After Sabbath school Dave gave a great message on peace. He had many scriptural passages on what peace is. And he brought out the difference of the peace the world gives and the peace that God gives.
We enjoyed further fellowship after church when good friends came over for the day. That is rest for me. During the week I don't get much chance to talk with adults so I look forward to Sabbath and company whether it be friends or my adult children.
Our friends' children enjoyed jumping on the trampoline. One little girl and Daniel jumped all afternoon with only a few breaks. Leah gets a little nervous (with good reason) when there are more than two people in there at one time. She will only go in and jump with one other person. But she kept busy doing other things.
Yesterday was a busy day of work. Since I still had my table covering on my good table I thought I should clean out my china hutches. I have two, my own and my mother's. Brandon will take my mother's hutch when he is ready for it. As I was taking things out I thought I really need to get rid of some things. There are so many pretty things that I don't use. Why clean around them all the time? So I set some things aside. I will let the adult children pick anything they might want. The rest I will try to sell at Tim's mom's sale.
After I got both hutches cleaned, they were very dusty, I moved them ahead and washed the walls behind and the floor underneath. Then I decided I still had most of the day and could get all the walls washed down in the dining room. I even had time to wash the walls in the living room, clean the windows in both rooms, wash the curtains, and clean the light fixtures and ceiling fans. It felt so good to get those two rooms cleaned. The nice thing about it is I didn't go into the job with high expectations. I was just going to clean out the hutches.
While I was doing the inside work Tim and Daniel were outside raking the west lawn. There were so many little, and big, twigs that needed to be cleaned up before Tim can mow. Tim cut off the branches on my "berry" tree that broke when we had that heavy snow and ice last fall. The tree looks not so nice but I hate to cut it down as so many birds feed on the berries every spring. He also cut down a dead tree by my raspberry bushes. Then he still had to go to work and work hard for 14 hours. I really don't know how he does it.
Brandon came over later in the afternoon. He had taken his black car up to town on a trailer pulled by our blue Ford. He rebuilt the motor a few years ago but still can't get it running right. He even had it down at school in Wahpeton but his teacher couldn't figure out the problem either. So he is going to take it in somewhere.
Yesterday he loaded his silver car on the trailer as he wants to overhaul the motor in it. Last year he put a new transmission in that car and knew he would eventually need to redo the motor. It will give him something to do after work.
Both of Brandon's cars were purchased with cash by him. He didn't pay much for either and they have been good cars. He likes both and doesn't want to get rid of either. With his abilities he should be able to keep them running.
Brandon said he kept busy yesterday by cleaning and raking Grandpa's yard and cleaning out the flower beds which probably hadn't been done in awhile. The neighbors to the east came over and visited with him while he worked. The lady said anytime he was hungry to come over and she would bake him some cookies. They are nice people. I expect they are happy someone will be there to take care of the yard and get it looking better.
This post is getting much too long so I will get to the pictures now. In school we are studying Russia. The family who writes and publishes My Father's World were missionaries in what we call Siberia for years. The ground stays frozen all the time. It is called permafrost. In the summer the top layer will thaw. Since the ground is still frozen underneath, the snow that melts can't go down into the earth. So it stays on top, a muddy mess.
Marie said in my teacher's manual that they would see old houses that were sinking into the ground. The newer houses and apartment buildings are built on concrete stilts that go down into the permafrost layer. Then they leave 10 feet between the ground and the bottom of the building. This has prevented the houses from sinking.
For our permafrost activity we made some plain gelatin for our permafrost layer. Once it was set we put some dirt on it. We finished by putting snow on top of the dirt. We still had some snow out in the yard for that. Then we let it sit in the sun to see what would happen.
When the snow melted we were left with a soupy mud mess on top that didn't penetrate the "permafrost."
Our neighbor was selling a dirt bike and gave Brandon a really good deal. While Brandon was home yesterday he went over to pay the neighbor and pick up the bike. It is a tall bike. Brandon is a tall man and can barely reach the ground. He was going to take my picture sitting on it but I told him I was sure I wouldn't be able to reach the ground.
I think that is all I have to say for now. 'Till next time...