I have a new blog post up! http://piecedtreasures.wordpress.com/

I have a new blog!  Haven’t written much, but from now on I will be writing on the new one.  It is: http://piecedtreasures.wordpress.com/

My story about last week continues. . . So, the furniture arrived Friday in the late afternoon, and takes up a lot of our downstairs!  Well, not so much furniture, but a lot of boxes!  

Saturday morning – Amanda’s power at her house was still not on, and so they were still staying with us.  We were having a great time!  Well, she was tired, thanks to the sweetest little baby girl in the world who does NOT think sleeping is such a good idea – she doesn’t want to miss anything her big brothers and sister are doing, after all!  On Saturday morning, we took the kids to Target for a fun outing AND for some things I had to get to prepare for the possibility of having 17 people at my house by Sunday night.

Came home from Target and I started cooking, cooking, keeping up with laundry and trying to get as much done ahead of Sunday as I could.  The kids wanted tacos for dinner, so I made those, and then some of the food for Sunday night.   Andrew and Betsy were in Chicago, and were going to leave there in the evening and arrive home in the morning.  The man who had moved their extra car, who, was told by the moving company that he should come Sunday afternoon, since I wanted to go to church in the morning, called Andrew to say he would arrive in the morning.  Sigh.   Oh, and Jim arrived home from his hike, at least the weekend part of it, and was going to stay home and decide whether to continue with the other hikers who would be here on Sunday night and leaving Monday morning.

Sunday:  We heard that the power had been restored to Amanda and Sam’s neighborhood!  Bets and Andrew arrived home around 9, and Jim stayed home with them to wait for the car to arrive.  Amanda’s family went to church and I went to church, came home, put the kiddos down for rest time here so that Amanda and Sam could pack.  And guess what?  The car STILL hadn’t arrived by then!  It finally came mid-afternoon.

I finished cooking, cleaning bathrooms, and getting things as ready as I could for the 7 hikers to spend the night.  Sam changed all the downstairs beds for me, and he and Andrew worked on setting up some electronic things that Betsy and Andrew have.  The hikers arrived in the late afternoon and were thankful to be where they could take showers and have a nice dinner and bed!  They were the most kind and gracious group of men that they could possibly be, and we were so glad to get to know them!  They are progressively hiking the Appalachian trail, and this summer has taken them to the stretch of the trail nearest to us.

Dinner was:  Venison roast, homemade macaroni and cheese, green beans, a raw veggie tray, bread, and then pound cake with strawberries and whipped cream for dessert.  They must have liked it, because they were coming back for more!  Amanda and Sam and kiddos left, and the men chatted and helped clean up, and found beds or places on couches or the floor and it all worked out great!  I also fixed a breakfast casserole that would be ready for the next morning, and Bets and Andrew went to the store to buy fruit and muffins that I hadn’t thought about, to go with it.  

Monday:  5:30 came early, to get breakfast ready.  The hikers left, and Jim left for PA to visit his parents following his dad’s fall, and Betsy and I missed the kiddos so much that we went to story time at the library where we knew they would be to see them!!  Then more laundry!

That brings us to today.  I woke up with a migraine!  Are we surprised???  Thank the Lord for my very nice pain medication.  By afternoon I was functioning again!

Jim reports that his dad is doing well.  He is home from the hospital, with a neck brace for some very serious injuries to his vertebrae and multiple fractures of his facial bones.  He is doing very well.  Praise the Lord!!  

I got a call tonight from Amanda with the happiest request that a Grandma can get – the kids want to come over to play tomorrow!!   

Our week was just as my title says – full of family, friends, flexibility, and fun!  Here is the way the week was PLANNED to go:

Tuesday – I drive up to Leesburg (4 hours) to pick up Suzanne and bring her home.

Wednesday – Betsy and Andrew’s furniture and stuff arrive to our house.

Thursday – 2 of Jim’s hiking friends coming to spend the night.

Friday – Jim goes on hike; Suzanne’s boyfriend comes in for the weekend.

Saturday – Bets and Andrew getting in then or Sunday.

Sunday – Suz and Bryan head back to northern VA.

I wonder if God was laughing AGAIN at how I plan and plan.  I do, however, say that my middle name is “flexible.”

Here is how the week turned out:

Tuesday – I drive up to Leesburg and come home with Suzanne.

Tuesday night – Between 9 and 9:15 all of those planned started to change!  Suz registered for a grad school class, but it ended up starting a week earlier than she expected.  The movers told Andrew that they were coming on Friday.  Jim’s OTHER hiking friends, who had originally been going to stay with us Sunday night, but then decided to stay elsewhere, emailed to see if that was still possible for Sunday night.  Of course!

Wednesday – I did hang out with Suz and we got to visit with Amanda and kiddos.

Thursday – I took Suz back to Leesburg, knowing that a major storm was headed our way.  We arrived before the storm hit either DC or Roanoke, so I literally dropped her off at her door and turned around and drove home.  Shortly after I left her, she called to tell me they lost power and were under a tornado warning.  I kept driving, going through some rain, but nothing major.  Amanda calls in the late afternoon.  The storm had hit Roanoke and they were without power.  Sam was already out helping people cut limbs off trees that fell on and near cars.  I told her to gather up the kids and come on to our house!  Thursday night, Amanda, Sam and the kiddos were settled in, the 2  hikers came and helped go to Amanda’s house and bring all her cold and frozen stuff to our house.  The guys were very agreeable to sleeping on couches and cots.  AND, we got a call that Jim’s dad had taken a bad fall and was in the hospital.  They live in PA.

Friday – the mover, who thought he was arriving in the morning with Bets and Andrew’s stuff, was much farther away than he thought.  He arrived at 3. 

Here is a funny little interlude. . . Amanda and I were busy – taking care of kids, one of whom was only 3 weeks old, trying to keep up with people coming and going, and then the mover, which was exciting for the kids.  We decided on CHINESE take out for dinner!  We thought we were so smart!  I ordered our food, and we always get the same things from the same place about a mile from my house. . . and Amanda was going to pick it up while I stayed with the mover (he was by himself so it was taking a long time) and the kids. . . she came in with her purse on her shoulder and her keys in her hand. . . she couldn’t get out of the driveway because the moving truck was all the way across it!  So, I called the Chinese place back to see if they would deliver, and they did!  We couldn’t stop laughing at ourselves and our plans!!

If I keep on typing, no one will hang out here long enough to hear the rest of the weekend frantically fun frolics!  More tomorrow!  I will say that Suzanne’s power eventually came back on, there was no tornado, and she made it to her class.  

Last weekend, I went on a “yarn crawl”.  It is similar to a quilt shop hop!  But to yarn shops!  In this yarn crawl, 6 shops within an hour or so of Roanoke, got together and offered specials, door prizes, and a nice prize for someone who visited all of the shops.  Wonder who got that prize?  It wasn’t me!  But I did win a door prize at one shop.  Explain that one to young children!  When I got the phone call that I had won a door prize, my grandchildren were here, and I told them and they were confused. . . “A door, Grandma?”   “What does that have to do with a door?”   I don’t know!  I finally explained that I guess it is called that because you go in the door into the shop!

Anyway, I went with a group of gals to these yarn shops, and we did this for 2 days.  The first shop we went to was one I had been to before, at a beautiful farm in Raphine, VA, and the shop is called Orchardside Yarn Shop.  An adorable little house surrounded by beauty!

Here we are inside -

And here is my friend Pam who got me into this!      

We ate lunch at a picnic area at an orchard nearby -

Look at these beautiful irises!

A view of the orchard -

The next pictures I took were 2 days later, when we started our day in Blacksburg, VA – first we went to a coffee shop – but those pictures didn’t turn out all that well.  The first yarn shop was one called Mosaic and I hadn’t been there before -

Such yummy yarn!

Pam checking out the yarn! 

I almost forgot this little guy who greeted us as we walked in -

We went to 4 other shops, bought some yarn, and had a delightful day!

I have a beautiful new granddaughter!  Her name is Amelia Mae.  She was born yesterday at 12:14, and was 7lb 5oz.  The other three kids have been staying with me for these couple of days, and today we went to see their new little sister and Mommy in the hospital!

Silly Daddy – he put her in his hat on the windowsill.  The kids loved the view from the window, AND having the baby right there!

I have some more pictures, but neither my computer, nor xanga is cooperating very well, so I will try again next time!

It was my privilege tonight to go and hear Valerie Shepard speak at a local church!  Valerie is the daughter of Jim and Elisabeth Elliot.  Many of you know that Jim Elliot was one of five young men, missionaries, killed by the Auca Indians in 1956, in Ecuador.  His wife, Elisabeth, lived among the Auca Indians for several years after that, with her little daughter, Valerie, bringing the gospel to those people.  I heard Elisabeth Elliot speak once, in 1978, in Philadelphia at Tenth Presbyterian Church, at the Philadelphia Conference on Reformed Theology.  Before her talk, Elisabeth told the congregation that she would have to leave immediately afterwards because her daughter was about to have her first baby in Mississippi.  I told Valerie that story tonight, and she told me that her mother made it there in time for the birth!  

Valerie was selling some of her mother’s books, but I already own them and I had my own daughters read them and others that Elisabeth had written, as required reading when we homeschooled!

Valerie told the story of her parents, her father’s death, and her life as a child among the Auca Indians of Ecuador.  It was a blessing to see and hear her and to be pointed once again to our sovereign God who does all things well!

He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain that which he cannot lose - Jim Elliot

God is our Refuge and Strength.  My heart is heavy with soooo many very critical things that I am currently praying about today.  The little daughter of some friends has some very serious infections going on.  Another friend is having chemo this afternoon for  his ongoing cancer.  The grandsons of two dear friends – one little boy with a tumor and the other with leukemia.  Another friend raising his two young sons and having major health issues of his own, now at 6 months after his wife died of cancer.  A young woman whose husband is now home after a serious car accident and whose family needs financial help.  And I am spending a lot of time in prayer for those three young women and a little girl in Cleveland who have a long, long road of healing ahead of them. Many others, but those are the top concerns right now.  And happier prayers for my own family – a new granddaughter soon to be born, jobs, moves, travels.  I need to be in prayer more and more, unceasingly!  I pray for God’s protection on my family and those I know and care about.  I pray for God’s Word as it is carried to the ends of the earth by the missionaries I know.  Just thought I would share what is on my heart and in my mind this morning.  Praise God that He is sovereign.  In Him alone is our salvation!

This past weekend I went to Quilt Camp!  It is held at beautiful Camp Bethel, in Fincastle, VA, not too far away!  Twice a year a group of about 26 of us get together and rent a place at the camp for a long weekend.  We stay in one building that has a very large room to sew in, and 4 rooms off of that with bunk beds – we each get a bottom bunk.   We go to the dining hall for delicious meals.  We can sew all day long and into the night if we want to.  Most everyone brings her sewing machine, but not always.  This year two ladies did handwork the whole time.  We set up ironing boards, cutting tables, a table for coffee and tea, and a table for snacks.  Some of us see each other often throughout the year, but some of the gals come from farther away and it is like a mini reunion!  The youngest this time was 42 and the oldest was 84!  

I have taken lots of pictures at previous camps, of our quilts, our room, lots of people.  But I just didn’t feel like running all around with my camera this time!  I wanted to relax, sew, enjoy visiting with my friends without always snapping pictures.  I did sew – two tablerunners and binding for two other quilts, and a little handwork.  I learned some new skills – everyone is so friendly and helpful!  And I was reminded that almost 10 years ago, when I went to my first camp, I didn’t even know how to use a rotary cutter or machine piece my quilts.  I had previously learned to do it all by hand.  What a lot I have learned in 10 years!  And, more important than that, what wonderful friends I have made in those 10 years!

I did take walks each day of camp, and so this time I decided to just get some pictures of the beautiful camp in the spring.  Many of my local friends spent their childhoods going to camp at Camp Bethel, which holds camps all summer long, or they sent their children to camp there.  They might love seeing these pictures!

Here is the lodge where we stay and sew -

The dogwoods and redbuds were beautiful, and the scenery is lovely and peaceful -

This is the building where we go to eat -

I didn’t take these cutie pies to camp with me, but I sure did miss them!

When I tell people that I am friends in real life with people I have met online via blogging, they are sometimes a little surprised.  But when I tell them that about 5 years ago, I went to actually stay with a xanga blog friend who I had never met in person, they are often astounded!  I have heard:  ”You STAYED with them?”   “You DIDN’T!!”   And my favorite:  ”MOM, you would NEVER have let us do that!!”    But I did!  I went to visit Julie in Chicago for a quilt show, stayed with her and Arne, and I even took my youngest daughter, who was then in college, with me!  I just KNEW it was ok.  Julie and I had spent hours online, so to speak, in that we chatted via our blogs.  And we chatted in person on the phone quite a bit.  And we had a lot in common – we both had 3 adult daughters, who we had homeschooled; we went to similar types of churches; our husbands were both elders in our churches; we both quilted and knitted; we were both Christians and loved the Lord.  We had been in touch with each other for several years, so we had lots of time to make sure that neither of us wasn’t who we said we were.  And after that first visit, there were lots more!  And our husbands became friends!  They came here for Thanksgiving one year, and we went there for meetings in Chicago; one time we went on a dinner cruise!  And now when Jim goes to Chicago, he meets Arne for dinner!  And when Arne bought a bowed psaltery to play, they came out this way last year to the psaltery workshops and symphony.  This year, it didn’t work out for them to come for the whole thing, but they were able to get there to see the musical performance – and see us!

We visited together while the set up and rehearsals were going on – here is Jim coming out to the stage for practicing -

And a few more pictures of the rehearsal just before it started -

After the show was over and everyone met to do one more “jam”, and started saying goodbyes, Jim and I went to the cabin where Julie and Arne were staying.  It was lovely!

And they grilled steaks for us and made us a delicious dinner!  Here is Julie ready to cook!

Both in the kitchen -

Dinner was wonderful!  And the company was delightful!

Ok, so I know how important it is to be careful about who we meet online.  Really, I do.  And I am blessed, because I have met up with quite a few of my blog friends over the years, and the experiences have made my life richer!