T IS FOR TREES

Not a very imaginative topic, but then I do love trees.  There is quite an assortment of trees along our creek which definitely adds to the rural feeling of the setting. A couple of days ago one of the park workers came by to look at the trees just off our property and on the bank of the creek.  He told me they will be removing one of the big old pine trees that dominates our view.

It certainly is a very large tree.

The Red Hawk likes to sit on one of the branches and eye our bird feeders, looking to snatch a tasty morsel.  It has three large trunks and must stand a good 50 feet tall.

In addition it leans towards the creek  and if it ever did come down it would take half the bank with it.

One of the really good things about our park is the upkeep of the grounds.  So in anticipation of removing this tree they have planted a couple of others  -- liquid amber and a pepper tree. Here they are waiting to be planted and I'm happy to say they were planted before the day was out. Another happy factor is that the leaves will blow towards the creek and not add to our responsibility.  The gardeners regularly clean out the creek. Later I noticed that they have planted quite a few other trees up and down the creek and recently we had about half an inch of rain.  Greatly welcomed!!

I hope I'm at home the day they decide to bring down the big old pine tree -- should bring quite a bit of excitement.

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This is my submission to Mrs. Nesbitt and Roger Owen Green's popular meme, ABC Wednesday. To see other contributions from all over the world please click HERE.

CREATIVE TUESDAY

CHRISTMAS TIDINGS was the theme for this session.

For ABC TUESDAY please scroll down one page.

Here is my submission based on a page from a monthly devotional.  I liked the birds and the theme of the message of peace, so I copied it and then realized it would fit in with the Creative Tuesday theme for this Tuesday.

For more entries to Creative Tuesday on the Christmas theme please click on this link:

creativetuesdays@blogspot.com

S IS FOR.....

SANTA CLAUS

QUESTION:  Where does Santa go in the summer time?

ANSWER:      A luau on Kauai.

Can't pass S without a photo of Scruffy:

Such a love  ! ! !

Linking to Mrs. Nesbitt and Roger Owen Green's ABC Wednesday.  Link HERE for more participant entries.

NINETIETH ANNIVERSARY AND COUNTING

Yesterday we celebrated the ninetieth anniversary of our church.  It was started by two ladies as a Sunday School in downtown Carlsbad, in 1924.  Wouldn't they be surprised if they saw it today! There have been three church buildings over the years -- one, a small Mexican style stucco one, the next a stylish A-frame building with a patio, lava stones and stained glass windows, and finally a large two story building with a parking garage in the basement, an elevator, three floors and a balcony, all of which we now call a Worship Center.

First, appropriately because the church started with a Sunday School, we started with the children's choir:

This was followed by someone describing highlights from each decade.  The platform was beautifully decorated with many sunflowers and chrysanthemums.

Since we were there for thirty of the ninety years, my husband spoke about one of the decades:

He doesn't look as old as he does in this photo!  We still attend the church.  I teach a Ladies' Bible Study and my husband fills in for one of the Adult Sunday School classes as well as occasionally preaching on Sundays.

There were more than 500 people there and we had to put up some more tables.  Our Spanish church which uses one of our buildings also joined in the celebration.  It was wonderful to see so many friends, some of whom traveled a long way to be with us on this special occasion.

GOD IS GOOD ALL THE TIME -- ALL THE TIME GOD IS GOOD

THE INVASION OF THE CROWS

For several days last week we were invaded by a black cloud of crows! (I know it should be 'a murder of crows', but that sounds so pretentious!) There is no way I could get a proper photo of them all as they settled in the trees around us, but I tried to get a video with all the noise they made:

I haven't tried uploading any of my videos before so the quality is not good, but I think you can hear all the racket they made.  Some of them flew down to the creek, but again it was difficult to show the number there were.

I so enjoy our rural style environment and I thought the invasion of the crows was hilarious.  They are such funny creatures. Whenever I hear them coming, I drop whatever I am doing and run out onto the deck to watch. Unfortunately, I have been quite disappointed to discover that their roosting area has now moved further down the creek and almost out of earshot.  Perhaps they will return another time.  

We are rejoicing today after receiving almost a half inch of rain last night and yesterday.  This is the first we have had since the beginning of March.  Some of our young shrubs and plants were really suffering and I was afraid we would lose some of them.  Poor Moth has had to go out and water all our potted plants every couple of days (we have quite a lot of them because of the poor quality of the soil since we live so close to the creek -- very sandy).  It was quite a lot of work.  Hopefully we will get back to our normal weather now, but the temperatures are expected to go up to the mid 80's next week and there is no more rain in sight. 

My beautiful plumeria is still in full bloom even though it is November:

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Today is especially set aside as "Prayer for the Persecuted Christians " day.  Our church is having a special service this evening.  Pastor Abou Saeed Abedini, an Iranian pastor, has been imprisoned and tortured in Iran for two years now.  He has a wife and family.  There are many others like him who are suffering horribly for the 'crime' of being a Christian. If you believe in prayer and in our Lord Jesus Christ, please join those of us around the nation who are praying for relief for these persecuted Christians.   

ANOTHER UPDATE -- AND STILL GOOD

The news on Haley is all good.  She is home, sleeping well and eating (limited foods) but has a good appetite.  They are even thinking she may be able to go back to school in a week or two.  She is getting bored.  Fortunately she was well ahead in her school work so she will have no problems catching up.  

Thank you to every one who prayed and showed concern for her.  We are so thankful to you and to our Lord who brought us through this crisis.

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Meanwhile, we are getting quite concerned about the need for rain down here.  We have a number of shrubs that are just hanging on.  We are watching the calendar closely. We usually get some rain in November.  As it is we've had no rain since March 1st.  Water restrictions are in place, so we get to do the minimum of watering.  Even so, by the looks of these two shrubs below, you'd never think we are short on water.  

This is the Lantana that grows outside our front living room window.  It has not stopped blooming for a year and a half (when we first moved  here).  But today it is simply bursting with blooms and now stands more than eight feet high.  It gets full sun almost all day, so I guess it doesn't have great water needs.  The butterflies and humming birds love it.

We've been watching this Golden Rain tree for several months.  It flowers late summer and with missing spring rains and any fall rains we might have had we weren't sure if it would flower well.  But here it is spreading its beautiful sunshine on the northern side of our house.

You may have guessed that we are not accomplished gardeners.  We had very little experience in our previous house -- it was quite low maintenance.  But we are learning!  Both of the shrubs  above need to pruned quite badly.  We decided to do the lantana after it stopped flowering  -- but it has never stopped.  The Golden Rain is definitely in need of some pruning and being tied back.  It has quite a number of thin branches or spreading trunks.  This bush will surely stop blooming in another month.  Then it will get its haircut!

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We have a busy month ahead for a variety of reasons.  I'm going to see if I can get back into ABC Wednesday and Creative Tuesday again but am not certain I will.  Just hoping not too much on my mind as the weeks go by.  

UPDATE -- GOOD NEWS

I haven't been blogging for over a week.  My mind just gets too overloaded when so many things are going on.  So I missed ABC Wednesday (sorry, Denise and Roger) and Creative Tuesday (sorry Michael).  However, the good news is that Haley (my step-granddaughter) is home from the hospital after two weeks of very up and down experiences and some not at all pleasant.

After a second flare-up of the Crohn's while in the hospital they were finally able to give her the necessary meds even while she was also dealing with the C-diff bug.  Not sure if the latter is over but they wanted her out of the hospital environment because it is a hospital born bug.

After her mom and step-dad had been giving her 24 hour care at the hospital all this time, she slept 14 hours straight, the first night home -- WHAT A BLESSING!  and Mom and Dad slept 10 hours!!

Haven't had an update today but we are not bothering them, they have too many adjustments to make at home for her.

So we are truly giving thanks on this Canadian Thanksgiving weekend.  We thank all of you who have prayed -- so many praying, all over the world, (close friends from our years of ministry) from Australia, Micronesia, Europe, Canada and of course England.

Please continue praying for her recovery and no relapses.

GOD IS GOOD ALL  THE TIME no matter what happens, we trust Him, because we know Him.