Friday

Spent the morning getting the house clean; the afternoon was spent in the garden transplanting my peas that were on the porch; Bob was home working with Mike and Matt on the new stall – this kept me busy making lunch and running to the hardware store.  I didn’t accomplish as much as I would have liked to in the garden.

Friday night we went out for ice cream and a movie – it was a late evening as we were eating ice cream at 9:00 p.m. and going to the movie at ten.

( As I weeded my strawberry patch and raspberry garden, I took pictures from where I was sitting.)

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Saturday

I sat outside with Rachel on the porch just enjoying the beauty of everything before me and the company of my daughter.  I marveled at the beauty of the Sabbath – a day set aside just to rest and enjoy what God has provided. I especially enjoyed watching and listening to the sounds of the birds all around me.  When one is always busy working, you don’t stop to “smell the flowers” or to listen and enjoy the sounds of nature.  As we sat on the big double rocker, we talked about the gift of the Sabbath, and what life was like for us before appreciating this gift.  Rachel was too young to remember, but I spent a lifetime of letting one day and one week run into the next, rarely taking a breather of rest.  The house always needed to be cleaned, there was always the "next" job of organization to tackle.  My life has changed dramatically since then.  Now, our life is more like music, than noise.  Just like a sheet of music, without rests or pauses, would cease to be beautiful music, so is life when one never stops.  In His infinite wisdom, He knew our nature to be goal oriented, and  knew that He would need to command many of us to "stop," and smell the roses.  And more than smelling the roses, for me, I take this day to appreciate and spend time with the people He has surrounded and blessed  me with.

He has told us that the gift of the Sabbath is for us, not the other way around. It's a gift, not a law that is heavy and a burden to bear.   It is to our own lack of blessing should we ignore this one commandment of the Ten. 

As we sat on the porch talking, Rachel got a phone call from our missionary neighbors that were down the road from us at a garage sale that was selling tack.  Although I aim to not shop on this day, I confess, we went over as soon as we could.  We found the deals of a life time, a horse lovers dream garage sale, and bought three saddles, in perfect condition, with all the pieces (stir-ups, girth) for less than $100.00  Rachel got first rate clothes for the upcoming 4-H competition in July - two outfits for $35.00.  This was an answer to prayer.

Late afternoon we went on trail rides, visited with our missionary neighbors, and then got ready to go see our good friends, the Vales.  We arrived at their house close to eight, and stayed until after ten. 

Sunday

This morning we were without fellowship of any other families present, but this did not hinder a wonderful morning spent in worship. We sat on the porch and my husband gave testimony to our children about the first church after the ascension of Christ, and what led us to Home Church.  He then read from Isaiah chapter 40 and gave commentary about the greatness of God.  As I sat on our porch this morning, I marveled at the beauty and simplicity of a worship service that the father of the home leads his children in instruction of righteousness and praise to God.  As he spoke of God’s greatness, he also gave his own testimony to the children that during these stressful and difficult times, it has helped him to draw closer to God and to reveal to him misplaced priorities.  He shared with the children the silver and gold that he is seeing in these times of trial.

 (Our ranch resident ducks taking a stroll.)

At 1:00 p.m. our company arrived.  Mike had offered the night before when we were visiting their home, to come over and give us a hand on the new stalls we are building for our pregnant mares.  I made a simple lunch as this was a last minute plan.  I prepared potato salad, and egg salad and tunafish sandwiches.  Margie brought brownies for dessert. There were twelve of us all together sitting outside at the picnic table, enjoying a simple lunch and the fellowship of one another.  When lunch was done, everyone went to work. We accomplished a lot.

Monday

Our friends came back Monday morning to continue with our ranch project.  I started making breakfast at 6:30 a.m. The night before, I had premixed the blueberry pancakes and dethawed the hickory smoked bacon.  I had a busy kitchen this morning as I had pancakes cooking on the griddle, three dozen scrambled eggs in the frying pan, bacon in the oven, and English muffins in the toaster.  It felt a little bit chaotic and the kitchen looked like it felt.

Matt and Kristi and Kayla joined us and we had 15 people present for breakfast.  There was so much food that I had plenty to spare and sent the remaining eggs, bacon, and pancakes over to our neighbors, the missionaries to Romania.  I felt happy that I was able to do this because they have special visiting company with them this weekend.

After breakfast, again everyone went to our ranch project. The first stall had been completed on Sunday, and today they worked on the second stall.  They also worked on clearing out the second floor of the crib barn preparing it for storage of our alfalfa harvest.  This was a huge project.

Here are some pictures from our weekend I will share with you:

Don't children and kitties go together like peas in the pod?

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Ruthie came and sat down with me while I was weeding my garden.  I couldn't help but make it a picture moment with my camera that was sitting beside me.

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Although we got a lot of ranch work accomplished this weekend, there was still time for horses.

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.These pictures were taken early Sunday morning. It was still cool outside.

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.This is one of of our pregnant mares due any time now.

I love all of our horses, but Minnie is one of my favorites. She has such a sweet dispostion.

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We spend a lot of time on our porch in the early mornings of our weekends.

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There was lots of paddle boating going on this weekend - .

I took this picture from my porch - Jacob is comfortably reading a book in his swing.

The girls work as hard as the boys around here....

Pasture rotation time - this is done twice a day.

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I took this picture from the porch.  I love capturing these mornings with my camera.

Nope, that's not ALL the pictures I took this weekend!  But, it is all the time I have for this morning to post.  I have some adorable ones of Jacob and an exciting moment he had when he found a turtle in the horse pasture.  I'll post more later.