Remember when my ceiling downstairs looked like this, following the water damage earlier this year, with spaces cut out for drying and to do some electrical work?                                             

                                        

 

                                            

Now it looks like this!      

                                                  

                                          

I had lots of fun with my three grandchildren over this morning!  Charlie was being silly, toppling over on that rocking horse, while Megan is enthralled on what is on TV, and John is sitting up very well, but I wasn't going to take any chances, so that is why there are pillows all over around him.        

                                                  

                                                  

                                            

And here is what they were watching - a video of sign language, learning about colors!      

                                                  

                                            

Later on, Charlie was coloring and cutting out lots of fun things!       

                                            

Megan being cute!        

                                             

And one more picture of John.  He loves to sit and watch the older two play, although he got fussy, wouldn't take a nap for Grandma, and so there wasn't much picture-taking after that!        

                                             

 

I am having a lot of trouble posting pictures on my blog!  Xanga won't let me do it on Firefox, which is where I usually do everything, so I can use Internet Explorer, but then it won't let me easily link it to Facebook.  So, then I have to go back and forth to do everything.  Sigh. . . technology. . .    After this, I think I need to go sew.  At least my needle and thread work!         

We finally decided on the placement of the furniture in our great room!  And when I was in Colorado a couple of weeks ago, I found fabric to make a quilt for that room!

                                            

Here is the furniture -

                                         

                                         

                                          

And I just finished flower # 33 of my Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt - I need at least that many more!

                                         

Each flower is made of hexagons, using the English paper piecing method.  The print fabrics are reproduction feedsack fabric, and each has a solid middle, then a yellow center.  No two will be exactly alike, I hope, although I have to use some of the same fabrics with a different matching solid to have enough.  I love doing this technique!  It is all hand sewn.  When I finish all the flowers, I have a white on white fabric to put around each one, then attach them together.  I have been working on it for years!  But we will be taking a couple more trips soon, when I should have more time to sit and sew, and this project is easy to pack.

So, I have lots of sewing to do!  I better get busy. . .

This weekend marks a 5 year anniversary of a terrible event.  This post is being written with permission.  And I also have permission to link it to Betsy's blog.

I am swimming in tears.  I can barely see to type.  But this is nothing compared to the emotions of 5 years ago, when I thought I wouldn't take another breath because it hurt so much.

But it is also the anniversary of a time of learning more about God and His grace than I ever thought I would know.  God gave me this verse from Isaiah 43, all those years ago:

Isaiah 43: 2 

When you pass through the waters, I will be with you;  and through the rivers, they shall not overwhelm you;  when you walk through fire you shall not be burned, and the flame shall not consume you.

I watched while God changed the life of my daughter, drew her to Himself, and strengthened her in ways that I cannot fathom.  Yes, the days and weeks and months were difficult.  Yes, we hurt, we asked God, "Why?", we were often immobilized with pain.  But we bonded together as a family in an incredible way.  We watched while Betsy lived Isaiah 43, while God held her up through the waters and through the flame.  And she emerged as gold.

So, on this anniversary of pain, I will do as I have done every year on this day.  I pray, I knit (although I told Betsy that I am not knitting anything stress free right this minute, but I am going to work on my paper pieced Grandmother's Flower Garden quilt, instead, this year), and I struggle through a weekend of wondering how she is doing and what she is doing and trusting that God, who promised that He redeemed her and called her by name, is taking care of her.

Five years ago, when anyone asked me if I was ok, I replied, "No, and I never will be again."  This year I can reply, "Yes, by the grace of our sovereign Lord and Savior, who did not promise that we will never have trouble, but Who promised that He will uphold us in His righteous hand, I am ok."

I drove to Colorado with a friend!  The trip took 11 days total.  More about that in a minute!  Before I left, I entered a blog give-away by my long-time xanga friend, now blogging at sealevel320, Cheryl.  And I won!  And this is what I won - a bottle of shells and sea glass from Puerto Rico!

                                        

I love it, and it now has a prominent place on the bottom of my canning shelf in the kitchen!  Thanks, Cheryl!

I left for Colorado on Sept 6th, along with a friend and her 7-yr old daughter.  My friend has asked not to have her pictures on my blog or on Facebook, so she will remain anonymous, but I do have a few other pictures to show of the trip.  My friend is also a quilter, so we decided ahead of time that this would be a wonderful opportunity to find quilt shops across the country.  And we did!

But of course my main reason for going was to see Betsy and Andrew!  And to take some furniture to Betsy that she especially wanted - a recliner of my father's, and some chairs that my mother had with a small table in her little apartment, then in assisted living.  Bets and Andrew were able to fit the table and 2 of the chairs when they were here in July.

So, we took some detours off of the main highways to find quilt shops that we saw in the book about quilt shops across the country, that my friend had, and we had fun doing that.  We did buy fabric and books and probably way too many things!  I'll take pictures of my fabric for the next blog!  And we spent lots of time with Betsy and Andrew, saw their adorable apartment, did some shopping, took my friend's daughter to story hour at the library where Betsy works and got a personal tour of the library, drank way too many Starbucks and McDonald's coffee drinks, stayed in different hotels, ate in lots of restaurants, cooked in Betsy's apartment, and shopped in MORE quilt shops in the Greeley/Loveland/Windsor area of CO.

One day we drove down to Denver to go to the Children's museum (I took lots of pictures there, all with my friend's daughter in them before I knew she wouldn't want them to be shown), and we went back to the Denver Aquarium where Betsy and Andrew got married!

Here is a picture of Bets in front of that tank, right where the wedding took place, showing her ring -

                                   

Betsy and I hadn't really had a chance to tour the aquarium the last time, so we enjoyed that.  They even have a tiger!  Ooops, looks like he has horns; I didn't notice the background when I took the picture!

                                   

And my dear friend, Betsy, who my Betsy was named after, came to meet us for lunch!  She lives in Colorado Springs now, and we saw her and her husband the last time we were there, but it was after Bets and Andrew were gone, so the two Betsys hadn't seen each other in 16 years;  my Betsy was only 8 years old then, so she didn't remember it all very well.

                                   

That picture of the two Betsys I love makes me smile!

Andrew's parents invited us for dinner one night -we had a cookout and such a nice time!

Betsy, Andrew, and Luna -

                                    

Andrew's mother, Bonita, with one of his brothers, JD, and his wife, Lianna -

                                    

Another brother, Jesse -

                                    

And Andrew's dad, Daniel -

                                    

What a wonderful time we had, enjoying their hospitality!

Then it was time to come home.  We enjoyed passing this car several times on our way home!  Elk antlers!

                                    

I am so glad to be home!  It took me half of the time in Colorado to adjust to the time change, and now I am re-adjusting to Eastern time again, and I think it will take several days!  But I miss Betsy soooo much.      Love ya, Bets!

                               

I did two delightful things today, and I didn't have my camera at the first, and didn't pick it up to take any pictures at the second!  This morning, Jim took a friend of mine and I to visit a third friend, at her parents' home/farm.  It is the farm where he hunts most of the time.  We went to take some food and to visit, as this friend's mother had broken her shoulder a couple of weeks ago after a fall, and she is having shoulder replacement surgery this coming Wednesday.  We had a very nice visit, the mom seemed to not be in as much pain as she had been, and we tried to be as encouraging as possible.  After that, we took their Gator - I am guessing my farm friends know what that is because I hadn't a clue prior to this - all around the farm.  It was such a great time, and Jim was so happy to be showing us the farm that he has come to know and love.  Mostly, it was beautiful, and peaceful, and was very relaxing, even as we were bumping along and ducking trees and laughing!

The second delightful thing was that we had an early family Labor Day cook out.  Minus Betsy and Andrew, of course.     But Suzanne was home, and so Amanda and Sam and the kids came, and Joan and Kip and Josh, and we (Jim, not me, really) grilled hamburgers and hot dogs in the rain, and we ate a simple meal of that, baked beans (thanks, Joan!) some fruit, vegetables and chips, tomatoes from Amanda and Sam's garden, and cupcakes that have been in my freezer since the wedding reception a month ago!

The busyness of the past 6 months is something I have blogged about before!  The kitchen water damage, planning a wedding in Colorado, trips to Colorado, planning a reception here and then having the reception, and then all that goes into remodeling a kitchen and living room,  boxing up and moving things, and moving them again, and again, and yet again.  And not knowing where anything is.  Having my desk moved from the kitchen beforehand, to a bedroom downstairs, until we needed it for a bedroom, then upstairs to take over my sewing room along with all the other stuff that needed a temporary home.  Piles of paperwork that need to be sorted, piles of shirts that need to be ironed, boxes that can't be unpacked until we figure out where everything is going to go. . . I have named my downstairs family room the "war zone" because it not only has stuff, but it has work and construction-related items since the water damage extended to the ceiling there, and it still has to be plastered and painted.

I am looking for simplicity!!!  I am frustrated with all that I am not getting accomplished!  But, at the same time, I love my new kitchen and I am so thankful for all the remodeling!  But I long for a quiet week - a week that I could actually sit and sew, stay home and work on a project, even an organizing project, without having a million places to be and a million things that must be done immediately.  An extended period of time to focus on the important, not the urgent!

I have been influenced for the past few days by a blog - http://www.sealevel320.com/ - by Cheryl, who used to blog on xanga at cherylmsf2.xanga.com, and so many of my xanga friends know her.  I haven't ever met Cheryl in person, but we have been internet friends for years now!  Cheryl has been posting about a need to focus, in her life and in her photography, by finding a way to eliminate what is crowding out the important.  Her beautiful photographs and the descriptions she uses speak to me in a very real way about life. 

I am not a photographer, really, although I love to take pictures!  I love to take pictures only to remember what is important to me, like my family, my grandchildren, my home, my friends, my activities.  I am not all that interested in improving my photography.  But I have been able to see, in Cheryl's photos, what she is talking about in finding what to focus on, and in applying that to my life!!!

I am on a mission to eliminate clutter in my life, to focus on what are the most important things to me, to search out what God would have me do to simplify and what He wants me to be doing.  And along with that, I have been continuing to work on my healthy eating and exercising, which made their way to the bottom of my list of important things these past few months.

Meanwhile, though, I am dropping everything at home right in the middle of all the remodeling and clutter, and leaving items all over the place that need to be organized and taken care of, and forgetting about the war zone that is my downstairs, and the sewing room that does not have a sewing machine set up because the table is filled with stuff, and I am packing my suitcase and adding it to the furniture that is already packed into the Tahoe, picking up a friend in a few days, and driving to Colorado!!!  I am taking the furniture and some other things out to Betsy and Andrew.  We are taking a little bit of a different route than we did before so we won't be stopping to see some of the people I saw the last time I drove.

We do, however, have a list of quilt shops that we want to stop and see on the way!

When the earthquake, that we here in VA had today, hit, besides feeling some shaking, I heard the rattling of my canning jars on my shelves -

                                     

I suppose they could have come tumbling down had we experienced a worse situation!

Meanwhile, my new furniture has arrived, and we have spent days moving it around and deciding exactly how we want to set up this room with a dining room table in it as well as a couch and chairs and all.  So, we are still deciding!  But here is what it looks like -

                                      

                                      

                                      

When we finally decide how it all will end up, I'll take some more pictures of it!

The painting is all finished!  I love the colors!  There is still the backsplash tile in the kitchen to be done, as well as some other odds and ends before everything gets put back together.

The large room off the kitchen, now called the great room, is a pretty blue/gray -

                                     

                                 

The kitchen itself is a little darker blue -

                                 

                                  

                                 

And the laundry room, which is where just about everyone enters the house from the driveway, was such a dingy beige.  It hasn't been painted in a long, long time, and I wanted to really brighten it up.  So, I chose a bright yellow!  The cabinets and trim in the laundry room are white.

                                 

                                 

                                 

Next time:  New furniture                                              

I wasn't quite prepared yesterday afternoon when it turned out that the painters could come earlier than expected - at least than I expected - a week or so early - the next day!  Which was today.  In about a half hour, Sam managed to get everything out of the old living room (which we are now calling the great room), while I was trying to get the things that I would want to get to in the next week, somewhere where I could find it.  More packing of boxes and moving furniture around.  There were few places for all this stuff, which still included the kitchen stuff that hadn't been put anywhere while it was waiting for everything to be finished.  So, it all got moved, as well as anything in the kitchen that was important to take out - to the living room -

                                  

To my sewing room, where my laptop and "office" stuff are -

                                  

                                  

And to the downstairs, which already looks like a construction zone!

                                  

Or a war zone, is what I was feeling like.  This is what was left in the great room -

                                  

Remember how packed with stuff it was just a few days ago?

Earlier that morning, Charlie and Megan were over, and enjoyed playing in some of the boxes I had emptied out.  They wanted to eat their snack, which was a little bag of chips, in the boxes, so we called them their "snack box."

                                  

                                  

I was overwhelmed last night and this morning - I can't find a thing!  I have piles and piles of papers and mail on the table that was once, and might become again, my sewing table.  I feel so displaced!  The only place I really have to sit is right here in this chair in front of this laptop.  You know that feeling when you are so thankful and glad that something is happening because it will be so wonderful, but going through the process feels like more stress than you can handle?  I was determined to hold it all together, telling myself. . ."I will not cry, I will not cry. . ." and I was doing a pretty good job this morning as all of a sudden my house was taken over by painters and electricians and Sam.  But I sure didn't hang around long!  Amanda was blanching tomatoes - over 180 of them, from her garden, to make into spaghetti sauce to be canned and I went over to help her!  She was very organized and didn't need a whole lot of help, but I sure needed to be there!

Time for an update on how the new kitchen is coming along!  It is completely usable - it still needs painted, the backsplash installed, a little electrical work done, and the ice maker installed, as well as the little sink beside it.  I am trying to remember where I put everything, and learning how to use my new appliances!

                                    

                                       

That counter top looks like two different colors because of the lighting. 

My favorite is this shelving for canning jars!

                                    

Here you can see that there is still more work to be done!

                                    

I am thanking the Lord today for a cooler day - it was 78 degrees most of the day, going up to about 83 - no rain, but it did rain a tad little bit yesterday.  The reason I am so thankful is that we were without power all day.  The electrician guys had to re-do our whole breaker box, since so much has been changed with the kitchen remodeling.  They told us yesterday that they were going to do it, so we were able to prepare some.  It would have been an especially awful day if it was still hovering around 100 degrees!  The temps are suppose to go up again, but we had a little respite.

I spent the morning at Amanda's, helping her can spaghetti sauce, played with the kiddos, went to the library with them, ate lunch with them.  Then I came home, read a little, and ended up taking a 2 hour nap!

Exhaustion - that's been my week.  I am exhausted after all the activity around here!  Getting ready for the reception, getting the kitchen ready for guests, the whole family in town, having the reception, having 2 family/friends dinners here in my almost-finished kitchen, then hanging out with the kids for a few more days, now getting the rest of the kitchen put away, as much as I can before backsplash goes on and it gets all painted - I loved it all!  I enjoyed it all, and I would do it all again in a heartbeat!  But I have been just so tired, that I don't get a lot done at any one time!

Tomorrow I will try to remember to take a picture of the kitchen now, as it is almost finished.  But I think we have several weeks yet before we can call it finished, really!