St. Matthew's Church Fire

Our church caught fire early this morning and from the looks of it, was totally destroyed. I think I am still in shock and that it will take a while for reality to really sink in. The top photo was taken this morning and the one below is a photo of the church before the fire.

We have been members of St. Matthew's for about eleven years and both of our boys were baptized there. There are a lot of older parishioners who have been members their whole lives and I know this loss will be devastating for them. These are people with a strong faith, however, so I know that God will be with them and we will all make it through this tragedy.

Random Summer Activities

Not too much is going on here other than enjoying the lazy days of summer. The boys have been going to day camp and are looking forward to a visit to Texas in a few weeks.

Last week Evan went to art camp. The instructors showed the children how to use a different medium each day. They did projects using acrylic paint, watercolor paint, clay, and pastels. 

On the day that Evan did the clay projects, he told me that in order to last, they had to be baked. He handed me an instruction sheet and I saw that it had instructions for air drying and baking. Wanting to bake the items, I followed the instructions in the baking section. I put them in the oven, set the timer, etc. After about 45 minutes I heard a really loud popping sound come from the kitchen. I turned the light on in the oven and saw that one of the items that he made had exploded.

I then looked more closely at the directions and realized that the clay items were supposed to be air dried for several days AND THEN baked. I let everything cool and then a few hours later was able to pick up the big pieces of clay out of the oven and the vacuum cleaner picked up the rest, so there was no permanent damage done.

Collection of Evan's art projects.

Clay cat, pencil holder, cup and turtle.

Speaking of pops, Todd was using my computer on Sunday afternoon, heard a pop and the whole computer shut down. Being an electronic genius, Todd opened it up to see if he could find out what was wrong and fix it. Since I need a computer for my business we had plan A, fix the computer and plan B, buy another computer that evening. He did some investigating and initially thought that it was a problem with the power supply. He also then took out the video card and saw that some caps had popped. 

We went to the electronics store and bought a new video card and power supply. We also looked at the new computers just in case the computer couldn't be fixed. Todd first put in the video card and turned on the computer. Nothing happened. He then changed out the power supply and bingo, the computer started whirring and came back to life. I was relieved because starting over with a new computer is a LOT of work. Thanks, Honey!

I never realized there was so much empty space in the computer. Todd says it is for air circulation.

Service with a smile!

Sunday Derailed

As usual, Todd had lots of projects on his list for Sunday afternoon. That was until I went to put clothes in the washing machine and saw water along the wall of our laundry room. Todd came in and quickly diagnosed the problem as a water heater leak. 

We proceed to mop and use the wet vac to get most of the water up while we drained the tank. After that was under control, Todd headed off to Lowe's to get a new water heater. Fortunately for me, he is very good with electrical, plumbing and other household maintenance projects. I would have had no clue what to do.

After about an hour, Todd came home with the new water heater. I help him unload it (it is not light) and we got it in the house and out of the box only to discover that it had a big dent in the top and side. We repacked the water heater, got it back on his truck and he headed back to Lowe's to exchange it for an undamaged one. About an hour after that, he returned home with the second water heater. We went through the unloading and unboxing process once again.  Luckily, this one was in good condition.

Todd hooked everything up and about an hour later we had hot water and no leaks. Needless to say, it was almost 6:00, so it was time for dinner and baths. He will just have to save that project list for next weekend. Thanks for the good work, honey!

Chad offering Todd some assistance with the hook-up.

Happy that this project is almost over.

Next time I ask for something shiny and expensive for Mother's Day, I will be more specific.

Busy Saturday

Todd woke up yesterday and noticed that his clock was not illuminated. He went and checked our electric panel and saw that one of our breakers had tripped. To make a long story short, it turned out that there was a short in our septic tank pump and that it had bitten the dust.

Todd is very good at mechanical things, so we started calling plumbing stores to see if we could find a replacement pump. After instructions to use as little water as possible to avoid a backup into the house, Todd was off on his quest. One trip to the plumbing store, two trips to Lowe's and several hours later, Todd had the pump changed out and we were up and running again.

In addition to that project, we also had our friend with the tractor return and do more leveling of the dirt in our backyard. Who knew that owing a house was so much work!

Septic crisis of the day.

More backyard work.

The boys played outside a lot since the weather was beautiful. Evan has insisted that I don't put any more photos of him on my blog, so it may be a while before you see him again.

Chad throwing the baseball.

"We love to play catch!"

New Awning Photo

Last week I blogged about the awning that was knocked down at the grocery store where I shop. Someone that Todd works with was there right after it happened and got a better photo. Thankfully, no one was hurt!

Fallen Awning

I went to the grocery store yesterday and found that much of the front of the store was blocked off. After looking around, I noticed that a large piece of awning was off the building and on the ground. It turns out that a delivery truck tried to go underneath it, but the truck was too high and tore the whole thing down. Small town excitement!!!!