"The Lord is Peace." ~Judges 6:24

One morning before we sat down to read our Bible I decided to open the box from my Aunt Margaret and family - imagine our delight when inside we found a personally inscribed Bible for each of us. God's perfect timing once again! Below is one of the cards which my aunt and my cousins included in the Bibles they sent.

Hours after the fire Capstone Eye Clinic and Walmart Vision Center came to Psalm and Wynn's rescue by providing them with free frames and lenses as neither child had time to grab their glasses when they exited the house. Thank you Dr. Erickson and Dr. Tasso and staff for meeting our immediate needs so swiftly.

Dr. Erickson is pictured above on the right with one of her wonderful staff members and Dr. Tasso below with Psalm.

Brothers Kenton and Seth at the Walmart Vision Center having a lighthearted moment exploring a new look.

Thanks to Marlyn and Jean for driving from Wasilla all these years to support and encourage the kids' piano playing. Jeanne, Gretchen, and Susan and Charles and Lois came also, but snuck away before we could snap a photo.
Jean and Marlyn with Micah. Behind Jean is a picture of the adjudicator who judged the competition in which Micah placed first.

We were also blessed by Esther, Hope, and Vladimir coming to listen to the recital.
Micah and Jasper had fun playing "The Coachman's Quarter" and "Tarantella" by Gavrilin to a packed house at UAA Saturday night at the Anchorage Concert Chorus' annual winner's recital.


Micah also performed "Fantasie in F Minor" by Chopin.

Earlier that day, after digging metal out of the piles of debris, Seth and Doug resembled chimney sweeps.

Psalm playing dress up the McKinnis way.

Margaret in her Cancer Survivor shirt which she recently received at the Relay for Life. It was Margaret's house to which we fled when we escaped from the fire (even though she was not there at the time), her home in which we met with the insurance agents, and her place that workers used as a "break room" And it is Margaret who gave a temporary home to our two messy parakeets and continues to provide a refuge to our three rambunctious black labs while we are in transition. Thanks to Margaret for being a true neighbor. Margaret joined us for the dump runs and filled up her truck bed numerous times for us.My childhood friend, Jeanne, her mother(Gretchen), and sister (Susan).Thanks to Susan's extra help we were successful at pulling out the extremely heavy metal piano part from each of the two pianos.

Ready, get set, pull!

All that was left of the grand piano.

Seth, Wynn, Susan, Wendy, Psalm, Jeanne, Gretchen, and Kenton after the project.

Thanks to Uncle Dave for letting us use his flatbed trailer. With it we were able to haul much metal to the dump on Friday and Saturday.