Hurray! It's February!

First off, I want to say that I’m sorry I disappeared this week. It’s been a harrowing five days.

My mom had major surgery and my dad and I were with her for several days at the hospital. Thankfully, she’s recovering well and is back home.

A huge storm hit. And our sump pump died. Thankfully, it was only a partial death. So instead of bailing the basement with buckets (which we have done before), we had to plug and unplug the pump every hour. Yesterday, the new sump pump arrived. Yay!

When the huge storm hit, our city was spared tornadoes. But I was sitting with my mom in the hospital when I got the news that the manufacturing plant where the husband of my dear friend worked took a direct hit. Thankfully, we found out within the hour that everyone had survived. However, the plant was completely destroyed. And a lot of people are now without a livelihood--we’re hoping and praying that the company will rebuild and continue to provide some kind of work for their employees in the meantime.

And now that today is February, we can kick January out the door--it sure feel like it's been much longer than 31 days.