we do Mondays with them, but they were in the mood for more Dally madness, I mean, who wouldn’t be?! At any rate, they live 5 miles from us and it just happened that as we turned onto the road that leads to their house we saw a car angled into the ditch and could barely see the curly white hair of someone inside. As there was no other car present I thought perhaps the person had maybe passed out at the wheel (heaven forbid, I don’t know CPR) so we stopped and I got out to see if I could help.

The lady was trying to get out of the ditch, but she was way too far in. So I knocked on her passenger window and had a nice chat.
Me: Are you alright?

Lady: Some guy was hogging the whole road and as I turned I had to swerve to avoid getting hit, and then I had to correct my swerve and I over-corrected and landed in the ditch! It was some city guy…..big white truck and it was clean and he didn’t stop! And I just got out of the hospital and I have to have a new pace maker.

Me: uhhuh….would you like me to call someone to help pull you out of the ditch? (cause I have a girlie truck as the guys at church tease me about- it’s not 4 wheel drive) and to myself “Dear Lord please don’t let her have a heart attack on me!”

So I called the G.’s to come help, and thanks to another passerby who actually knew Ms. Annie, helped pull her safely out of the car. Carolyn and Connor G. came and used their mondo 15 passenger van and tow ropes and pulled the car right out, then I moved the car to a safer part of the road for the lady. And like my mom sometimes says “No good deed goes unpunished..” my car keys and cell phone fell out of my jacket pockets while I was helping. My phone ended up in Ms. Annie’s car which she dropped off at the G’s house (thankfully I described to her where they live- and everyone recognizes it as they live on the main drag and do poultry and goats via the pastured poultry model- moving the fences daily). She did not, however, find my car keys, so either she just hasn’t spotted them yet, or I dropped them in the ditch. The good news is that my Mom had my spare key, and thankfully I had also parked my truck off of the road into a farmers access lane. The G’s brought me home to grab the spare key, and we went and had dinner with them.

the Moral is, if you are driving in the country and inadvertently cause someone to ditch- stop and offer to help them in some way! . Although I must say, Bubba and Cooter are fairly reliable at showing up and pulling people out- they live for this kind of thing! Though they didn’t show up, I think we did pretty well as fill in’s for ‘em. They were probably off rescuing someone else!

Life in the country is never dull. So, we’re off to finish A.M. chores then have breakfast with the G’s and after that Carolyn and I are going to use the G’s high powered magnet doohicky to go drag the ditch and see if my keys are in there. The fun never ends! Today is chores, shopping and contra dancing tonight. Hope you all have a great day!

For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose!

~Kate

This is a disturbing trend….two friends celebrated their birthdays with…pie! not cake?! Although, messing about with a can of spray whipped cream turned out to be a highlight of the party. Seriously though, just cause Thanksgiving is around the corner, that’s no reason to go messing with perfection!

So, we’re having issues with today…mainly, doing things… . Got to bed late cause I had covered my bed with stuff from my closet and I didn’t want to just wedge everything back in to the closet…you know how it is, it would feel like stepping backwards. So, waking up turned out to be a challenge as well. A.m. chores are done, we’re getting brunch going, Lizzy is making dutch babies and coffee,yummmmmmmmm…., Hoppy is organizing the craft beads and Elena is doing schoolwork.

Today we have to finish my room and make a decent stab at the girls room, and hopefully we’ll get that done as well. We’d like to go contra-dancing on Saturday night so getting everything done would be a good thing. Congregational meal is on Sunday and I’m not sure what we’ll be making for a main dish but I think we’ll make apple pie squares for dessert, that serves a good crowd and it’ll be Pie again!!

On the farmstead front, the goat gals were not in heat, so that means we have to watch ‘em closely in order to hustle them down to the buck when they are. Sure hope it’s not on Thanksgiving or Christmas, that would be a bit frustrating. I did though, discover a shorter route to the breeder, shaved about 15/20 min. off the original route! Need to winterize all of the animal shelters and get a light on a timer in to the chickens.

It’s a gorgeous day and Elena just passed her spelling test! Awesome, she’s doing really well. Sunny and 45 degrees here, beautiful. For once my phone has me in Virginia at least, just not in my city. Lately it’s had me in Mobile, Al and I can say that I have been there several times since I grew up in New Orleans and that was a normal cut through on vacations.

Have to get to work now and hear Hoppy read her literature to me.

Hope you all have a blessed Friday!

“We should not arrive at death’s door all prim and proper in a pretty and well-preserved body. Instead we ought to arrive breathlessly, skidding broadside through the pearly gates, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming, “Wow! What a ride!” ~unknown

~Kate

Well, to be exact, a cheesy-broccoli-potato soup Thursday. Last night’s rain brought a cold front. This is a crazy time of year. I had the a/c on yesterday and now we’re back in sweaters…I totally love Virginia!

To Do Today: Light day of school while we continue the fall cleaning through; separate the goat milk soap we made so it can cure properly; Dump Run; go in to town for a birthday dinner with friends from church.

Cleaning through my closet today and organizing sewing stuff. I need to get working on projects! Well, I’m off to hear Hoppy read Wind in the Willows to me. She’s doing really well.

Have a blessed day!

~Kate

“Make a joyful shout to the Lord all ye lands! Serve the Lord with gladness. Come before His presence with singing. Know that the Lord, He is God. It is He who had made us and not we ourselves.” Ps. 100

So, the girls have been introduced to this rather catchy European song. It’s great to do dishes to…seriously.  Lovin’ that song even though we have no idea what’s being said and as my Elena said, “I sure hope it’s not saying anything nasty” ha! We’ve got it on a random cycle with Weird Al Yancovick , Charlie Daniels, The Monkeys and Sha-Na-Na of all things. Suits us really, very eclectic, that’s us.

We’re hoping our 4 year old dairy goats are in the mood to be bred. I’m still new to this and figuring out the signs are still a mystery, but I think both of them are needing a visit to OhNo, the nubian buck our breeders have. So hopefully we can expect spring babies again and be back into full fledged milking. We stopped milking Margot as she fought us like crazy, but we’re going to make it work next spring. Going to have my rent-a-son, Connor G., make a milk stand that has leg restraint so we can milk her without ninja goat taking out someones head. We just made homemade cold pressed goat milk soap, scented with vanilla and lavender and it appears to have set so we’ll be able to give that for Christmas! Cool.

We made some awesome sweet rolls for Sunday, they were like cinnabun….mmmmmmmmmmm….Perhaps we’ll add that to the Christmas baskets we do for friends and neighbors.

Well, we’re having a slow start this morning, but thankfully the common rooms are mostly done. We haven’t had breakfast yet, Dutch Baby and pancakes (some of us couldn’t make up our minds…), but we have been cleaning and doing school around the prep, so it’ll happen.  Today the girls have to clean out the walmart pool Nan bought so we can store it for winter and I have to get through my room!! I have several quilts I want to make for a few families at church who are moving, and a couple people who are ill. I did make an irish chain not long ago, just the top, but it’s chicken fabrics, really cute, I’ll have to post pictures when I finish it.  I’ll give it to the head of our 4-H poultry and rabbit division. I think she would enjoy it the most, and it would be a good thank you gift for all of her hard work.

So, off to finish things. Breakfast then Bible & Prayer time. Then morning chores, girls to clean out pool, Connor G. to come help move fences and load goats for transport to the breeders. Tonight is book study with a few families from church, Nate Wilsons DVD study on philosphy and Worldview. We’re really liking it so far.

Hope you all have a blessed day!

~Kate

Catch up is the name of the game on Mondays. We take a complete work break on Sundays…those are sweet days after all . So, Mondays are major clean up the madness days. Common rooms are all done, but bedrooms are in desperate need of intervention, and I’m just not in the mood. Tonight we go visit the G family for our Monday ritual of dinner and a movie. Right now we’re going through the new seasons (well, new to me at any rate) of Dr. Who. We’re on David Tennants second season as the Doctor. He’s very enjoyable, lots of energy, but I still find Christopher Eccleston more “manly” as it were. *wink wink*:)

Lizzy was given The Secret Garden to watch, but it’s a bit whiney and shouty…ahh well. I think it’ll be a one timer, then we’ll donate it, spread the love.

My mom made sour beef and potato dumplings for lunch today, it was wonderful. My girls were a little leery though. Funny, I grew up with it, so it’s homey to me, but my husband did not care for German flavored food…haha, that sounds funny, but you know what I mean. He was Italian through and through. And I’m good with that. Fettucini Alfredo is one of my favorites.

Deacon Bob came through his surgery well, please pray for effective treatment and his cancer to be gone.

Well, I guess I ought to go check email and so forth. It was a gorgeous day today. Sure hope tomorrow is just as pleasant so we can do some of our outdoor chores.

Hope you all have a blessed evening.

“But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting on those who fear Him.” Ps. 103

~Kate

Listening to : The Thief Lord by Cornelia Funke, read by Simon Jones.

So, I made homemade fettucini….turned out really well and cooked really quickly! Made a shrimp fettucini alfredo for lunch….I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned the ridiculous amount of farm cats that we have. We’ve got 2 of the original 3, + the one we adopted from the feed store. She who was adopted managed to get out and get friendly for a few days, so we had 5 kittens. While we were sitting at our round table having lunch, these ferocious fur balls circled us, mewing and sharp eyed. We were attacked a few times and had to kick them out, but survived on the whole, intact. We let them lick the pot clean…purr purr…and now I have to do a seriously hot water washing .

I had to have two new tires put on the truck yesterday and was blessed to be able to hang out at my sisters house in the city. We watched the 2 Dr. Who episodes they hadn’t seen yet. *sniff* goodbye David Tenant.

Today we’re cleaning up and supposed to be finishing bedrooms, we’ll see how that goes. Have to get hay and do some minor grocery shopping. This weekend we hope to go see Rogers and Hammersteins Cinderella put on by a college group in the city. Our friends son is in it. This should be oodles of fun for the girls. Live performances are always fun.

Well, just wanted to ramble a bit….putting off the chores . Hope you’re all having a blessed day. We’re praying for Deacon Bob’s surgery today to remove cancer cells, for Dale and his family and for Pastor Yucef in Iran who is under the death penalty for being a Christian- may God grant them all His peace and protection.

“As for man, his days are like grass

as a flower of the field so he flourishes

for the wind passes over it and it is gone

and its place remembers it no more.

But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting to everlasting

on those who fear Him.”

Ps. 103 ( the bit we’re memorizing at present)

~Kate

A friends cousin, Dale has been diagnosed with stage 4 cancer in a brain tumor they found this past week. He has been given 18 mos. at most to live. Please pray for his wife, Julie, and their precious daughters, : Danielle and Rachel ( 13 & 16 yrs). Dale and his wife love the Lord, please pray that they would be surrounded by tangible evidences of Gods love. Please especially pray for Julie as she is really struggling and for the daughters who are adopted, they have already lost their birth parents.

For it is God who works in you to will and to act according to His good purpose.

Thanks dear ones! I’ll update as I’m able.

Blessings,

~Kate

It is so gorgeous outside! Blue skies, white puffy clouds, trees covered in purple, gold, russet, brown and green. A wonderful fall snap in the air! The kind of day that screams….drop everything and come enjoy me! Days like this make me know God loves me and wants me to be happy! (totally taking off Franklin’s quote on Beer) HA! We’ll do stuff though. Just finishing up a lateish breakfast then we’ll do Bible time! Then, we’ll get to weeding out all of the girls clothes, finish their room, do my room, clean out the truck (especially the bed- we butchered chickens on Sat. and well, eww…gets here and there on those days). Got to get going! Have a blessed Monday! Rejoice in Christ in Him we live and move and have our being! Glorify God and enjoy Him!

Off to do Bible, then put on some Zydeco and get moooooooooooving!

~Kate

We’re off to church this evening for our annual Reformation party. Praising God for the faithful present in all generations. A big Woot! for Martin Luther who stood up to the tyrannical and unbiblical practices of the church gone worldly and the guts to nail the truth to the door! Thanks God for all men, women and children who stand up for Gods truth!

Have a blessed day celebrating the light that shines in the dark places!

Because He lives and reigns!

~Kate

Mom and I and the girls took a weekend hop back to Florida for a wedding.  Lillian VanM., who taught Hoppy preschool the year Frankie died, was marrying Samuel J.

Here’s the happy couple with my girls:            And here’s the girls outside of the church by the pond:  

Lizzy turned 15 on the 30th, she’s quite the young lady now. We visited several friends. We were blessed to see our old neighbor Mrs. H. one last time as she is now on hospice. We would love to have you join us in prayer for her to have an easy passing into the arms of our Savior.

We called a few officers, but none of them were able to meet with us. We were able to see Cousin Rose who now lives in Clearwater. She hurt her hip, so prayer for that would be appreciated too.

We were able to go to our old church for services on Sunday. Lizzy was able to see her favorite Deacon, Bob D. He’s like a grandfather to her. He has always been so sweet and prayed for her. She just hugged him so tight and cried she was so happy to see him. He was as sweet as ever and apologized that he couldn’t pick her up anymore, she’s too big! I wish I had gotten a picture of them.

At any rate. It was wicked hot on Friday, but cooled off nicely for the wedding on Sat. We took the girls to the beach on Monday after seeing Rosie. They had a ball and I really enjoyed sitting under an umbrella with a cool breeze and a warm sun. It was so bright, that it made all the pictures come out fuzzy, I guess from the glare of the sun on water and white sand. It was so beautiful.

While we enjoyed the wedding, friends, family and the beach we totally did not enjoy the driving. Florida drivers apparently don’t balk at the thought that their need for speed is more important than the lives of other people who happen to be on the road. God is good though and protected us from a few very serious could’ve beens. I don’t miss the driving or the heat. I just miss some of my nearest and dearest, hopefully we’ll get some visitors before long.