I Have A Lot To Say So Just Sit Back And Get Comfortable

First off, let me say I had not realized how much I'd come to depend on my blogging time until I didn't have it! The past few days have been quite busy with virtually no time to log in except very late at night. And we know how incoherent I can be then.

I also have a lot of photos to share.

I'm not going to try and keep my thoughts organized; that just takes too much work. And I already have enough work without adding more.

Today I started AND FINISHED the expense report for last month [patting self on back] and, with the hubby's help, I'm about ready to start working on thank you's. I printed out some new cards and he cut them to size while I addressed envelopes. Or started to anyway. Mom made supper tonight and she called to say it was ready when I was half-way through addressing envelopes.

Barring a catastrophe I will have those done TONIGHT. Woohoo! I am a model of efficiency today :-)

Which is only possible with God's help...because this past week?... Well, let's just say I was an emotional trainwreck. Physically and emotionally drained and trying to keep up with what was going on.

So in the past week we have put about 500 miles on the car. I am a little tired of the car. The car that's been stalling and stuttering and overheating like a teenage boy. The car that's now running as smooth as a 1992 with almost 240,000 miles on it can. Because my amazing brother-in-law diagnosed the stalling, stuttering and overheating problem in less time than it takes me to fix my hair (2.3 minutes) and it was, THANK THE LORD, a simple fix of a few vacuum hoses. Whew! Had us me concerned for a while!

You know what I am NOT tired of? This wonderful and beautiful gift of fabric from Jen at Craftygiveaways.com. If you haven't visited her yet, you should GO RIGHT NOW. I was the grateful recipient of the first giveaway and can hardly wait to get started playing with these batiks! Jen posted an excellent, detailed tutorial for making the lovely little folded flowers and I can tell you, having tried to figure out another tutorial from a book on fabric origami, Jen's directions are much easier to follow!

I'm also not tired of the precious time we've had with friends and family. Yesterday the daughter and her boyfriend went with us to the church where hubby was preaching, and our son and daughter-in-law met us there. Afterward the son and his wife took us all out to eat. Good times! Here are photos we snapped during and right after lunch. The son and daughter-in-law, who just celebrated their first anniversary on Saturday! Aren't they just adorable?

And here's the daughter and her MANfriend. He's a big guy and she says it's ridiculous to call him BOYfriend. I think she's right :-) These two always ham it up when I try to take their picture.

When the girls came out of the restroom, the guys were waiting just like this and I had to take a picture! What a handsome bunch :-) And finally the girls. We all sat daintily down for our picture. In case you're wondering, no I didn't just wrap myself in a length of safari fabric. I'm wearing one of my flowing, comfortable summer dresses with matching short-sleeved jacket. But after seeing this pix, I'm thinking of retiring the outfit. I never realized how incredibly UNFLATTERING it was. Although I'm more into comfort than fashion, there is a fine line between the two. And clearly I've crossed it. Ugh.

On a happier note, I just love this picture of the hubby with his mom before he took her to a play last month. They went a little early and visited the Warsaw Biblical Garden. An interesting little stop if you're ever in the Warsaw, Indiana, area.

We have just a few days here with dad and mom before we have to head back to Michigan for the final time. The shipping container will be delivered next Monday and we'll have two hours to load it before they start charging $90/hour. So this Thursday through Saturday we will finish packing everything and secure it all on pallets. We have six fully loaded pallets right now and it looks like we'll have two more (there's room for ten in the container).

I'm not sure how much I'll be able to post in the ELEVEN DAYS BEFORE WE LEAVE and I have no idea how, or even IF, I'll be able to blog once we get there...until we are settled in our own place with internet, which may be six months from now. After suffering the pangs of blogging withdrawal after just a few days away, I'm asking right now for prayer! Do I hear an AMEN?!