Grateful

We have a roof! Believe it or not, this was done in 8 hours with two 'English' (Tim and I), one Amish man and his three oldest boys. 

Levi called Tim as we were prepairing to head out. He had his orders caught up at the sawmill. He had haying to do, but not until the afternoon, after it had dried in the sun for half a day. He offered to help. We were surprised, but not going to turn that one down, the primary reason being that Levi has put on tin roofs before, and having an experienced person on site is a huge time saver. They understand team work. Tim cut the 'double bubble', which is what they call the insulating layer that goes under the tin. Either Amos or I ran it up the ladder. In between that, Amos and I carried the tin sheets over to the building and set them on end so that they were ready to push up to Levi and Reuben and Andy on the roof. Levi directed, and the rest of us kept up. The first morning, we had half of the roof done. 

We were even more surprised when Levi gave us another morning. We got it done. 

This is such a big deal. There are not enough words. I have a bad knee. I will need a knee replacement, but now is not the time. If my foot is not level, my knee has a tendency to 'give out' with no warning. I can't do roofs. Tim shouldn't do roofs, in my opinion, but he has been doing them right along. 

Now. suddenly the roof is done. 

Every last thing left to be done on that house can be done by the two of us. 

Every time that I think about that, there is a happy lightness in my heart.  I am so grateful. 

We had a party that night. Pizzas. Macaroni salad. Ice cream. I brought sparklers and fountains for the childen, along with some spinners which whistled and danced around on the driveway. I had specifically sorted through the fireworks that we had, picking the ones that didn't make booms, only emitted showers and sparks. I had quite a selection of stuff. While we waited for it to get dark, I taught the girls how to play 'cat's cradle'. They'd never seen it before but were enthralled. Everyone ran to get yarn to make their own game. 

It was a wonderful evening. Well. Except for the fact that despite the description on the box, the first firework went off with a boom. I couldn't believe it. Everyone shrieked. Tim said Levi jumped so badly he nearly fell out of his chair. Rudy ran crying to his father.  

I felt terrible. I had specifically weeded those out. 

I thought. 

Anyways, the rest of the fireworks display went well. Andy did the fountains and everyone oohed and aahed as if we were at a big fireworks display. The sparklers were in all different colors, which were fun to watch. I had probably 3 dozen of those. It was fun to watch the kids excitedly leaping and waving them in the yard. Cars going past on the road slowed to watch the fun too. 

At last it was time to go home. We headed down the hill and before we got to the bottom of it, suddenly, without warning Tim became violently ill. That was the beginning of a pretty scary two days. I worried about dehydration, since that seemed to trigger the cascade of events that triggered his stroke. Deja vu. We have absolutely no idea what brought this on. No one else got sick. We all ate the same thing. He said he felt fine all night. 

He is better today and seems no worse for the experience.

I'm grateful for that, as well.