I have SO much to tell y'all!!!

Hello everyone!!

Oh it's SO good to be back home again! This post will probably take a good amount of time to write, but I'm sure you will all be patient and bear with me! :) A lot of what I am going to say will be from my journal that I kept while we were in South/Eastern Oregon. And I hope you will enjoy the pictures too! :)

Let's see...

Monday: (evening) My family dropped me off at my Uncle's house in Sandy, Oregon. My Uncle had gone out to dinner with some friends, but my cousin, Nicholas, was there. They live in Virginia, and so we hadn't seen Nicholas for over two (or so) years! (We had seen Uncle Mike a couple months ago when he came to visit, but he came alone.) Nicholas was born in'94, so is right in between Noah's and my ages. We've always been the "Thrilling Three" (as we called ourselves, when we were together :) We hadn't seen Nicholas for so long that, naturally, he had grown a lot! :) Even thought Noah is a whole year older than him, Nicholas is a bit taller that Noah! :) And his voice has gotten so much deeper, but Noah's is deeper. Anyway, kinda got off-track there! :) We just got caught up on each other's lives while we were waiting for Uncle Mike to come back from dinner. My parents left soon after dropping us off, because it was getting late and there were still goats to be milked. Uncle Mike got back about an hour or so after we had been there, and the rest of time (before going to bed) we talked of some things about the camp trip that we either needed, or needed to do before the next day.

Tuesday:

Got up early and helped load/pack the rental GMC and UHAUL trailer that my Uncle had rented the day before. When we finally got everything packed, we headed out. We only stopped a couple times - to fill up on gas and get a bale of straw (you'll find out why later). We drove about 6 hours before we finally got to Rock Springs. When we did, we found two tents already set up. Uncle Mike said that his friend Jan (pronounced: "Y"an - he's from Czechoslovakia) and his two buddies, who were coming camping with us, had probably gotten there before us (since they had left earlier) and so that must've been their camp. So, we unpacked some of our stuff and finally heaved the huge medium-sized army tent of my Uncle's, out into a clearing by the other two tents and picnic table. It's really hard to set up and by the time we were done, it had taken us about a half-hour/45 minutes...only to find out later that those other two tents weren't Jan's and his two buddies'. Jan arrived just a few minutes after we had set up the tent, and after making introductions (his friends' names are: Bob and Cliff), they said, "Okay, well, we'd better get our tents set up." My Uncle was puzzled! "Aren't these yours?" he said, waving his hand at the other two tents. "No!" they said. "We just got here! How could we have set up our tents already?" You can imagine what we were thinking: We have to move this huge tent and set it up again!

[our campsite...the first one :) ]

Well, we finally got the tent moved to the next campsite, and finally got dinner going. We ended up not eating till fairly late, though. And we were all really tired! I only woke up a couple times that night - which is pretty surprising, considering how I don't sleep too well when camping. Oh, and by the way, the big tent doesn't have a floor, so that's why we bought the straw. :)

Wednesday:

We all ate breakfast, then Jan and his two friends went to Calamity Lookout and we went to scout around the area to look for a good coyote hunting spot. We found one (not too far from us) and were there for awhile and called with the jack rabbit distress calls that we have. We didn't see any there but guess what we heard?(at least, the kids heard) A bear! We heard it about 5 or 6 times! Not the thrashing through the tress, but the grunting sound that they make. It was kinda...scary, to say the least. And he/she sounded really close. We estimated that it was probably over a little hill to our left. But Uncle Mike had brought a shotgun (just in case something like a bear attack would happen) so I wasn't too scared for long! :) Thankfully, we didn't have to use it, though.

After being at that spot for a while, we drove around some more. Boy, did we have fun! Jostling along dirt and gravel roads on 4-wheel drive, blasting country music! :) (Oh, and I just wanted to insert there that I don't necessarily like all the country songs out there...we turned the radio off (or changed it) when one of those dumb songs came on!)

While we were driving around, I spotted a beautiful, little cabin nestled between pine trees, sage brush, fields, and cattle. I told Uncle Mike and my cousin and brother that I want to live out here somewhere. :) (And the whole time we were there, after I said that, my Uncle kept pointing "For Sale"ranches and saying: "You should buy that one!" or "That one looks really nice!" :) Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get a really good picture of it, though. :( But following, are a few pictures that I did take:

[Noah (r) and Nicholas, sitting on a log-fence that we passed by a little creek.]

[Nicholas, Uncle Mike and Noah at McCoy Creek]

Thursday:

We went some more coyote hunting...except this time, I stayed in the car to write up in my journal. :) After that, we went to Malheur River. Nicholas walked all the way across the river, and came back. It was up to about his hips, and actually, surprisingly cool! Not exactly warm, but not as cold as you would expect it. Noah finally got in too, and they tried building a dam to catch some of the little baby fish that were swimming around - boys! :) After getting my feet and legs wet, I decided to hike around the river a little. I found this gigantic fallen tree! It looked like it had been knocked over from the roots, so there must've been a big storm. But, judging from how it looked, it had probably been a while ago. After hiking, I went back to the car where Uncle was catching a few zzz's. I wrote about being in the river, etc. until the boys came back and got in the car. Soon after, we set off for more driving. But, boy, did we not know what was going to happen! Our back, left tire went flat!! As soon as it did, we naturally got out, took all of our stuff out and started looking for a jack - which every car should have! We looked and looked and didn't find anything. We were just about to start walking to the highway, when the Lord sent someone to help us! :) His name (we later found out) was Darrell Clark. He had been cutting wood, down the road from where we had gotten "stranded", to fix some of his fences on his ranch. We told him our predicament (it was embarrassing that our rental didn't have a jack! :( and he said that he had one, so pulled over and parked on the side of the road. He produced his jack from the back of his truck, and Uncle and he got the GMC lifted enough to change the tire. But our problems didn't end there. The spare tire, which was under the car, would not come undone. It was somehow tied to the bottom of the car with a thick cable that Uncle couldn't figure out how to get loose. Uncle told us to look for some kind of a release button of some sort, but we couldn't find that either. You can imagine how frustrated we all were! Finally, Uncle just gave up patience and cut the cable. While all this was going on, Darrell had two dogs that were riding atop the wood he had cut. A male and female Border Collie. The female had jumped off the truck when it had come to a stop and wagged her tail (and herself :) over to me to be petted. She was the friendliest and most obedient dog I have ever met! I pet and played with her while they were working on the GM. Later, when the tire was finally (thankfully!) fixed, Darrell called her and I found out that her name is Sissy. :)

[me at Malheur]

[my brother took this pic: Sissy and me]

Well, we made it back to camp okay and while we were getting dinner ready (fried chidcken, barbecued ribs, fried onions and potatoes!) Tio told Jan and his friends how and what happened. Also, while dinner was being made, I had a wonderful talk with Cliff. He actually lives, I think, near San Leandro, in California. He goes to a church called The Well. It was really encouraging talking to him. He is so lost in God that it was really neat to meet and get to know him!

Friday:

Jan and his friends left. They needed to get back in time for Jan's daughter's graduation party on Saturday. After they left...we got out the guns! :) My Uncle had brought a few guns to go target practicing with. We had a blast!! :) Nicholas shot only once. A rifle. I don't remember, at the moment, what kind it was. The target was an old juice jug filled with water at about 170 yards away. He completely BLEW the thing to pieces! :) Then Noah shot a .223 rifle. Oh, and both the guns had stands that we set up on a picnic table there. Anyway, Noah's first shot was amazing! The bullet actually punctured the jug and exploded INSIDE it! It made a huge gash in the bottom - on one side, and blew the lid off. It was really neat! Then the second time he shot it, it just blew up - kind like Nicholas'. I'm going to be completely honest...I didn't hit the target with the rifle. :( I tried FIVE times, and still didn't get it! BUT, when Uncle brought out the pistols, I shot a 9mm Glock and hit the target! :) Yay! I absolutely LOVE that Glock, and really want to get one like it. Then I shot a .22 pistol and got all 5 bullets on the target. So, as you can see, I do a lot better with pistols. :) But, we couldn't shoot for too long because it was nearing lunchtime and a few people arrived at the campspot.

Oh, I forgot to mention that I only slept one night in the tent. The rest of the nights (up until we left) I slept in the car. It was just way too cold for me in the tent! And I'm glad that I finally DID sleep in the tent because a couple of the nights, it rained and the boys' tent and sleeping bags got soaked! And my sleeping bag isn't really...a GOOD one. I mean, it's Coleman, but the old kind. :) And so I know that I probably would've just frozen!

We just did some more driving around and the boys hunted a little more...We went to a place a few miles from Rock Springs called Poison Creek. (I know! What a name!) It's just a tiny creek that runs into a big lake. You can fish there too! If we would've known, we would've brought fishing equipment, but as it turned out - we didn't. Anyway, it was getting kinda dark and I took this really nice picture of the sunset!

[Poinson Creek sunset]

There was a lot of clearing around the lake, so we decided that we'd come back tomorrow and try hunting there.

Saturday:

We went into the nearest town, which was Burns, and got some ice cream. I had the green mint chocolate chip kind...yummy! Then we stopped a bookstore, but I didn't get anything. They were pretty spendy, actually. But Nicholas did manage to get a book on "Gunslingers of the West" for Uncle for Father's Day - the next day. Then we went back to camp and ate lunch. Yeah, dessert came before meals! :)

Then, in the evening, we went back to Poinson Creek. There were a few guys there fishing, so we waited till they left and got the guns and calls out. The guys called for about an hour and didn't see anything. But, we did see a really pretty bird! It was pretty big - about the size of a Macaw - and all black with a yellow face and beak. Unusual, yes...but very pretty!

Sunday: Father's Day
I was sad that I couldn't be home for Father's Day for Dad, and that I had to miss church! :( At 11:00am (when service starts) I looked at the clock and was like, "Aw! Church is starting!" :) Saturday night rained "bears and beavers"! It was awful! Sunday morning, everything was wet and we had a really hard time starting a fire. Finally we just all got in the GM and blasted the heat - thankfully, it had seat and back warmers too...mmm! Uncle read us some stories from the book that Nicholas gave him and after reading for a while, we decided to just go back home. We packed everything up - which was also hard because everything was so wet AND it kept sprinkling while we were packing. When we finally got everything loaded up (which took about 1 1/2 hours) we headed out. On the way back, we passed through a town and got air for the tires, and while Uncle was doing that, I went in and got a few post cards. Two of them have cowboys rounding up cattle, and then one of them has really pretty flowers on the front with a verse on it. That's pretty unusual...and that was one reason I got that one. :) But they were good additions to my post card collection.

Anyway, it took us to get back to Uncle's about as long as it took to get to camp, so...we were really tired when we got back and after taking a nice HOT shower, I went straight to bed! :)

Monday:

My family came and picked Noah and I up! It was SOOOOO good to see them!! I had missed them all so much! I filled them in on everything that had happened (using my journal as a reference again! :). I started writing this entry on Tuesday, and I'm really sorry that it's taken me so long to finally put it up. Following are a couple more pics that I thought I'd share with ya'll.

[The remains of what used to be a large-looking cabin]

[One of the days that we were there, Uncle made roasted apples. He lined the bottom of the pot with slices so that the whole apples wouldn't get burnt too much. I thought it was kinda pretty. :)

[Oops! I forgot to mention that one of the days (I think it was Thursday) we went to Calamity Lookout. The picture isn't very clear, but the view from up there was just AMAZING!!]

Well, hope ya'll enjoyed this update! :) Don't forget to comment!

Crowned With Silver article - by my Mom! :)

Here is an article that my Mom wrote for a Crowned With Silver magazine back in 2002. I hope you enjoy reading it! Please leave your comments...

Only ten years ago I would have thought Crowned With Silver was “behind the time” and “too old-fashioned” for my “tastes”. Now, however, I find it as a source of nurturing to my God-given feminine roles as wife and mother!
When I married my husband 12years ago, I had no idea what marriage was about. I didn’t know that you each came in with an individual role. I had absolutely no desire to have children, as that would ruin my figure too much. I contemplated divorce after only six months of marriage but knew that this was not God’s will for marriage.
I even began to plan ways, in my head, of how I could divorce “biblically” so that I’d be free to remarry! What utter wickedness!!! Every time I tried to devise a plan, the Hold Spirit would remind me of my wickedness and cause me to see how utterly unfaithful I was being to the man I vowed to stay married to now matter what!
Even though, at the time I would never have considered myself a feminist, my worldview had certainly been influenced enough to think like one. I needed help!!! I went to counseling; the counselor only listened and got paid with no real input. I spoke to many of my trusted girl friends who encouraged me to divorce since I wasn’t happy. But the Holy Spirit’s urging was much more compelling than all the wicked advice I received.
After consistently hearing the Word of God taught and preached, the Lord slowly and carefully began to show me areas in my life that needed some major changing in order to restore my marriage. He caused me to remember testimonies I had heard of broken, seemingly hopeless marriages that God miraculously pieced back together, therefore, confirming to me that He WAS able to restore MY marriage.
He showed me how dominating I was; how I constantly tried to overthrow my husband’s role as head. He showed me how important it was to surround myself with godly women who were not afraid to tell me what I didn’t want to hear. He showed me how I needed to pray continually for my husband an d how in those prayers, that I need to show genuine thankfulness and gratitude to my Heavenly Father for having given me a husband at all!
Finally, and most importantly, He showed me how I needed to find out from His HOLD WORD what marriage was exactly…how He designed it; what were our roles, how I was to submit to my husband’s headship, etc.
He is so gracious and faithful in restoring marriages to anyone that trust Him and obeys.
All too often, the world does so well to paint pictures of marriages that are “perfect” and that live “happily ever after”, yet God’s intention for marriages is to teach us submission; to serve one another; showing us our individual faults; disagreeing but at the same time accepts each other’s views graciously; dying to ourselves daily for God’s glory and honor; working hard towards loving each other even under the most difficult circumstances. This is all very hard work! Only when we take this challenge of hard work and willingly obey our Father’s instructions do we see the most beautiful, wonderful union take place.
Four years into our marriage, the Lord blessed us with our first child and now I am pregnant with our fourth! We are excited to see where He will take us in this journey of marriage. We have certainly not arrived. Every day, new challenges occur that are sent our way to teach us something. The most joyful thing about those challenges is that they are sent by a loving, caring Father who knows that we learn best by trials.

“…Count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.” ~James 1:2-4

So, I would encourage you to persevere, to love your husbands, love your children, pray for them, find out ways to encourage your husband, show him that you are thankful that God put you together in this life. Keep a watchful eye on your motives; don’t expect anything in return. When you have had bad thoughts about your husband, make a list of things you are thankful for about him. God will honor your efforts with blessings beyond comprehension. He can restore any marriage; no challenge is too difficult for His infinite power.
All glory, honor and power be His,
Mrs. Ricardo (Tanya) Duarte

For the readers: please be notified that Mrs. Duarte is now the happy and loving mother of 6 children, ages: 15, 14, 9, 7, 4, and 10 months. She hopes and prays that whatever God has planned for her and her husband in the future is all in HIS hands!

Will be gone for a while...

I just wanted to let all of you know that my brother and I are going camping with a very close Uncle of ours, who came up from Virginia Saturday afternoon, and we're going to be leaving today and staying till next Monday. I won't have any computer access between now and then, so just wanted to let you know that if any of you e-mail me and I don't e-mail back, that it's because I'm not here! :) Please do not send me any forwards, as I will have quite enough e-mails without those! :)

Well, my Aunt and Uncle's 40th wedding anniversary went very well! My Mom took me to my grandparent's house, where my Uncle picked me up and then we went with my Aunt and Uncle and my Uncle's sister (he's only related to us by marriage), to the church where they were going to hold the party. We met another lady there (Mrs. Nancy Ballantyne) and were there for FIVE hours - decorating, doing the flowers, food, tables, etc., etc. When we got back to their place, you can imagine how tired we all were! :) But it was a good tired, you know? :) Then we went early Saturday morning, just to make sure that everything had stayed in place, got the food set out and people started arriving on time, so we got the whole party going at the time that my Aunt and Uncle had wanted it to. God really blessed them with a great turn-out of people! 64 people had RSVPed to their invitations, and only 3 or 4 of them didn't show up, so that's not really that bad. Well, I was in charge of some picture-taking, and was a server at the food table, and I'm glad that I was able to bless them in some way. What a wonderful celebration - a 40th wedding anniversary!

Well, then yesterday, after church, our pastor's family had another bonfire - kind of a "fairwell" to the months of burning. As of today, you are not allowed to burn outside anymore. Only Dad, Noah, Lydia and I went to (both) church and the bonfire. Eunice and Priscilla hadn't been feeling well ever since Saturday, so Mom stayed with them. Like, I think I said before, it's easier for Mom to stay with Grace especially, since she usually gets fussy sitting in service. :) Well, at the bonfire, we ate hot dogs, marshmallows, s'mores, camp patties, etc. and we also were able to jump on the trampoline this time! :) Yay! It was really fun! :)

Well, I can't write much longer. I'm going to go take a nap before we have to leave for my Uncle's. Please pray for safety on the road down to Southern Oregon. The place where we're going to be camping/coyote hunting is 60 miles South of Burns, Oregon. It's a place called Rock Springs. Anyway, so long for now! Hope you have a wonderful week!

In Christ,

P.S. The young lady whose paintings I posted previously (Kaitlin), thought you girls would like to see the other artwork of other students at MSOA. Click on the link below to see the 2009 student's works of art:

http://www.msoaonline.com/apps/photos/album?albumid=5971839

Crowned With Silver - online!

For those of you who know the magazine "Crowned With Silver", be sure to check out their website and sign up for their magazine through e-mail. Click on the link below to visit their site...

http://www.crownedwithsilver.com/

P.S. I will try to be on later today and update all you! :) Oh, and thank you, Kirsten, for following my blog! :)

This Past Week

Hello one and all!

Thank you for being faithful in checking up on my blog! I'm sorry that I haven't been as faithful as updating it...but, as the most famous excuse: "Life has been busy!" :) But, I will include pictures in this posting, so I hope you have fun - not only reading of my past week, but also seeing pictures.

Let's see...May 23rd proved to be one of our goat's due dates! She gave birth to a beautiful baby doe (left). We haven't quite decided her name, but are leaning towards: Jiji Rae. To keep our herd in order, we name the offspring of a buck and doe, with the first initials of the parents' names. This doeling's parents' names are: Juliette and Romeo - thus, "J"iji "R"ae. Sorry if that's a little confusing! :) She's doing well...growing quickly, as they all do.

Now, skip five days to May 28th, Thursday. Noah's art college had their Revue Night, where all the students show their artwork, and the ones who were in acting classes, etc. did their skits on stage. For those of you who don't know, when the students display their paintings, watercolors, colored pencils, etc. the public get to view and vote on which one(s) they think are best. Then, after Revue, the president and vice president count the votes and send out the results through e-mail. The evening didn't end there! :) Five of my friends and one of their moms came to Revue Night and when the "show" was done, they took me to their house where we had been planning a girls' night for quite some time! :) We stayed up till about 1:40AM, Friday morning, talking, listening to music, and just catching up. I hadn't seen some of them for about a year and it was so good to see their faces again! :) We keep in touch through e-mail and blogs, but it isn't the same, you know? Friday morning dawned bright and sunny - and hot! It felt like a regular summer day! We went on a walk and took tons of pictures! :) The girls were kind enough to take some of me - since my little sisters aren't quite handy (yet!) with the camera. Then Lucia and I went farther down a trail and we took a few more pics...

The time drew near for me to go home. One of my friends, Rachael, has her driver's license already and so met my Mom half way between our two hometowns. It was sad, to say the least, to say good-bye, but we are hoping to plan another girls' night this summer sometime - when we're all done with school! :)

Then this last Sunday...my family and I went to church. We were planning on having a family over, from there, but they weren't able to come for various reasons. Instead, the Pastor invited everyone to his family's house for a bonfire! It was later in the evening, so after church, my family and I all came back home, at lunch, started watching a new movie that my Dad found called: "A Man Called Peter". It is now one of my favorite movies! I heartily recommend it to all of you! After eating and watching, we all took a short nap before leaving for the bonfire. The Pastor's family doesn't live far from us, so it doesn't take us long to get to their house. Almost everyone from the congregation was there - minus a few elderly people. They have a teeter-totter that they made that - when you are up in the air - is at least 8 feet high! :) It was SO much fun...but fun sometimes has a price. Since Sunday, my thighs have been hurting and it hurts to move my legs! :) But it was worth it! We ate hot dogs and marshmallows, played on the teeter-totter, then set up a trampoline that they had recently been given from another family at church. But by the time we were done putting it up, it was time to go. (Oh, quick insert: Noah wasn't feeling very well on Sunday, so didn't go to church or to the bonfire. We don't really know what he had. It was like a one day fever-type sickness, so he is all better now!) The mosquitoes were getting a little annoying and Grace was tired. By the time we got home, it was 10:40PM! :) But we had SO much fun!! Unfortunately, I forgot the camera, so no pictures for that. I hope I described it in detail, though. :)

Monday...nothing much really happened. The day was pretty laid back. One exciting thing for me, that is, was that I finished my Geography book!! :) So now I only have Algebra (which I'm probably going to have to do through summer), but I'm basically done with school. Since Monday (which was on two days ago), I've been treating my days as if I don't have any school and then just sit down and do Algebra, really, whenever I feel like doing it! :) But of course, Mom said that I must do at least 2 lessons every day - which isn't all that much of a bother when you have everything else out of your way. :) I am so thankful that I'm finally down to one subject in school!

Tuesday morning was SO beautiful! After the hot weather that we've been having, Tuesday morning revealed that it had rained the night before. When I stepped outside on the front porch yesterday morning, the beautiful, sweet aroma of newly rained on earth filled my nostrils! I LOVE that smell and it seems to relax me a bit. (Sorry for my "poetic" sentence there! :) The author side of me peeps in once in a while. :) The day proved to continue being beautiful! My goat, Portia, had her little doeling yesterday at around 11:30AM. We haven't quite decided on a name for this little one yet, either, but for now, have been calling her: Pixi Rain. (see picture below) "P" for Portia (her dam) and "R" for Romeo (her sire). Oh, by the way, if any of you young ladies have any suggestions on names for the little doelings, please let me know. :)

(Sorry if the picture is a bit blurry)

Today has been going as a usual day in my family's home. In a little while, though, we will be having some friends over to pick up some scrap metal that we have. I will have to sign off soon, but I hope you all enjoyed reading this update! :) And seeing pictures...

Until next time, I remain yours

In Christ,

Next day (today: June 4th, 2009):

Okay...so I wasn't able to upload all the pics that I wanted to yesterday before the Woltersdorf family got here, so I just saved this posting as a draft, and will tell you about my day while the other photos upload! :) Okay, after I finished writing everything above, the whole, entire Woltersdorf family came - when we were just expecting 3 or 4 of them! :) (By the way, there are 10 children in their family...just to let you know :) Well, while the guys were loading up the scrap metal, I was talking to the girls. I had never really got to know them before, and by the time the guys got done loading, I really wanted them to stay for dinner! :) Well...sometimes our wishes do come true! :) They stayed and we just got a few pizzas. We (the six older kids - from both families) ate outside since it was a little cooler than in. It was kinda muggy yesterday, but somewhat cooler outside. We had tons of fun talking, laughing, cracking jokes on each other (Josiah got us all started! :), etc., etc. Finally, after dinner, we all went on a walk up our road. We walked a little over 2 miles and by the time we got back it started getting dark. But we had TONS of fun!! Below is a picture of the Woltersdorf and our family... It was funny...after they left, it seemed like our family was missing a whole bunch of kids! :) Well, I didn't go to bed last night until around 10pm, but it was well worth being tired this morning. :)

Okay! So now about this morning! :) I got a call at about 10:30AM from our neighbor down the road. She said that a lady from their church had come over to plant some flowers in their flower bed and my neighbor was wondering if I'd like to come over a help her out. So, of course, I did. The lady (whose name I don't remember at the moment, but she told me to call her: Mrs. H. :) showed me how we were, basically, going to lay everything out, but then let me decide where each other different colored plants were going to be. We had such a nice variety too! Petunias, Marigolds, Snap-dragons, and a few others that I don't remember their names. When we were done planting, fertilizing, and watering the big flower bed, we started in on my neighbors' garden. I planted everything except 6 tomato plants and three mounds of cucumbers. So the stuff that I planted were: corn, beets, beans, lettuce, swiss chard, zucchini, two other kinds of squash, kholbarish (sp?), and carrots. If I'm missing any - sorry! I am so tired right now! :) Well, I worked from 10:30 this morning to 3:15 in the afternoon. It was nice to finally get home and take a shower, eat and then flop on my bed! :) I did get to rest a little before having to get up and eat dinner. My dear mother was kind enough to make dinner without my help today - what would the world be without moms!! "Three cheers for Marmee!" :) Also, another REALLY neat thing that happened today was that I got a response to a letter that I had previously sent to Mrs. Elisabeth Elliot-Gren! Her husband had written me back - for her - and enclosed a photo of her! :) The one that I'm putting in this posting is the one that I received. Isn't she darling? :)

Well, I should be getting off the computer. Looking at the clock on the computer, it is exactly 11:23PM! Yikes! :) Well, I hope you all enjoyed reading this update on the past few events of my life! :) Please feel free to comment! Oh, and since it is so late, I won't be able to put up pictures of my girls' night at my friends house, but I'll see if I can do that later - or you can just e-mail me directly and I'll send them to you.

Good-night for now...and may God bless you and give you a good-night's rest.

Yours Truly,