​I have been writing about our move in my latest blogs.  We are down to hopefully one more load and we will be completely moved.  Finding a place for everything is a whole new problem, and then remembering where you put it when you DO find a place.

On Tuesday, I work with 3 other girls in the Lost Sheep warehouse sorting clothing that comes in for the homeless.  Their names are Anne, Tansile, Regina and Nancy.  It will be hard not being with my girls on Tuesday.

Anne painted me a rock with a sheep on it to help me remember my girls...as if I could forget!  

This morning, Tansile texted me and said she missed me and her prayers were with me.  I wrote back and said, "You have NO idea how much I miss you all.  Tuesday was the highlight of my week 'cause I got to be with you girls!"  She wrote back and said,

"ONE DAY SOON EVERY DAY WILL BE TUESDAY!"

WOW!  What else can I say but WOW! 

For the 22nd time in our married life, we are moving.  For some reason, this move has been harder than the others.  Even the move we made 2 weeks before Jason was  born!  

For that move, we moved into a parsonage in Hampton,TN and we had everything put where it belonged, and even had the pictures hung!  On the second Sunday at church we had an open house.  On Tuesday, I went to the hospital and had Jason in two hours!  He was the first Lamaze baby (natural childbirth) born in Johnson City hospital.  In those days the husband was not allowed in the delivery room, but they let Tommy in.  The Dr. even said "just tell me what to do Tommy!"  So he did!

Every time I start to feel a little "down" or wonder if the end will ever be in sight, I look back at all those other 21 times and know that we will see the light at the end of the tunnel.  

Oh...those 22 times did not include the other people we have helped move through the years.  And, as if the Lord truly does have a sense of humor, we got a call this week asking if we could help move a widow into an apartment.  Of course we said yes, but sometimes I admit that I do wonder at the Lord's timing!  

Jason Amos has been wanting to take us hiking on The Little River Trail in the Smokies.  We went last week. 

The day was perfect.  The temperature all day felt like the Lord had turned air conditioning on all along the trail, just for us!  

Before we started on the hike, Jason wanted us to stop and look at a community of summer cabins, now abandoned, but maintained by the park service .  There was a row of cabins on both sides of a narrow road, all different and all delightful.  They were summer homes for families back before the park bought the property.  As I walked through them, I could picture children meeting their friends each summer and running from house to house and up and down the road.  I could picture them anxious to get to the mountains after a year in the city going to school.  John boy said it was kind of sad to him, as if ghosts were haunting the place.  (Of course he did!)

After we finished walking through the summer homes, we started our hike.  It was an easy hike with no hills (my kind of hike) and the Little River rushed along the whole way.  We found out it is one of the cleanest rivers around and indeed it looked pristine.

About half way up the trail, we saw hundreds of butterflies up ahead.  It was absolutely breath taking!  We finally saw what we thought was a nest of them.  They would fly away, then come back to the "nest".  Jason said they were eating, and I won't say what he said they were eating! 

A few feet further we saw another "nest" of them!  Again, they would light, then fly around in the woods.  I thought to myself, we would never have seen this phenomenal sight had we stayed at home, on the couch, surfing tv (and no, we don't do that anyway!).

We all proclaimed it "the perfect day"!  But as I looked back, it wasn't the Smoky Mountains, or the Little River, or the summer homes, or the breezes, or even the butterflies, as beautiful as they all were.

It was family.  When the boys were little we spent a lot of time hiking with them.  I have so many memories of days spent in the mountains, along rivers, in cool breezes, with my boys running ahead to find whatever boys find when they are turned loose to run and play...maybe even a nest of butterflies!

This time, my boys were grown men.  And they did, indeed, find a nest of butterflies.  

In my minds eye though, I could see a little blonde haired boy and a little dark haired boy, running up the Little River trail and that was the best part of the day!

​How many times have you looked at a long line and thought "I wish I were first in line."....
Or gone to a church dinner where they called your table last to go through the line....
Or come into a room and all the good chairs were taken...
Or gone to get food at a food truck and ended up at the back of the line...

What if you call "shotgun" in the car and the car wrecks?  Shotgun is the seat where most people die in a car wreck.

What if you go to a retreat and claim the best bed and end up being the only one to get bitten by bed bugs?

What if you go through the line first at the food truck and some of the best stuff came out at the end rather than the beginning?

On the other hand, what if you waited until last to claim a seat?  What if you waited last to get in line.  What if you took the last bed...the one furtherest away from the "bed bug bed"?

What if, when everything was over you stayed around to help clean up?

Just asking.

Matthew 20:16
Luke 14:7-11
Philippians 2:3-8
Mark 10:42-45
Mark 9:34-35

​Tommy and John boy wrote a musical about Noah and the Ark.  It's called The Flood Brothers.  They dress like the Blues Brothers.  And, of course, the music is Blues.  

One of the early performances was done in a church in Banner Elk, North Carolina.  The church asked if their choir could do back up for the show, so John thomas wrote choir arrangements.

The day of the performance came and the church was packed.  They had to bring more chairs in!  The choir entered in their choir robes and the show  began!

Oh My!  They raised the roof!  After the show I told them that they surpassed the Sister Act choir!  It was beyond amazing!

 John thomas asked them if they would be willing to do a cast recording and they said emphatically, YES!  So, John boy set a date and all was in place for him to go back and do the recording.

Then.....the hurricane and flood hit that area!  

We still have not been able to reschedule the recording, but have plans to do that soon.  In the meantime, we are praying that another flood doesn't hit!  

We wrote a play about a flood.  The Lord sent a flood.  You can't make up some things!

I have a poem that talks about leaving a house.  It talks about all the things you have to do when leaving...the last thing, of course, being to lock the door.  It also talks about the fact that if you aren't leaving a loved one behind, then it is all going to be ok.

I have felt that way every time we have moved, and that has happened a lot since Tommy and I married!  There is usually a bit of sadness in closing one chapter, but also excitement thinking of the next chapter.  While there is a certain amount of sadness in leaving what is comfortable and routine, I always know it is going to be ok because Tommy and John boy are with me.  As one person said, and said very well, "we take our home with us!"  


We have made a home in the desert of Mexico, so making one in the USA is a piece of cake, compared to Mexico!

It seems we may be moving yet again.  We aren't exactly sure where we will end up this time, but that's ok too.  The Lord knows, and He will let US know when the time is right.  I learned a long time ago that His timing is far different from ours!

So, I go about the normal business of packing and labeling and moving.  Like Abraham and Sarah of old...
​"By an act of faith, Abraham said yes to God's call to travel to an unknown place that would become his home.  When he left he had no idea where he was going." (Hebrew 11:8)

ON LEAVING
Take down the curtains, lock the door
And give the key to someone new;

I'll see the jonquil bud once more
And turn my back and go with you.

For little gardens everywhere
Quicken to a loving hand,

And little houses just as fair
Hug the highways of the land.

But there is only one of you
To satisfy my spirit's need,

And home is anywhere we two
Shall find a house and plant a seed.
 
​- H.R. Roberts

My cousin, Marshall Taft, sent me a response to my last post.  Marshall states:

In our house, the saying is: "If it's not where it's supposed to be, it's somewhere it is NOT supposed to be. Have you checked the refrigerator?" My family always thought that was weird, but they did understand. If the shoes were supposed to be in the closet (or the box marked: shoes), and they weren't, then they must be somewhere they are not supposed to be. They are not supposed to be in the fridge, so check there. And, of course, check everywhere else you think they should not be. And often, the item will turn up, in some place it should not be.

In our family, that is a common saying....but only from Tommy.  John thomas and I aren't sure it will, so we keep searching.  I suspect that Jason Amos is more like his Daddy.

​When we are looking for something and can't find it,Tommy says the well known catch phrase and goes to bed.  He is asleep almost as soon as his head hits the pillow.

I lie awake and try to figure out where said object is.  John boy stays up half the night looking.

Invariably, we find it!   Not Tommy mind you, but either John boy or I ! 

Our grandson has some stuff stored in our basement.  He lives in California.  He wanted us to send him something out of one of the boxes.  We looked though every box and the item was not to be found.  Of course Tommy said "It'll show up!" ...and went to bed...and to sleep.

I went to bed, but not to sleep.  I stewed all night. 

At 6 a.m. I got up and headed for the basement, determined to go through every box again.

What?  One box was still taped???  Hm-mmmm...it says shoes, but I wonder.

I carefully slit the tape and wa-la!  The lost had been found!

So, the ending of this story is that Tommy was right....it DID show up...but I made it show up.  

And yes..I did pray and ask Jesus to help me...and He did!

Luke 15:8  "..Imagine a woman who has ten coins and loses one.  Won't she light a lamp and scour the house looking in every nook and cranny until she finds it?  And when she finds it you can  be sure she'll call her friends and neighbors.  'Celebrate with me!  I found my lost coin!'  Count on it--that's the kind of party God's angels throw every time one lost soul turns to God!"

P.S.  I realized when I read the scripture that I too, used a light.  The basement was dark and I took a flashlight down with me!

Since I don't know what I am going to write, I decided to just call this BLOG.
Usually Jason Amos gets onto me if I don't write, so in order to avoid the wrath of Amos, here goes.

Since we are having a few days of Spring what better subject could I write about.  Even though it has been a fairly warm winter and spring seemed to happen overnight, it never fails to give me a boost!  Last week underneath the bridge was probably one of the coldest, most miserable nights we have had down there!  This week, a sweatshirt will suffice.  We also won't have to take our light tower since the time has changed.

Part of the reason winter seemed to pass so quickly is that we spent almost the whole month of February in Florida.  We had a gig in West Palm Beach and the weather the whole time was just about perfect!  We walked every day and the places we walked were beautiful!  (Mostly wildlife preserves.)   There were also no other people on the trails.  It was if we had the whole reserve to ourselves!

This week the temperature is supposed to get up to the high seventies.  I'm not getting TOO excited though.  I know we still have blackberry winter and dogwood winter.  At any rate, I just decided how to end this blog....with a poem that I wrote when I was about 13 years old.  I was sitting in the tree house that my Daddy had built for me.  It was spring and I was excited.  It meant more days in my treehouse and also that my shoes could come off for the summer.

SPRING
Spring is in the air..
Birds are singing everywhere.
Butterflies and Bees...
Flowers and trees.
At night with the cool breezes blowing, and the bright starts glowing...
The moon waits for the sun to rise, as it brightly shines up in the skies.
Morning is come!
Hear the hummingbirds hum?
Dew is on the ground,
 Birds wake up from their nests made of down.
Can't you tell it?
Can't you smell it?
SPRING is in the air!

We came to Florida last year and got a year pass to Universal Studio, so we have been saving to come back this year and use the pass again before it expires.  We sent a little money to the owner of the house we always rent, all year long so as not to have such a big payment. The house was paid for when we got here!  So...the only expense we have while here is food and gas.  We also have a gig in West Palm Beach, so the expense is somewhat justified.

It has been a good time to slow down, reflect and look at our lives from a less busy perspective.  It isn't that we have just been loafing.  The guys have worked on projects and we have looked at the upcoming months and planned projects and activities for when we go back home.

We have not always been able to get away "to a quiet place"  so I am doubly thankful for this time to rest and reflect.  It makes me want to look for more opportunities in the busy, every day hustle and bustle of life.  

God can speak to a person in the hustle and bustle, but I am not sure I always HEAR Him during those times.  When He speaks in the quiet times, I actually listen and can see that His way is the right way and the only way.  When I try to figure out the best solution to the things I face every day, it usually ends in, if not disaster, then at least it is very convoluted.

When I go to bed at home, my mind won't shut off.  I have slept deeply and restfully here.  Partly because I know that all the stuff that clutters my mind,  is back in Tennessee!

Here is hoping for you a peaceful, uncluttered day, and for the Lord to speak to you so that you hear His voice above all other voices in your head. 

 Isaiah 32:17-18  "The fruit of righteousness will be peace.  The effect of righteousness will be quietness and confidence forever.  My people will live in peaceful dwelling places.  In secure homes.  In undisturbed places of rest."  

 Isiah 30:15  "This is what the sovereign  Lord, the Holy One of Israel says, 'In repentance and rest is your salvation.  In quietness and trust is your strength..."