March 1 & 2. I never did get to write in my journal last night. I thought maybe I could get to it this morning, but this morning was too busy too.
Yesterday (the 1st) was a somewhat frustrating day. We were thankful that it wasn’t quite as cold yesterday, although it was still chilly, and Daddy kept the fire going all day again. I think the high yesterday was around 70º.
After our lunch today, Phinehas and Dallas came for keyboard class. They are both doing quite well and becoming more comfortable at the keyboard.
Most of the rest of the day (after nap), I worked hard to get the soul-winning lesson finished so I could print it out in the evening. Worked on it a bit before school, and then in the afternoon instead of grading papers. I figured I could grade papers Monday since I thought there would be no school. But now I’ll have to try to get them done tomorrow. As soon as the generator came on yesterday evening, I was ready to start printing. But the printer would not print. What was wrong? There didn’t seem to be a problem with the Brother printer. Okay, I’ll try the Canon. Same thing. It wouldn’t print. For some reason the computer did not seem to be communicating with the printer. Well, let’s see, I’ll transfer the files to the acer and print from there. Same thing. It wasn’t communicating either. What in the world could be wrong? I’ll try scanning. If the scanner works, then we’ll know that the printer works. It scanned with no problem. A half hour had already been wasted trying to make things work.
While Daddy was waiting for the men to arrive for Bible school, he tried doing some trouble shooting. But he could not get any answers. It was very disheartening as we needed the lessons printed for Sunday night, and I have lots of school lessons to print too.
After Daddy went off to Bible school, a thought occurred to me. Had an e-mail or something corrupted word? The document I was trying to print was in word. Or was there something else that made Microsoft word stop communicating with the printer? Maybe I can try printing from Publisher and see if that will work. So the next little while I spent transferring the word document to Publisher. This was Daddy’s copy of the soul-winning lesson. Then I set up the student copy of the lesson with blanks to be filled in. It is already a Publisher document, but had to be copied from the teacher file and highlighted words changed to blanks. I also usually add pictures. That was another frustration. I hunted through various flash drives and CD’s, but could not find the pictures I was looking for. I finally just left it as it was and turned the Brother printer on again to see if the Publisher file would print. It did. Praise the Lord! I got Daddy’s copy of the lesson printed out and a student copy for myself so I could proofread it before printing out the students’ copies. By then it was already late. Daddy said he would leave the generator on until 10:00 if that would help. But I still had to proofread before doing any more printing. Could he run the generator again the next evening? Yes, he would do that.
We finally went to bed, very tired out. Up early this morning, thankful to the Lord for a new day, a clean page in history. It was lotu morning and also laundry morning. I usually sort out laundry before eating and having quiet time, but this morning I did things the other way around. By the time all was done, people were here for lotu. Daddy had Matthew lead the singing and take prayer requests this morning, and Daddy finished his talk on the Lord’s prayer which he had started some time ago.
I only did two loads of laundry today, and I will do another couple loads on Tuesday morning before Daddy goes to town. It was better to shorten the laundry job this morning so I could work on other things that needed to be done. While things were washing, I got clean sheets put on the bed, ingredients together for granola, and a start of things for bread. There was something really yucky in the bag of oats that I dumped into the pan for granola - something gray that was caked with flour and oats. It didn’t seem to have much of any bad smell, but it turned my stomach a bit to see that clump in the oats. I quickly removed it to the garbage can. This was our last bag of oats. Now what shall we do? What was the thing? Is it safe to use the oats for granola? They didn’t look or smell bad now that the yucky thing was disposed of. We didn’t have anything else to make granola out of. Maybe if we cook it longer than usual, that will kill any germs that might be in it.
I also put peanuts from one tray away in a flour bag (they were already dry) and put the other two trays out in the sun. We were very thankful for some sun this morning although there was still a light overcast. Between the sun and the wind, the clothes got dry by noon. Daddy went out and brought things in while I was getting dinner warmed up.
After hanging out the clothes, with Daddy’s help, I finished getting the bread mixed up and in the pan to rise. Then I went to the computer for the rest of the morning. Had to get the student Bible lesson ready for this coming week of school and also get another music lesson made. Those were printed out this evening, as well as the soul-winning lessons. So we are thankful that much is done. I still have other school materials that need to be printed or photo-copied for this coming week, but can work on some of that tomorrow evening.
Before dinner, Daddy got the rest of the pumpkin cut up, and I peeled that and put it in a pan to cook for dinner. We had leftover rice to go with it. At dinner time, the bread was ready to go into the oven so started that cooking while we were eating. After it was done, the granola had to be cooked. So I looked over the tax forms that Daddy has ready to send off and put my John Hancock on them. Then worked more on lessons until the granola was done. It was 2:00 when we went for nap.
Enjoyed a good nap, and afterward, it was back to the computer again. Also got the bread and granola put away. The other two trays of peanuts that had been out in the sun for the morning were also ready to be put into the flour bag with the others.
After supper and dishes, I cleaned the bathroom before getting busy with printing. Now it is 8:30 - time for snack and then bath.
“5And a certain man was there, which had an infirmity thirty and eight years. 6When Jesus saw him lie, and knew that he had been now a long time in that case, he saith unto him, Wilt thou be made whole? 7The impotent man answered him, Sir, I have no man, when the water is troubled, to put me into the pool: but while I am coming, another steppeth down before me. 8Jesus saith unto him, Rise, take up thy bed, and walk. 9And immediately the man was made whole, and took up his bed, and walked: and on the same day was the sabbath.” John 5:5-9
March 3. Almost 8:30 p.m. Daddy is out in the meeting room teaching soul-winning class. I did not help this evening as I had tons of printing to do. I am thankful that I have gotten that all done. I am hoping that, tomorrow evening, I can get e-mails written and Daddy can send them when he goes to town.
The Lord gave us a beautiful, sunny Sunday morning. I only fixed enough pancakes for today and tomorrow since the freezer won’t be running all week while Daddy is gone so no way to keep extras from spoiling. So I got done a little earlier than usual making breakfast. While pancakes were cooking, I got the chalkboard washed, the pulpit dusted off, the books covered. After eating breakfast, having quiet time, doing a little walking, I punched holes in the new soul-winning lessons which Daddy had collated. Also corrected the students’ math books so I could put them back in the cupboard, and trimmed the new Bible and music lessons for the school students, punched holes in them, and put them in their folders. Put the folders back in the school cupboard and locked up the cupboard. After that, I worked on more pages that I would need to print this evening.
People started coming really early for lotu - some even came at 9:30. This was rather unusual. After a while, we found out that Matthew and Amos, after they finished early morning public preaching, had gone around and told people to come early for lotu. Daddy had told Matthew yesterday that his message would probably be longer today so he hoped people would come early. Daddy wanted to give the people some Scriptures to help them understand why the teaching that is going around this country saying that 666 has arrived is false teaching. The Lord brought a good group out this morning - 80 plus.
Part way through the song time this morning, my vision starting going like it did the other day. So I went the the kitchen, grabbed a handful of almonds, and went and sat in the recliner until the vision cleared up. Then I went back to the meeting room.
Daddy actually finished the first meeting early, around 11:45. So we had our lunch early. A lot of people were sleeping between meetings. Daddy rested a while, and I worked on grading the rest of the school papers and workbooks that hadn’t been done yet.
Daddy continued his talk during the second meeting. It was going on 3:00 before we lay down for nap. After nap, it was back to the computer to get things finished up for printing.
Before we lay down for nap, the weather was still nice and sunny and warm. When we got up about 45 minutes later, we noticed that someone had "stolen" the sunshine while we were sleeping. :-) Soon the rain began to fall. The Lord sent us quite a hard rain this evening while Daddy was teaching soul-winning class. He had to stop for a while during the middle of the teaching as the rain was too loud on the roof.