Week update

I realized a lot has happened in our lives in the past week. First of all, we had Valentine's Day. The men of the house bought the ladies flowers. Maci and Eliana carried them all over the house. They were pretty excited. We have known since the first week that they love flowers! Hopefully they felt treasured.

We then went to St. Louis for a long weekend. We helped Tom and Connie a bit on Saturday. Sunday on the way to church our truck nearly lost it's back tire. To make a long story short the back passenger tire had snapped three of the six bolts that hold it on and a nearly tragic situation occurred. Tom and I fixed that (and took out the spacers that were causing the problem) the whole time thankful that it was not worse than it was. Sunday evening we went to the Queen of Sheba Restaurant in St Louis and had a great time ordering a couple of combo platters. There were some people that spoke Amharic to the girls. We enjoyed watching the girls reconnect (with language, music , and food). The rest of the family did alright with the food as well (first time for the older kids and in-laws). If you are near St. Louis I'd recommend for the experience. They just opened last fall and we'd love to see them there for years to come.

Monday we went to the zoo. It was great to see the girls experience seeing the animals live for the first time. We really enjoyed are time there...even though the lions were not found. We did get to the zebras, penguins, and polar bear (thanks Eric Carle for the exposure).

All in all it was a great week! I posted some pics from Valentines and the Ethiopian Restaurant as well as from the zoo. Just click on the pictures below. Hope you enjoy.

zoo

Valentines week

By the way...we have since found out the tomorrow means "go somewhere" to Eliana...as in "tomorrow we will ..."

Tomorrow Today

The past couple of days the term "tomorrow" has been very difficult for Eliana to understand. You should see us try to explain it. It happened yesterday when we tried to explain that we would go to church tomorrow. We think she believes tomorrow means right now. She threw the biggest fit we have seen in weeks until we got around the mess. How does this happen you might ask? Let me give you an example.

Someone told Eliana that we are going to the zoo tomorrow. We were trying to avoid it because we knew it would be a problem. Now I tell her"the sun will go down, dark outside, you will sleep, we get up and that is tomorrow". She says okay, tells me she already took her nap, and then starts whining that she wants to go see the zebra "tomorrow" (meaning right now).

As a side, when we were going shopping she then asked if we were going to "tomorrow". I told her in a sense we are always moving toward tomorrow. I guess we'll get it sooner or later.

-Dave

Winter Wonderland

Another snow day! Can't hardly believe it. We are expected 4-8 inches by the end of the day. I can't complain about the opportunity to get caught up with a few things around here. However, this is getting a bit ridiculous. I think we have a high of 12 tomorrow!

Every winter that it is cold enough, we go out to one of the lakes in town to walk around/on it. The kids love the idea that it is a lake and we can be on it. We are extra cautious...and with 3 weeks of below freezing temps we knew it was about time. I have included some pics.

Birthday Snow!

Yeah, we are caught trying to explain birthdays to the girls. It is my birthday today! Well, what do you know, but that snow comes on big events. When we were going to Ethiopia we got a snow day to prep (I am a teacher). Well today, we got 4" of snow on top of the 10 degree weather...what a gift. I came home at 1:30, didn't have to host detention, and didn't have to go back for the basketball game tonight.

Here are some pictures of the snow fun.

Two of Sonya and the girls...















Two of the boys on our ice rink (our sub pump line broke and has been spilling water into the yard for a week...hard to fix when the ground has been frozen...so now we have a larger sheet of ice!)














Happy birthday to me! (If you really want to get me a gift, throw out a bid on the truck I have on ebay...that would be my old one)

for crying OUT LOUD....

I was sorting clothes coming out of the laundry chute this morning & it occured to me that I could just pile up all the jeans & then they would be ready for me to zoom through with the stain stuff & take care of the grass, ketchup, etc....
I was unprepared for the sheer numbers at that time.
As I continued to pile, I decided I better count. Now, consider that I did almost ALL the laundry on Thursday. There was maybe one load & a couple of straggler items that I didn't get to.
Okay.
There were 16...yes, SIXTEEN pairs of jeans in my laundry pile today.
Oh my goodness.
Reality hits.

Thankfulness

Wow are we glad we got that stove in last week. We woke up to -4 degrees this morning! It is supposed to be pretty cold like that for a week straight! Tom and Connie came up and brought us a load of wood, along with some from Mike and Rachel, we should be good for a few weeks at least. We are having no problem staying warm!

We bought a new truck yesterday. I had a '90 Ranger that was pretty pathetic. It was a 6 cyl automatic whose transmission is dying to go soon (in my mind at least) so when the emergency brake went, I disconnected; the passenger window went and I just keep pushing it up; valve cover gasket leaks and I keep smelling the smoke. Well, the leaf spring is bad...$600, so I went looking. I got a '94 4cyl 5 speed manual trans with 96,000, new rad, tires, shocks, valve cover gasket, etc...and little rust. It needs a few small things but seems great! Supposed to get 25mpg (great compared to the 16 the suburban gets!)

At times, when we are all busy, and things are breaking, and the money is going out, we can loose sight of eternity. We are trying to "fix our eyes on Jesus" In it all, as the home equity goes up and the bills come in, we are choosing to be thankful (with grinted teeth at times). God has been SO good in the past, we know he will continue.

We'd be lost without Him!