Happy Birthday To The Love of My Life and An Update!

Yesterday was Ross' Birthday, so the girls I were sad we couldn't be there to celebrate with him.  I thought his day might be like any other day as I wasn't there to make him his birthday dinner and cake and have friends over, but our good friends Keith and Tabitha filled in for me without me even saying anything!  He went over to their house to have dinner along with my Dad.  Afterwards they had our Pastor and his family and some additional friends over for cake.  Thanks for filling in for me Keith and Tabitha!

As you can see, my husband is full of Adventure and I am happy to ride along on this Adventure of life with him!  Since Ross' Birthday last year had lots of stories about toilets and sewer pipes (if you want to read about it click here), I thought I wouldn't disappoint you and share a funny but little personal story along the same line!  Not so sure I should share this on my blog, but it is pretty funny!

Ross was the man this year with getting our stuff to the barge.  Since I had to cancel our flight (due to my leg) to meet him in Anchorage in order to get our Barge shopping done, he had to do all the barge shopping by himself.  With lots of lists from me and pre-ordered stuff I had ordered off of Costco's catalogs.  Anyways, he ended up sleeping in our Suburban in the Walmart parking lot for several nights while he was doing the barge shopping in Fairbanks.  He is good at roughing it and didn't want to pay for a hotel.  It is common for RV's and motor homes to park in the Walmart parking lot in order to camp for the night so Ross joined all the other travelers.  Well it was dark out and Ross needed to relieve himself so he walked over to the woods that were beside the Walmart parking lot.  He was back in the trees, about ready to do his business when he heard a voice very close to him say "Hey!" He couldn't see anyone around him and it scared him so bad that he let out a holler!  Finally he saw some movement in front of him, only to realize it was a homeless man all wrapped up in camo and sleeping on the ground.  Ross said, "Sorry man, if you hadn't of said anything I would have peed on you!" The guy just rolled back over, not saying anything and Ross quickly got out of there!  A couple days later, Ross saw the guy coming out of the woods.  It turned out he had a tiny sports car with his stuff tied onto the back of the car and was begging for gas money!

Since I am on a roll of telling stories about Ross, I thought I would do a little update of what has happened since my last post about my horse injury.  Ross finished commercial fishing, bought a Toyota to replace our pickup that got wet in the flood, put it on the ferry in Petersburg, got to Haines and was driving it about 45 miles past Haines and into Canada.  He was going up a hill when suddenly the pickup started making all kinds of noise and died.  He couldn't get it started again, so he coasted all the way back down the hill to the border which was quite a ways to coast!  He got to the border and the guy said it was $1000 bucks just to get a tow truck to come from Haines to tow the pickup back to Haines.  But then he said he was off in an hour and would tow Ross back to Haines.  Thank goodness!  Ross had to wait in Haines till the next morning for the mechanic to look at it.  Turns out it was toast and needs a total rebuild!  Oh no!

So Ross is stuck in Haines with a brand new freezer full of salmon that he somehow has to get to Galena and a broken down truck.  Look at how God provides...It turns out some friends of ours from Galena know some people in Haines so they gave Ross the contact information.  They are a Christian family with lots of kids and a 15 passenger van.  The mom would be driving the van up to Anchorage with some of her kids (which is about an 11 hour drive from Haines) on that Sunday and could bring our freezer and fish.  Our pickup could be stored at their house until we figure out what to do with it or just take a loss on it.  Ross needed to get up to Anchorage to get our barge shopping done so he flew out of Haines and up to Anchorage, got the barge shopping done that he could around the Anchorage area and then met her on Sunday to pick up the freezer and fish.  He then drove up to Nenana to unload all the stuff at the barge.  Then to Fairbanks to finish the barge shopping.  Ross had a lot on his plate this year with barge shopping as it was kind of like we were starting over.  He had to get furniture plus our yearly groceries.  I was here in Montana, checking out deals on Craigslist and then he would go pick the furniture up.  He loaded the container at the barge just in time before the cut off of when we could have our stuff there and flew out to Galena on the last day of August.  

Ross had to start work with in-service starting September 3rd, so he had the house to work on, plus moving classrooms, getting ready for the students to come, and moose hunting.  Most of the insulation and drywall had been replaced on our house by the time Ross returned to Galena by our landlord and volunteers, but pretty much everything else had sat untouched all summer.  The carpet was still being laid at the school and their was not running water or sewer at the school or our house.  Somewhat overwhelming! Dad volunteered to fly up to help Ross on the house, so we sent him up there last Thursday.  I am so thankful that he was willing to give of his time as I know he has plenty of his own things to get done here on the ranch.  

The girls and I have been waiting to fly back for multiple reasons...When I went to the Orthopedic, he told me I should not be flying until the first or second week in September because of the chance of increasing blood clots with elevation and flying.  I had to cancel our tickets to fly up there on the 25th of August.  I still am not able to do much on my leg without it swelling up by night time, but I do feel I have turned the corner and it is getting better.  I am able to walk on it now without limping too badly!  It is still very tender, but is starting to look like a normal leg!  Yeah!  Now that my leg is getting better, we have been waiting for there to be sewer and water in our house and for the barge to get there with our furniture so we have a place to lay our heads at night.  Ross and Dad have been staying at a friend's house and now are sleeping on a cot and air mattress in our house.  A volunteer plumber who is there through the bible church has been working on our plumbing and is very close to being done.  Ross and Dad have been working on the sewer tank outside so we should have water and sewer soon.  The barge should be coming to Galena sometime this week (we hope) so hopefully our furniture will be there soon as well.  I finally booked our tickets for the 19th and we will be flying into Galena on the 20th.  The girls will be missing two weeks of school, but their teachers do not seem to be too concerned as I will work on some things here with them.  I am preparing myself for being overwhelmed when I get there, especially with all that will need to be done with a bum leg to boot!  If Ross doesn't get a moose this weekend, he will have to go hunting again the weekend we arrive as that is the last weekend of moose season and we need a moose for meat for the winter.  I am thankful my Dad will be there to keep me company and help with the house.  Please pray that Ross will get a moose this weekend so he doesn't have to be gone the weekend we arrive!

Other Updates:

My Mom's staph infection has gone away but she will not be able to have her knee surgery she was suppose to have in September until November now as apparently staph can lay dormant in your body for up to 3 months.  The doctor wouldn't even touch her until the chance of the staph being in her body is gone, so that it won't show up in her knee after surgery.

Larry's cat-scan turned out fine.  His memory was a little blurry for a few more days after his horse accident but he is doing fine now!  I think our family should have a big bubble around them though as we went down to watch Christey and Larry's boy show his pig in the fair.  Larry was a board man (the person who puts the board in between the pigs when they are fighting).  Well there were some pretty viscous pigs and Larry ended up getting bit 3 times by some pigs that were fighting each other when he went to put the board between them.  All in the same day, Larry and Christey's other son had to be rushed to the hospital when he had a anaphylactic reaction to something he was allergic to at the fair.  

Another story:  Mom and I were headed back to the ranch after my leg injury and stopped in Missoula to go to the Chiropractor.  We came out and the car wouldn't start, so we had to get a jump and Mom had to take the car to get a new battery.  While she was doing that she dropped me off at Costco.  I had to get an electrical wheel chair and had the girls following me around Costco.  I was back in the cooler section when the wheel chair ran out of battery power and died in the cooler.  I couldn't get it to move so I gimped over to a flat cart that was sitting there and got to the front of Costco to check out.  Mom was waiting there as Costco was closing and ended up pushing me out of the store on the flat cart, since I left my crutches in the car!  Funny story now, but not when it happened!  It seems every time we turn around something it happening!

People keep saying it can only get better from here!  I have gotten to the point where I just laugh when another thing happens, because what else can you do!  This has been some year!  I will never forget the year of 2013!  Ross' motto has been, "It could be worse!"...and it could be, so I am thankful for the blessing we have.  I was reading the Daily Bread a few days ago and this quote stuck out to me..."Let God write your story.  A lot of people want to write their own story and have God be their editor when it goes wrong.  None of us knows how the next chapter of our life will read.  But as we look to Jesus and run with endurance the race that is set before us, we can trust Him-the author and finisher of our faith.  Jesus wrote the beginning of our story, and He'll write the next chapter and the ending as well." As I look at joining Ross in Galena, I hope I trust in God to write the next chapter of our lives this year!