I have so missed blogging for the last 5 days and 23 hours.  (That's how long our power was out from Katrina.) There was so much to write and I wasn't able to share it with all of you. I had to resort to the old fashioned way, paper and pen .  Later, when I have more time, I will post my journal entries for the days we were without power. But first, I must give God awesome glory.  As bad as it has been, it could have been so much worse.  I even heard a man on the New Orleans radio station talk about how many near misses he saw in regards to trees on houses.  I echo that in my area.  Every house here should have a tree on it, but it is as if God cupped His hands over most of them.  Why most were spared and some weren't I don't know.  Why some lived and so many died, I don't know either.  I do know that it could have been much, much worse even for New Orleans.

We are now able to see the pictures on TV and the internet.  My DH is a HUGE N.O. Saints fan!  We were horrified to hear about the situation at the Superdome.  We've been in the Superdome several times.  DH was born in NO.  Just last year my MIL, DD (10), and I had an awesome time at the Audabon Zoo.  I can't even imagine what it must look like, if it's even there.  Any time I feel sorry for myself I just think:  As long as I'm not on a roof top in New Orleans I'm ok.

There are many refugees in our area.  (That's what I'm calling them because so many have no place to go home to any more.)  As our church members get themselves back on their feet we are beginning to reach out to refugees and to take disaster relief to loved ones south of here.  The need is overwhelming, and the opportunity to be the hands and feet of Christ is unprecidented.  This reminds me so much of our time overseas when we worked in a war torn area.  This is now a war torn area.  We were invaded by Katrina.  Pray for all the believers here to look outward and upward and be the body of Christ we were meant to be.

I took some "after" pictures which I'll share as I'm able to get to them.  God has blessed us over the last 5 days and 23 hours with a generator, offers of hot showers (though we usually roughed it here at the house), ice, water, and even today He provided money to restock our refridgerator as we weren't able to save everything.

Thank you to everyone who prayed for us and wrote to ask how we were doing.

More later,

Me