Monday Monday~Time to Prepare

 Here it is Monday evening, and I haven't written anything yet!  We've had a bit of a busy day...prepping for Hurricane Milton, which is scheduled to arrive in our state sometime late Wednesday evening or overnight Thursday morning.  If you've been watching the news, you will see that it is currently a Category 5 storm, but it is still in the warm waters of the Gulf of Mexico, and moving slowly toward the peninsula of Florida. It is scheduled (at this time) to make landfall somewhere near Tampa Bay, maybe a little north, or maybe a little south, but hopefully by then it will have slowed down to a Category 3, which is still huge, and it will wreak havoc on the Gulf Coast with strong storm surges again in areas already hit hard by Hurricane Helene two weeks prior.  This storm is supposed to move across the state rather than going up the coast, which means it will come barreling in our direction. However, the current prediction is that it will slow down and be more of a Category 1 as it crosses the state, but it may move very slowly, which means it will have more time to dump more rain and blow high winds all around while it lingers over us.  Therefore, even though we are more inland and north of the main impact zone, we could still get sustained 60-75 mph winds, which most likely will do some major tree damage and we can expect to have widespread power outages.  (I'm beginning to sound like a weatherman! We spend so much time watching them, we are being programmed...)

So anyway, we went to the store this morning and stocked up on some food/paper goods items, and then came home and put things away again from the yard...bird feeders, wind chimes, small items that could blow away, etc.  Then we went to our Bible Studies this afternoon and did more talking about what's going on that doing our Bible Study very seriously. But we encouraged one another and prayed for our situation and basically prepared ourselves mentally and spiritually for what is coming.

Speaking of bird feeders, I put ours up on the back porch under shelter for now, but left out where the birds could still find them and eat, and also where we could watch them from inside the house.  I enjoyed just sitting and watching and snapping a few pictures for a while, which was very relaxing and calming:

Male Cardinal

Carolina Chickadee

Male Cardinal and Chickadee

Tufted Titmouse

Male Cardinal

Female Cardinal

Carolina Chickadee

Two Carolina Chickadees!

I enjoyed watching them so much! I hope you did too!

Yesterday was our grandson Noah's 25th birthday!  We tried to call him, but he had to work, so we just left him a message on the phone and sang Happy Birthday to him.  But happily, he called us back this evening and we had a nice long conversation.  Here's the latest picture of him, posted by his mother on Facebook yesterday.  Someone said he must be a James Bond fan because of his gesture.  But my son said, no, it would be an Austin Powers gesture...I don't know anything about that, but apparently he was just being funny and cute.  He reminds me so much of his father, our son Matthew, who was always doing something funny and cute. Anyway, I'm just so glad we were able to talk with him. That means so much to us, and hopefully it did to him as well.

Also yesterday evening our "kids" (Benton and Rose) came over and we had bratwurst with peppers and onions on it for supper.  Then we played some of that game, "Deer in the Headlights", and discussed Hurricane strategy.   If things get too wild and rough, we may go over to their house, as they have a solid concrete block home, whereas we live in a manufactured home.  However, we have a generator and they don't, plus we have city water and they have a well, so we would have water and electricity via generator, but they would have solid concrete walls, but no water or power.  We shall see what we end up needing the most. Praying mostly that we will all be safe no matter what condition our utilities are in.  

While the kids were here, of course the grandpups came over too. They were being their usual cute selves.

Here's Sugar...and this is her habit when she knows she is about to be fed:  She runs with her tennis ball in her mouth and goes to her "dinner mat" and waits for her food. It's really comical...she will run and find that ball as soon as she hears someone say something about coming to eat...

And here's Spice....She doesn't bother with the tennis ball, but she just waits for the food. Sometimes she tends to be very finicky  and doesn't eat everything, but Sugar will usually take care of any of her leftovers. Their personalities and little habits are such fun to watch.

Here is the link to our church service yesterday.  I am linking it because I wanted you to hear the choir singing "Let Us Break Bread Together". (it's at the very beginning).

Yesterday, our Pastor and wife were away on vacation. The sermon on this video was actually from a message he preached last year, since they were away this week and did not record a new sermon. (And we had a guest speaker preach for the service on Sunday.)  But the song we recorded during our choir practice last week.  Anyway, I tell you all of this because even though I am singing with the choir in this video, in reality on Sunday morning, I was directing the choir.  Our Pastor's wife is also our choir and worship leader, and since they were going away, I was asked to fill in for her.  So on Sunday morning I directed the choir when they sang this song.  Thankfully it was a very easy song to sing and direct, and everything went well.  I also had to lead the congregational singing and make all the announcements, etc., basically everything except for the things that the Pastor does, like pray and preach and lead the Communion service. We had a few little snafu's at the beginning when the sound system would not work properly, and our usual sound technician was also on vacation.  Another person had been trained to operate the system, but for some reason things didn't go exactly as planned, however we did manage to find a microphone that worked and the service carried on without a hitch from then on.  I give thanks and glory to God for getting us through it all, and I'm also thankful our Pastor and wife will be back next Sunday! LOL. It certainly made me appreciate everything they do every Sunday even more! And they truly deserved and needed to have a break!  (It also made me thankful that my hubby and I are now retired from the pastoral ministry, because we had to do all those things before every week as well for many years! But we were younger then and had a lot more energy!)  Actually, I am very thankful to God that I was able to serve in this way, and I really did enjoy every minute.  But my Sunday afternoon nap felt real good! LOL. 

 "Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think of anything as being from ourselves, but our sufficiency is from God..."

2 Corinthians 3:5

Well folks, "Lord willin' and the creek don't rise," I hope to write again tomorrow for the Tuesday 4 meme, and then I will be getting things ready for Hurricane Milton to make his way through on Wednesday and Thursday.  Hopefully I will still be able to communicate with you during that time, but please just be praying for everyone in the path of this storm. There are quite a few of us bloggers here in Florida, and I pray we will all be safe and sound and able to talk about our experiences when it's over.

"I will both lie down in peace, and sleep;

For You alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety."

Psalm 4:8  NKJV