Somebody Prayed for Power!

And God said, "YES!"

I had prepared myself for the worst. When we left Arlington, the last word we had was that there was no power at the campground where we were able to get reservations, and power was not expected to be restored for at least 10 days. We do have a generator, but it burns costly gasoline, is noisy, and it can run only a few things at a time. So to live on generated power meant no morning coffee, no blow dryer, (which with my curly hair and Louisiana humidity, that was no big deal--you can't tell that I try to fix my hair anyway) no washing dirty clothes, no microwave cooking, .........

But praise the Lord, power is back on in the area and I've had my morning coffee! Last night when we checked in, the lady at the desk said that the reason they were able to get power restored so soon was because the owner of the campground "knew somebody."

Yeah, me too! ;) God is good isn't He?

So here we are in Livingston, LA just a little east of Baton Rouge. We're all settled in (except for some major cleaning I need to do, and I still have to talk Rick into putting the awning out for me) and Rick is hard at work.

Me? Like I said, I have some house cleaning to do. I already scrubbed the toilet this morning! And I've been out to take a few pictures so you can have a look around too.

The campground is full of insurance adjusters. We are camped next to some we call friends. Amarillo is home for them too. It is always a pleasure when we get to work a storm with people we know. Our rig is way down at the end of this row.We know we are in the coastal south when we catch millions of love bug on the front of the trailer as we go down the road. Rick spent 3 days washing and waxing our "house" while we were home. Oh well...Love bugs are SO annoying! If you've never encountered them, let me know and I'll get you a close up picture. (of live ones in action) But if you really want, I can snap a close-up picture of the dead ones caught on the camper. lol. It's up to you.You know we've settled in when the chairs and little table and BBQ are set up. We've been on the move some much lately, and when we were in New Hampshire it rained every day, so we've not had the chairs out in a while. (Rick never takes time to sit and relax, but one chair looks so lonely.) But...we are watching Ike and hoping that we won't have to bug out.Do you remember my single-pot flower garden? The whole time we were in New England (practically all summer) it never got enough sun. So it pouted and refused to bloom. In just the few days we were home, with the nice bright Texas sun and hot temperatures, it came out of it's funk and started putting on new leaves and blooms. It is glad to be in the South again!

This is the view from my chair on the patio. We were lucky to get a lakeside spot. The campground has a few pets. This is Snowflake. He is quite taken with himself. The last time we stayed here (passing through almost a year ago) he chased us, but today he was happy to pose for me when he saw my camera. He turned his head to the left, then to the right, then back to the left...Talk about a bird with an attitude! I expect he will chase me again before our time here is over.Snowflake has a friend. Midnight is a little more humble and hospitable.Then there are these two little guys. I don't know if they have names, but they trail along behind the swans peacefully. Wanna-bes I guess.

Okay, I've killed enough time. It's time to drag out the broom and mop and dust rag. Or maybe I should have lunch first. Ya think? Yeah, me too.

The Best Came Last

The best part of our vacation came last--at home with our children.And grandchildren.Of all the places we go, home is always the best. And nothing can ever compare to the love of family. God has blessed us so!

As I write this post we are in Arlington. Rick had his meeting on Tuesday, was assigned claims on Wednesday, is contacting his insureds today, and Friday we will head to Baton Rouge, LA. If you think about it, you could say a prayer for us. I'm expecting to have to "rough it" for a while because the area where we are headed has no electricity due to the storm. We do have a generator, but it will only run a few things, and gas for it is costly. I may not get to blog much. Oh No!!!

As always, it was hard to leave the kids, but we've got to make a living. I leave the pencil marks on my table and the hand prints on my mirror for weeks, just to remind me of those sweet little ones who call us by our REAL names--Mimi and Pawpaw.

Grandeur

After we left Plymouth, we drove out to Cape Cod and went up into a lighthouse. The view was wonderful. I'll spare you the pictures here, but someday they may show up as a puzzle.
We started for home but decided to make one more "vacation" stop. There are no words to adequately describe the beauty...The campground where we stayed was on the shore of Lake Ontario. You know me--I just had to put my feet into the water. Just so I could say that I did. So far I've dipped my little piggies in the Pacific, the Atlantic, the Gulf of Mexico, and Lake Ontario. I lack 4 of the Great Lakes being able to say that I've waded in all the bodies of water that surround our great country. Across the lake we could see the buildings of downtown Toronto. We sat in the grass, holding hands, and watching the sunset. Though it was a little late, it made up for the bowl of blueberries I got for my anniversary.
Wow! I love it when God shows off!
The next day we spent the entire day at Niagara Falls. If you've never been there, put it on your bucket list. We had such a good day. I can't come up with the words I need to tell you about it. I've never seen anything like the falls. They are so beautiful and so grand. Powerful. Majestic. Loud. Mesmerizing. Here are only a few of the 100+ pictures I took. I had a hard time deciding which I should share with you. I hope you enjoy these, but keep in mind that no picture can do justice to the beauty that we experienced.

Above is some of the more gentle rapids leading up to the falls. Below I'm getting drenched by the Bridal Vail Falls.

Across the gorge is Canada. We didn't have our birth certificates, so we couldn't cross the border. If you go, make sure you have your passport or birth certificate and picture ID.

In all my wildest dreams I never dreamed that I would have the chance to be here. It is one of the "perks," I guess you could say, of the gypsy lifestyle.

Vacation Mystery Picture Post

I'm no good at mysteries--writing them or solving them. So this is going to be easy.

To save myself a bunch of time, I'm just going to post some pictures and let you figure out where we were. (Some of my readers already know because I told them all about it.) But, for those of you who don't know all my secrets, leave your comments as to where you think we went and what my pictures are all about. I'll fill you in on any details you want to know later. Just leave your comments and enjoy my pictures! And for those of you who know the location, you can leave your comments too. :)The sign pictured below hangs over the door of the house pictured above.

Sitting at a Red Light

Thanks to those of you who took my poll. It seems trying to decide where to go it what we do most. Could it be that we are on the phone trying to get another's opinion as to where we should go? And thanks to the one TRUTHFUL soul who admitted to picking your nose! This was not a scientific poll nor was it research for my next book. (But come to think of it...) LOL It was just silly fun. I think we all need a little of that in our lives, don't you? I wish more of you would have participated, but maybe you will next time. If you are curious about something and would like to me to make it a poll topic, let me know. I'd be happy to post your question!

Portsmouth

(I've been playing with the grand babies so you'll just have to pardon my lack of blogging time.)

The day after our whale tour we poked around Portsmouth and took a harbor tour. It was not extremely exciting, but we did learn some history of the area and saw a few cool things.This was, at one time, the home of William Whipple. He was a signer of the Declaration of Independence. We saw many homes and building that were built in the 1700s and early 1800s.This was, at one time, a Naval prison where the worst of the worst were incarcerated. It sits on an island and no man ever escaped from here. Why you ask? The prisoners were guarded by Marines. If a Marine allowed one of the imprisoned sailors to escape, his punishment would be to serve out the remainder of the escapee's sentence. Humphrey Bogart suffered an injury (see the scar on his lip) when a prisoner he was guarding, while in transport to this big jail house, hit him and got away. Bogart didn't want to serve the man's sentence, so he managed to recapture him and delivered him to the prison. There is a Coast Guard station there. They refuel, repair, refurbish, and decommission nuclear submarines. A cutter just happened to be in port that day.We saw several lighthouses. I think they are cool. The only lighthouse that is still tended manually is in Boston Harbor. All the rest, like this one, are automated and run by the Coast Guard. I bought a t-shirt at Hampton Beach that has a lighthouse on it with this verse.

Guiding friendly strangers, the keeper of the lighthouse is surely friends with God.In the background you see another lighthouse. But in the foreground you can see the remains of an old fort. My memory fails me. Because we saw several old forts on our vacation, I don't recall if this fort had been rebuilt at one time or if this is the original remains. But at this place the British king had stored most of the black powder that he had sent to New England. It was guarded by one British solder and a bunch of Colonists. As the Colonists started to be more "independent thinkers" the king grew uneasy about them guarding all his explosive stash. He sent troops from England to relieve the colonists of their duty. The colonists got wind of his plan by a messenger named Paul Revere. The independent thinking men overtook the one British soldier then took the black powder for the cause of independence. They hid it, scattered in churches and homes. It was said that under every pulpit was a keg of black powder. This was considered the first act of aggression of the Colonists toward the crown.

I wish I would have paid more attention in history class over a quarter of a century ago! It's too late for that now, but I am thankful for the opportunity I've had to visit some of the places where history was made. I appreciate more this country and what it stands for because of it. Though I sometimes feel like a member of a traitor generation when I think of the freedoms our forefathers suffered, lived, and died for that we have gladly given over in exchange for comfort and security. A comfortable existence has a high price. I have to ask myself, is this still the land of the free and the home of the brave?