Life as we know it

I took the kids to the local water park yesterday. They were having Warrens Resident Day. Anyone with a Warrens address gets in free for the day. I took the kids and their cousins for the afternoon. We all had a great time. There is something pretty cool about sitting in a hot tub "outside" in cold weather.

My friend Vicki and I were trying to ride the lazy river, you know one of those things that you ride around a "river course" in an innertube. We had just got into the tubes (now there's a picture) and were trying to start on the course when Vicki got caught in some weird current thing and ended up heading against the water going towards where the innertubes come out of the slides. No matter what she did her tube would not float with the water, she just kept heading upstream. Of course, I'm no help as I laugh like a loon over on the other side. Anyway, this very nice, very large highschool kid (football player type) lifeguard came and saved us and pulled both of us in our tubes out to the river and sent us on our way. How funny.....we hadn't even been in the water long enough to get wet and already had to be saved by the lifeguard. Figures! The next time we came around, being a smart alec he stood in the middle of the opening so that we could not end up in the wrong place again, which made me laugh harder. My sides still hurt from laughing.

All in all a good day...and then....

We all trooped out to get into the car and head home. Jake in the front, with Jessalyn, Jessica and Tim in the back. As Jake went to shut his door, Jessa was just getting in the back. She had her hand in the wrong place and you can guess what happened next. Strong 15 year old slams door on 11 year old hand. It caught all 4 fingers. Thankfully Tim works part time at the park. I asked him to run in and get ice and a towel. He ran ALL the way, full tilt. Poor kid. He was completely worn out. Probably 1/2 mile when you add halls etc.

Jacob felt terrible. He is such a soft hearted thing. He just wanted to do something, anything to help his little sister. I didn't know who to feel worse for. Jessalyn was really hurting, but she dealt with it like a little trooper. I'm very proud of them both. Her for being so understanding and not blaming Jacob or him for being so concerned for his sister.

I have not woke her up for school yet. We'll see how bad it is in a little bit. She is probably not going to be able to write today. Poor thing. Tomorrow is the regional spelling bee. She is very concerned about that. Since she had musical practise and musical performances the last 2 weeks, she has not had much time to study the words. Not comforting for someone that takes her studies seriously like she does.

Well, Jake needs Mom, so I'll quit for now and update you on the remodeling work later. Although I will tell you that my very frustrated husband spent Saturday pulling down the Christmas lights from outside. We could not pull them down earlier as they were encased in ice from more than one ice storm and ice from all that snow. Almost all are now broken and not repairable. He was not a happy camper. I think next year there might not be any lights.

Have a great day.
dea

Panic mode (well almost)

Monday I stayed home from work. I have been fighting this terrible cold, sore throat thing since Friday night. I had asked the Lord to spare me from getting sick because I did not have time, but I also have learned that since I am sick so very seldom, it is usually when I need to learn something that I do get sick. So I pretty much said "OK Lord, if I have to get sick to learn something please don't let me get sick until I am done singing at the Good Friday service, since so many people are depending on me." Guess what? I got sick on the way home. Actually it was pretty cool how it happened.

After my conversation with God, I was pretty sure that this would be a learning experience. Let me tell you, I really have grown to dread these learning experiences. They are usually something about patience ( I really have none) or control (I have issues with letting others do something, when I could just do it and get it done in much less time). You never know what's going to happen and usually it is a hard lesson to learn. I figure that when I am sick it's the only time that He can be sure that I slow down enough to pay attention to what's going on.

Ok, so I'm sick. I work sick on Saturday with plans to come home and paint Jessalyn's room that afternoon. It's obvious after stopping to pick up a few groceries that I am in no shape to paint. I'm still going to try though, until gravity took hold. I sat down on a chair and could not seem to get back out of it. Ok so I'm not painting. I went to bed.

Sunday was Easter as you well know. We went to church and then over to my Mom and Pop's house for dinner. It was fun sitting around laughing, but Will brought my sick body home none too soon and I went to bed to moan and croak in peace. Why is it when you lose your voice, that's when your children want to talk to you the most? Up until then, talking to Mom was the last thing on their minds. Now I'm popular? I think they did it just to hear me croaking and then went into their rooms to laugh. Of all the nerve....

Stayed home Monday to get back to the living. Still having learned nothing except that I really, really like blankets. That soft warm feeling that you have when you are sleeping or when you are just laying there reading under a nice warm blanket. God did good when he invented blankets. One of the best ideas ever.

Anyway, suddenly Monday afternoon my right eye went crazy. Broken glass type bright flashing light type crazy. All around the edges. Made me motion sick and I could not do anything, but close my eyes and hope that it would go away. Which it did in about 20 minutes. Then it happened again. Ok, I figured, I've got sinus pressure and it's causing me to have these things.

Tuesday morning I get into the car to go to work and it happens again. Ok, so now this is a little weird. I call in and then call the doctor who says get in here. I go in and they do a bunch of testing on me and then tell me I need to see a specialist right away because they think my retina is detaching. Oh great. Just what I need.

Mom and Pop had driven me to the doctor because Will now has what I did and is home sleeping. I call him and then we head over an hour away to the doctor's at a big hospital in Marshfield. I'm not really nervous for some reason. I'm pretty calm. We eat lunch at a cute little restaurant and then head to the specialist.

A bunch of tests later, I do not have retina problems, thank you God. What I do have is some type of weird thing going on with the blood vessels in my head. They are causing migraine episodes in my eye. So instead of getting migraines in my head and being sick for hours, I get a spasm in my eye that distorts my vision and makes me miserable for 20 minutes and then I get on with my life. What a weird thing. Although because of this and because of the deer coming through the windshield and hitting me in the head, I now have to go more often to the eye doctor because I am prone to retinal detachment.

So my lesson learned at least for now from my illness is that I get "eyegraines". WEIRD!
AND my overtired body had more sleep in the last few days than it has had in months. I was burning the candle at both ends.

So now I'm back to the land of the living....Ok I'm hanging onto the edge by a thread, but I'm here and I don't have time to be sick any more, so on with life.....charge!

By the way, Jessalyn is one of the finalists for the area spelling bee and is going to regionals on the 1rst of April. Her musical that she has been practising for 3 days a week for two months starts performances tomorrow through Saturday. Jacob goes on a field trip the 3rd and then Jessalyn leaves the 24th for her safety patrol trip to Washington DC and Gettysburg. Throw in Uncle Lloyd's memorial celebration, a couple of meetings, a couple of birthdays, Young Eagles and work and you've got a pretty full schedule. We try not to get too bogged down in "busy", but this month looks to be topping the scales.

Hope you all have a great day!
God bless.
dea

What a Tease!!

A couple of days of 44 degrees (F) and then wham!
6 inches of snow! Yuck!

This is a weird kind of snow too.

Until I moved to Wisconsin I just didn't realize how many different kinds of snow there really are. I just thought snow is snow; ya know?

This is stuff is bad...or good depending on your disposition.
If you are looking to make the meanest snowball ever than this is the stuff.

It's wet.
It's sticky.
It packs down really really well.
You could really hurt someone with this stuff!

On the other hand...

It's wet.
It's sticky.
It packs down really really well.
it's really really easy to slip, fall, and hurt yourself with!

Cars slid off the road yesterday with such regularity it looked like an Olympic sport:

synchronized carnage.

Thursday morning I got up early to burn my pile of scrap wood. I was in a hurry because I needed to get it done before all the snow melted. For the first time since November I could actually see grass in my yard. The temperature Thursday was 44 degrees. As I was burning, my wife called to tell me the forecast for Friday: Snow. Anywhere from 2 to 10 inches! Did I mention: Yuck! ?

You can no longer see grass in my yard.

To put a good spin on this, this morning I'm going over to help Kris and Marge tear down a building and set fire to it and another scrap pile. This weather means it should be safer to do that. Provided I can make it to their house without getting stuck.

Deanna has to deliver Mail in this stuff.

Yuck! again.

Someone told me this is the earliest Easter that this generation will ever see. I don't know if that's true or not but I pray this Easter is your Best one yet!
Amen!
Will.

Spring might be here?

I'm afraid to get my hopes up. We have had wonderful weather the last 4 days. Temps from 38-52 and sunny. To most of you that sounds cold. To most of us it's a heat wave. I have actually delivered my mail route all four days in just a t-shirt and my hooded sweatshirt.

Although yesterday was the first day that we actually hoped for spring and thought we might get it. It all started in the morning when Will took the dog out for his morning exploration. You see we have to call it an exploration because he lies and says he really, really has to go, while doing the "potty dance". Once you get outside he seems to forget the dance and is more interested in smelling the entire yard to see who might have walked over it during the night. You actually have to remind him why he came out in the first place. Now that the snow is melting and things are actually "smelling" again, it's harder than ever to keep in on track.

Anyway, Will had the dog out and came in with a big smile on his face. It seems that the "dawn chorus" was awake and singing. During the winter here, the birds do not really sing. Most of the song birds migrate. You end up with Blue Jays and Crows for the most part and let me tell you when they sing, it sounds more like an argument. Evidently the birds were all singing in the trees around him and he had 3 woodpeckers that were doing their thing in three different areas. It was kind of an echo effect with them. Then add in a couple of Canadian geese honking as they flew over. It was spring.

On my route I pulled into an area that I have to stand outside and deliver mail to over 100 boxes. When I pulled up I was delighted to smell the earth. It's hard to explain, but during winter you smell crisp air and ice. Nothing else seems to smell except smoke from chimneys etc. It's like the world is frozen trees, ground and all. Yesterday was the first day that I could smell the world around me. I could smell the sun beating down on the earth, the grass starting to emerge again and all the smells of "life" beginning again. Then some Canadian geese came over followed by a sandhill crain. It was great! I could have just stood there for hours. What a great job God does.

We are going to have a celebration of Uncle Lloyd's life the beginning of April. He wanted lots of singing and food. That's something my family can really get into. Add a little talking, ok a lot of talking and you've got it made. Now that's our family's idea of perfect, except it will really be different without Lloyd there. Maybe by then we will be able to sing without getting choked up. I'm not holding my breath.

Time to get ready for church and then after church get ready to start planning the remodeling project. We are repainting every room in the house. Restaining the outside, new soffet and facia, new roof and new septic God willing.

On that optomistic but depressing note. Oh man, Oh man, Oh man.... what a lot of work. Hey Bob, how about coming over from Australia on a work visa and helping? I'll feed you! Bring Nick. Just kidding!

Have a great day!
dea

I DO NOT LIKE THIS DYING STUFF!

My Uncle Lloyd went home to be with God yesterday and it's rough. He was such an important part of all of our lives that it is hard to really wrap our minds around it. He might have been a very laid back person in most ways, but truly he was a force to be reckoned with. A mighty prayer warrior, pastor, mentor, friend, singer, leader and jokester just to name a few.

With him going it brings an end to the Dads & Daughters, a singing group that I have been blessed to sing with for over 10 years. I loved it. Singing with those three other people was as easy as breathing for me. I'm not sure where to go from here because that ministry was very important to us and our family.

I almost drowned once and this is the exact same feeling. Like you are going under and cannot breath. The waves keep crashing down. He was my Uncle not my Dad, so I cannot even imagine what my cousins are going through. Although in lots of ways he was my second father, my buddy.

When my Aunt died late this last year and I made the trip to Pensacola/Lillian AL with Lloyd and my other Aunt and Uncle. Lloyd had just had his second hip replaced. He was walking with a walker and I was his gopher. We had a blast! It was a terribly sad occasion and we all still miss Aunt Ruth greatly, but for me it was a special trip. Lloyd and I spent lots of time together and I will always be thankful.

I will miss him bunches as will the rest of the family. He was Jacob's mentor, Jessa's goofoff buddy and Will's friend. Believe me I don't think that Will is ever going to forget the fact that Uncle Lloyd called him Rich for our first 3 years of marriage. At first it was by accident, but then after that I'm not so sure. I think that he just liked to tease Will that way.

He had a very quick wit. I will miss him stopping us in a song while the Dads & Daughters were singing and asking us if we had ever sung this song before. I will miss him playing the jug on one of our songs because he said it had too many words and we sang them too fast. I will miss him singing the girl's part in another one exclaiming in falcetto "He didn't even shake my hand!". The man kept me in stitches quite often and for the most part I could not allow myself to look at him during our concerts because I would get the giggles.

I'm just plain going to miss my Uncle Lloyd and all of the fun that he brought into my life.

Thank you God for letting me share him all these years. I just hope that I remember all of the lessons that he tried to teach us all just by living his every day life.

See you Uncle Lloyd and be ready to sing when I get there.

Do you remember the stupid things rule?

We have discussed that rule before. Stupid things happen to me. Well, it happened again. Everyone else was suprised, but not me. I knew that it would rear it's ugly head and probably at the most innapropriate moment. It did.

I went this last weekend to the Governor's Conference on Tourism, which feels for the most part like my one chance during the year to do something really creative and actually be seen as an intelligent person. For the rest of the year I am just "me". Now don't get me wrong, I'm happy to be me, but sometimes it is nice to let my creative energy out of the every day box. Sometimes it is nice to have the chance to just let the ideas fly. I got a chance to do that this year and enjoyed it. I happened to sit in on a couple of round table discussions that really got the energy flowing. I also got to have my own hotel room at a resort and spa that saw to my every comfort including my daily walking requirements (my room was 847 steps one way from the main conference room). One day I walked it a total of 9 times (18 if you count the return trips). Lots and lots of steps. It was great! I love walking, especially when my foot does not hurt. Anyway, I digress.

I was really enjoying the pampering, the thinking, the not being responsible for anyone but myself although I could not handle any of it any longer than I did. I am programmed to be responsible and to think about others. It was nice though for a little bit.....but then the stupid things rule....

Picture this..... I am sitting at a table for breakfast with 8 other people and we are talking about ideas for this next couple of years of Cranfest. We are also discussing ideas that we can bounce by the tourism department and other agencies for creative advertising. This is one of my favorite type subjects. Everyone is just throwing ideas around and you really have to work to keep up with all of them. One idea just leads to another. We are really on a roll. Someone asks me for the cream. Someone else reaches for something next to the cream as I am passing this little cream pitcher on it's own little saucer. You can see it coming right? The pitcher tips a little and then flies off of the saucer landing on guess who?

I am now wearing white cream all over my red sweater. You know it's suprising how much cream that one little pitcher could hold. Especially since we had already been using it. I am covered all down my front, right down to my shoes. Everyone is talking at once. Everyone is trying to get me cleaned off. The servers are running for napkins. Everyone is concerned and I am laughing. I think that they think I am hysterical, as I laugh it off.

I try to explain the stupid things rule. They look at me like I'm nuts (Probably)but what can you do? There's no use crying over spilled milk right? Gotcha!! I've been waiting for a chance to use that one although, I probably really should have waited longer. Anyway, they're all worried. Not me.. I was expecting this. I have at least 2 other outfits back at the room for this type of situation. They are looking at me. I just calmly finish eating breakfast and then head back to the room to take my second shower in 2 hours, change clothes and return. No problem. I appreciated their concern, but I had expected it. It waited until the second morning, so I knew it was coming. At least it was not painful.

Well, that was my excursion into adultland. I am now home trying to get caught up. I keep trying, but don't know when I'll succeed. I have lots and lots of laundry to do.

By the way, it's not like our Christmas tree was in our main living area rotting and shedding. It is in our extra room. It was all naked of lights etc, but the weather has been terrible. We have had between 20-50 below wind chill factor and snow for so long, that it was just safer, warmer and less hassle to leave it there until the weather cooperated. Besides with all the snow on the ground, Will would have been almost waist high in snow taking it out. Not fun, so we didn't push it. The weather is slightly being more cooperative lately, so we can do more. But it's still windy. The tree is no longer where it was, but has moved in the wind another 100 feet or so. Poor Tater the dog thinks it's alive.

My Uncle is still in ICU. The doctors do not hold much hope for him, but I HAVE A BIG GOD!! We are all praying. I mean look what he did with Lazerus. Uncle LLoyd is still functioning and doing better than expected. We're keeping the faith and waiting.

Well, the weather is supposed to be better this week and we hope that it holds true. We still have well over a foot of condensed snow that has turned pretty much to solid ice. Not fun on a mail route, especially when you get out to deliver a package.

Hope you all have a great day.
God bless.
dea

Procrastinate later!

Today is March 7th.
So I'll tell you what I did on March 1st!
I took down the Christmas tree!!!
You thought you were running behind maybe?

We're still having computer problems but I'm learning how to deal with them by trial and error. The trial of making errors. Now my other computer is so disgusted with my feeble attempts to fix it's networking issues that it no longer wishes to communicate with the monitor.

This would be the same as of poking the eyes out of the guy who isn't a doctor but is convinced that blood-letting and leaches might solve your inability to speak.
I guess I can't blame it.

Well, that should convince you that we haven't dropped from the face of the earth!
Deanna went to the Governors conference on tourism and I'll let her fill you in on all of that.

Have a great God filled Day!
Will