We're going to Africa!

We had a busy and eventful week. Monday we drove to St. Louis to look at properties and see abut setting up a team there. We saw properties with 3 realtors, talked to 2 property managers, and spoke with one banker. We saw about 12 properties in person and several dozen more on paper. I had plotted this grueling trek to the hour. We left Mountain Home at 6:30 and got to St. Louis at 11:30. Saw properties with Peter McKercher and talked to his property manager. Mostly we saw duplexes and 4 plexes with him. We looked at some he was working on, and one he’d already remodeled. At 3:30 we moved on to the next realtor. We spent an hour or so discussing what we wanted with her assistant, Tony, before going and seeing properties. Mostly they were single houses. One was $9,000 and about 3,000 sq feet that needed a total remodel. Such fun to see and such potential… but too costly for us. We saw another house partly remodeled and the house next door that had been beautifully refinished and was now being offered for a mere $289,000. We finished there about 8 pm. I’d been struggling with bronchitis for the last week or two and was dog tired. We finally got dinner, checked into the hotel and crashed.

Tuesday we saw realtor #3 and her assistant. We really clicked with Amy. She seemed to know exactly what we were looking for. She deals with many foreclosures and the banks ask her to look at them and evaluate them for resale. She has a handy-man refurbisher who she’s worked with for 10 years and can take a distressed house and restore it. We saw a possibility with her. Then we went back to Realtor #2’s office and visited with a banker by phone and with a property manager. Then we headed to the temple and did 2 sessions. Again, we had a 9 pm dinner.

Wednesday we left by 7am so we could shop at Aldie’s and still get home in time for Tom to go to work by 12:30. I think I kind of dragged around the rest of the day. Dan had arrived for a week’s visit on Tuesday and Rebecca and Dan went over to work on the house in the afternoon and I watched children. Wednesday evening we celebrated Tom's birthday with liver and onions and a great chocolate cake.

Saturday,evening we had a pioneer pot-luck dinner. Then the Young Single adults went to the Drake’s house for a movie night. We saw “Forever Strong,” a really good movie—even if it was about rugby. The young adults seemed to have a good time. We let them know about our mission and announced it Sunday as well.

Saturday afternoon, Tom finally got in the zip line for the kids. There are more techniques for zip lines than we probably know. It turned out to be pretty high and when we put weight on it—like me—it really roared down the line. The grandkids were a bit timid about the whole thing. They started out at the bottom, just getting slid up a ways. But after we left them on their own, they figured how to hop and ride and finally got the courage to go down from the top. They had a raucous time! Here Sandy is showing them how to ride. Here Tom is trying to convince nervous children that it's all just fine and lots of fun!

Thursday Dan and Rebecca went on a mini-moon and we watched children until Friday morning. Thursday about noon, we got the white envelope with our mission call! How exciting! Kenya, Nairobi! We will go into the MTC at the same time as Sue and Steve—November 2^nd. We are way excited. We spent the afternoon on the computer trying to find out about Kenya. The mission includes Kenya and Tanzania. English and Swahili are the national languages and then there are about 40 tribal languages. Rebecca took a picture of us with our mission call.

Friday was a memorial service for a friend. Tom went to the grave side service before heading to the midway duplex to clean and mow. I had an appointment at 10 am with a nursing home to do a spa treatment with the locked wing. It was interesting. Mostly hand massaging with lavender and a few agreed to foot baths with peppermint and Epsom salts. Then when I was done I went to Doug’s “wake” at their quilt shop. Lots of biker friends there. In the afternoon, Dan gave us a phone number of a friend’s parents who returned from their mission to Kenya three months ago. We called and talked to Bro. Pocock and learned lots of good things—mild temperatures, apartments furnished. Cell phones. Internet. Name brand foods. All the conveniences of life. He got so excited talking about his mission, he wanted to go back. The people sound wonderful. We are so excited to be going!

Here are the children enjoying the chickens. The chickens have provided a lot of entertainment for Marian, Callie and Delany. I think they-- the chickens-- will be glad for peace and quiet.

The blog and I are not getting along. I can't cut and paste. My pictures don't want to move. Blah! And that's how I've felt this week. BLUCK! Nasty cough. Hacking up a lung. The best I can say is that it's not at its worst.

Friday Tom discovered a leak in our water line. We were without water most of the day until our favorite plumber came and dug a trench for the new line. The grandchildren thought this was a fabulous adventure. When he told them chickens loved worms, they searched through the dirt!
Bruce arrived at 2. By 5 we had water and the trench was closed up.

Tom and Rebecca powerwashed the High St. House on Monday when it was raining. We got about 3 inches of rain this week. Enough to change plans for house painting several days. Rebecca took kids to "help" but it turned out to be less than effective. Here's the before photo.

Here is the after picture. There is still trim to paint, but it looks SOO much better!

Deborah left on Monday. Sadness.

Dad continues to work on the tree house. He installed one of the windows and ordered the Zip Line stuff.

Saturday, while Tom was busy painting, Sandy went to Branson for a Girl's Camp meeting. Got a lot of stuff sorted out, learned a lot. Discovered there was much yet to do. Girls' Camp is in early August.

Boring belated news

Skipping a week of letter writing because we are just too busy is similar to skipping church: it sure is easy to skip the next week as well. But we really were busy last week! We had 10 adults, and 12 children under the age of 12, staying in our house and keeping all those stomachs happy was a full time job.

Deborah drove in from SLC on Monday 29 June with Sarah and Steven. Then on Wednesday, Andy and his family of seven drove in from Vicksburg while Adam, Savannah and Denali caravanned from Tulsa with Dan and Miranda. The majority had left by Tuesday, 9 July, but not before we engaged in a lot of fun, food, games, and great times. Of course we all had to hold the newest addition the family, Denali, and enjoy her cute smiles.

Memorable moments include: 1. taking five canoes, eight adults and seven children down the river for a five mile float, enjoying the scenery, wildlife (not sure what is so ‘wild’ about turtles) and splashing. Only Adam seems to have gotten sunburned. 2. We also hosted an open house to introduce Denali to the locals and we had lots of yummy goodies to share with friends. 3. Watching the grand children play together; they really got along very well. The chickens were a big hit.4. Playing the usual games (and I didn’t lose this time). 5. Catching up on the latest family news. 6. Enjoying a home made fireworks display—mostly courtesy of Miranda. The kids lit little ones in the early evening, and then the adults had fun with the wild cascading things once it was dark. Callie, Savannah and Denali watched from the upstairs windows inside.

On Sunday morning, we served the traditional Bisquick cinnamon cake before getting all of us to church with plenty of time to spare. It was fun to take up two rows and the children reconnected with some of the older church members. By Monday, July 6, the numbers began to thin. Andy went back to Mississippi. Kera took the children and went to see her Mom, who is not doing as well as we would like. Miranda and Dan left on Monday afternoon, after doing some more pawn shopping. Adam and Savannah and Denali left on Tuesday afternoon. Wow! The house was almost quiet.

Wednesday Deborah and Sandy went off to do some house hunting with Kevin Darracq. They got through 7 of 9 houses before Steven had enough and Deborah found one she liked well enough to have Tom take a look at it. Tom was busy at the Midway duplex building a deck and stair railings. Wow! He did a fantastic job! He is also back teaching at OMART. How hard it seems to be to make time from his busy schedule for teaching. Fortunately they are flexible about when he can come and teach.

Saturday we went to the lake to swim. The children enjoyed it and we met two other church families there. Alas, it was windy and stormy. That made the lake choppy and tended to blow the children toward the edge of the roped-off swimming area. We decided it probably wasn’t wise to swim in the thunder and lightening and so cut our time short.

Monday Deborah put in an offer for the little house then headed home. Alas, another offer came in that trumped hers. So, less work, less stress, less results.

Substitute Blogger

I suppose you have all been wondering why this blog has been un-updated for so long. And even now, the primary bloggers are still AWOL. This is being done by Rebecca. I got tired of no new anythings and took control. (Bwa-ha-ha-ha!) and I will be doing today's edition of events. I apologise in advance for the order of pictures, and I am hoping that your sheer delight in having something to see here will make up for any mistakes or possible disgruntlements.

So, for those of you who were not here, the reason Mom and Dad have been too busy to blog is because most of their offspring descended upon them and wore them out over the 4th of July weekend. All their children but Jonathan were here and most of the families came too. Deborah and I were husbandless, but other than that, Andy and his wife and children came, Deborah and her children were here, Miranda and her Dan were here, and Adam came with his lovely wife and 5 week old daughter. And you know when we get together, we like to party!

I have put together pictures for your perusal so you can get an idea of what a great time we had!

Here is Deborah and her children, Sarah (4) and Steven (10 mos). We were out on the 4th of July and the big boys were setting off lots of fireworks. Sarah wasn't sure she liked it. It was a lot of noise.

Here are Adam, Savannah and baby Denali. We held and Open House, which was really just an excuse to have a party and have friends come over to visit and munch on goodies.

It was a lot of fun to have a lot of children running around. They played surprisingly well together. Here we have Andy's 2 youngest, Mathew and Emma, sitting next to my youngest, Delaney at the piano. Emma wasn't so sure she wanted to share the piano.

Most of the family went canoeing. Here are Dan and Miranda, with Marian. They had a great time paddling down the river. They saw lots of animals and there was much splashing going on.

Here we have a more refined picture of Dan and Miranda. Miranda called this the Prom Pose picture!

We were able to corral Andy's family for a photo and don't the girls look great with the purple in their dresses?! What a good looking bunch!

Some of you may be unaware, but when we get together, we have some pretty competitive games that come out. 5 Crowns is a popular tradition and we like to hang out, talking trash and playing cards.

Okay, the grown ups like to play cards. The kids prefer to go to the park. I think that Emma here just may be the cutest kid in the universe. Granted, every mom thinks their kid is the cutest, but I have to admit that Emma trumps even my children's adoribility. I think its the curls that do it!

Sarah, Matthew and Delaney are mugging for the camera. They were so cute, all dressed and almost ready for church.

And after church, Kera managed to get nearly all the children to sit for a group picture. Adam is a putz and ran away as soon as the closing prayer was said, so there's no Denali here. I think we got all the other kids, except for Steven though. Such a cute crew!

And there you have the reason why this blog has been neglected for so long!