Joplin Two Months Later

Last month, a dear friend arranged through United Way to take her kids to Joplin and volunteer for a couple of days. She invited me and my kids along. I was tickled to watch my kids work so hard in the sweltering heat.

It was an experience.So many people with nothing, people who lost both homes and jobs. Although they need help, they won't take a bit more than absolutely necessary as they do all they can to get back on their feet. Many of them are spending part of their time volunteering, finding a way to make sense of it all as they serve and lift others.

Two short vignettes:

A family with two young sons, were sitting in the emergency room for dad's broken rib when it hit. Rented home? Gone. Mom's and Dad's jobs? Gone. Just paid off truck? Found totaled two blocks away in a tree with a car in the back. Husband had a stroke during the tornado and for a while, they thought he was dead. The things they saw and walked over as they left the hospital will never fully leave them. The boys are in counseling to deal with it, but the family is intact, with smiles on their faces as you talk to them. Grateful for life and more days together, regardless of what they've lost.

A man who's lived a hard life, you can see it on his face, was in Chicago when it hit and came to help his sister whose home was damaged. He lost everything in Katrina and could never remember feeling more desolate and alone. But people came from everywhere and lifted him back up and he vowed if anything like this ever happened again, he'd get there and volunteer and so there he was working and giving hope.

I could tell more, but suffice to say, we met amazing people who were undaunted in the face of devastation.

Here are some pics (click to see the larger version).

Notice the steps lead to the nowhere now that the house is gone, but the rubble has been cleared away ready to rebuild and the family is living in a trailer with a new shed.

Can you see the three pieces of metal wrapped around what is left of this tree?

Most of the rubble has been pushed to the streets to be taken away and the construction business is booming!

Signs of hope are everywhere.

Whoda thunk that you could safely ride out a tornado in the McDonald's playplace?

I loved the flags on display, this one from a tree...

...in the middle of the rubble.

...at a rebuilding sight.

It will take years, but the Joplin's spirit isn't broken. They'll be back. I loved this sign on a bank.

Vinyl banners were everywhere on businesses. This one says:

"WE WILL REBUILD!"

I had to take a picture of the Chick-Fil-A because our family adores that place.

Yes, the Home Depot that you saw on the news has reopened from this massive tent and it's a busy place.

There are still stickers on the new windows, but Walgreens is open.

Every church I saw had tents like this outside, collecting and distributing needed items.

 

I'll never forget the devastation, but what a beautiful thing to see people of all faiths come together to help our brothers and sisters in need.

School's In!!

Summer is officially over, having sent my wee ones (and not so wee ones) off to school last Wednesday. I'm sad to see it go, but as I prognosticated in a previous post I am fully in the it's-time-to-get-them-back-in-school-so-that-we-can-get-organized mode, along with the I-can't-wait-to-get-back-into-blogging mode.

This is quite the landmark year. For essentially the first time in more more than 24 years, I do not have a preschooler or even a kindergartner...blink....blink.

I'm not sure I comprehend what that is going to mean, it's been so long. But, as of last Wednesday, I have six hours without any children in my house every week day. Now, don't get me wrong, I'm sad about the end of my preschooler days. I'll miss the one on one time with my Girlie-whirl. But at the same time, there's this shining notion of myriad possibilities that is tantalizing and oh, so exciting!!

So here for all the world to read, which will, hopefully, keep me more accountable, is my short list of things I want to accomplish in my child-free hours.

1. De junk the whole house. I'm going to dedicate one morning a week to throwing stuff out and organizing what's left. I'm going at it room by room. We haven't had a move in over ten years to force us to get rid of stuff and somethings gotta give!

2. Attend the temple at least twice a month. (I'm embarrassed to say that would be an improvement, but there it is!)

3. Dedicate one afternoon a week to visiting teaching. I will be a better visiting teacher if I have a specific time each week to think about my sisters and act on any thoughts I may have.

4. Blog, read, craft, exercise. All that stuff that you do, but feel guilty about the time it's taking away from your family.

I know. It's a pretty boring list for all my bluster about the exciting possibilities. But it's what I want to do. Someday, maybe, I'll move on to more exciting pursuits. But for now, finding time for these is quite enough of a thrill!

Argghhhh!

Our internet connection is having major issues. It can't handle uploading a single picture.

So instead of blogging I'm ranting, and muttering under my breath.

Hopefully we'll get it fixed soon and I can upload pics of my sweet sis visiting and the cool masks from Mexico that my son and cute daughter-in-law sent us and the Easter eggs we made (we had a blast for two solid hours decorating those eggs.)

...sigh

Behind!

I've had multiple things I wanted to blog about, but life got in the way. The following three posts are a quick attempt to catch up on some of them.

I'm not a decorator, but I love my new light!

My home is not impressively decorated. I'm cheap and although I enjoy looking at beautiful homes, magazines about decorating and decorating blogs, I don't usually implement any of the ideas that I see.

As a result, I don't love my home. Let me clarify. I love it because it's where the people I adore the most hang out and because I can relax here. But I don't love the way it looks and it doesn't reflect my personality (except the disorganization--that's me to a T!) It's time to branch out and fall in love with my home.

This blog is one of my favs. In the past, one of my biggest roadblocks to home decorating is that I know it won't be perfect and so I don't even start. The Nester's philosophy of decorating is "It doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful." I'm starting to embrace that concept and it's so freeing!

I went garage saleing with a good friend last Saturday and found a light fixture that I fell in love with. It was super cheap (nine bucks), but has no glass. I decided that nine dollars was worth the risk of having it sit in the basement if I never bothered to buy the glass.

However, I didn't put it in the basement after I brought it home. I left it on the floor of the dining area. Hubders (who didn't even like the light) put it up yesterday! (Thanks sweetheart!) I LOVE it!!! It's not perfect, incomplete as it is, but it's beautiful!

This is my old fixture (actually this one is just like it and hangs over my stairs--nice, huh?). It's shiny and tired looking and only gives off 180 watts of light.

Here's the new one. It's distressed and has character. It's big and fab! It gives off soooo much more light than our old one. My dining area is so flooded with light as I type this that the kitchen lights are rendered unnecessary. Imperfect, but puts the old fixture to shame!

(Tangent: This picture shows two of my favorite things in my home, the chocolate donut clock, which I found at a junk shop. It's cheap and covered in naugahyde and I have to keep re-hot gluing in spots, but I LOVE it! The other, the $20 mirror I found at walmart one day. Also notice our nook for the entertainment center we've yet to build. Believe it or not, what you see is a HUGE improvement. Until last week it had a small tv stand, a side table and a small coffee table all lined up in the nook for our media needs.)

I don't know how long it will take me to find the right glass. I need eight of them, and I won't spend an arm and a leg, so this could take a while. But, in the meantime, I'm so excited over the beauty of my light that who cares if you can see the white part you screw the bulb into? It's such an improvement that I'm happy to live just like this for a while!

One more shot, a close up, just 'cuz I can, and it makes me happy! (if you click on the picture you can make it full size and truly see the beauty of my $9 light!)

SiteMeter problems

A couple of weeks ago, (after reading Inkmom's post on the subject) I set up a SiteMeter account and deleted my old counter. I had been getting 20-30 hits a day but Sitemeter says that I am now getting one or less hits per week. I know that I haven't set things up correcty since I haven't even got the SiteMeter thing to appear on my blog. But try as I might, I can't seem to fix it. Any suggestions? I'd love some help!

I've wanted to learn how do a hot link on my blog. My little sis, Paily, explained it to me and I've just successfully done it for the first time! I've now made too big of a deal over it, but, being fairly new to blogging, it feels good to, bit by bit, learn these things!