Going...Going...

Gone!

The chimney that is. Oh, and a couple of walls too!

You might remember these pictures.

and this one in particular...

but this is what happened next!

Mr. Guy asked Mr. Sammy to put his foot through the hole. Well, I was expecting a foot through the hole not a foot through the wall!

And so before we knew it, all of this turned into this...

And I finally got to see the floor, or lack there of, revealed...

and see the bottom of that blasted chimney that's been pulling the center of our house down!

The ceiling has pretty much looked like this for a week or so...

...and our heater is working overtime (and AC since its been 80 degrees here!), but that's nothing unusual!

Addie, Paul, and I had almost packed up the kitchen...

but weren't expecting the cabinets to come out until the next day.

Instead, we had 3 contractors and 2 plumbers in the house...

and out went the cabinets...

...no more sink, no more stove, no more dishwasher and no more oven (although we'd been without that since the gas leaks!)

But in order to allow us to get to the little girls room, our house turned into a scene straight out of ET.

What has all of this taught me?

1. God is teaching me more about flexibility and patience than I ever cared to know...
2. God Himself is thankfully willing to wait me out until I learn said patience and flexibility. Apparently I'm a slow learner..
3. I guess I've been functioning in organized chaos for a while now, but I'm pretty sure now it's just plain 'ole chaos!
4. It isn't that our house is too small, it's that we have too much stuff. The give-away pile is growing, and the Christmas lists are shrinking!
5. Not having a kitchen sink (or dishwasher) doesn't make things easy, but it does mean that I don't have a kitchen sink to keep empty, clean and shine! ...now I just have to keep the bathroom sink cleaned out! 
6. You can eat decent meals made solely on the grill and in the microwave.
7. None of this really matters in the whole grand scheme of things. It's just a phase of life. It will come and go. What really matters is our family and our three precious girls! 

...but I'll have pictures of what we discovered behind the dishwasher and sink cabinets soon. :/

Ecclesiasties 3: 1, 6-7, 11, 14a

There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens...

...a time to search and a time to give up, a time to keep and a time to throw away,
a time to tear and a time to mend, a time to be silent and a time to speak...

...He has made everything beautiful in its time. He has also set eternity in the human heart; yet no one can fathom what God has done from beginning to end...

...I know that everything God does will endure forever; nothing can be added to it and nothing taken from it.