confessions of faith

We go through swimming pools like lollipops. Seriously. Every year we get a pool and every year it gets ruined in a wind storm. Just like a lollipop. You open it up and enjoy it for as long as you can and all you have left is just a stick that you just toss away. This past summer I managed to master the up keep of the pool with the help of my son Shawn. This was to keep Scot from being frustrated with the thing he never really used. And believe me it caused him a lot of frustration for some reason?

We managed to keep the pool "safe" all winter long until February when one of those dang gone wind storms came up one night. I got up in the morning to see the pool upside down and plastered along the railing of the deck. Oh no, was my first response. Then, maybe it's not ruined, I don't see any holes in it. But naturally the legs were all mangled and bent.

All I could think about was what will I do with the kids all summer if we don't have a pool? It's such an expense and there are so many other things that need to be tended to around here that I wouldn't even think to ask Scot if we could get another pool. So I said, well God, I guess if you want us to have a pool your going to have to find a way to make that happen. I really did say this out loud.

I posted a picture of the mangled pool on facebook and simply said we lost our pool.............. And what do you know .... one of my friends says hey, we got a pool that's been in storage for years that we are never going to use do you want it? Yes! Yes! we would love to have it. It came in 9 boxes!! Not just one, like the ones we always buy at Walmart. And not only that but it's a hard sided pool, the ones that last for years and years. An official for real above ground pool!! Wow! God must have decided that we really do need a pool.

Faith ...... I believe that if you really have it God WILL answer and provide. He's just so awesome like that! 

Curiosity ALMOST killed the cat

Curoisity killed the cat..... It's an expression we have all used, it's as old as time. But have we ever really considered it's meaning?
On a Saturday morning as I was doing "stuff" in the kitchen I was glancing out the kitchen window. There's lots to see from that window. Chickens and roosters wandering around the yard. The swing set where I can watch the kids play. The peach trees now bare and naked with winter, eight little birds nest dotting the top of it. The pool sitting their in it's ghostly state waiting for summer to arrive again. The cover recently brittle with the cold temperatures shredded from a wind storm just the other week.
And there was Hunter walking around the edge of the pool. Five feet in depth and about a two inch ledge. It amazes me how cats are no nimble. Hunter is still young, he moved in from next door, guess he didn't like his home over their and I tried to find him another home but that didn't work. Hes a good boy, but obviously curious.
 I called Scot and said look at this cat walking around the edge of the pool. Scot got up and came to look and asked, what is he doing? I don't know I said. I glanced my eyes away for just a minute and Scot said, well he just jumped in the pool. Your kidding! I looked out the window and sure enough he was not in view and I could see the sides of the pool being pounded on from the inside.
 Out the door we flew and their was poor Hunter swimming in the one and a half foot of water left in the pool. He was frantically jumping up to the ledge but not making it. Around and around in the circle he was swimming and I called his name and reached in but the jumps weren't high enough. I called for Scot to get a net but it wasn't nearly big enough to rescue him. His ears were flattened to his head and he was looking so terrified. I called for Scot to get the ladder, which was nearly half way across the yard for obvious reasons.
 Suddenly Hunters strokes got slower and he would sink and survival instincts kicked in and he would swim again and sink. Dear God hes going to die. With his pleading eyes looked at me. I grabbed the ledge, bent my knees and hoisted myself up to the ledge. Balancing on my belly I reached down and grabbed whatever of him that I could and pulled him out. Scot arrived with the ladder but Hunter was out of the pool, dripping wet and very cold.
 I craddled him to me and ran for the back door. Grabbing a hoodie I wrapped him in it and in seconds it was soaked. Two towles later he wasn't dripping wet any longer and I rubbed his fur dry. Poor baby. I layed him under the Christmas tree and opened the front door so the sunshine would pour in and warm him.
I tried to not asked the what "if's". What if no one was home? What if I wasn't looking out the window? That whole thing lasted maybe two minutes but felt like forever until I got him out of there. But thank God it happened that day at that very minute. The pool is now drained and their is maybe two inches of water in it. Just enough to keep it from blowing away in yet another wind storm. Hunter, you will always and forever be very near and dear to my heart. I bet you used up a few of those nine lives that day.

 And that my friends is how curiosity ALMOST killed the cat....................

conversations with dolly

Dolly: poppy I'm sick
Poppy: you are?
Dolly: I have a bad cough (cough cough, hack hack, choke choke)
Poppy: oh my you do have a bad cough
Dolly: I got a fever too
Poppy: awww
Dolly: your suppose to give people flowers when there sick poppy
Poppy: you are?
Dolly: yes ..... red ones ....... and long ones not short ones ...... and they can't be real   cause they will die ......

I didn't see but I am sure she was batting her eyes and giving him that charming smile

She was suppose to visit grandma and grandpa but she couldn't because she was sick. She persistently asked me, and I had to keep telling her no. She told me if she was a grown up and had a little girl she would let her go to grandma's house with her medicine!

conversations with dolly

Me: tomorrow we are going to have a girls day and we are going to run around with grandma

Dolly: um I don't think that's a good idea cause grandma is sort of ... you know fat
and she can't run around so good

stick glue vs. bottle glue

Nanny can I please have a bottle of elmer's glue, this glue stick really doesn't work.

Fast forward to many weeks. It's homework time and I reach in the back pack to get the pencil box only to find it covered in goo........ What is this? I open the box and it is also covered in goo..........
Mack! You didn't close the lid on the glue bottle.

Were going back to the glue stick right after I wash the markers and crayons and erasers and scissors.

Conversations with Madison

Yeah!! Now it's my turn to read the dairrhea of a whimpy kid book !!

Now that was a priceless moment

Dolly's wedding plans

Nanny when I grow up I am going to marry with Lucas. Then I am going to fall in love with him. I am going to wear a so, so, SO, beautiful long dress then I am going to sing to Lucas and Madi will faint!!

She is already a hopeless romantic at the age of 4. Thank you Cinderella, Snow White and princess Aeriel.............................