I thought it’s probably time to send another email and update you on our lives a bit. In answer to probably the two most important questions regarding our little family here in Idaho – no, the swine flu has not conquered us, and, no, we are not snowed in yet! As for the snow, we’ve had a few flurries and even got an inch the other night, but it soon melted and we still have green grass. Our snowy season doesn’t usually start until after Thanksgiving, closer to December.
The swine flu wasn’t as scary as we thought it might be, although it does have some crazy earmarks to it. (no pun intended!) The children took turns over 2 weeks to come down with high fever for 5 days, aching, coughs, fatigue, and runny noses. Then the earmark part started in . . . about a week later it seems that most cases of this swine flu get a day or two where it seems they are sick again. The children ran low-grade fevers and were grumpy for about a day, then it cleared up and seemed to go away. Right now we are relatively healthy. I say relatively because Lowell got his version of this flu just last week, although mild, and seems to be having a day or two where he doesn’t feel quite right even now. I never got it bad at all. Never had fever, just a cough and stuffy nose with sore throat. We are so thankful the Lord has spared our family! He is still showing His faithfulness.
To prove to you how well again we are, I’ll have to tell you a story. This past Sunday a visitor came to church from Boise, Idaho. He is from the non-Mennonites and yet he and Lowell found some things in common business-wise and wanted to chat together. So we invited him up for dinner last evening. He’s probably in his fifties and, pardon me for being so blunt, is losing his hair. Well, we had sat down at the dinner table, and everyone was helping themselves and talking at the same time when Logan pipes up. Now before I tell you the rest of the story, you must understand that Logan has a brain that is constantly processing information. It does not quit. Even when he’s sleeping he will sometimes talk outloud about what is going through that mind of his. Anyway, he pipes up in a none-too-quiet voice and says, “Where did the man’s hair go?” I about dropped my fork while trying to search for something appropriate to say. All that this pregnant brain of mine could come up with sounded pretty much like a 3-year-old, “It went away!” Thankfully, the man himself was laughing and said he was going to say that his head outgrew his hair! Next time we sit down with company I will have to make sure Logan’s mouth is constantly kept full of food so that he does not have opportunity to embarrass his poor, blonde mama.
We are approaching the holiday season fast and furiously. Our holiday season here gets kicked off with our school sale and auction the Saturday before Thanksgiving, which is in 3 days. The church families all make crafts and mothers do a horrendous amount of baking to sell at the school sale. We serve homemade donuts and cinnamon rolls for breakfast and then begins the lunch line. For lunch we serve a choice of chili soup or potato soup, cornbread or rolls, homemade pies or cheesecake, tea, and coffee. The sale ends at 4:00 for the community folks, but is far from over for us church folks. We get to eat whatever is leftover and then begins the auction. Whatever crafts, food, etc. did not sell is then auctioned off to all of us. Also, some folks throw in suppers, babysitting, odd jobs to be auctioned off – kind of like a slave auction. Then we still have to clean up before going home. It makes for a long, long day, but one that everyone looks forward to with enthusiasm. School children have their own table set up to sell crafts they’ve made in school as well as oodles of candy and pop. I am scheduled to help serve in the food line – which I love to do – so Lowell will take the two littlest ones home for naps and the boys and I will stay at school for the afternoon. This will be the first year the boys get to stay there all day and they will even be allowed to have a pocketfull of coins in case their bellies need a pop or candy bar. Usually Lowell takes all the kids home for the afternoon, but this year they are big enough to stay with me. Most dads end up babysitting on the day of the school sale, which makes it really nice for us mamas.
Well, I need to quickly shut off this email especially since it seems I’ve had an interruption every minute while trying to type this. So before another crisis occurs, I’ll say goodbye and God bless!!
Love you all~
The Idaho Grabers
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