where have I been???

I have been on a mini roller coaster! I say mini, because I dont like real roller coasters and it has been a good few weeks. A lot has happened and we have been very busy. I will give you the update!

First, we flew to Ga to see some of my favorite people in the world. My children's best friends Calob (12), Faith (11), Manny (8) and Willow (5). And of course their mama and daddy, Nikki and Brian. Nikki has been my best friend since we were 14. She found good ticket prices and so we flew impromptu to Ga for a wk.

We had a blast! I havent had that much fun in a long time. Our kids crammed in as much fun as possible, we swam and kayaked in the river, gardened and canned, the kids built a real indian village equipped with a fire pit that they ate dinner on (fresh worms, eggs stolen from the chicken house and a pkg of hot dogs when we found out they were eating worms... ), tried to camp out but then it rained.

While we were gone (tuesday-tuesday) our shop here on our property caught fire somehow and burned down. This happened saturday, we were phoned by the woman keeping the goats and garden cared for. It was a big mess and I am so grateful that the firemen were able to contain it. It was a total loss on the shop and contents but we feel very blessed. The wind was going the right direction to save everything but a bit of fence, it rained during the following few days thus helping the firefighters (fire took 4 days of work to keep it from flaring back up), we had amazing friends who helped to save all 3 of my freezers full of food (elec was out from the fire-for several days I would have lost a lot of food), we have great insurance and we were not here so no one was injured. I feel like God has taken care of us in every way once again in a potentially harmful situation.

Next in news, we found out that we cannot stay at Ft Riley, and we have to move to a new post when Frank gets home from deployment. Very shortly after! As in, not even sure his things will all arrive from deployment in time to be packed by the army! We are moving some things alone, and we are moving to Fairbanks, Ak. We are very excited about the move, it is somewhere we have all wanted to go.

We had already began the process of selling goats, chickens and farm equipment because we planned on going to school with Frank next year. I am so glad now, because I am left with less work than I had before. The drawback is that we have quite a tight time-line to get the house finished and sold. We have 3 partially finished bathrooms, so it will be a lot of work. I am sure we will get it done, and things will go well. They always do, as long as we are patient and stay happy. Everything is brighter when one determines it is!

This week we have 4h showings at the fair. Both of the children showed sewing projects, Nathalie got a 2nd place ribbon for her skirt, Tad got a 1st place for his shirt. Tad got 2nd for his knitted hat and Nathalie got 2nd for her baked goods. Now they have their goats, and Tad has a bantam rooster. This year the fair rules are that we have to keep the goats there from yesterday (wed) all the way to sunday! So even if we do not have things to do at the fair during the day we have to be there most of the time regardless. So we are again off! This time to shave and tattoo our baby goats.