A Weekend of Gratefulness

 3-17-21 This morning I sit here reflecting on the weekend and feeling very grateful. On Saturday morning we headed to Phoenix to meet up with a nice couple that Susan and Ben are connected to through her marriage to Ben's step dad, named Don. We met up at the Cracker Barrel. We enjoyed a nice lunch and conversation. After everyone said their good-byes and took a few pictures we went or separate ways.  Ben drove us over Dan's house (Susan's boyfriend) to visit him a little bit before heading back home.  We left Dan's around 3:30 p.m. When we had left Parks that morning it was a cloudy cold morning with promise of snow later in the day.  While we were in Phoenix, around 1:30 or so I got a called from Sara letting me know she was off work and also sharing how yucky the weather was at that time in Flagstaff.

We proceed down the road.  Ben asked his mom to check the traffic ahead on her phone so we would know if there was any issues to prepare for ahead as we were driving home.  Susan announced that there were a couple of traffic issues with accidents at two different spots along the way. Susan said that her phone was saying that it would take us extra time to get home.  We decide to stop at McDonalds at Camp Verde.  There were people moving around as if they had been sitting in a car for a long time after dealing with bad roads and weather. A man had shared how bad the weather was and to be prepared to sit and wait and to take it slow and easy as we continue home.  We grabbed some food and got back in the truck and heading on down the road.

We did end up running into bad weather, bad roads, stuck cars and big trucks.  It took us 7 hours to get home.  We were home at 10:30 p.m.  It turned out to be a long day.....

This pic shows both side coming and going from Flagstaff with long lines of cars backed up.

Now if you thought Saturday was exciting.....lets just say Sunday morning was going to get even more eventful. Sara left the house to head to work.  She had to be at work by 9:00 a.m. I was sitting on the couch drinking my cup of coffee and Ben had one of his shows on T.V.  Sara hadn't been gone very long, my phone rings and it is Sara screaming and crying uncontrollably and all I could understand was road, and tree.  As I was trying to listen to her, Ben could hear her through the phone across the room and he went right away to put on jeans and boots (out of his comfy sweats) and go start his truck to warm up and get the ice off of the windshield.  I managed to get from Sara that she slide off the road.  I went to go throw on a sweatshirt over my T-shirt and sweats and put on my jacket and snow boots and head out to the truck.  Ben called her and got a better idea of where she was, she said she was okay.  I texted her and told her to stay calm and that we were coming.

When we got there a highway patrol was there and also a tow truck, someone must of seen from a distance and called.  As soon as Ben parked on the side of the road I was out as fast as I could safely walk to her in the snow that covered the ground.  She was walking towards me to.  I grabbed her and held her close to me tightly and didn't let go for a few what seems like a long time but it was only a few seconds and then I pulled away just enough to look at her and make sure she was alright.  She was shook up, cold but she was alright otherwise.  Ben had gone over to the tow truck driver.  Ben told Sara and I to get in the truck and wait for him. The tow truck driver pulled her car out.

We are very thankful that it wasn't worse.  If it wasn't for the big pile of snow on the ground she could have flipped and rolled.  She had been wearing her granddaddy's jacket and said that she felt like she had been watched over and taken care of.  I said yes she was by God and both of her grand pa's. :)

It was a long and tiring weekend but we rested and we thanked God for keeping all of us safe and out of harms way.  So very thankful my Sara was okay.