A Stormy April

This April, we had some really beautiful weather and we had some really scary weather. The tornado sirens in Wellsville were really working overtime as we found ourselves in two tornado warnings in 10 days time.  The first one was on the evening of Oliver's golf meet in Paola. We weren't expecting any severe weather, and then suddenly we found ourselves in the middle of the red. Oliver wasn't home yet because the team had gone to eat Mexican after their meet.  Thankfully Maddox's dad lives just outside of Paola so the boys were able to go there until the storm passed.

Our electricity went out, and we girls hunkered down in our safe space downstairs while Russ kept track of what the storm was doing on his phone.

Violet was being very quiet until she said, "Pray for Oliver?" She's such a sweet sister. Yes, we definitely prayed for Oliver to make it home safely.

When the threat was gone, we went outside to see a very cool sky. The lightning was almost constant and the wall cloud was HUGE.

Between lightning strikes, you could see so many stars as the sky cleared. It was really pretty.

Thankfully we made it through the night with no damage. Our neighbors in Hillsdale weren't so lucky, as I detailed in my "Post Tax Day Getaway" post.

Then on April 23, we found ourselves in our safe room again. At least we had lights this time.

And we had Oliver at home this time. But not Russ. He was on his way home from an elder's meeting at church and driving almost exactly where the tornado was purported to be.  I decided I really prefer to have all of my family at home when we're in the middle of a tornado warning!

Once again, I thanked God when the storm was over and my family was home and we were all safe. That's enough severe weather for one year, let alone for one month! Hopefully May will be calmer for us!

Hesed: Middle School Huddle 2026

 We just got back from another GREAT Middle School Huddle at Rock Springs, this time under the theme: "Hesed."  The weather forecast was looking a little scary for the afternoon we were supposed to leave. Actually it was more than a little scary; in fact, school let out at 1:15 so the buses wouldn't end up dealing with the storms that were predicted to have 90 mph straight-line winds. Russ looked at the radar with me and advised me to get west as quickly as possible. So although the retreat didn't begin until 6:00, I left with Evelyn and Kyla as soon as Evelyn got home from school. We headed to Topeka and did a little shopping at Walmart as we waited for Berkeley to get off the bus there at 3:15. God was certainly watching over us, and we successfully made it west of the storms and avoided any scary driving situations. We stopped at the A&W near Junction City to eat and kill some time (actually we were very productive and practiced our Catechism questions for their upcoming Confirmation Questioning).

The girls weren't so sure the worker knew what a "kids cone" was supposed to be. Look at the size of those things!

We left the A&W, drove the final stretch to Rock Springs, got checked in, and found our way to Hansen, our home for the night. These are the same cabins we stayed in last year, and they are really nice!

The girls got their beds made and their stuff unpacked. I gifted them each a pretty journal with Lamentations 3:22-23 on the cover. This "steadfast love" is the "Hesed" we'd be studying during our retreat.

We played some 9-square and Human Bingo in the rec center before it was time for our opening session.

The sessions were the time of real learning on the theme, as we dug into scripture. On the LCMS Kansas District website, it was described as follows: "This year’s theme was “Hesed – Steadfast Love, Lovingkindness, Mercy.” What is Hesed? It’s God’s faithfulness, His mercy, His righteous kindness, and His steadfast love to all nations, languages, and peoples of all times. Hesed is Jesus, the Word made flesh for you." 

The silhouette of the chapel looked so pretty at dusk.

After our opening session, we headed to the campfire circle for more singing and s'mores.

The student band from Concordia Nebraska brought their guitars and we sang several hymns by the campfire. "Abide with Me" is always a favorite evening hymn.

Getting those marshmallows the perfect degree of toastiness. . . or at least, trying not to burn them.

After the campfire, we still had some time before lights-out, so we played card games in the common room of our cabin with kids from other churches. It's a really nice space for hanging out.

Saturday morning, we got our new "hesed" shirts on. We all still look a little sleepy in this early-morning picture.

We enjoyed a delicious breakfast at the dining hall and then headed back to the auditorium for session 2.

To begin each session, the band from CUNE led us in several songs which taught about God's love for us.

Our speaker for the Huddle was Pastor Seth Meyer. He focused on 3 Old Testament prophets--Isaiah, Jeremiah, and Zechariah-- as he taught about what Hesed means to us as God's people. We even learned a little Hebrew as we studied Lamentations.

We had our "thematic activity" between sessions 2 and 3. During this time, we practiced writing Hesed in Hebrew, looked up lots of Bible verses using this word, and decorated rocks with all that Hesed means.

I thought our rocks turned out great! And what a nice reminder of our weekend and of God's Hesed for us.

After lunch we were sent on a really unique Scavenger Challenge. Each group was given a compass, a long piece of string and directions to where their target would be.

All of the clues were found in the Old Testament.  Our first target was "The Tabernacle."  We had to use our string to help measure 725 cubits from Home Base and our compass to lead us 355 degrees.  There was some math involved!

Once we found the right location, we were tasked with using the provided cones to "build" the Tabernacle to the exact specifications in Exodus.  There was a similar target for Noah's Ark.  It was cool!

We were put into groups by our birthdays, so I wasn't with my girls. But Evie and Kyla, both being September babies, were in the same group. One of the other leaders sent me this pic of their pyramid they had to build for the "Tower of Babel" -- not sure how my girls ended up on the very bottom! 

The only downside to the Scavenger Challenge was the lack of time. We only made it through half of our book, but the ones we completed were really fun!  The final part of the day was games. We rotated through Capture the Flag, Indoor Games in the Rec, Gaga Ball, and Kickball.  The girls definitely had the most fun playing 9-square in the Rec and they were really good at it, spending WAY more time in the "queen square" than anyone else!

They were also pretty good at Gaga ball, each of them winning a round.

Kickball may have been the least-favorite, but it was a beautiful day, so any outdoor activities were great.

I absolutely LOVED getting to spend another weekend at Rock Springs learning more about Jesus with my Evie and Kyla! It was a fantastic experience and I thank God for this time.

And I thank God for his Hesed toward me!

As an added bonus for an already-awesome weekend, we were able to take Calvin out to dinner in Manhattan on our way home. My heart was FULL!

I hope I am able to attend more Middle School Huddles in the future!

Post-Tax Day Getaway in a Covered Wagon!

 I wasn't entirely sure Russ and I were going to have time to take our annual "Post-Tax Day Getaway" this year. There is SO much going on with Evelyn's track, Oliver's golf, and the quickly-approaching confirmation and graduation in our family. I really studied the calendar on April 13 and realized that April 16 would be our only opportunity. It was a rather busy week already (EXTREMELY busy for Russ), but we decided it's always worth it to take this time away together. I looked on Airbnb for options within about 30 minutes of Evelyn's track meet at Jayhawk Linn, and found possibly the cutest place ever! But before we get to that place, we had some exploring to do. Russ needed to drop off a tax return at a client's place in Osawatomie, so we decided to check out some of the John Brown stuff there. I'd taken the boys here on a JM&MB day several years ago, but Russ had never been.  We started with a tour around the park where the Battle of Osawatomie took place.  This park had been through a bit of a battle the evening before (on the night of tax day) with some crazy storms. Even the signs showed evidence of all of the trees blown around.

We found John Brown!

After our park tour, we headed into the Museum that houses the family cabin.

I forgot how cool this cabin was! It was set up exactly as it had been in the 1850s.

When I see a mortar and pestle, it always catches my eye. This one wasn't used to compound medications, though. It was used to grind corn. That would've been a SLOW process.

We picked up a brochure with all of the historical points of interest in Osawatomie and checked out most of them.

There were 3 different bridges on the list and we visited them all. I'll include a picture of the oldest one, and the one that is no longer in use. It reminded us a little of the "death bridge" in Peoria from our high school days.

We were saddened to see more damage from the previous night's storm. Nearly every house had significant hail damage and this church's siding was destroyed.

We stopped and got some home cooking for lunch at the Whistle Stop Cafe.

Then we did a little shopping downtown. Russ wanted to see if the Palace Market (aka the Cow Palace) had a front-end to purchase meat. He was excited to discover that they did! We got some beef jerky and a pound of bacon.

Then we checked out the murals at the Railroad Museum.

We finished our grand Oz tour with a visit to the Old Stone Church, built in 1861. John Brown's brother-in-law was the first pastor here.

Sadly, the windows of this historic church had been broken by hail the previous night.

Speaking of storm damage, we drove through Hillsdale on our way to our Airbnb. This area had been hit by a tornado on Monday evening and the devastation was everywhere.

Thankfully no one was seriously injured in the tornado, but there was SO much damage.

Our next destination was Isinglass Estate in La Cygne, where we would be spending our night.

We got there a few minutes early and I immediately spotted all of the adorable animals near the restaurant.

The preemie goats were quite possibly the cutest creatures God ever thought of creating. When our hostess arrived, she said we were free to play with the animals all we wanted!

The curly-haired little pigs were really cute, too.

Although the restaurant wasn't open, our hostess took us on a tour. The place was beautiful!

Then she showed us to our covered wagon. Yes, our covered wagon! This place was SO fun!

Look how nice it is inside! King-size bed, full bathroom, couch, coffee bar, all you could want for a Post-Tax Day Getaway!

After we got all of our things unpacked, I convinced Russ to walk back over to the animals so I could play with them a bit more. (I think he kinda enjoyed it, too.) He especially liked the Tibetan Yak, Findley.

I couldn't get enough of the babies. There were also 2-week old ewe lambs. They were SO sweet. Momma, on the other hand, could've used a hair cut.

When I see this sweet face, I see Jesus holding this lamb in his arms. Good Shepherd Sunday is coming up!

Like I said, I could've stayed with these adorable babies all day.

We went into the self-serve General Store to pick up a bottle of wine for dinner. It was super-convenient since we were the only people on the property at the time.

And here are just a couple more pictures of the expansive property that covers over 600 acres. We checked out the vineyards and the cool picnic table swings. The whole place was so cool.

Our evening activity was track and field in Mound City. Evelyn's meet at Jayhawk Linn included 13 schools, which is their largest meet. She did great, getting 2nd in the hurdles with a PR! She and her beautiful besties had some fun sparkles/gems in their hair.

Love getting to cheer on my girl!

Once Evelyn was done competing, we headed back to our adorable place. Russ had brought steaks and asparagus, which we wrapped in our Palace bacon, for a delicious dinner on the grill.

We paired it with a yummy Frontenac wine to complete our gourmet feast.

What a wonderfully-relaxing evening with my hard-working hubby.

We were treated to a gorgeous sunset.

Watching the sun go down and the stars come out by the firepit was a perfect finish to our day.

I love getting to celebrate him and the end of another successful tax season!