My family always said that I was a “stick in the mud.” To tell you the truth, I am not exactly sure how that analogy pans out; but we all know what is meant by it. Well, this time I was. I knew that the roads were going to be bad, so I decided that I would hit the roads early to avoid traffic, melting ice, and possible accidents. To test the ground a little bit, the Polish in me decided that our back yard was the best place to test (man! I’m a genius). Hannah requested that I turn the GPS on my phone so that she could tell where I was on my way to work. I had forgotten to turn my GPS on when an hour later Hannah texted me saying that she was disappointed that I had not turned on my GPS. I then turned on my GPS for her. She then sent me a text message asking where I was. I was still at home “testing” the traction of my tires on the ground. Needless to say, Hannah got really giddy and turned into a paparazzi in between her laughing and snide remarks. I finally got fed up and frustrated that I went inside to start working from home. I texted my boss and told him the situation. He said to come in whenever I could come safely. I went back a couple hours later to try to dig my car out of the mud. I was able to move the car, but I also got it further in the mud. With Hannah’s help this time, we were able to move the car to stable ground. This is where it sat till I got home that evening after deciding to take the other car to work. When I returned home, I tried one last time to try to get my car to the driveway. It took less than a minute to get it up there. It’s funny to look back, but it wasn’t so much then. Hannah and I have done several things the hard way in order to learn important lessons. This is just one more. As Hannah put it – we did not get to play in snow this year; we got to play in mother nature’s other beauty – mud (or clay).  Moral of the story is “never let Josh test the car out in the yard.”

Truly humbled,

Josh

PS – Not much has been happening on here for a while. I hope that everyone has not given up hope. I still enjoy family news and updates.

PS2 – Ricky and Karlyn will have to share with us how the conference went that they spoke at in MD. Karla might be able to be a guest writer and give us a sample of her trip to India (I haven’t asked her yet). Soon we will be having our Annual Income Tax Celebration Dinner. So, there is plenty to talk about. Love you all!

This last Thursday, the Big Storm hit!! The prediction was that we were going to get snow starting at 4am. It would rain through the day, and the affects of the storm would end about 6am Friday morning. That is about how it went, too. But as opposed to last year’s storm, we didn’t have an ice storm or a huge power outage. I slept in Thursday morning because schools were closed, and woke up to a beautiful covering of about 1 1/2 of snow blanketing everything. It was beautiful. It did rain throughout the day, and froze through the night. We had a 2 hr delay on Friday. It was nice to stay safely inside while keeping warm and not having much at all to do. As opposed to Northern thought (by those who have never lived in the South), it isn’t just because we have drivers who don’t know how to drive in snow. The biggest problem when the South gets snow is that it is just barely cold enough to snow which means the roads ends up being ice. The reason that most people rush to the store for food (besides they are just paranoid) is because we could have a power outage like last year and end up with no means of getting food. I guess that is their reason. But I don’t know what people do with all that milk and bread. Southerners do overreact though, and storms are usually overrated (at least down here). Kids do enjoy making “snow/dirt”men and have snow/slush/ice fights. Cherith and Jesse had fun having an “snow” fight at their friend’s house for a few hours on our day off. The poor daffodils by our mailbox sprouted a few weeks ago and have been trying to bloom for about a week now. Then they got iced. The flowers around here are so confused with our warm and cold flashes in the weather. I just saw today that someone in the next neighborhood does have daffodils that are in full bloom now. We will have to see if we end up with any other “storms” in weeks to come.

by Eunice