Family Reunion Plans Ruined
Have you ever had one of those things that you really wanted to do, but you keep getting little signs that tell you you shouldn't? That is what happened to us yesterday and my husband and I took these as signs from God to STAY HOME. We just wished we would have took notice a little sooner than we did.
Most of it started Friday night, the night before we were planning on leaving. We had had Vacation Bible School all week long, which I will be blogging about in another post. That morning Stinky had woke up with a sore throat. She is not one to complain about being sick, so I knew something was wrong. Later that evening she ended up with a fever. It was very low grade, never got over 100. She had it for most of the night, but early morning it left.
Hubby and I had planned on leaving the house by 6am to get on the road. It was only a 1 hour 45 minute drive there and we thought we'd get there bright and early to spend the whole day. Greg was even looking forward to our trip so he could go fishing. I did let Stinky sleep in though for a bit. When she woke up, we could tell that she didn't feel good, but there was no fever and she wanted to go. We all got ready and packed for the day.
We got gas, drinks for the ride and a small snack for the kids. Off we go. We had about 30-40 minutes left until we reached our destination and hubby needs to use the little boys room. He pulls over, beside a cliff mind you because we are going over a mountain pass. Chinook Pass, in Washington, to be exact. A tiny road on steep mountains is not my ideal place to be. He gets out, I hear the van start to die and try to save it but I'm too late. It dies.
Greg gets in the van and tries and tries to start it. It won't start. He thinks it's my fuel filter or fuel pump or something of that nature. We're of course, parked uphill, as we were still going up the pass. Because he can't get the van to start, the power steering and power brakes won't work, of course, so that makes things even harder. Greg knows we can turn around and get faced downhill and probably be ok, but there isn't room to turn around and my van won't start anyhow.
There was a point when he was trying to position the van to turn around and boy he was getting close to the edge with hardly any brakes for me! Stinky felt the same way. Bubba stayed pretty calm, surprisingly. Poor Stinky was crying. We were all praying by this point. Greg and I both tried our HARDEST to stay calm, so the kids would feel better. I was shaking so bad that I thought for sure I was going to pass out. I was envisioning many things that could happen to us. I don't like being parked on the side of a highway with the kids. Anything could happen. Especially with a cliff on one side.
So since we couldn't start the van, we tried pushing it. The kids got out because it was so close to the edge. I unloaded my purse, and things I knew we would need if I have to walk with the kids (sunblock, etc.). A man pulled over, of course it was AFTER I helped Greg push the van out of a hole. That was hard! We had to rock it, and rock it, and rock it. There was one point that I just kept pushing and pushing and we got it out. After a guy stopped to help, a forest ranger found us. He told us to just wait it out and see if it will start. lol Ok.
I am thinking of many things right now. It's hot in the van, I don't want the kids to overheat. I checked Stinky's temp to make sure it hadn't gone up, it hadn't. Thank the Lord. I also thought we could get hit by a car and have it push us over the edge. So I took everything heavy that could hit the kids in the head while we are rolling down a hill and shoved it into the back so hopefully it wouldn't get them. I made sure we stayed buckled for that reason also.
Greg had been outside of the van by now, checking all things. He was tapping things, laying under the van and whatever else he tried. He came up to the window, tried to start the van and we heard this strange noise. We both look at each other with shock written all over our faces. That weird sound was the engine running! Greg yells, "Hurry! Let's go!!" I jump out of the van because he had just opened the side door and pull it shut! He runs to the gas tank, shuts it, then runs to the hood, shuts it and he jumps in. We scramble to buckle up, praying out loud to please get us turned around. We thankfully got turned around and we go on down the hill, towards home.
Now we are yelling, "Thank you Jesus!" and so happy to have it running. We had already decided that this was too many weird signs and that we need to get home. All of us are upset, it would have been a fun day. But what can we do? We don't want to go further over the pass, into Eastern Washington and break down there.
We stopped in town to get some food to take home before we got there and while me and the kids were inside getting the food, the van died and Greg couldn't get it to start. So while we wait for it to start, we ate lunch. Then Stinky had to go to the bathroom, and it was gonna be a while. Greg got it started then, but it took us too long to get out and it died again. We sat a little longer. By now, I am so tired of the sun on my legs because every position that the van has died in, I am in the sun. I was trying to get out of the sun, but running out of room!
After we got it started, again, it died on us, again. We finally got it going and made it home and it died in the driveway. I am glad that church was planning on me being gone today, so that didn't really mess anything up. Hopefully, we can get it fixed before Wednesday night, when I need to be at church to help watch kids during Family Bible study.
I am bummed that we missed our Tee Pee Creeper reunion though. I had heard it was the last camp out reunion and that is uncool that we missed it. But the Lord had different things in mind. We truly felt that we should go home. It was such a strong feeling. Especially to me, while I was praying. It was way too strong to ignore. And the worse part for everyone else was that the family was expecting us there and we never showed up! People don't get cell phone reception there and so when I called to let them know what happened, it was only voice mail I got. I did leave a message, but Grandma won't get it until after she gets reception. :-(
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