End of the Road Ranch

New baby, new dog and a roof

I'm back, I think.  Life got a little hectic with the birth of our 3rd child on August 21st, but I think we are settling down again (I'll write another time with the details of his birth).  As we left to go to the birth center to have Connor, DH suggested that we stay at his mom and her boyfriends place for a few days to recover in a clean and more comfortable place where we could have help with the older kids.  I really enjoyed that stay.  This birth was harder on me than the previous two, and I was really sore for a few days (mostly in my hip and abs).  I laid on the couch with the newborn for almost two days straight - I never thought that would be possible with two toddlers.

We finally got back to our little cabin and enjoyed the two weeks of dinners our church family provides for families with new babies.  DH and a good friend of his were working very hard on our big house and got the roof papered when the first round of wind started.  The first time the Santa Ana winds hit it blew off about half of the roofing paper. My tired DH worked all evening in the very cold wind repairing the paper before more damage could be done.  That started the rounds of sickness.

We spent 2 weeks with colds and the stomach flu at the same time.  Wanting somewhere more comfortable and clean we moved back out of the cabin for the first of 3 1/2 weeks of moving between my parents’ house (about 20 minutes away) and Josh's mom's place.  Every time we moved back into the cabin something else would happen.  Somewhere in the middle of all of this I bought 2 bushels of apple seconds and spend a day and a half canning 32 quarts of apple pie filling!  The second round of winds sent us back to Mom and Dad's as Josh stayed in the cabin praying the whole place wouldn't blow away (this time only 1/3 of the roofing paper blew away).  Josh estimated that we had sustained winds of around 80 mph at our property.  That was when all the fires started, so the next few days there was so much smoke in the air that I wouldn't let my still sniffly kids outside - so we stayed at my parents, until the smoke cleared at the beach and we went to visit my MIL again.  We are now on our 3rd straight night in our own beds and our little cabin. 

The big house is coming along nicely.  The drywallers are mudding the interior and the exposed beam work is all stained.  The rest of the roof came early this week and DH and friends will be roofing all day tomorrow and Saturday.  The painter wants to start staining the porch beams, t and g ceiling and decking on Monday.  We are planning to have an interior painting party the day after Thanksgiving.  Josh has finished milling all of the wood for the exterior siding and will start putting that up soon after the roofing is done.

As if this isn't enough, we got our new black tri Australian Shepherd puppy right in the middle of all of this.  She was born the day after Connor and we got her when they were 7 weeks old.  We named her Belle and she certainly is a beauty.   She has been going to work with Josh everyday and is doing very well adjusting to life with us. 

Well life around here in a one room cabin with 3 kids under 3, a puppy, 4 kittens, 22 guineas, 2 turkeys and 18 chickens and several men working on the house each day keeps us on our toes - theres not much chance to get bored. 

Remember that God can help you handle whatever he has given you!  Smile and let Him do the work!