Change~

Sometimes change is exciting! Sometimes it's a little sad.

Today, I felt a change that is exciting and yet sad in a way... Let me explain:

The Dagley family needed the skid-steer back for a project they want to work on in the next couple of days, so we decided to all take it back today and visit with them a little while. So, after eating our noon meal at home, we all piled into Andrews' pickup (which he already had hooked up to the trailer,) and we headed West. The hour and a half journey seemed to go by very quickly, as we were listening to another of Dr. S. M. Davis's sermons--this time about true repentance, or as he calls it, "Godly repentance."

When we arrived at the Dagley home, Mom, Jacob & I headed for the house while Dad and Andrew unloaded the skid-steer.

We all spent a couple hours of visiting, singing, and looking at their garden and had a lovely time, but several times I found myself feeling sad....... Why? Because there were no longer any young people to visit with...

Things have changed so much in the Dagley home since we first got to know them 7 years ago! Jonathan's married to Jaidra; David's married to Susanna; Ben's busy helping neighbors with harvest; Amanda's away with her fiance James and his family; and Michael is helping his older brothers work on a ranch a ways South of us.

Time changes so much.... Really, it is as it should be--the children are starting families of their own now, but it's just......different. The house seemed so quite.

We headed for home around 6:00 and Mom and I took turns reading from "The Walrus Hunters" (by Ballantyne). I highly recommend his books, as they make for very interesting reading while you're learning about far away people and places. In the few books we've read, Ballantyne's always talked about God (and the heros always have great character), so we've come to like his books better than Henty books for that reason. I personally think that sometimes he's a bit too graphic--about the aspects of war and such, but I guess that is reality...

When Andrew stopped at Steele to fill the gas tank up, Mom posted a sign for the Appleseed Project in the gas station there.

We ended up doing chores in the dark tonight and, once they were done with, Mother popped some popcorn and I ground some of it up for popcorn cereal--one of our favorites! We watched a Bonanza episode while we ate our late supper; then had family prayer time and now it's family bed-time!