Mud, Manure, and Memorabilia

I think that I am quickly becoming accustomed to life in the country. Perhaps I am enjoying it a little too much right now. I am waiting for hard reality to hit, yet all I feel is the growing enchantment and freedom of country life. Everything is more beautiful in the country. The air is fresher, the grass greener, and the scenes more breathtaking. That is my very humble and undecided opinion.

After settling into the house, our thoughts begin to turn to the outdoors and the plans for next years garden. Finally, we decided that it was time to do something about our garden space. Jonathon looked on Craigslist and found someone that was getting rid of horse manure for free. Horse manure is not the best, I know, but you can't beat free and we needed to get our garden covered. So yesterday, Jonathon, Daddy, and I drove out to Battleground and shoveled manure into the back of Daddy's pick-up.

Daddy's truck has been officially initiated into country life now. Daddy's one compromise was to put a lining of plastic all over his truck bed before we shoveled the manure in. I am sure that farmers would laugh at us, but I think it will not be long before even the plastic is gone and Daddy resigns his truck to life on a farm.





The soil is frozen and so it was hard to work. It thawed out a little yesterday, but not enough to hoe the entire garden. I think we will have to cover the garden with compost and then wait until spring to use a rototiller.

After two weeks in the country, Daddy and Mommy realized that mud boots were a necessity. So we took a family trip down to Wilcos and bought boots for everyone. We just got black PVC boots, not pretty, but functional. Ania, however, got beautiful, red ladybug mud boots. She definitely looks like a classy farm girl.

The day that we got the boots, Austin, Annalise, and Ania went outdoors to play. When they came to the door an hour or so later, they were covered in mud. We discovered that they had made a mud puddle outdoors with the hose and spent the last half hour or so in jumping into the mud puddle. When questioned as to their reason for making such a mess, Austin replied with some surprise, "That's what the mud boots are for." You just can't argue with that logic.

Later in the day, they further complicated matters by deciding to give Bear (our dog) a bath in the garage with the hose. The results were less than satisfactory.

Grandpa and Grandma both came up for Christmas and we had a wonderful time with them. Grandpa even got caught up into the farming life (or at least pretended to). ;-)

We decided that in order to really become farmers we had to have a fire in our fireplace every once in a while. So we eased ourselves into the wood buying industry by purchasing a half cord of wood. We wheeled it back to the porch and stacked it neatly outside of our back door. The fireplace is not designed to be a great source of heat, but at least it looks pretty with the flames dancing inside.

As for the children, they couldn't be happier. They are spending more time outside during the winter then they ever did during the summertime at our old home. They are thriving in the fresh air and wide open spaces. This will be a very pleasant place for them to grow up. They are going to have to learn to take responsibility and pull their own weight, as there is going to be a lot that needs to be done as we busy ourselves with gardening and animals, but I think that it will be very good for them.

I am very grateful that God brought us here. It is definitely worth all the months of doubt and uncertainty that preceded our move here. It is easy to know intellectually that God has a plan for our lives which He is working out, but when the unknown stretches before you, it is hard to trust that His plan is perfect. So often we want to jump in and orchestrate things ourselves. Yet, in His mercy, God gently leads us, keeps us from making great errors, and lets us struggle with our own headstrong desires to take the lead before gently bringing us to the place where He wants us to be.

White, feathery flakes have just begun to fall from the sky. It is the first snow of winter here. Can it get any better than this?

Spafford Relocation

Where do I begin? That is the question with which I am wrestling as I sit down to write a post. Occasionally I am at a loss for material to make up a post, but so much has happened in the last few weeks that I am at a loss as to where to begin. I have a folder with 239 pictures and I must pick through them to decide what would be the best ones to put on this post.

Well, I guess the beginning is a very good place to start. So...we first saw the home late on Thursday night, Dec. 3. This was the first time that all of us children, except for Jonathon, got to see the home. Exclamations of wonder and delight comprised most of the noise during the first tour of the house. It surpassed our expectations. We spent the first night in sleeping bags on the Bonus Room floor.

When I woke up in the morning, I walked over to the window sill where I had left my glasses and put them on. This is the scene that lay before me, framed in the window like a picture. All I could do was let out a deep breath and wonder at the fact that this was our home. After nearly two years of uncertainty, God had led us here.

The photos don't do it justice.

These are the scenes from the back of the house. We have two chickens which came along with the house and we hope to add to their number come spring.

And the view from the right side of our home. There is not an ugly view anywhere. Everywhere that you look, you are surrounded by the beauties of God's creation with very little man made creations to mar their splendor.










Well...we enjoyed a morning in our great empty home and then the boxes began to move in and take up their own little spaces, demanding to be emptied. The task seemed nearly overwhelming, but the reward of being settled in our own dear home spurred us on.






We were blessed with many helpers during the moving process. On Friday Pastor Will came over and helped Daddy move two whole storage units (which have held a portion of our belongings for 18 months now) as well as an entire moving truck load of things from our rental home. They got a good head start on the move. Then on Saturday a large group from our church came over and helped us move everything else into our home. What a blessing!

The Entire Work Crew!



For the first week we have enjoyed blue skies and a very icy cold snap. In fact, it was so cold that our little waterfall in the front yard froze over completely.

During the 11 days since we began our move, we have entirely unpacked, sorted, and set up everything from our old home and the two storage units. The only boxes left are book boxes (we are in the process of having library shelves built) and garage boxes. We have made multiple trips to the dump and Goodwill and are completely settled in except for our pictures, which we have yet to hang on the walls. Christmas decorating is completely done and today we did Christmas baking for our neighbors.

This has probably been the busiest 11 days of my entire life. There is a satisfying sense of accomplishment, however, and an overpowering realization of the goodness of the Lord throughout this entire process. All the the glory must go to Him. He has led, strengthened, and sustained us during all these days of uncertainty.

In the midst of this whole process, Daddy and Mommy bought us a dog. This is the first time in my entire life that we have ever owned any pet, except for the three goldfish that I had for a brief time when I was very little before they promptly died.

Anyway on Sunday afternoon, Daddy and Mommy took us to the home of a lady who was selling several puppies and bought us a dog. He is a beautiful little black lab the product of a father who is a golden English lab and his mother a chocolate lab. Go figure! He is the sweetest, most cuddly little puppy I have ever seen; with eyes like a Precious Moments dog. We named him Bear. For now he is Little Bear, although, judging from the size of his paws, he shows great promise of being Big Bear soon.

As you can see, much has happened in the last month. I told Mommy that she and Daddy can never top these Christmas gifts: a new house and a dog. God is very good and has been very faithful.

New E-mail Address

We are all in one place now, but the unpacking and settling in continues. There is so much to do! Leisel suggested that we take some of the boxes and just burn them because evidently some of the boxes we have happily lived without for 18 months and if we burned them we would not even know what the contents were so they would never be missed. Not a bad idea. You don't realize how much stuff you have until you move. It just seems to collect everywhere.

Anyway, I am still going to do a real post complete with pictures and everything, but until then, I am going to be busy unpacking yet more boxes. :-)

Because of our move, all of our e-mail addresses have changed. So I decided that instead of writing an e-mail to everyone I could possibly think of who had my wrong e-mail address, I would just post my e-mail address on my blog and hope that most of the people that need my new address will see it here. So my new e-mail is charae.e@gmail.com.

I will be back...if I don't get buried under a load of boxes first. :-D