Fun, but busy weekend!

Hello all!

Oh, this past weekend has been so full of fun and I've enjoyed it immensely! I apologize, though, for not updating you all on it, but I hope to make this post rather long and explain - in detail! - everything that has happened here. :) I have taken pictures of different things that I will mention, and hopefully will have that up in a near-future post. But for now, bear with me and read my explanation of a fun, but busy weekend! :)

Okay, on Saturday, the day was just beautiful and I got school done early (which is always so nice!) and was having a fairly good day. Then, when Dad got home, he had two packages in the mail for me! :) I had recently bought a couple things on eBay, and was excited to see that they had finally arrived. One package contained the whole series of "Anne of Green Gables" books that I had bought. I was so excited to finally get those! And I got them for a good price, too. The other package contained a 570 page book called, "Polished Cornerstones" that I found, recommended, in a book entitled, "Pearl of Beauty". I have not read the whole book of "Polished Cornerstones" and you can imagine how long it shall take me to read! :) But, I skimmed through it and am SO excited to start reading and learning from it. I highly recommend it to young maidens! So, after Dad had changed out of his work clothes, he surprised all of us, by saying that he was going to take all of us to the Rainier Highschool track! You see, Mom has been walking around the track for exercise, but rarely did we ALL go. And to make it even more enjoyable, we all loaded our bikes into the back of our farm truck and while Mom drove three of the children in the van with her, Dad took three others in the truck with him. Our truck is "new" (to us!) and I had not ridden in it yet, so Dad took Noah, Eunice and I in it on the way TO the track. When we got there, Eunice, who is 7, practiced riding a two-wheeled bike. She did very well and got the hang of it in less than 15 minutes! (I have pictures of this that I will put up.) She was so excited to finally be able to ride...it was so cute to see her so happy! :) Then, while Mom walked around the track, Dad watched Eunice, Priscilla (Prisky) and Grace and Noah, Lydia and I started out on our bikes down a wooded trail off to the left of the high school. We biked for about 2 miles before turning around and heading back. (I have pictures of all this too.) When we got back (since it was such a beautiful, sunny, warm day!) we all drank tons of water and sprayed our faces and heads with a water bottle of cold water that Dad had wisely brought. How thankful we were to taste cool, well water after a long, hard - but fun! - bike ride! So, by the time we got back to the track, Mom had already walked a mile and so we all trooped back into the truck and van. This time, Lydia, Prisky and I rode in the truck. When we got back to the house, Dad and Mom decided to order pizza to go from our "Papa Murphy's" pizza place in Longview. So while the pizza people were making it (they said it would take approx. 25 minutes) Dad, Eunice and I washed the van, truck and Dad's little Toyota Corolla. By the time we had finished with the van, the pizza was ready to be picked up. So when Dad and Mom had left to go pick it up, I finished washing the cars and then decided to surprise Mom a little by scrubbing some of the siding on the house. You know when siding gets all moldy and icky? Well, around our front door especially, it was getting that, so I scrubbed it as best as I could (my arms were already hurting from all the bike riding! :) and listened to a new MercyMe CD that my Dad recently bought. The evening air was still and the trees in the woods to the right of our house were rustling gently...and "I Can Only Imagine", by MercyMe was playing and I was just so peaceful....it was such a wonderful moment! I reflected on the day, and how wonderful it had been - being happily surprised with my books in the mail, Dad surprising all of us by taking us to the track and letting us ride our bikes, washing the cars...and even though the latter was hard, it was FUN because I got to do it with my family and by the end of the day I was SO tired, but SO happy and contended with my day! You can imagine how well I slept that night! :)

Sunday dawned bright and early. We got up at around 8AM (late for us! :) and started getting ready for church. Oh, also, on Saturday (during the day) we cleaned the house a little because on Sunday we were expecting company over. So, the Knolls - an older couple who we have known for years! - accompanied us to the church that we have been attending lately. The visiting pastor, who is filling in for Pastor Jeff who is in Africa on a mission's trip till the 27th, preached on the subject of "Prayer". It was a good sermon and I appreciated how thorough he was in it. After service they came home with us and we had some extra pizzas that Dad and Mom had decided to get the day before. We had a good fellowship time together with the Knolls. Mrs. Knolls was diagnosed with Alzheimer's a couple years ago, and even though she is quickly deteriorating, it was nice to make some more memories that we can cherish later on in life. After the Knolls left, at around 4 or 5 PM, we had a relaxing rest of the day.

Well...Monday, yesterday, was a pretty "usual" day in our family's household. I did school, watched the children, etc., etc...UNTIL! Dad and Mom had to go to the feed store to get some hay for the goats, and while they were gone, I was in the office trying to catch up on a few things on the computer and starting a short children's story that I had an inspiration to do, when all of a sudden, I heard Lydia scream and the Eunice crying hysterically. I was with Grace at the moment, so jumped up and went to see what was wrong. It turned out that Eunice had accidentally sat on Lydia's hand backwards and Lydia said that she could not move her wrist. I tried to stay as calm as possible, under the circumstances, and quickly called Mom's cell phone while Noah asked Lydia if anything else hurt. When Dad and Mom finally got back home, Mom took Lydia to the clinic at the hospital and while I waited in the car (because Grace had fallen asleep) Mom went in with Lydia. (Dad and the rest of the children stayed home.) An hour later, which I am SO glad that I had taken my "Anne of Green Gables" book along to read in the car :), Mom and Lydia came out of the clinic and got in the car. Lydia had fractured her wrist. Now, for some of you who might not know me or my family well, it seems that we have an "unlucky" hand/wrist thing about ourselves! :) Now, I only use the word "unlucky" because I can't seem to find a more suitable word at the moment...but know that I don't use that word much. :) Well, the reason I say that is because almost everyone in our family has had SOMETHING happen to their hand/fingers or wrist. Dad has had a whole fingernail ripped off by a garage door (LONG story!), Mom has accidentally chopped the tip of her index finger on the left hand off - while "showing" me how to chop yams, Noah has had surgery on his wrist when he had a ganglion cyst AND has fractured his wrist too - in almost the exact same spot as Lydia's! Just the younger girls (after Lydia) and I have not had something seriously wrong happen to us and I hope we won't...at least for the time being! Well...Lydia is going to get a cast on on Thursday. For now, she has her whole right arm wrapped up and in a splint. She is keeping it as elevated as possible (above her heart). But please keep her in your prayers...that the recovery would be swift and she might not experience any more pain than she has already.

Well...today has been slow paced. Dad got home early and he, Mom, Lydia, Eunice and Grace went to Costco to stock up on some things that we needed. At the moment, everyone is asleep except Noah (who is working on his art college portfolio for his Revue Night in two weeks) and I am here, eating Kirkland vanilla ice cream that Dad and Mom got today with chocolate chips on it. Yum yum! I think I'll close this posting and go eat it! :)

I hope you all enjoyed reading this update on Raquel's life! :) Please comment on anything. And I shall get the pictures up as soon as I can.

With Love in Christ,