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Friday, November 30, 2012

Manna from heaven...


Okay wells it's probably not fair or very accurate to compare having your only son on a two year mission to the starving Isrealites traveling through the desert.  

But I can tell you "Packages from Paraguay" are really really special at our house!!

And I can pretty much guarantee a sealed box will NOT wait until Christmas Eve or even through the weekend!!

Thursday, November 29, 2012

Baby Blessing...

It was the sweetest experience ever to be invited back to Tristan's baby blessing.

It was Jim's first to stand in on, and he was so honored.
After all this family has been through, fighting for life each day from the beginning and then the loss of everything in their house fire just 3 days prior, it was the biggest testimony of faith and my heart was so touched.   Tristan's great grandfather blessed her and it was so sweet and precious.
(Mom handing the baby into the Priesthood)

Her aunt had made her a special dress and Mom, when asked about the beautiful dress she was wearing, just gracefully said "the one that was made especially for her, well isn't here for obvious reasons" and she just accepted the sadness of that, and was so thankful she had a new one to wear.  

Keep putting one foot in front of the other... it is such a hard thing to do, but I know sometimes that is just what God is watching to make sure we do, and He is so excited when we do it with such grace as this Mom.  She was amazing!

Wednesday, November 28, 2012

Thanksgiving 2012

Thanksgiving morning started off with the traditional "turkey bowl"... the only non-traditional part was that my strong silent mysterious man went to fill in for the missionary. 
It's his favorite part of Thanksgiving... and they miss him, next year he will be right in the middle of it again, I am certain!
The good news is no broken bones!  Yay!
The turkey gift from Jim's boss, so good.
Turkey for a year for the two of us :)
But so super grateful!!
Jim's ONLY request was mashed potatoes and gravy!
It is all he ever asks for on Thanksgiving.
And it's not like we don't eat it every week!
Hello, we live in Idaho :)
But that's what he wants, so that's what I make... if I make more it doesn't get eaten unless I eat it.  So I don't need it, so I didn't make it.

Except for pie.
He does eat apple pie, so I made one, cut the recipe in half and it made two?????  

I didn't question it, I just kept baking.
It was one of those laws of heaven opening and the blessing pouring out... who questions that?

But then I had extra pie crust so I found some fresh pumpkin in the freezer from last year (I didn't think that was gross, was it?)

Yes, looks really pretty right?
When I cut into it, it was like puke on the inside... something went terribly wrong in the making.  Was it the year old frozen pumpkin?
I allowed for extra liquid from it being frozen, but it was NOT enough apparently?  It's hard to fix what you don't know went wrong?  Oh well, I have a pretty pumpkin pie PICTURE and if I never say anything, nobody will know, ha ha ha.
I don't remember ever making pumpkin pie, so it just goes to show the first time flop always gives you something to talk about for years.
Don't even get me going on my first 10 years of turkeys!!

Oh and we had company, Cocoa came to visit while her Mom went to stay the night with her Dad.  He is doing well and healing, he got his stitches out from his surgery this week and next week hopes to get to sit up for 5 min. at a time.  It's a super slow process of healing, but all is going well.

This is what a turkey hangover looks like... or maybe his was just a mashed potato and gravy one.
We ate early and so naps were really in order :)
I spent my nap time freezing leftover turkey.... well someone had to do it.

Tuesday Jim called our friends who just got home in October with their little girl who had heart surgeries since she was born in June in California.  And he said they were all fine, but their house burned down.  What???
Our hearts sank, but immediately we saw the troops from the church rallying and gathering some much needed items for this family.
So he called him again Thursday to find out where they were staying and the Bishop in their ward had a house for them to stay in for as long as they needed.  And he told Jim they were in it, and their friends from our church had it all set up for them with beds and they were already having Thanksgiving dinner there!

Wow, what blessings!
It really is wonderful to see our church following in Jesus Christ example to do everything it took to absorb this kind of wave for this family.  They sounded good, but we had a painting that belonged to his grandmother we purchased at an auction earlier in the year at a fund raiser for his baby.


I told Jim, they had to have this painting for the house they were staying in.  They had lost EVERYTHING except their family and they needed something that would have new/old meaning to them.  

We were right, they loved it!
It was so awesome to see Tristan, she is beautiful and doing so well!
Still not going out in public and has a feeding tube, but she is great.
It was horrible circumstances to go see them, but we were so happy we did.  What a comfort to know they are going to be okay, somehow, someday.
The blessings of that Bishop having a house sitting empty and the blessings from the community being able to come furnish it for this family.  They even thought to copy photos from facebook and print them and put them in frames around the house to try and make it feel like home.  That really cushioned so much of the blow.
They did not miss a beat, it will be a long recover in their hearts... but we were so grateful for the reminder of all that we have to be thankful for this season.
It's not about the stuff.

I am so grateful for this story touching so close to us to help me remember that.  Stay tuned, we were invited back Friday night with them, for a really special special occasion.


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