For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: a time to be born, and a time to die; a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; …
~Ecclesiastes 3:1-22~ ESV
Saying autumn was lovely is almost a given… it was lovely… and longer then usual so we enjoyed mild snowless weather right up until December. Even now our December is not crazy snowy or crazy cold. The kids had a great time covering the whole town on Halloween, getting too much candy and enjoying the hot chocolate and hotdogs handed out by our local seniors club. I ran around taking as many pictures of the pretty changing leaves, as often as I could get out, and the dog (Riddick the smooth fox terrier) enjoyed the longer warm season… he hibernates come winter… poor little guy has very little fur. School events are underway with clubs and sports for each of the kids, my man and I are enjoying our continued time spend volunteering for Spoken Word Ministries and we are all settled in to our old house actually able to await a real snowed in winter after such a good fall.
Hightlights started with apple season. We had to cut down the tree that had the beautiful red delisious like apples as it got sick, hoping what we left will grow back for next season. With the smaller tree remaining we were shocked at how much we got off of it! It kept me hopping for a few weeks and filled our freezer with pies, chopped apples, broiling apples and MUCH apple sauce. The Fehr Apple Festival was a grand success! Not only did we find it much easier to pick from our new tree compaired to the ones at our city home but we also got more. The crab apples grew so well on our two crab trees that one tree bend over almost to the point of breaking. So we experimented with little crab apples this year too. The kids love picking and helping but the indoor work of chopping and stewing and bagging leaves everyone TIRED.
Our second highlight was becoming a cat family. Now I have secretly hoped for a kitten since I left my childhood home and my precious farm cat Smokey behind many many years ago… but there are allergies in the extended family so I kept my cat person pushed way down inside. The girls didn’t help… every year my daughters would PRAY for a kitten for Christmas… every year I would voice why we shouldn’t but simultaneously wished they got their prayer answered with a yes… I am so glad I was not directly to blame for the CAT event of 2015 😉 I was away at a ministry conference, heading up the prayer team part of it, when the kids discovered a half frozen little kitty hiding in our back yard. They held him up to the dining room winter (where my husband sat at the table having coffee) and cried about how he might die and was frozen and starving and the coyotes were coming for him. My husband, the self declared NONE PET PERSON, let them bring in the temporarily named Oscar the cat. We took care of him for a few days and eventually found his owner. Once the rescue was returned the house was in a state of heart break and the emotional blues… SO my husband agreed we may as well get a cat for keeps if we can find one… hahaha there are kittens for free everywhere so I set to work and 3 day later we had Obadiah. Oby is orange, orange coat and eyes, with the pinkest nose and white paws and chest. He immediately became part of the family and a blue color with bell and name tag sealed the deal. The kids and I, totally genuinely, express regularly since his arrival that he is all we needed for Christmas! I for sure have no more wishes as he is just amazing. Riddick is doing fine with him. He has played with the neighborhood cats for years and realised through the rescued cat experience we are just going to get another if one disappears!
Changing seasons are very often my favourite times of year as I don’t always tolerate the extreme weather so well. So I thank God for change and time passing even as I realise my last post was almost a total complaint about that very concept, lol, so is the complexities and mix match of emotions in the heart of a human being.
“While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.”
~Genesis 8:22~ ESV
TTFN
Always Lady Mac an Rothaich
