Hebrews 13:5b-6 - “for he hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.”

Gayle’s Bakery in Capitola, California is one of the most wonderful places to have lunch, dessert and coffee. You can also take dinner home. If you’ve never been, and you are ever in the vicinity, you owe it to yourself to visit there. Todd (my son) and I went there yesterday after our chiropractic appointments and enjoyed ourselves thoroughly. Here are some pics.

Lunch: Sandwiches and wraps.

Salads.

Dinner.

Dessert.

I took this photo just for my Pastor. He LOVES creme brulee.

Mine and Todd’s lunch: Tuna sandwich, chicken w/ pesto sandwich on croissant, cole slaw, caramel-chocolate parfait, and strawberry éclair’. M-m-m-m-m-m, good!

This made me cry.

Searching the rubble of a Chinese school, parents’ grief turns to fury

Tania Branigan in Dujiangyan
Wednesday May 14 2008
The Guardian

Tenderly, she eased the clean fleece over her little boy’s hand and up around his plump shoulder. The steady rain washing the town’s streets had chilled the usually warm Sichuan weather.

He didn’t look alarmed or frightened but dirt and blood were caked on his forehead. She touched his hair and then they pulled up the zipper on the bodybag and carried him away. Only her husband marked her howls. The whole street was seething with misery and anger. She had seen her son, at least; most of the children still lay in the rubble of Xinjian elementary school.

Four hundred and fifty pupils, aged between six and 12, were there when the quake hit yesterday at 2.28pm. A fortunate few were pulled out within hours by anxious parents scrabbling at the wreckage with bare hands. A handful more were saved overnight, after troops arrived to take over the rescue effort. Doctors were unsure how many had been taken to hospital - perhaps 15, perhaps 50.

What was certain was that hundreds more remained trapped and that hope was ebbing by the moment.

“There’s a slight chance they could save a few more now; probably not very many,” said a white-coated doctor.

Even the medics were raw-eyed and anxious. The sobs, wails and shouting mixed with sirens and the steady patter of rain. Under bright umbrellas, parents and relatives stood in whatever they grabbed when the quake hit: dressing gowns, slippers, straw hats. Some bore the bruises and scars of the previous day. Scores of doctors and nurses were waiting to help survivors from the school. But the scale of the challenge - and the collapse of the nearby hospital - meant that resources appeared to be limited. One child was carried to an ambulance by the arms and legs, apparently because there were not enough stretchers.

One man showed his raw, filthy hands. He didn’t want to give his name but said his 12-year-old son, Futian, was still in the wreckage.

“Before the troops came we found more than 10 people. I saved two students and one teacher but I didn’t get my own child out,” he said.

“I’m already 39 and he’s 44,” said his wife. “We had only one child. Why should I live on now?”

Like many parents here, their mood was turning from raw grief to fury as they waited for news. Twenty four hours after the quake they were losing hope, and only rage was left. They blamed everyone: soldiers for coming too late, the builders for cutting corners, officials for - they claimed - siphoning off cash. “The contractors can’t have been qualified. It’s a ‘tofu’ [soft and shoddy] building. Please, help us release this news,” her husband said. “About 450 were inside, in nine classes, and it collapsed completely from the top to the ground. It didn’t fall over; it was almost like an explosion.”

His neighbour, still half hoping for a sight of her daughter, burst out angrily: “Why isn’t there money to build a good school for our kids? Chinese officials are too corrupt and bad.

“These buildings outside have been here for 20 years and didn’t collapse - the school was only 10 years old. They took the money from investment, so they took the lives of hundreds of kids. They have money for prostitutes and second wives but they don’t have money for our children.

“This is not a natural disaster - this is done by humans.”

Intravenous drips, cigarette butts and scraps of children’s clothes were trodden under foot as families surged forward, trying to force their way through the lines of paramilitary police and troops guarding the site. “They haven’t told us anything. They won’t even let us see the place now,” shouted one mother, trying not to cry.

A man with a red umbrella paused to watch the scene. “My neighbours had two kids here,” he said quietly. “One was on the first floor and ran out but was hit by a falling brick and died. The other one is still in there.” Residents of Dujiangyan know other places were worse hit. Most of the buildings in the town are still standing, but no one dared enter them and many bore long cracks down their sides. The squares and roadsides were packed with residents huddling under tarpaulins, carpets and anything they could find. Too scared to go inside, they stayed out all night.

As the day wore on, an exodus began. People clustered by the roadside to hitch lifts, wait hopefully for buses or simply tramp along the long road to Chengdu to find shelter. Those without umbrellas covered their heads with plastic bags, towels and books in a vain attempt to stay dry. Some held bulging cloth bundles or backpacks; others fled without anything.

Dujianyang was a thriving town until yesterday, and the debris hinted at its previously prospering life. Now, all anyone wanted was to find safety and those they loved.

Not far from Xinjian school, at the Long Tan Wan housing compound, a young couple stared, dazed, at the remains of their apartment block: a pitiless jumble of tin basins, curtains, books, chairs, slabs of concrete and the twisted metal that used to be window frames. Their one-and-a-half year old daughter, Xixi, was somewhere inside. Her father drew the back of his hand across his eyes.

“I tried to get to her myself, but it all started falling down and I couldn’t carry on,” he said. “I called the police, but they wouldn’t come. They said they had bigger disasters.”
From my Uncle Glenn’s blog.

Official temblor death toll tops 12,000, but figure likely to rise.

Chinese rescuers search a collapsed building for survivors in Beichuan, in southwest China’s Sichuan province on Tuesday.

Go here to msnbc for the best videos and photos of the results of this devastating earthquake.

We are praying that more survivors are found. And we’re praying for those who are mourning the loss of their loved ones. This is so hard to comprehend and so unbelievably sad.

I’m so thankful to God for protecting my cousin who lives 50 miles from the epicenter. Angela is living there, working as a school teacher, and God has kept her safe.

A rescuer searches for victims at the collapsed site of a school building after an earthquake in Chongqing municipality May 12, 2008.

People prepare to spend the night in the open air on a street in Mianyang, Sichuan province, after an earthquake hit the area May 12, 2008.

A rescuer searches for victims after an earthquake in Chongqing municipality, May 12, 2008.

A view shows part of a collapsed school building after an earthquake in Dujiangyan, Sichuan province May 12, 2008.

An injured man whose leg is trapped receives care on the debris of a collapsed building at Juyuan Middle School after an earthquake in Dujiangyan, Sichuan province.

Rescuers search for victims at a collapsed school building.

A child sleeps outside on a street.

(Stringer/Reuters)

Please join us in prayer for the people who are suffering as a result of this massive 7.8 earthquake in central China.

My heart is breaking for the 900 high school students trapped under a building. It is night there now. How scared they must me.

BEIJING, China (CNN) — More than 7,600 people have been killed by Monday’s powerful earthquake in just one affected region of central China, the Chinese government said.

Rescuers try to help a child trapped in the rubble at Juyuan Middle School in Dujiangyan City.

State-run news agency Xinhua said the official toll had risen to 7,651 in Sichuan Province.

In addition, at least 48 people were killed in the northwest Gansu Province, Xinhua said.

Authorities had earlier said they believed about 10,000 people were injured in Beichuan County in the northeastern part of the province.

The Sichuan provincial disaster relief headquarters said 80 percent of the buildings collapsed in the Beichuan Qiang Autonomous County after the 7.8-magnitude quake, Xinhua reported.

Several hundred students were also feared to be buried in collapsed school buildings, the agency said.

China’s Seismological Bureau said the earthquake had affected more than half the country’s provinces and municipalities.

President George W. Bush released a statement saying the United States “stands ready to help in any way possible.”

“I am particularly saddened by the number of students and children affected by this tragedy,” Bush said.

Read more here.

6:00 a.m. - Got out of bed.

7:30 a.m. - Len (my husband) and I loaded the cherries into his truck from our cooler. (Not our cherries - they aren’t ripe, yet. These are the first crop - from Lodi).

8:00 a.m. - We went to the strawberry fields and picked up some strawberries.

8:15 a.m. - We took it all to our new fruit stand on Hwy 152 in Gilroy. Len’s brother met us there and I helped him set up the stand and showed him how to run it.

8:45 a.m. - We went home and got ready for church.

10:00 a.m. - My family and I went to church. We usually have church at 1:00 p.m., but since it was Mother’s Day, the service was earlier. We had an awesome time at church! Pastor Hurst preached a beautiful sermon titled, “A Mother’s Part and God’s Part”. He preached: if us mother’s would do our, to the best of our ability, to raise our children in the fear of God, then God would do His part and make sure they were saved. (Paraphrased).

12:30 p.m. - We went home, changed clothes and tidied up the house.

1:30 p.m. - Len and I went to Starbuck’s, then to our fruit stand to work. His brother left.

1:30 - 7:00 p.m. - My husband and I sold fruit then closed down.

7:45 p.m. - My family and I went to eat dinner at Westside Grill in Gilroy. We had a nice, relaxing, fun time together.

After dinner, we went to Baskin-Robbins and got some ice cream for dessert! I had a scoop of Heath Bar and a scoop of York Peppermint Patty. It was yuuuuuuumy!!!

9:15 p.m. - We took our ice cream next door to the Nob Hill Grocery store and got some groceries as we ate. Kyle was being his usual silly, funny self and had us all cracking up. It was so much fun!

10:00 p.m. - Finally got home, put groceries away, blogged a little and now I’m going to bed.

Sigh…what a wonderful Mother’s Day. It was very different and I’m very tired, but I’m happy.

God is awesome and I love Him. I thank Him for this wonderful day. I thank Him for a wonderful touch of His Spirit in church. I thank Him for the precious relationship I have with my family. I thank Him that we have such a great time together.

I thank Him for making me a mother of the two most awesome boys in the world!

I hope all you mothers had a wonderful day, too. May God bless you.

No photos of today.  I didn’t have my camera with me.

Our new sun room addition is complete! We enclosed our back patio which already had a roof. And we added a new outdoor patio, a pergola, and a BBQ island - complete with “The Big Green Egg“! Mike Buxton will appreciate this! Thanks to him we have one.

Thank you, Cousin Cindy, for sharing this with me.  Very cool.

My precious, beautiful niece turns 13 today!

THIRTEEN! A T-E-E-N-A-G-E-R!

Wow! I can hardly believe it!

Christmas 2007.

Chloe is a wonderful young lady. She loves God and she loves the work of the Lord. She has always been helpful to her parents as they work to build a church in La Mesa, California. Being the oldest of five children, she is very helpful to her mom with her siblings, housework, etc.

Chloe is bubbly, happy, sweet, loving, caring, fun to hang out with, tender-hearted, smart, etc., etc.

I can’t keep up with her ever-changing likes, though. Her favorite color was pink. Now, it’s green, I think. I do know she absolutely LOVES ice cream!

HAVE A VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY, CHLOE! Your Aunt Tena and Uncle Lennie love you very much and are proud of you! You are THE BEST 13 YEAR OLD IN THE WORLD!