The month of December was quite the month for us. Austin finished his exams and made it home from NGU just in time to repack his bags as the Reynolds Family headed out for New York City! You see, two and a half years ago, for Austin's 16th birthday, we decided to let him decide where we should go for our family vacation with our four free plane tickets. He picked Seattle, WA and we had a great time. Well, in December Heather turned 16 and once again, we had enough Delta miles for 4 more free plane tickets. This time it was Heather's turn to pick and she decided we should all go to NYC.
We browsed the internet making our "wish list" of places to go and things to see, and then watched good "training films" like On the Town and White Christmas. You can understand On the Town, but why White Christmas? Well, because we were blessed with tickets to go see it on the night of Heather's birthday - on broadway!! How cool is that? We also went to the top of the Empire State Building, rode the Staten Island Ferry past the Statue of Liberty at sunset, ate lunch at Mr. Tangs on Mott Street in Chinatown, went to Coney Island and the original Nathan's Hotdogs, toured Carnegie Hall, took a carriage ride through Central Park, and even got pretty good at getting around on the subway and bus!! Of course, we saw and did many other things, but those were some of the highlights. We also attended Sunday morning services at Brooklyn Tabernacle and went back one evening to see their Christmas cantata.
While there we got to spend time with our dear friends, Jimmy and Bernice, and their wonderful kids Janice and Jaime! Jimmy retired from the NYPD the same month I retired in Montgomery, and he was a great tour guide. Bernice is an elementary school principal, so she is a hero in our eyes! Jimmy and Bernice joined us for White Christmas, they all met us at Katz's Deli for pastrami on rye and potato knishes, and then had us over to their house for a wonderful family meal the night before we came home.
Oh, speaking of coming home... wow, what a trip that was! Back in October, we had booked our flight to go from Tri-Cities Airport near Bristol to Atlanta and on to Laguardia in NY, with the return flight going through the same airports. A couple of weeks after we booked, we got an email from Delta saying they had to change our return flight to go through Cincinnati, with a 6 hour layover. Well, beggars can't be choosers they say, so we were still just glad to have the free tickets. We arrived in Cincinnati a little late because our flight leaving NY was delayed, but we still had 5 hours to kill. We went and had a nice leisurely supper, found our gate, and settled in for the wait, no problem.
After a while we got thirsty for some Starbucks (our closest one in KY is 2 hours away) and so I headed back to the concourse where we had seen it. When I got back, I noticed they were no longer scrolling our flight number on the board over the desk. Hmmm... Rachael and the kids said that there had not been any announcements, and there were only a couple of people in line at the counter, so I wasn't overly concerned. I casually walked over, but as I got closer I could tell that the guy at the counter was being given instructions on getting to a hotel and to come back in the morning for "standby". Not a good sign. Sure enough, not only was OUR flight cancelled, but so had just about all flights in and out of anywhere near the eastern KY, eastern TN, western NC area. The issue...? SNOW STORM
I motioned for Rachael and the kids to come over and off they went to try to rent a 4wd vehicle to drive home while I waited my turn to ask for our luggage to be sent to the claim area. By the time I ran to catch up with the family, there was a ton of people in line behind me. Just in time. We were able to rent the last 4wd vehicle they had (thank you, Lord) and we hopped in our Toyota Rav4 and headed south. We made good time on the interstate, but what a mess there was on the parkway! What is normally a 3 1/2 hour drive was a little over 7 hours that night, but the Lord sent us two trucks and then a snow plow to follow and got us home safely. We had no power (for a couple of days), but we were home in our own beds!! I took the rental to the airport in TN the next day, and I lost count after 100 of all the vehicles wrecked, stuck and abandoned in the snow. No doubt in our minds that God's grace and mercy got us home.
That snow storm on December 18th started the coldest, snowiest winter that this area has seen in many years. We are still "in it", so to speak (low of 12 tonight and more snow tomorrow), but by Thursday it is supposed to hit 40!!! HEAT WAVE! We have been blessed thoughout this time to not have any significant problems with the cold and snow and ice, and we are sure that God's mercy is the reason.
After our travels, we were quite ready to stay home for a while, and that's what we did for Christmas. Rachael's folks, Earl and Jan, came up for Christmas this year and it was very good to have them here. I DID notice that they waited until the power came back on before they came. :-) The week after Christmas we were blessed with the Mountain View Baptist Youth Retreat and a trip to the Creation Museum. We also were able to take them to see the elk herd, went horseback riding and toured the Kentucky Coal Museum in Benham. Great week!
As Mountain View pulled out on New Year's Day, Austin was not far behind them. He wasn't headed to school, though, he was headed way down south to attend Passion 2010 in Atlanta with some friends from school. He had a great time and said the conference was great. We were so glad he was able to be a part of this.
Well, it's hard to believe that 2009 is completely in the books now. As our pastor said this morning, this is 2010 and we have never been here before. It's a new day and many opportunities lie ahead. May we all look for opportunities (and take advantage of them!) to be involved in building the Lord's Kingdom even more than ever before. Until the whole world hears...
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