Working on our Basement and other Random Happenings

 

    We have been making good progress on our basement project and I am super excited about that. We have been laying the vinyl plank flooring and we made great headway this week. That was largely thanks to our friend and brother-in-Christ, Justin. Justin and his lovely wife Paige and their four fun kids came over two afternoons/ evenings this week and helped on the floor. Justin has had experience with flooring and was able to help with some of the hard cuts around doors that I was nervous about. He had a special tool for cutting off the bottom of the doorframes so that we didn't have to take all the doors down and then hang them again later. That was a huge blessing!

Aaron has been helping with the floor project as well. We finished up the den and the main room and now just have half of the bedroom left (including the closet) and then we are done. It is very exciting!

 I also got the bathroom painted a lovely blue (paint found for free at the transfer station so that was nice!). Megan helped a little with the priming.

 Last week the cabinet guy came and put the sink and cabinet and medicine chest in. It is looking good.

Tomorrow I plan on starting on the tiling. I am hoping then to finish it next week. I called the plumber to see if they could come the next week. 

That is the progress on the house. It is going good and I am excited to have it done soon.

   I am  trying a new thing to develop a habit of having a clean desk. Before I can go on the computer I have to clean my desk for 5 minutes. I have been able to accomplish quite a bit with this new rule. Hopefully it is helping me to develop a life long habit.

My niece Beatrice is staying in our area (with my parents) for a couple of months. She is working with the boys at the ice-cream shop. She also enjoys spending time with Megan. This week she came over and they did a bunch of baking. Last week she came over and they were working on making corsets. Not necessarily what  every teen thinks they need, but these two do. 

I enjoyed working on the flowers for a wedding last weekend. There is a certain elegance with white flowers and greenery.

Homeschool baseball started for the summer on Tuesday. We are excited about it. Megan doesn't want to come but Aaron and Jonathan and I went. Our friends, the Murrays, who just moved here also came. It was fun to have them there. 

 Next week Aaron and Megan are going to Bible camp and I get to go for a few days too to help out. It should be a lot of fun!

   I hope you all are doing great!

Trust the Process

Malcolm and I at Lake of the Woods

   I recently finished going through a program called "Pathways Core Training" and while I will save telling much about the program for another post I did want to share something that came from it. In the program as you think about and share so many different things from your life they tell you over and over again "Trust the process". I admit that wasn't easy for me nor did it sit well with me. I tend to want to be pretty independent and a free thinker and what would cause me to trust them? I didn't even know them. We were meeting on zoom and so the whole idea of trusting was hard for me.  

   I don't think it is all bad to be a little skeptical of new ideas and to check things out well but I realized that I have a tendency to want to figure everything out for myself and I really struggle with letting go and trusting. We could debate on whether that was good or not where Pathways was concerned but I know for sure a place that I need to learn to trust completely and not still try to be in control and that is with God.

   Proverbs 3:5&6 says "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge Him and He will make your paths straight."

   I memorized those verse as a young child. I know them well and I know that our God is completely trustworthy. I have read of all that He has done that is recorded in the Bible. I have heard the stories of many loved ones who have found Him trustworthy. I have seen Him prove himself over and over again in my own life and still I struggle with trusting.

  This year has been a great one for me to come to grips with how much I struggle in this area, how much I need to grow. And I have been growing. It doesn't happen overnight (at least not for me) but it is happening. I am slowly truly learning to trust. Not just trusting God when everything is going right but trusting Him when it feels like everything is going wrong. Resting in Him, finding peace in Him and counting all the trials as joy.

  James 1:2-4 says "  Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters,  whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. 

   Part of me learning to trust God more has been to spend more time looking at the big picture - to truly focus on eternity. A lot of the things that seem really hard here are pretty small in the focus of eternity. A lot of those things are preparing us to be more ready for eternity if we let that happen.

   Last Saturday Aaron was wanting to find a different vehicle because his truck was having issues. He found one he wanted 2.5 hours drive away. I agreed to take him there and then invited Mara and Malcolm to come along. That morning we delivered Wedding flowers, dropped Megan off at work and headed to Mara's apartment. I wasn't feeling great and was wishing I would have taken an ibuprofen while at home. Mara gave one to me but it didn't work. When we went to load up the van to leave, one of the sliding doors was opened and would not shut again. I was ready to give up on the trip but Mara said we could take their car. So off we went leaving the van with the open door behind.

   We made it up safely, I rode in the back with Malcolm (who slept beautifully) and struggled with a headache and nausea.

   We got there to look at the truck and Aaron and I went on a test drive while Mara fed Malcolm. I am feeling overwhelmed because vehicle shopping is completely out of my element. I know basically nothing about vehicles. I had no idea if Aaron was making a good decision or not. I just had to let go and trust.

 

   After Aaron paid the guy (we let our teenagers buy their own vehicles and pay for their own insurance it is a method that we think works well) we head off. A few miles down the road Aaron pulls over and when I go check on him (I was riding with Mara) I found out he is dealing with smoke inside. This does not seem good. The feelings of anxiety and overwhelm waft over me once again. 

   He looks under the hood and we can see something smoking. I had no idea what it is so I suggest that he call his uncle Luke and send him a picture. I also suggest that we could turn right around and take the truck back and I am sure they would give the money back. Aaron isn't interested in doing that. Luke thinks it is just the air conditioner (which is too old to work) and that turned out to be true.

 

 Meanwhile Mara, Malcolm and I enjoy a little cemetery right on the side of the road. Aaron turns the air conditioner off and we continue on. It seems like it is working better.  We went up to the Lake of the Woods and had a lovely picnic there.

   We came home again to face a Van that still had a door that didn't close. But we went over to Keren and Benjamin's for supper and Benjamin went to work on the van and got it closed and then the next day he worked on it some more and fixed it even better.

   Monday I had a lovely, encouraging day with various visits and a Bible study. It was really fun. Then Monday evening the computer  wouldn't work. It said the Hard disk had an error. I took it in the next morning. I learned that the hard drive was completely shot and they couldn't recover anything off of it. Then I learned that our back up system hadn't worked since September. I had lost pretty much all of my business records for this year. It felt a little overwhelming. For a bit I was struggling yet again with trusting. 
    But I am learning to Trust the Process. I know that God is at work. I don't always understand His ways but that is how He said it would be. I am however little by little seeing how God is using my whole situation for His good. And that is a truly wonderful thing. When I take the time to step back and in my limited view attempt to see the whole picture I am truly in awe at how God has worked in my life and how He is working. I can truly Trust the Process. I hope that you can too. And please, if you see me struggling in this - just remind me to step out in faith and trust.

Recently I went to visit a friend that lost her 10 year old daughter to brain cancer this Spring. Losing her has been so hard but my friend has been learning more and more to follow Proverbs 3: 5 & 6. They don't understand why this happened but they know that they can trust the One who does.

   My prayer for you is that you too can trust the process. God is at work.

Aaron and Malcolm bringing beauty to my life

Malcolm's first canoe outing

Let God Write Your Story with Steve Saint & Jaime Saint

  When I am working on Wedding flowers or folding laundry I will often find educational or uplifting videos to watch on Youtube. I ran across the story of Steve Saint which then led me to watching this video. It blessed me immensely. I hope that you are able to find time to watch it sometime too and that it blesses you and makes you consider whether you are letting God write your story.