Day 37

Good day everybody. Today was quite the interesting day. It was stressful in a way, but in another way it was also God's answering of prayers. Allow me to explain. Every day when I pray, I continue working to give all "our" cares, worries, and stresses to God. I know there are worries that we might have that are harder than others to let go of and give it completely over to Him. So what I ask from Him is that he simply take those stresses from us. We are not meant to be stressed over the little things in life, and there fore we must give it all over to him, and He will take care of us. It takes patience, and a lot of faith. Every day I would continue to pray to Him, and continue to have faith that the things that we worry about are small, and that He has a plan for us, and that eventually when it's right in God's eyes, things will line up the way he means them to be, and everything will make sense.

Well, for a while now, our electric bill has been apparently extremely high. We received assistance a few months back, and with that payment we were under then impression that our remaining bill would be about 1 month's payment. Well, a month and a half later, we received a few bills from my parents *the current account is in their name, but payed for by us, and is delivered to their address*, and suddenly we owed $1500.00. Of course, we were like "OmGosh! Holy Crap!" I'm the kind of person that although yes we may have had $100.00 or whatever here or there, but hardly the $280.00 per month, and especially nowhere near $1500.00 or whatever it was at then, and to me, if we have a huge bill that keeps accumulating I find it hard to make a small payment when it doesn't even make a dent. It's like, paying $50.00 on a loan that just keeps getting $150.00 interest per month. Yes you have payed $50.00, but then you are still going negative another $100.00. Well, that was where we were. We had times when we could pay small payments, even the $280.00 maybe, but the bill was still upwards of $2,000 by today.

So this morning, Erin left for work. When she left, all was well. I told you all recently how I have had some really intense dreams lately. Very vivid, very detailed, etc. Do they mean anything? Has God spoken to me or tried to help me figure things out through these dreams? I don't know. I did not get a clear message from any of them, although I woke up from each going "OMG!" Well, to describe for you how detailed and crystal clear some of my dreams have been, here you go. This morning after I got Lex off to the bus stop, I came back to bed. Not even an hour later, I was having a dream that Zoe was making her way down the stairs. Some times I am scared to death when she is coming down the stairs by herself because I don't want her to end up taking a tumble, and getting badly hurt. Well in my dream, she was carrying a blanket or something and before I could get to her she went rolling down the stairs and landed at the landing. I actually chirped because in the dream I was screaming "NO! ZOE!" Erin rolled over and partially woke up. She was like "What was that?" I was like "It's nothing. It was just a dream. I dreamed Zoe slipped on the steps."

Well, some time shortly after that, I remember feeling like our electricity was off. Part of it was a dream, but it was like somehow I felt like that was going to happen specifically today. Shortly after that, Erin left, and the electricity was still on. I know it was because Erin's alarm clock woke her up. Plus we have a ceiling fan going usually. Well about 30 minutes after she left, I remember randomly waking up and thinking "the power is off." I did not know for certain yet, but I had this strong feeling that it was. I looked up and the ceiling fan was still spinning but was slowly slowing down. I looked over to the wall and the switch was still flicked into the "on" position. I went over and flicked it up and down, nothing. "Shit!" I said. How did I know? I wondered. I had no idea. Somehow I had known before I was able to confirm it. Somehow I knew even before it happened. Strange? Yes. Coincidence? Maybe.

So I ended up grilling hotdogs for Zoe and I because our stove and microwave are electric obviously. I texted Erin about what was going on. I tried to call the electric company but they wouldn't talk to me because the account was in my dad's name. When Erin got off and came home, we went to the agencies in town that help with stuff like that, but the most they could do was $100.00. Our balance was apparently over $2,000 and $100.00 was not going to be enough. I ended up having to call my dad and having him call them so we could get the figures and information about what we would need to do to get turned back on. He was upset of course, but at the same time I was not asking him for money. I avoid that like the plague usually. Well he gave me the amount that we needed to pay, which was over $1,700.00 in order to get it turned back on. He said that after we pay the entire thing bringing the account current, that he was going to close it in his name and that we could open a new account in our name so the bill would come to us, and that we would be able to access the account. Within an hour, by the grace of God, we found a way through another bank account where the $1,700 ish, could get wired to us by tomorrow, and we would pay the bill plus the $160.00 reconnect fee. I texted my dad at 3:55 telling him the update, and he called. Apparently if we took care of it by 4, the reconnect fee was only 59.00 instead of 160.00.

He was like "you're 'certain' you are getting the money wired to you?" I was like "Yes we are." He was like "I have not payed a few bills yet. Let me call them in the next few minutes and see if I can pay the $1,700 for you, if you are willing to send me the money when you get it." I mentioned it to Erin, and we both said "That sounds great. Yes we would wire the money directly to you as soon as it is in the account." So, thank God, our power is back on. Now after tomorrow when we forward the money to pay my dad back, we will owe less than $300.00 left towards the electric account. We both get payed in a little over a week and we will pay the remaining balance so we can open an account in our own name instead of having to do the 3-party system again. The way I see it, and know in my heart, God meant for this whole little ordeal to happen, because through it, my worries about how we would end up taking care of the outrageous electric balance have been lifted.

So tonight, while Erin was emailing the bank giving them the information so they could wire transfer, I gave Lex some Mt Dew. Only a little bit, maybe like an ounce or two. I said "Drink for 5 seconds." To my knowledge, she had not had mt dew before. I told her how a coach I had when I was young some times brought small cans of coke to the game or practice and said it was good for quick energy for a brief period, such as a game or practice. I think it worked, because tonight she was a force of nature. The way we scrimmaged tonight was me and the main coach on one team, and all 8 of the girls on a team and they were playing against us. The coach said "Any time Chris or I score you guys have to run a lap." The girls did end up scoring about 3 times on us, but they ended up running I believe 8 laps. Every time they ran a lap, even after they had run several already, Lex was the leader of the pack. I was so impressed! Usually she is a great runner, but lately tires out quick and lags. Now I'm thinking we'll give her a small cup of dew before the game and see what happens. I'm so anxious to see! :-D

Erin had to run home to take care of something, but when she got back, it was just lex and I still at the field. While we waited, I kicked around with Lex. When we got home, I told Erin how I think Dew was a great idea, and told her how awesome lex did. She gave her a high 5 and told her how proud of her she was. By the time we came home the lights were back on. That felt good to see the electric on again. I had been preparing myself all day for the house to be lit by candles. Plus, no power would have meant our freezer and fridge slowly getting warmer, and having only the grill as a means to cook dinner. We got home, I ran up stairs, showered and got ready for work. When I came back downstairs, it was 7:30. I was starving and tired! I got busy right away. I put water on to boil, I started quickly dicing up the potatos, and then I started breading the cube steaks. By the time I left to come to work, the potatos were done, I strained them, and the cube steaks had been flipped once already. I went into the family room and told Erin that the meat just needed a little more time, that the potatos were boiled and ready to be mashed and just a few other things left, but that I did what I could to make things easier on her.

Meat and potatos. Mmmmmmmmm. Nothing helps you feel energized better than a hearty meal of meat and potatos that fills ya up. So in closing, it has been an eventful day indeed. It's amazing how many different things life throws at ya, but the great part is as long as you are giving yourself and everything you have over to God, and having faith that anything bothering you he will deal with, there is nothing that you can't handle. There is something that we were told in church. God doesn't give us anything that we can not handle. That is a very true statement! Everyone may not have experienced anything that makees them believe this, but Erin and I have. With God in our lives, today was not stressful at all. In the past, we would have been so stressed and upset, but we both knew that everything was going to be ok. So that will be it for tonight everyone. I will write more for you all tomorrow.

Thanks for being here.

CB