We Are Blessed

The best way to tell about the last two months is to say, “Whew, I’m tired.” In fact I can’t remember the last time I was this tired. But we are blessed. We have had a verrrry busy two months. Okay, now that I’ve said that, let me show it to you in pictures.

See, I said I was tired! Just don’t mess with my baby. Actually I think I was just waking up from a much-needed nap. Jeyanthi came to visit the 9th of July and went home the 24th of  August. She brought her mom and dad and brother and sister with her, of course. It sure was fun watching her change while she was here. She learned to roll from her back to her stomach and then almost to her knees to crawl. Her dad thinks she learned to say, “da da” but I think it was more like “gra pa.”

She and auntie Ginger get along well. Ginger even went with them for their own week-long family vacation in Kentucky. They did that the week before they left for home. Here Jey and Ginger are studying the plans for Ginger’s addition to our house.

More about the move later but here Jey and Lilly are enjoying the fun of empty boxes. And below they seem to  have shrunk as they sit in a huge chair on a trek to a children’s museum.

The Willamette Valley Fruit Company makes pies at a place just outside Salem. A friend helped us discover that every weekday from 9:00 to 11:00 is Happy Hour – a slice of pie is $1.00! We just HAD to show the kids this wonderful place.

On Monday, July 25th we signed the loan papers for our house. But no key. They (Federal Government) wouldn’t let it close until August 1. But that week we were at Fir Point camp so we let Ginger pick up the key. She said it was quite anticlimactic. Instead of some big "Here’s-the-key-to-your-new-home” ceremony by the realtor, she left the key in an envelope at the Remax Office. But Ginger couldn’t get it on the 1st – something about not getting the fax that the loan went through. So Ginger picked it up on the 2nd, went to the house, and couldn’t get the key to work. After trying various doors, going back to the Remax office, getting the listing agent to help, they discovered the key really worked but the front door was stuck – they had to push really hard on it. So finally, what began about a year and half ago as an idea to move to Salem culminated on the 2nd day of August.

As I said, we were at Fir Point Kids Camp having fun and getting more tired. But really the purpose in being there was to teach the Bible story in a way the kids will not forget. The theme was from Group Publishing – PandaMania. Many churches used it this summer.

Some of you will recognize that Jana is a fireman warning us to be careful about fire as we act out the story of Elijah praying for fire from heaven to consume the sacrifice. The sacrifice was a nice big, mouth-watering Hershey’s chocolate bar. The point was made that a sacrifice is something that is important to us.

Here we have a wonderful picture portrait of Hannah and Samuel. Remember, in obedience to a promise, Samuel was given to the priest to serve in the temple.

Fir Point camp extended from Monday to Friday. When we got home Friday it was a quick turn around to leave for our church camp out Saturday morning. It started Thursday and ended Monday so obviously we were a little late. It was at a campground west of Portland with lots of hiking trails. The picture below is one of my favorites. Jey is enjoying her ride as we hiked one of the trails.

Sunday morning we had our worship time in the amphitheater. About 80 people were at the campout but not all of them were there at the same time and some were relatives of our church people. Nevertheless there weren’t very many people in the church building back in Salem!

Smores are always good and even better over a campfire rather than a barbecue (see an earlier post). When we got home from the campout it was time to go to work on the house. It needed paint…

Thanks Carol. Also thanks to Wayne, Cathy, Michele, Jerry, Billie, Korak…

…Josiah, Lilly, and Jana! I  guess a little fun makes the work a lot easier. There was a lot of cleaning, painting, and  fixing. We removed the carpet in the family room replacing it with laminate. The rest of the carpet was carefully cleaned.

Joyce’s brother, Jack, came to give advice.

My nephew, Roy (and wife Twyla) came to help with the laminate.

Then it was moving time. I chose Tuesday, August 23 which gave us Wednesday to finish up the odds and ends of moving. The city of Salem chose the same two days to pave the street in front of the old house! They gave us 17 hours notice or I would have picked different days. At first they were going to start at the other end of the street, then decided to start at our end. My pickup is pulling the trailer in the picture above. The pickup belongs to Kalab, our assistant youth pastor. We also had another pickup and another small trailer. We all made one trip but the paving crew had too much tar on the road for the other two rigs so Kalab and I braved the elements to get to the house (actually the tar didn’t stick to the tires very much). The whole paving thing was simply a big inconvenience. The guy with the small trailer actually hand-trucked the washer and dryer down the street to his vehicle – plus some boxes. Between us and the paving, we gave the neighborhood something to talk about at dinner.

Here’s our moving crew, L-R: Phil, Jeff, Wes, and Kalab. The Greencrest house is now clean and turned back to the owners.

There are a lot more pictures but I better post this. We are in the house, slowly unpacking boxes and putting things away. There are still things to do (window coverings are still  incomplete) but we are picking away at them. I’m tired but we are blessed.