Two Crazy Weeks!!

Whew! I finally have a moment to gather a thought or two. It has been two incredibly crazy weeks here in the Schwind household. Here are some highlights since my last post:

• Two visits to karate and judo with my oldest three boys.
• Two great visits with our small group from church, one of which involved making a bacon wrapped meatloaf from The Pioneer Woman. Oh, mamma.
• One long day spent serving an underprivileged community near downtown Indy with my oldest two sons. What a blessing!!!
• My 7 year old asking Jesus to be his Savior! The best day of all of these by far!
• One long evening setting up the polls for our Primary Elections here in Indiana.
• One VERY long, 17 hour day running the polls for a nearby precinct. What a big job, but what an incredible experience watching first hand as one of our country's most vital freedoms played out in front of my eyes!
• One closing ceremony for my AWANA Sparky!
• One rehearsal at church and one wonderful morning leading worship for three services with our band and music pastor. As usual, this was an incredible honor and blessing.

Now, the reality of things is, this is sort of a normal state of busyness for us Americans, is it not? However, I forgot to add in one stressful thing that was the under-current of most of this crazy busyness. About a week and a half ago, we had an unexpected occurrence. The drainage hose on the back of our washer popped off mid-cycle, and poof! Instant swimming pool!

Unfortunately, the unwanted body of water leaked under three walls into the adjacent living room, hallway and garage. We had just an incredible amount of water to clean up, complicated by the fact that we aren't equipped to deal with that kind of thing!

It was quite entertaining to watch us sucking up water with our wet/dry vac and our tiny Bissell Little Green!! I'll save you from having to hear about all the hoops we jumped through to dry this house out. Needless to say, we prayed a lot. Replacing carpet isn't in our budget right now!

If you know me, or have known anything about my past, you know what a faith-stretcher this thing was for me. When we have issues that could potentially cost us the big bucks, I get scared. Panicky. My faith usually takes a tumble.

While I will admit I had one moment of sitting down and crying over it all, I have to say that, for the most part, my heart felt sure that God would provide for our needs. This was a major step for me to see my heart leaning toward faith rather than toward doubt. I am so thankful when I see God changing me for the better!

And, as usual, God showed Himself faithful in all of it. We had a restoration company come out, and all the pains we had taken, (and they were a PAIN) had done their job, and we were dry! Our carpet doesn't need to be replaced. Amazing! God is so good to this little family.

So, today I sit here thankful, blessed and pooped! It may take a year long nap to recover from the last two weeks, but I'll be napping full of joy and praise for God, who carried us through!