Weekly Update: 11.16.25
The week dawned winter-like, with icy temperatures slicing through our clothes and stinging our faces. It felt more like December than November last Sunday morning when a bunch of us piled into the SUV for a small road trip. Despite the cold, the lovely autumn palette didn’t let us forget what month it was as we drove to a parish a bit further from home than usual. We have been wanting to visit St. Mary’s in Lamar for a while, and the beautiful foliage was just the excuse we needed. While clouds draped over the Ozarks on the way to church, the sun came out for our return trip — it was a gorgeous drive.
We spent the rest of the day celebrating our niece’s birthday. We spoiled her with presents, and we played some games. It was a festive way to start the week.
The warm weather returned on Tuesday, and we made good use of it.
Grace started refinishing our old quilt frame, which our mom had when we were kids up in North Idaho. It’s one of our few possessions to have come with us on the move to Missouri and every move since. We are going to hang it in the living area of the bunkhouse.
Grace also whitewashed the framing of our small storage loft landing. She stained the boards that will act as flooring to match the floor in the rest of the room. I applied a couple coats of polyurethane to protect the floor portion. We installed the landing on Wednesday. Now, all we need is a ladder. We made this project a priority, as it will make installing our last windows much easier. Because the tent was so close to this end of the bunkhouse, we haven’t been able to install the upper windows until now.
Our dad installed one of the floodlights at the corner of the bunkhouse. It’s fun to see it in place, though it won’t function until the other light is installed.
My dad and I also started the process of installing an antenna. We had planned to do this last week, but then we realized an outdoor antenna needs to be grounded, and we had to order the materials. Once everything arrived, I assembled the antenna, and my dad mounted it on the southeast side of the bunkhouse. Then he ran the ground wire to our copper grounding rod near our electric panel. When Jeremiah was off work, he ran the coaxial cable through a wall to our entertainment center — a task that was rather tricky given the wall was already mostly finished. We were able to remove a couple boards on one side, which helped. As of yesterday afternoon, we had more than a dozen channels and three major networks.
We finally made serious progress with our kitchen shelving this week. My dad went over my plans with me one afternoon, and we decided to tweak a few things. I had planned to assemble the shelves with pocket-holes, but I had started to wonder if that construction would be strong enough. My dad agreed a different construction style would make more sense, so I adapted the plans and we got to work cutting materials. We finished cutting all the wood for the upper shelving on Thursday. Grace and Bonnie-Jean got right to work sanding the boards.
While we sisters we busy with various projects, Erin worked on finishing siding in the rooms on their end of the bunkhouse. Both her girls pitched in on different days, and it was amazing seeing how much they got done.
On Saturday, a bunch of the family worked on moving and organizing our lumber. We have several stacks of materials for different ongoing projects — interior and exterior siding, kitchen storage, etc. We also had two scrap piles that could be combined. Grace and Levi headed up this project. When they were done, the yard looked so much better.
On Wednesday night, the aurora borealis made another appearance in the Ozarks. In some ways, it seemed even brighter to the naked eye than the show we had last May.
It was such an unexpected gift to once again see the Northern Lights. As I watched, lyrics of the old hymn flitted through my mind.
For the beauty of the earth,
For the glory of the skies,
For the love which from our birth
Over and around us lies:
Lord of all
To Thee we raise
This our hymn of grateful praise
Folliott S. Pierpoint
I write often of the tangible ways God shows his love through nature. Standing beneath the stary sky gazing at the Northern Lights was one such moment of loving beauty. As we watched, we saw several shooting stars. These fireballs were apparently debris from a comet that happened to be going by this week, but the effect was positively stunning — indeed, we were all awed by the glory of the skies that night.
When I went to bed, I found myself humming that hymn of grateful praise. That gratitude carried through the rest of a busy week full of typical ups and some difficult downs. We picked up our Thanksgiving groceries yesterday, and holiday plans are starting to come together in our minds and on our calendars. There is a lot we want to accomplish in the next couple weeks, but no matter what — we have so much to be thankful for.
