Craig was home yesterday, so we took the opportunity to go to the shooting range so he could sight in his new rifle. (It is actually a rifle for the boys and myself, but it will need some modifications before we’ll be able to use it!) We wore short sleeves, because it was about 75 outside. By the time we got there, 45 minutes later, the wind had started blowing, and it just continued to pick up. We found one coat in the truck to share between us, and sat through mini sand-storms at the range while the temperature dropped quickly to about 50. By the time we left, about 3 hours from the time we started out, it was COLD and windy. It started raining about 9 pm, and the lights flashed on and off about 10 times. Apparently, the power lines hadn’t experienced rain in so long that they panicked. The sleeting began around 9:30 pm, at which time the lights also went out for good, so I pulled the boys out of bed to see it. They were still awake, and couldn’t believe that sno-cone ice was falling from the sky! They went back to bed, and we got ourselves ready for bed by candlelight, then got ready for a cold night. Rod called at 10:30 to tell us it was snowing, and since he is only about 10 miles from our house, I jumped up to check. The ground was still covered in ice, but real snow was billowing from the sky. I raced around the house with a flashlight, looking for my coveralls, grabbed the camera, and headed outside. Craig wasn’t as excited as I was, so he just stood inside the door and watched. We tried to wake up the boys, but they weren’t interested in leaving their toasty beds, and never really gained enough consciousness to understand what I was saying. It was falling hard and fast, and I stayed outside about 15 minutes, just enjoying what I haven’t done in many, many years. There wasn’t quite enough to make angels, but it was powdery and beautiful.
When we got up this morning, a pretty good layer was still on the ground, so we woke the boys up early, dressed them up in their winter costumes, and sent them out. When Levi first looked out the window, still not fully awake, he squinted and got this funny look on his face and said, “What is that?” When I told him it was snow, he said, “It’s not ice? It’s real snow?”
They went around scraping the deck railings, car, table, and any other white surface to make those fairy-tale snowballs, and had a lot of fun. It didn’t last long, though. They came in for hot chocolate pretty soon, and now we’ll get on with our day. No snow day here! It’s school time! We’ll be taking off two weeks for Christmas and camping, since Craig will be off, so we have a load to do before then.
Backtracking a bit, we had a great Thanksgiving. Houston was fun, even though we made a bit of a rush trip, down on Thursday and back on Friday night. Last week, we stayed home and schooled, and this week is more of the same. We have a gospel meeting beginning on Friday, so it will be a super-busy weekend, but hopefully a good one. There is a lot of sickness going around, and we sure don’t want to be part of that! We’ll be loading up on kefir and super-tonic for the next few days. (If you aren’t familiar with those, it’s cultured milk and herbal antibiotics!)
Luke got in a scuffle with a bunk bed the other day and looks like a beaten step-child, but he’s recovering. Apparently, he slid down between the bed and the wall and hit his face, twice, on the metal bed. That, added to the healing split in his forehead from dropping the globe light cover from the ceiling fan on his face, makes for a pretty sad presentation. I think it will just be a race between he and Levi to see who gets broken first. It will be an absolute miracle if they make it to manhood with all their eyes, limbs, and digits intact. They may be broken, but at least intact will be a plus.
No other news to report, unless you’d like to know about our planned turtle release today. Craig had to swerve to miss a turtle on the highway yesterday, and due to the outcries of all his passengers, he had to turn around and pick it up. We brought it home and put him in the goat trailer, which is full of fluffy hay, and gave him a bowl of water, planning to release him at the river today. Well, we didn’t even think about him last night as the temperature plummeted, and thankfully, Jake remembered him this morning. Now he is resting in a box of hay in the kitchen, which we set on top of the heating pad. The last thing I want is to ‘rescue’ a turtle, only to bring it home and let it freeze to death! Hopefully, he’ll thaw out soon so we can release him.
Oh, yeah, the cabinets are still not finished… I have one more drawer out to be built, then I can go back to the painting and sanding. My three-day project has turned into a great lesson that do-it-yourselfers often learn, but never retain… Just BUY the stinking new cabinets!!! If it hadn’t been for Cousin Eddie, I’d have done that by now, I think. And Craig would have done it as a last-ditch effort to preserve my sanity. But, since Eddie is a master, he rebuilt all those drawers, and I hate to coop them up in the cabinets! They are just beautiful! Hopefully, though, I’ll have it all done by the end of January.
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