I passed!!!!

Yippee! Adam and I both passed our online course that we took this summer. We took a class on using the internet in the classroom. And I passed! (Some of you know how bumbling I am with technology, so this is really a GOOD THING.)

On another topic - the thunder clap earlier today? The accompanying lightning actually hit the Large Baptist Church where Philip works. He said they had firefighters scrambling through the building.

Jumping out of my skin!

That's what I did a little while ago when I was in the pool. It had been slightly overcast, the leaves in the trees has rustled a bit. Then the sun peeped through again. And then...

BAMMM!

Huge thunder clap.

I clambered out of the pool and took Julia with me!

I love a rainy afternoon. Summer is so wonderful, and would be perfect, if the weather were like October :) Still, these quiet days of reading and resting are just about heavenly.

The rain passed. Adam has fired up his oven and we'll have pizza again tonight.

Nothin' much else on this front.

Back to the old grind

At 11:00 today,I have to go to the school for some early in-service training. We'll do a short training on the Accelerated Reader program. Might be interesting. Not nearly so nice as my pool. Sigh - the summer is almost over.

Adam will also be there. They've asked him to prepare lunch for those in the training session. He'll make his wonderful wraps.

He is finished with his online class, and I only have one lesson to go! Then we will both be one step closer to finishing our re-accreditation process for teaching. It's been a very useful class on using the internet in the classroom. It only cost us $55 each, which is vastly better than the cost of some courses out there that teachers take! And we could do it at our own speed, in the comfort of our living room.

Happy Anniversary to Us!!

Yep! 19 sweet years!

And finally:

Some last pics from last week. Alynn and I stopped by one of our favorite stores, owned by one of our favorite people, Linda. This is Ernie's Rock Shop, in Brevard, NC. What a wonderful place! Lots of rocks, fossils, etc., plus beautiful jewelry.


Anna and my mother.

A little more of last week's fun:

Must start with a food pic, of course. This is one of the pizzas we had on Thursday night, from the backyard oven. Adam's refining his technique of trying to get it gorgeous, and getting the bottom lovely and brown. He's waiting for his steel brush and baking peel to arrive in the mail.

Aleya gave Julia a really sweet birthday gift from Bath and Body Works.

On Friday, for about 5 hours, Alynn and I enjoyed a luxurious tea with our dear friend Carolyn, at "Kathleen's Tearoom" in Fletcher, NC. It's in a neat old bungalow house. We each had a tea tray, with 3 endless pots of varied teas. Some of their fun teas include Darjeeling, Assam, Florence, Chocolate Mint, Ceylon Kenilworth, and others that I can't remember.


Aren't they lovely? I told them they are both photogenic.
Refreshing these friendships lifts the spirits and encourages us all. I'm so thankful for these dear ladies. I've known Alynn since about 1981, and Carolyn since 1995. Precious.

Blackberry picking

The children went blackberry picking this past week and came back with a nice bowl full of them.

I had to add some blueberries (from my brother & sil's farm) to fill out the pie dish.

Pretty yummy

She grew up last night -

Julia, that is. She turned 9 yesterday. And this morning in church, she opted to stay in the pew rather than go join the other kids on the front row for the Children's Message.

Kinda sad.

Ever been scared of your brekky?

I bought some yummy bagels, and thought I'd have a bagel & cream cheese.
I knew I had a new package of cream cheese, buried deep in the fridge somewhere. See cream cheese? See package. Yikes! Hannafords! (A few of you may realize the implications of this packaging.) Hannafords was our grocery store in Massachusetts.


We moved here from Massachusetts 2 years ago.

TWO YEARS.

I opened the package. It's didn't wiggle. Adam recommended I smell it. It smelled like itself. I ate it. It tasted like itself.

Adam says I should call it "finely aged."

Nothing Better -

What's better than spending an afternoon lounging in the pool, under a blue sky and waving trees, the aroma of a wood fire wafting across your face? I'll tell you. Doing all that with your best friends :) Tom and Alynn are here!

Mighty Busy

When we returned from the music conference, we hit the floor at a dead run. We have fun company coming in town this evening (Yippee!!!), but needed to do a little cleaning and straightening first. The pool was a fright. The yard needed mowing. Laundry was sky high. You know.
Anyway, before I dash away from music camp, here's a photo of our adult choir, with the director, Dr. Bill Thomas. He was a very good clinician. We didn't sing as much as I'd like, or do as difficult music as I'd like, but we learned a lot from him. He admitted that he had WAY underestimated the quality of the choir he would work with!

On Sunday afternoon, we went to some friends' lake house with many other church folks. The kids swam in the lake. It was SO hot, that the only comfortable place was in the living room of their little lake house. No AC there, but the cool cement block, shade, and fans made the room lovely. Philip got a little shut-eye.
Our pastor, Rob.
Friends from church.

"MY HUSBAND ROCKS" FRIDAY

Okay, so this is a new trick that this old dog blogger is learning.

On this blog, I found a fun thing to do each Friday -- tell what wonderful thing my dear hubby has done!

This week? He MERELY served as cook and dishwasher for 11 people, so that we could all enjoy ourselves at music camp for the week. He loves to cook, but this long chore is definitely an act of love. As he says, he's the "house elf."

We've had some yummy food! Thanks, dearest!

Negligent Blogger

Sorry. I've been busy singing, and stuff like that:)
I couldn't resist these adorable little girls, all lined up last night eating snow cones at the Carnival. Julia is not among them; she was in the gym playing games.


I shot a lot of pics before I got that expression!

Much Better

Anna is much better, for those of you concerned for her. She rested, drank lots of water, ate a little lunch, ate a little more lunch, and settled into some comforting TV. I think she was dehydrated a bit. Thanks for your caring!

A Little Day Trip

We took the kids to town, to Mast General Store. This is the 3rd Mast General I've visited. For the uninitiated, it's kind of like Cracker Barrel, minus the restaurant. And loads of candy. Candy in huge barrels. You grab a green basket and just start dumping it in. Julia said, "This is better than that store on Harry Potter!" And then moments later, "This is heaven!" Now, what kind of theology is that??

These 2 pics only show about 1/4 of the candy in the store.
Quaint downtown Hendersonville has all kinds of statues. There used to be mostly bear statues, but now I see they are adding other animals. Cute
Peter made friends with several dogs, of course.

Our group, indulging in our candy haul.

The Fainting Alto

That would be MY DAUGHTER, ANNA. Oh my. The adult and high school choirs rehearsed together at 9:00 this morning on a big piece. We sang it through about 3 times. Then I heard a group of altos say, "We need some help here." I thought they needed help with notes! Then I saw a brown pair of legs and a familiar pair of blue shorts, lying on the floor. Poor Anna, fainted right away! We don't really know why. She might have locked her legs up. She's had a sore throat, and now her tummy feels pretty yucky. She might be getting a bug. We put cool rags on her and fanned her, took her to the van in a wheelchair, got LOTS of attention. I brought her back here for Adam to look after her. She seems to be more steady now, but still feels yucky. She might be resting for the rest of the week.

Nature, Beauty and Music

Here are two views from the porches of the place where we're staying.
Overlooking the Bonclarken Lake.
Overlooking the Mill House Lodge Lake.
Another shot of the Heidelburg Hotel. I believe it was built in the 1800s. There are so many good photo ops with this building!
Who IS this beautiful young lady, talking on her cell phone??
This gazebo on the lake is Anna's favorite spot to lounge.

Go to Dark Gethsemane

I want to share with all of you the text of a hymn we sang this morning in the worship service. The tune was familiar ("Redhead"), but I'd never seen the words before. Our focus this week is on the passion and resurrection of Jesus.

Go to Dark Gethsemane

Go to dark Gethsemane, ye that feel the tempter's power.
Your Redeemer's conflict see; watch with him one bitter hour,
Turn not from His grief away; learn of Jesus Christ to pray.

Follow to the judgment hall; view the Lord of life arraigned.
O, the wormwood and the gall! O, the pangs His soul sustained!
Shun not suffering, shame, or loss; learn of Him to bear the cross.

Calvary's mournful mountain climb; there adoring at His feet,
Mark the miracle of time, God's own sacrifice complete:
"It is finished!" - Hear him cry; learn of Jesus Christ to die.

Early hasten to the tomb where they laid his breathless clay:
All is solitude and gloom; who hath taken Him away?
Christ is risen! He meets our eyes. Savior, teach us so to rise.


What a rich, rich text! The description is very good, but the message to the reader, to learn from Jesus HOW to do these things - how we need this! To pray as He prayed in the garden, to bear our crosses as He bore His, to die as He died, to rise into life as He rose. If we did learn these lessons from the Teacher, how much better prepared we would be to live the lives he has designed for us.

A Music List

For those music buffs out there who are interested, here is the list of the anthems the adult choir is working on this week, for our concert on Friday evening:

Christ Is Arisen, by Kenneth Jennings
Lamb of God, by John Carter (very nice - gorgeous arrangement and part mixing)
Lift High the Cross, by Kitchin & Newbolt
Were You There, by Ruth Artman (I may be having a solo in this piece)
Surely He hath Borne Our Griefs, by Karl Graun (beautiful, plaintive a cappella)
Ah, Holy Jesus, by John Ferguson
O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing, by John Ness Beck
Crown Him with Many Crowns, by Walter Pelz

As you can see, we are doing plain old hymn arrangement. But these really aren't plain. At first I thought it would be an easy week, but our director Bill Thomas from Furman, chose pieces that choir directors here would easily be able to implement in their churches at home. And they're beautiful.

Here, in the mountains

At a lovely, old retreat center -- here is a picture of the old hotel's entrance way.

We had the Sunday evening reception there last night. The old hotel also has lots of rockers on its long, wrap-around porch overlooking the lake...

Ah. This is nice.

Sunflowers

These were supposed to be dwarf, seedless. I've never known dwarves 8 feet tall :)

These aren't sunflowers, I know, but I'm so pleased at how these begonias are doing. I don't like begonias, but I wanted something sturdy, here by the pool.
And look at my weeping fig (I think that's right...) that Mother gave me. It is very happy on the patio.

The final arch

As Adam says, "It's really starting to look like something!"
That last arch is really nice. I like the concrete accent above. See the door he made? It needs some fine-tuning for fit, after he puts the tile in that concrete area in front of the door. He'll be doing that soon.
See how well our apples are doing? Many are starting to turn red like this.

Drivin' Around

I took my camera along, when I was driving today. Here is a neat church. At first I couldn't figure out what denomination it was: no sign of any type to tell me. Can you see what is on the corner spires? A Star of David. This is a synagogue!

Behind the synagogue is a very old cemetery - graves from the 1700s and the Civil War. I love places like this - dark, old trees.
Here's another interesting church, a Friends Meeting Place - for the Quakers.

Julia kept herself occupied for a couple of hours today painting on the patio.