Just a quick post this morning, with a prayer request attached. Our daughter Lara has taken a wonderful job at Baylor University in Waco, Texas. Yep, Texas! She leaves Columbus, Ohio this morning, driving a nice sized U-haul filled with miscellaneous furniture and towing her newly purchased Honda. Her traveling companions are Clem and Niki, her cats. It’s a LOOONNNNGGGG drive (about 1200 miles) and I know she would greatly appreciate your prayers for her as she makes this journey.
And then, of course, there’s the rest of the journey - new house (no more residence hall living!), new area, new friends, new….life! Lot’s of adventures ahead for our dear daughter.
Ah, yes. Prayer. It’s THE good thing!
I Peter 1:2b
May grace and peace be yours (hers!) in fullest measure.
So I haven’t shared too much about what we are actually doing here at Ecclesia College. It’s not because we haven’t been having a good time – we have, but just that the month has gone by pretty fast and we’ve been doing some pretty regular stuff. Jane and I have been working in the “Dome”, I’ve been manning the front desk, answering the phone and working on some spreadsheet/data entry for the upcoming school year (reminds me of my previous life!) and Jane has been doing everything from averaging grades to cleaning spots off the rugs. Gary and Neal have been working on completing some new residence space – mostly working on two matching bathrooms. They started with tiling – floors, walls, even the ceilings! That was pretty crazy! Have you ever heard of ceramic tile on the ceiling???? Well, it’s a done deal here.
So, real quick – here are some shots from the job….
The “Dome” – this is the main building on campus. It houses all of the offices, the library, bookstore, auditorium and I believe several classrooms.
One of the bathrooms in the beginning……….and near the end…..
Gary with Jane and Neil taking our wonderful mid-morning break!
And here’s a classic Gary shot – He just loves diving into a good electrical panel!
So that’s a nutshell of what we’ve been doing. But what I have really been enjoying is where we are parked. First of all we are parked right next to a lovely butterfly bush – and have been delighted with the variety (and abundance) of butterflies that have visited.
And between our rig and the butterfly bush we have hung our hummingbird feeder. And how we have enjoyed those antics! Lots of little hummingbird wars going on out there. And all of them moving too fast for this girl’s camera!
And on a totally un-related note, I thought I’d share this picture of our little blue-eyed Maddie. I’ve been having fun playing with my Photoshop Elements program - and came up with this today. I hope it brings you a smile. It brought one for me!
It’s been a while since we’ve worked traditional “Sower hours”. Ladies normally work from 8-11:30 and the men work from 8-3:30 with an hour off for lunch. And then there is that delightful four day work week. Yes, it’s been a while since we’ve enjoyed those Fridays off. But these days we’ve been enjoying those extra Saturdays!
Friday (or Saturday One) we headed south to Fayetteville, home of (among other things) the Razorbacks and University of Arkansas. But before we took a little tour of the campus, we went a little farther south to the small town of Prairie Grove. Here, in December of 1862 the last battle of the Western frontier of the Civil War was fought. We enjoyed the walking tour of the battlefield and then took the driving tour that went into the town. We always learn things at these parks, but I find them to be so poignant. So many lives were lost. But our day in Prairie Grove was quite nice. It was raining off and on, but we managed our walk nicely and then even tried a couple of geocaches. We weren’t so successful , but we won’t give up the GPS just yet!
There was a geocache in the apple orchard –
But try as we might, it remained hidden. However, it did let me take some fun apple shots….
We drove back up to Fayetteville and enjoyed a drive around town (though the teaming rain hindered some real sight-seeing!), lunch at a place called Hog Haus and the relative quiet of a college campus the Friday before the students arrive back in town! A quick stop at Sam’s Club, a slightly longer stop at Wal-Mart for groceries and supplies and we were back home in plenty of time for a quick nap.
Yeah, ya gotta love those extra Saturdays!
The Battle of Pea Ridge
On March 7 & 8, 1862, 26,000 soldiers fought here to decide the fate of Missouri. The 4,300-acre park honors those who fought for their way of life, North and South.
Before we move into the new weekend, I thought I’d share a little about our tourist day last Friday. We headed north and made a quick stop in Rogers, AR (home of the very first Wal-Mart, which we did not find, but also home to a very nice quilt shop which we did find! 
), checked out Bentonville (home of the original Walton’s 5&10, plus world headquarters for Wal-Mart), and spent the better part of our day at Pea Ridge National Military Park. The battle fought here was the most decisive Civil War battle west of the Mississippi. It was a very interesting driving tour, and as usual, the introductory movie was excellent. The area is so lovely, it’s hard to imagine all of the tragic loss of life that took place here.
We did stop at the Original Waltons 5&10 in Bentonville. Bentonville has a lovely little town square, and this little store has been made into a Wal-Mart (and the Walton family) museum. It was interesting and free . I thought it a little funny that the gift shop in the front of the museum didn’t take credit cards. Go figure!
We have found that these Arkansas towns by and large have lovely town squares. Here is Rogers, Arkansas -
See what I mean?
Tomorrow we head south to Fayetteville. Who knows what adventures await us there!
PS - there are a couple more Pea Ridge photos here.
Maddie is learning to crawl…..
………………….Mommy, I’m done!
