filling in the gap

I've been quiet for a couple of weeks because I have been very busy, so this will be a very fast look at the last couple of weeks.

We had a small celebration for Savannah on her actual birthday. She took a cookie cake to school to celebrate with her class, and she opened her gifts from us that night. We did get erasers, yes pencil erasers, which were on her list, and I took pictures of her with her immediate family members.

This is one for the record. It has been a loooong time since I could get a picture of these two so close together.

Savannah has continued her field hockey season, and every other Monday holds cross country, field hockey wrestling and AHG. It is crazy beyond crazy here, and I dread Mondays.

She likes it, she likes it... playing goalie that is. Who would have thought?

On a windy and warm Friday, Andy taught about 40 fifth graders about purity of heart. They came in groups, and he taught the lesson five times. The difference in groups was amazing. In spite of the popularity of Lord of the Rings, fifth graders do not know who Liv Tyler is. In case you are wondering how she made it into the lesson, Andy used the world's definition of "lovely" and found Liv Tyler when he did a google search for lovely. He compared it to what God calls lovely which is the ultimate sacrifice.

As they continued to prepared for middle school that day, the fifth graders did some team building activities.


We've had some summer type fun with bubbles.

We've watched a balloon or two take off.

Julia and I have had "muffins with mom" at preschool.

...and we've worked on building a summer wardrobe. I must admit that four is about the oldest that you can reasonably wear a halter top, and that is pushing it.

Zach and I are really in need of time and money to update our wardrobes.

...and the rest of the story

• a parent's meeting for 5th graders to get ready for middle school
• a musical performance of the 4th and 5th graders at Savannah's school
• a weekend where Andy's many areas of service all hit at once - playing drums for three church services, serving communion to shut ins, and attending a nursery leadership meeting -- did I mention that we also attended a birthday celebration for my nephew on the same weekend?
• a very special celebration for a new, very important, and long anticipated building at our church ---awakening a generation - all glory and praise to an amazing God!
• AWANA
• watching as our aging dog seems to be accelerating in this aging process and praying that we won't have to make the decision that every pet owner dreads
• planning a baby shower for special friends
• getting ready for the carpet cleaners to come tomorrow - necessary because of the dog who seems to have lost her ability to wait to get outside sometimes
• of course, there is always the job of getting our teenager to act like a human--of course I work at that with several hundred teenagers a day ---getting THEM to act human that is-- I hope I am acting human
• getting ready to walk/run? a 5K
• unexpected expenses such as the bill for Wyatt's surgical center being almost 6X the amount anticipated...seeking some help on this and trusting in the provision of God
• challenges in decisions about Wyatt, and fun moments too...like tonight when he brought me a library book that has Chinese characters all over the back and told me that he found the characters of his Chinese name among them... we compared them to his Chinese name, but only one was a pretty close match
• last but not least---having teachers talk on two or three recent occasions about when God seems distant (oh, like the last several months for me) --- there is a lesson in that, and He is speaking!!!!