Days 5 and 6 in South Carolina

Jeremiah 32:27

"Behold, I am the LORD, the God of all flesh:

is there any thing too hard for me?"

Saturday and Sunday are now "in the books" in South Carolina. I managed to complete 51 inspections on Saturday which was more than I expected since I was working the outlying area where the jobs were farthest out and in the country. I had a laid back day and the weather was nice. I met some wonderful "friends" -- four horses and their owners. One was a Clydesdale and two were Belgium and they were the BIGGEST horses I'd ever seen. Their owners were really nice and let me pet them and offered to let me ride them. I kindly passed on that, but I think if I'd had time I would have let them get out the ladders to hoist me up on Lacy (the Clydesdale). She was so gentle and loved on her owner. I loved her feet too -- all furry. Hmmm... I wonder if I should have called them hooves??? Anyway, here's a photo of Lacy, Henry, Ladybug and the one whose name I forgot.

I thought Lake Murray was really pretty in this shot.

I saw these sweet little Asian children statues at one home I inspected. I think they have great features and look really lifelike.

One of the photos from another day that I forgot to post is the one of the aloe vera plant that was over my head. I think it was close to six feet tall. The stems/leafs (whatever you call them) were wider than my hand.

And, lest anyone think I might not find a Krispy Kreme store on a trip, here is the proof that my car DOES have a tracking device on it that seeks out and finds all Krispy Kreme stores in all cities. And yes, I did get a donut.

Today was such a blessing as I got to sleep late, work on paperwork and see a movie. The sad parts were as I sat in the hotel room thinking of my family and friends in Sunday school, then church, then AWANA this evening. I thought of each of them as I was missing each event.

I also spent an hour on Saturday with my heart at the Center in Springfield missing Joshua's basketball game. Kevin videoed the game and is sending it to me on Monday so I can watch it later in the week. I was so excited that they won but sad that I missed it. I will miss another game on Monday night when my mom is taking Joshua. It's Kevin's first time doing deacon visitation. There is so much guilt when I'm here about all the things I'm missing at home. Everyone tells me, "Well, keep the goal in mind." I think the goal is well worth the trip or I wouldn't be here, but I suspect this might just be my last project. I'm a bit burned out and value the time with my family more and more and just don't want to be away from them this long.

I found a Once Upon a Child store here -- note that this is my FAVORITE store as I am such a bargain shopper that finding a Gymboree outfit for $7.50 just makes me HAPPY. I got several outfits that were super cute and got them at a real bargain. Several of them were even half off the regular price (which is inexpensive to begin with). Here are a couple of outfits that I got for Ellie. This first one will be great for Christmas this year.

I can just see her in this with a little turtleneck, tights and little shoes! Darling!!

Does this just not scream SASSY? The shirts says "Let's go fly a kite".

And my Gymboree nautical style dress and "bloomers" in a navy-gray pinstripe with sweet little smocking.

I am now working on entering the work from this week. I've gotten about 90 of the 420 I've done entered. I want to get as much as I can done so when I return home I can concentrate on getting our dossier together. I need to go in and meet with our home study agency to give them the needed documents to complete our home study, file our I-600A, schedule appointments for medical forms to be completed (this will be our FOURTH set, I'm sure my friend Tamera and Dr. H are getting a bit tired of us), gather the rest of the papers needed for our dossier and work on planning our other fundraisers.

Speaking of fundraisers, our friend Carla has started our Little Caesar's Pizza Kit fundraiser. We are SO FORTUNATE to have friends who are willing to suggest this, take the reins on getting it set up and to manage this while I am out of town. We are very grateful. To "celebrate" it's kickoff, for dinner tonight I got the $5 Little Caesar's Take Out (and will likely be eating it all week - ha!).

To close, I will share a great saying I saw on a church sign here. It says:

Church is God's gift to us. Some assembly required.