Under His Wings

Nate doing the "butter dance" The joys of being a stay at home mom....sitting on a charter bus with close to 50 4th graders including my son Nate.  Yesterday, I had the pleasure of chaparoning Nate's field trip to the Old Mac Donald education day at our local fairground.  It was even educational for me.  Did you know that deer has a ruminate type stomach like a cow?  I didn't know that. There is something about the smell of bus fabric and diesel fuel that takes me back 20+ years when I was a college student taking the Trailways and Greyhound buses back and forth to Syracuse NY for my internships at WTVH TV (now part of CNY Central).  Back then I was a young woman focusing on starting my TV career.  I focused on my career because my ultimate dream of being a wife and mom wasn't coming true.(there's much more I could say about that issue).  I would have to wait about 5 years for that to happen. I have thought about trying to revive my ...

photo from www.autobodypartsnow.com Psalm 18:2 King James Version The Lord is my rock, and my fortress, and my deliverer; my God, my strength, in whom I will trust; my buckler, and the horn of my salvation, and my high tower. On Friday afternoon I had a run in with a big rock driving out of a local store parking lot.  I had driven in and out of this lot many times in the 2 years it's been open.  It was actually the second day in a row I had been to this store....I had forgot cat food for our Lucy the day before. It was my fault and no one else's. I allowed myself to be distracted by the kids and the other cars around me (I was focusing more on not backing into anything instead of clearing the way to get past the rocks. I was devastated. I thought of my sweet husband!!!!!   We had decided to invest some of our tax return money in replacing our aging Ford Windstar a few days before with a 2005 Saturn Vue. Now I had an accident with the ...

It was one of those anything could go wrong kind of days.  It started out realizing I didn't do enough laundry for today and one of my kids needed underwear.   I was freaking out about it when Elijah made a mad dash for the bathroom. He didn't need the underwear afterall.  He had fallen victim to the tummy bug going through our house.  Nate had been sick on Saturday, but this morning he started to complain about an ear ache.  Last night Anna started feeling sick. So far she's escaped the tummy yuckies, but she's had a headache. I ended up taking Nate to the doctor and he was diagnosed with an ear infection.  When I went to leave the parking lot, my van would not start.  The van has not done that since June.  Thankfully, Tim could get away to come help me.  While we were waiting for him.  I told Nate that we should pray one of the 2 cars next to me would move before Tim arrived as it was, Tim would have had to block the...

We've been without a dryer for a while now.  In cold weather like today, we take our clothes to the laundromat.  In nicer days, I love to hang up our clothes. I usually take the half hour drying time to go get some shopping done, but I really didn't want to travel around after dark.  I chose to take a seat in front of the dryers.  I found it actually quite relaxing watching all the clothes representing my family spinning around.  There were Nate's jeans, Anna's sky blue shirt, Elijah's black checkered church shirt, and Tim's work clothes among the needed clothes to be dried today. Honestly, sometimes it's hard to when the kids fight or my sinuses act up like they did today, it's easy to lose sight of my blessings.  However, the moments like when the kids sing together or I see my daughter's silly faces bring me indescribable joy.   I can't believe Anna is going to be 8 on Sunday.  I'll write more about her story then.

As part of our anniversary celebration, my husband and I decided to take a local river trail.  We sat on the shore and I was amazed at the beauty I found!  It reminded me of some of the state parks I've been too....many miles away.  The sun was glistening down on the water.  The birds were gathering and chirping away.  I think I might have even seen a deer crossing the path from afar. We only saw a few town workers and a couple of people walking around. It was quiet and peaceful. West Elmira is only a couple of miles away.  I travel the parallel street to the trail at least 1-2 times a week at times.  What a beautiful hidden treasure.  We will definitely return. Another park we visited was Miller Pond. It's a city park about a mile from our house.  We had been there a few times, just basically on the left corner of the park.  What we realized that the pond is probably about a quarter of a mile long surrounded by shady trees....

September is a month of celebrating and remembering for our family.  It is full of birthdays and anniversaries in the Cone family.  The coming week is personally special for me. 15 years ago today -----my family and best friends arrived in town for our rehearsal/dinner.   I proved my lack of skill of giving directions.  My out of town wedding party got lost on the way to the church( except for one who came in the next day).  I remembered we even practiced crying during the candle song (Cherish the Treasure). Tim and I at our reception 9/13/97 September 13, 1997---- the day we married :)  The ceremony went smoothly except I forgot my bobby pins for my veil on Tim's couch the night before.  My veil kept falling off during my vows.   Our honeymoon got off to an interesting start.  In the process of moving, my diabetes medicine got misplaced and we didn't get to Niagara Falls until 11 PM.  The hotel owner rented out our...

When I saw a link on Facebook this afternoon from my hometown (Binghamton NY) newspaper that there would be a live video of the Spiedie* Fest balloon launch , I was very excited.  I used to attend the festival with my family and some years by myself for many years before I moved to Elmira nearly 16 years ago.   I was able to watch most of the launch live.  I was awestruck at the beauty of the balloons being blown up then take flight. I called my mom, who lives about 5 miles from where the balloons took off, and told her about the video.  She found it and we watched together.  What a neat experience as we could not be physically together.  After a while, my mom decided to go outside to see if the balloons would come her way as they used to on a regular basis when the festival first started nearly 30 years ago.  Sure enough at least 3 balloons came in sight.  I really really got homesick. It brought back a lot of special memories, ...