Catching Up!

Contrary to all surmisings, our family still exists!

I believe it has been more than 2 months since I wrote on here, so there is a lot to report.

I finished another class; Advanced Studies in the Gospel of John. It was due the middle of September, so I was quite busy for several weeks finishing all of the writing projects and reading.

Grant turned 6 on the 10th of September. For those of you who remember his premature birth and early health problems, we thank the LORD that he is thriving physically and academically. He is in the first grade this year.

Our gardening concluded quite well for the year. We made a couple dozen quarts of salsa, several jars of spiced cucumbers (think spiced apples if you've never seen them - they are either bright red or green and very sweet). We put up 7 quarts of pears and several pints of pear butter from about a bushel of pears a local man gave to us. Carol and the kids canned more than 30 quarts of grape juice from about a bushel of grapes given to us. We also made about a dozen quarts of tomato juice - very good, but a little spicy for the kids. We froze 48 pounds of sweet corn (think 48 bags of frozen corn from your grocery store - we already had about that many of green beans). All of the gardening has been very rewarding this year; praise the LORD for His bounty.

Carol now has braces on for about a year and a half to make room for the implant. Please pray for her, it was easier for her to have them as a teenager; but she is doing well with them, just very cautious. Carol went to a ladies retreat at Camp Assurance the first part of September with her mom.

After I finished my last class, I moved all of my books and desktop computer to storage at the church so that I could finish remodeling the office upstairs. So, I'm only using my old laptop and selected books until I finish the drywall, painting and flooring. I'll post pictures when I finish the work up there.

As a church, we had a difficult beginning to the month. A young (36) husband and father passed away and our church folks were "burden bearers" for the family.

I just returned about 2 hours ago (10/22/2009 @ 3:30 pm) from Texas. A long story - the building that we use for church services is for sale. There where 15 pews here that have never been used in this building. We offered to give them to my brother-in-law, Matt Shields, for use in their new church building in Mexico. They where happy to have them - another man in our church and I left Monday morning at 4:00 am with a 16X8 foot trailer behind my van; due to the size and weight of the trailer as well as the heat (82 on 10/20) of Texas, we could only drive an average of 55 miles an hour. Since Monday morning, we have traveled 2,836 miles at about 55 miles an hour. We had a good time with the Shields and we did stop at the Alamo in San Antonio on the way home.

Carol's parents took turns staying with her and the kids while I was gone; her dad was here on Tuesday and Wednesday and her mom was here Wednesday through Friday.

In two weeks, Carol and I will spend four much needed days at a Pastor and Wife retreat at Camp Joy. My mom and dad will keep the four younger kids and Carol's folks are keeping the two older ones.

Joel and Laura and Grant have all gotten off to a good start in school this year, they are actually several weeks ahead in their work, relative to the past years.

Well, I'll try not to wait so long before another update.

Cookies, a new park, Wheaton, pickles

I have Tuesday evening meetings with a group of men working on our church constitution, bylaws, and statement of faith. While I'm gone, Carol usually will try to find something of interest for the kids to make the evening go smoothly; all the pictures of the cookies are from a Tuesday evening. It is obvious that the kids enjoyed the evening!

After four years of living in Paxton (a town of 4600) people) we found a new park. The park had been there, but the mayor told me that they had just installed new equipment. The kids love parks! It is also a time for Carol and I to just sit on a park bench and talk quietly together like we used to by the fish pond at college.

We make a trip to Wheaton, IL a couple of times a year; there is a thrift store there that allows ministry people to get things for free. We usually get so much that we have to clean out some dressers and closets before we go on our little trip. The City of Paxton has several "drop boxes" in which different organizations receive clothing donations. Joel is loading one of them up before our trip to Wheaton last Monday. As always, we came home with a full van, this time minus Joel, we left him in Belivdere with Carol's folks for the week. He has been having all kinds of fun with Grandpa and Grandma Bumgardner. When he gets home, we'll post some of his pictures from the week.

The tomatoes will soon overwhelm us, but a few have been picked prematurely (thanks to eager fingers :-), they still ripen pretty well in the window. I'm looking forward to the salsa making. The cucumbers continue, fortunately, we found out that it is very easy to make pickles. We have made 5 quarts and a pint of sweet lime pickles, with about another 14 pints soon to be finished; 8 quarts of dill, and 14 pints of bread & butter. We are learning much and thoroughly enjoying it! The kids have done so much in the garden and I'm very proud of them.

Our local IGA grocery store has an annual Kidsfest. It is like a small carnival with free games and prizes, hot dogs, pizza, chips, Gatorade, popcorn, snow-cones, cotton candy, ice-cream, etc. Our children look forward to it every year (so do Carol and I). It is also a great opportunity for us to meet new people from our community.
Laura playing a game with cats . . .

John shooting at plastic cups.
Grant - getting handfuls of candy!

This first video is of John on the obstacle course, the second is of Josiah on the slide.

The End of July . . .

Kara and daddy; obviously she can't read, but she'll sit for a while and pretend like she is, jibber-jabber and all. It's rather funny, and since she is such a busy little climber, it keeps her occupied for a while.
I think these made about 20 cucumbers so far, and there seem to be many more on the vines. My family can eat them quickly (three at a meal the other day), but that could get a little old pretty quickly. I need to call and get my Grandma's sweet pickle recipe. That's our first head of cabbage, we have 4 more - I'm beginning to wish we had planted more.

We made a trip to Urbana, IL yesterday (no pictures). Our friends, Paul and Sarah Crow and children were coming through on their way to MN. They came to our services on Wednesday evening and then we had a cook-out together on Thursday. We talked and ate, as did the children, with playing included for them. I can vouch for Bro. Paul's grilling abilities, especially the yellow squash . . . come to think of it, our friendship began in the kitchen at ABC about 13+ years ago. The LORD is good.

Today was our trip to a new orthodontist for Carol. This new dentist is only 45 minutes away, costs MUCH less, and Carol really likes the atmosphere. We rejoice in HIM.

Ice Cream and Cucumbers

We got an electric ice cream maker last time we were in Wheaton, IL (for free). We decided to use it for the first time on my birthday. It was good (vanilla with Heath Toffee bits), it was rich, and we ate the whole gallon. Although, I should have let it freeze a little longer, it wasn't quite as firm as it could have been.

No pictures, but we also picked our first 4 cucumbers today; we ate two of them for lunch along with a couple of our tomatoes on ham sandwiches! :-)
Joel
John
Kara
Laura
Grant

Illustrations, Turtles, and The Holy War

We had a good evening together at church; the children are usually eager to tell me which illustration they liked best. Illustrations are a part of the preaching process at which I have to labor, but being able to help young minds grasp truth is not only immediately rewarding to me, but I'm sure will produce eternal fruit in their lives. So, I'll keep working at illustrating truth. . .

Caleb Stilley, one of the friends of our children, brought a turtle to church and, of course, they all wanted to go see him/her after the service. Living in town, our kids are pretty limited in which animals they get to see - stray cats, stray dogs, rabbits, birds, ubiquitous squirrels, and bugs; so a turtle is a big deal. Little creatures are such an impressive display of God's wisdom; the intricacies of God's biological creations are astounding to me . . . but children just enjoy them.

For my birthday, someone gave me a new copy of The Holy War by the indomitable Baptist author and Pastor, John Bunyon. I read the first chapter to the children tonight after church; it was an immediate favorite with them (except John, he dozed off :-). Bunyon's use of allegory makes some difficult theological concepts easily understood - and even exciting. I'm sure it will be an excellent tool, not only to put things in their minds, but as talking points in our home.

Sunday's activities

We had a good day at church; the highlight of our week. I was pleased that the four older children sat so well on the front row while Carol was in the nursery during the morning service. They are doing better and better all of the time. It is still a little bit of a struggle for John (4) and Grant (5), but with time they are doing better.

We had an enjoyable evening together. For those of you who don't know, we have lunch and then an afternoon service at church, so we are always home by about 3:15 on Sunday afternoons. After supper, I finished reading the epilogue of "The Great Bridge." It was an excellent story; just curious, has anyone every heard the name of Washington Roebling before now? He was the engineer who built the bridge. His name is little known in history, but what he built has endured - and according to the public works department in N.Y., with proper maintenance the bridge could endure for another 100 years, or in their word, "forever." May that be the case with my life and family. The story was also an excellent character study of many people - including some New York and Brooklyn politicians.

We started 1776. I read about the first 10 pages to the kids this evening; it seems as promising as the other McCullough books. I'm also reading John Phillips Exploring John to them - his writing style is not too difficult for the kids to comprehend.

Yard and garden work

Today's pick. The kids will snap these while I read David McCulloughs book "The Great Bridge" to them. It is the epic story of the building of the Brooklyn Bridge. We have about 7 pages left before the epilogue! It has been an excellent book, I recommend it - as well as any other book by McCullough.
First fruit!
Carol and Grant. She has a little "cut flower" garden over in the corner.
18 regular tomato plants, 4 cherry tomato plants, 6 pepper plants, 5 cabbage plants, 5 rows of green beans, and 9 cucumber hills.
Many of you remember when Joel was born! Now he is 9 and helps to mow the yard!

The swing set has certainly seen better days, but it has served the purpose.

Today, we'll pick the green beans again - every other day. The 3 older kids are big enough to help pick; they snap all of the beans before we freeze them. We'll have the first tomatoes and cucumbers in a few days!

Deatrick Family

This is the new blog for the Deatrick family! Periodically, I'll be adding photo's and video's of our growing family and updates on the happenings of our life as a Christian family serving the LORD! This is intended for your edification and it's an expression of our joy!

The picture is a family snapshot taken in May at my brother's wedding in NC. Right to Left (because I love Carol and Hebrew) - Carol, Josiah (2), Levi, Joel (9), John (4), Grant (5), Laura (8), and Kara (1).