Visitors!

We have the kind of house where you never know when the doorbell will ring or who will be ringing it. Well, in #2 house we don't ever get visitors. Well, I take that back, the Jehovah's Wittnesses have found us and stopped. But other than that our visitors are few and far between. So, imagine our excitement when two of my girlfriends from "down south" as we now call it, decided to bring their kiddos and stay a few days with us after Christmas. Picture 3 women, 7 kids and one husband, mine, who earned the Bestest Hubby Award. We had so much fun! The kids did their thing and us girls watched movies and chatted, just like we are supposed to. Oh, and we ate way too much. The first evening we were all here, I decided to make a fire in the wood stove, which apparently did not want a fire in itself. Smoke came billowing out of the back of the stove! It had never happened before and of course it had to happen while we had company! After the smoke cleared and everyone was done gagging and coughing, we did laugh, eventually. The big hit was Wii Resort and Just Dance. You should have seen those kids working up a sweat dancing, whether they were holding a remote or not! I think "Eye of the Tiger" was the fav, so funny, they call it an old song, very sad since I remember that being the "it" song. We got a huge snow storm the day after we got here and the kids had a blast playing out in it. I swear, it took us longer to get them bundled than they actually played outside. But hot chocolate always tastes good no matter how long, or short, that you are outside. They played Vampire, which means all the lights are off and the person who is it, jumps out and scares you at random intervals. The screams made are so much fun to hear because they are all followed by giggles. Good times!

Christmas

We read "Jotham's Journey" this advent season. If you haven't read those books, you need to. Age makes no difference, hubby and I enjoyed these as much as the girls did. To answer the question we get a lot, yes, we have two trees. Since we have been back and forth between our two houses every weekend and will be south for Christmas day, we needed two trees! Ariel said, Mom, since we have two houses, does that mean we are rich? My answer was a very loud laugh! So, Christmas. We got a real tree for the new house, #2 house Belle calls it. The girls and I made decorations for the tree up here. We found decorations in the Gooseberry Patch Christmas Book and fell in love with it. Of course I think, that won't be too bad, but after you cut out 40 ornaments, which have two sides each, and then have to sew them together, stuffing them is the last think I really want to do. Ariel says...I'll stuff them, mom! And what a great job she did!! After we finished I was so glad that she encouraged me to do that, what a good helper she is turning out to be! We decorated the mantle, so fun, and hung stockings on the railing to the stairs. Of course this impeded sliding down the banister, so I'm sure they will be the first thing to come down. The gingerbread house! We had so much fun doing that too. Of course, I think we were on a sugar high for a couple days after making that, you have to sample all the good stuff. Christmas is always such a fun time of year and with two houses to enjoy it in, this will be a Christmas we won't soon forget. Celebrating our Savior's birth is so fun!

Christmas Pagents

The girls got to be in their school play and in the Sunday School Christmas pageant. In the school play, Ariel was a king and had a solo! She did awesome. Belle was an angel and her big line was, "Let's talk about joy!". In the Sunday School pageant, Belle got to be Mary! It was so fun! Ariel once again used her beautiful singing voice to celebrate Jesus' birth!

Moving...

Ugh! Moving stuff from place to place, not on the top of my "Best times to be had" list. But, it wasn't so bad! We packed up the stuff we were taking, the old green couch and chair have been left behind, but the dining room table made the trip, and headed north in a 4 car caravan. I am a lucky girl to have wonderful in-laws! My father and mother-in-law pulled the trailer, my sister-in-law and nephew drove their van with stuff, my Jeep was packed and of course the cruiser with hubby...why he didn't let me drive the cruiser, I have nooooo idea! After a brief stop to load up the stuff we had used for the past 3 weeks from a friend's house just south of the new house, we landed at the house we will call home for a while. In no time at all our stuff was unpacked, the girls' beds were made and we were ready to hit those beds. The girls have already decided which room to have for a playroom and it looks like a playroom already! Their bathroom is totally girlie, complete with a feather boa as a window treatment. Good stuff. I think we'll make some good memories here.

House

Searching for a house is not all that fun. I love poking into other people's houses, that is fun, but to try to picture a cold, empty house with all our stuff in it and figure out if it will work, not so much fun. But, we have had success. God is good and continues to prove Himself over and over to us and why do I think He'll let us down now? We have found an old farmhouse, complete with an outdoor wood boiler like we have at home, with 7 bedrooms, a living room and a family room, and plenty of space to run outside. So...I'm wondering now what to bring...

Moving north

When ever I go to the doctor or take the kids, the secretary says, is your address still....and I always joke and say, yup, forever! Ha! Don't you love it when you have life all figured out and then, bam! Everything changes! So, hubby comes home this summer and says, I think I'd like to put in for a promotion. There is a troop commander who is retiring and I'd love to have the job. I'm always up for adventure and I'm so proud at what hubby does that I'm like, sure thing, let's do it. You know when you want something, but you don't really think that you'll get it? That's me with this promotion. You see, the troop that he wanted this job at would require a move two hours north. So, fast forward to the middle of October to the day he went for his interview. He was sitting in his cruiser for a few minutes in the driveway, so I went down to chat with him while he was finishing up work. While we were sitting there, his phone rings and he says...This is it! And I hear a voice on the other end say, Hello, Mark, this is Pat Flemming calling... Pat Flemming, aka Colonel Flemming, Unit 1 of the Maine State Police, the one who calls when you GET the job, continues talking as I'm thinking, holy crap, we are moving! So, in two weeks time, we are moved and Mark has a new job, and we are all still alive and sane. I'm homeschooling my girls, under the supervision of their teacher, and I think we are all going to make it! Hubby loves his new job and is getting to know lots of new people. A new adventure is in the works!

You give and take away, my heart will choose to say, blessed be the name of the Lord!

The fire. Not mentioned in my previous post but a big enough part of our life now that it deserves some attention. On a cold night in March, Hubby came home from work at about 3am and an hour later an SUV drives down our driveway honking and yelling Hubby's name. He goes out onto the porch and the SUV drives announces that our apartment building was totally engulfed in fire. When I was able to finally get to the scene at about 9am, I learned that it was not as bad as previously thought. There were four families living in the building and everyone was safe and sound. The two bottom floor apartments sustained the most damage. Leaving out all the boring details and fast forwarding until July, our contractor told Hubby that the cost that we were responsible for to get the apartment building back to code was not going to be worth the money. The way the insurance was going to depreciate the building, it was not going to be cost effective. The contractor also told Hubby that he had a friend who loved buying buildings like ours, as is. All I can think of is...is his friend crazy?! Here's where the blessing comes in. The insurance money could go directly to us after we paid the contractor and paid the mortgage off. Amazing! So fast forward to today. The way it stands now is that we have no debt! The friend who loves building stripped to the studs wants to buy the place. If that isn't a blessing straight from Heaven above, I don't know what is! Something that man meant for harm, God intended for good!