Monday Madness

Our family has been on vacation this past week. We rented a cabin at Cedars of Lebanon State Park in Tennessee. The original purpose of leaving was Jacob had to play baseball in Mt. Juliet over the weekend. We decided to combine a little rest and relaxation with some ball. We spent the entire week there and we were all ready to head back home. We had a wonderful time. Michael's mom and my mom live about an hour and half away from were we stayed. Michael's mom came down on Thursday to spend some time with us. She was having a huge family reunion and 3 of our children ended up going back to Ky with her. This included the 4 year old. I spent the next day huddled on the front porch of the cabin reading a book. It was glorious.

The Lord answered my garden prayers. Before we left it looked as if we would be gone when the June apples and green beans were ready to be picked. I was concerned we would miss the whole thing. I really struggled with this and I asked the Lord for a bit of delay. He answered my prayers and we came home to picking green beans. We picked half a bushel and there are some apples ripe today. I will use all of our garden bounty to make dinner tonight.

I was so very surprised at what a week of neglect will do to a garden. We had a friend come over and turn on the drip works for water. She took care of all of our animals and did a fantastic job. We would have never been able to leave for a week without somebody helping us with the farm. I would have never suggested she need to weed the beds. We just asked her to water and pick anything she wanted to take home. When we came back, the beds were over run with weeds. I don't know where they came from to be honest. I know every time I go out there to pick, I usually stop for 15 minutes or so and weed something. It will take several days to get it back in order.

My day will be filled getting the house put back together and doing laundry. We unpacked most everything last night. I have a week's worth of laundry for 7 people so you know that will consume a lot of time! I also need to continue to break beans and get ready to can them tomorrow. I also will have to go to the vet's office and pick up Missy, our English Mastiff. She has never been away from us except the time she went for surgery. She probably thought that the world has come to an end. Our oldest son took her to be boarded the morning we left. He asked if he could come with me to pick her up. He said that was a terribly hard thing for him to do, and he never wanted to have to leave her again.

grace and peace,
julie