Beautiful Feet: September 9

Happy Birthday and Happy Birthday and Happy Birthday! We traveled on Friday, September 9^th and got to see Clifton’s car from his wreck on Thursday. The damage was mostly to the right front headlight. We were thankful he was okay. We went to Caleb and Della’s house on Saturday for Charlotte’s 2 year birthday! What a great event to celebrate!! Everyone was there except Christina. We saw her early, but she had a wedding in Birmingham. We were blessed with a car from Tim and Joy McKee and enjoyed being with our Central family on Sunday. Through the week we primarily kept Charlotte most days, visited family and friends and stared looking for a replacement car for Clifton. The car was totaled, but we had good insurance so that was a blessing. On Friday, Dwaine and Clifton went car shopping and settled on an 04 Honda Civic LX. It was a year newer than the one he wrecked, but it had more miles than the old one. Friday was also another special day, a birthday, round two. My dad turned 88 and everyone was able to meet for a nice evening out. Saturday was a trip to Dwaine’s brother’s home in Luverne, Alabama. Caleb and Della just purchased a van, so we had that to make the trip. It sure was nice and roomy. It was a nice surprise that most of his family was there. Of the 13, 6 are living, Dwaine, one brother Guy and four sisters, Maxine, Doris, Mable and Judy. All but Mable came and Maxine daughter also came. It was great to be with family. Dwaine and I shared some in Sunday school and Dwaine did the preaching for the service. He received many compliments afterwards and it was a great visit. Clifton had to leave early for Auburn for he had a big test on Monday. That would be the last time we got to see him on our trip as he did not plan to come home on our last weekend. Weekdays were much like the first week with many visits and Charlotte time. For the last weekend, Christina, Leanna and I were planning a Friday night girl’s night and we did some shopping for gifts and then Christina said she wanted a banana milkshake from Angel’s. When we arrived, I was greeted with ‘Happy Birthday’ for my big 60 in December. Dwaine had asked Christina to pull together a surprise evening with some friends and it was very niceJ! Saturday we packed like crazy, but it was good to have most of that done before our last day. On Sunday, we had a nice send off at church. Dwaine had to opportunity to share about our growth and we were blessed with many clothes and school supply donations from church. For the afternoon, we had one last family reunion at our home and everyone came. Time is short….how to describe two weeks with your family in a short page of details…..seems….just too short. I was restless and stayed up to 1, only to get up at 3 to head for the airport at 4. Travel was smooth with less than an hour to make our gate in Houston. As we walked up, boarding was starting. We missed getting some of that $6 airport yogurt. We arrived back at 11 a.m. and Cesar met us at the airport. We went by Pricesmart (like Costco) and joined with Cesar and Eliza. After going for the campaign, we thought it was worth the membership for a year. Next we went on a wild goose chase, but it wasn’t for a goose. It was for a cat. San Salvador has two pet stores that we know of. The first, had no cats or dogs and certainly never carried cats. It is a dog world here with tons running free on the streets. They had lots of dogs, but no cats as well. But hey, they had a picture of a Persian cat they were selling for $1000! No such luck on that one. The cat is for me, since Wicket is pretty much Dwaine’s dog and the bird only lived about a week. Maybe something will work out another day. Dwaine drove home in a downpour and we got here about 4ish. Arnoldo, Regina, Lisbeth and Danielito came by for a visit and brought our key back. Arnoldo had cared for Wicket in our absence. She actually seemed to fare a little better on this trip, but she still had to ‘talk’ to us for about 30 minutes upon our arrival. We unpacked for the evening, anticipating renewing some contacts and missing family all at once.