Party Animals

Seems like there are a lot of people getting another year older during this and last month. I'm really bad about remembering birthdays...good thing I have Facebook to remind me so I don't look like a complete jerk and forget all my friends' birthdays.

We had 2 birthday parties this past week. *As anyone who knows my family knows...we don't let a birthday go by without using it as a good excuse to get together and eat cake. We love some cake.* The first party this past week was for my husband, Billy.

The second was for my sister, Amanda, who is actually currently in Mexico on her honeymoon right now. I am very jealous of excited for her.

We had a wedding over the weekend, and I am officially not the only old married lady in the family anymore. Now mom can get on Amanda's case about filling her grand baby craving. ;) Somehow I doubt that will let me off the hook...mom is relentless about wanting to have enough grandbabies to fill that 15 passenger van of hers that Dad keeps trying to get rid of.

Coming from a family with lots of cousins, and lots of family to celebrate special occasions with...I understand where she's coming from. I love being from a big family...most of the time. ;)

Families, and having another year with some of my favorite people, are things I'm really glad to have. Plus it's always fun to get together, and eat cake and ice cream of course...but I don't usually need an excuse to do that. ;)

Comic Relief

With all the driving back and forth we do on the weekends, the kids are getting pretty good at entertaining themselves, and us, in the car. Sometimes their "entertainment" is verging on the loud and obnoxious, but last weekend it was pretty cute:

It's so cute to see them "playing" together as Tirzah gets a little older...and tougher. ;) They were strapped in during this video, but usually his version of playing involves several wrestling moves. I'm sure she was glad for the break.

I Hope So...

We spend most of our weekends hanging out with kids. Not just our two, but with lots of other people's kids as well. With Billy's job of student minister...we have lots of time with these kids.

This last weekend, there were more kids than usual. Our church hosted an event we affectionately dubbed Cow Tippin...it was our Disciple Now event for this year. *Disciple Now is an event complete with rallies, overnight stays at church host homes, too much pizza and soda, and lots of speaking and singing.

And lots of shaving of my husbands once full head of hair, as you can see from these two shots.

He had promised these students that if they filled our gym with 200 people, his hair would get shaved. I put up a good fight, but in the end I lost...for a good cause at least. :) But still...it kind of hurts me "right there" that the 200th person they counted was none other than Tirzah. Traitor. ;) Seriously, though...I'm so excited that we had this many students in our little home church. It was an amazing weekend for everyone involved.

We had so many amazing volunteers that made it happen, an amazing speaker and band that really brought it, and energetic students ready to hear and put into action what they heard. I hope that this weekend will stick with all of us much longer than Billy will be bald.

This week's theme at You Capture was "Hopeful"...check out the link for more great photos and blogs!

Fashionista

In preparation for all the wedding festivities coming up this weekend, my sisters and I took my grandma shopping for a new outfit. Before I tease Grandma just a bit...let me say how much we all dearly love her, and how she loves to be teased. She is a sweet, godly lady. She is also one picky lady.

She is one of the best looking grandmas I've ever seen...she used to model in her younger days. This leads to her extremely good, but very hard to satisfy, sense of style. *I may have inherited her long legs, but I didn't get that sense of style. Darn it.* You can't take this lady to Target. We wandered back and forth through the mall for several hours trying on various pantsuits and jackets with her before we finally found one she would wear.

She's gonna look great...that goes without saying. She always does. Grandma is blind, has been for years, and she still manages to dress better than most of us who can see what we are putting on. How she does that I'm not sure...but maybe she'd consider teaching classes or something.

It was good to spend some time with her...even Merrick had a great time. I'm kind of glad Grandma was busy in the dressing room and didn't realize what her animal of a grandson was doing with the help of his Aunt Abby. When they weren't repelling from clothing racks and making an obstacle course of the escalator, they were riding around the department store in some piece of equipment that's probably not meant to be used as a carnival ride.

But it kept him busy, and kept Abby busy. Both of which are good ideas. Especially when you have an fashionista like Grandma in the dressing room and you might be there awhile. ;)

Sparrow

I'm writing this "before the storm". Not like I'm expecting Cow Tippin, a huge event our church is doing for the students this weekend, to be bad...I just know that it's going to be busy. Hopefully busy with lots of students who are searching and wanting to know more about God.

My husband is the student pastor at a small country church, and has been for the last 2.5 years or so. While we both feel it's not where we will be forever, it's where we are now, and we are wanting to invest everything we've got in these students. It's the church we grew up in, met each other, accepted Christ...lots of history, and hopefully a great future also.

Even though our church is small, we are constantly reminded of how important our small corner of the world ministry is. The ultimate concern isn't how many seats we fill up, even though we are hoping for a great turn-out this weekend, it's that we fill each person sitting in the seat full of the good news.

Hopefully at the end of this weekend, we'll be totally and completely exhausted and excited about what went on this weekend. Hopefully there will be several hundred students who are excited about all they've heard and ready to share it with anyone who will listen, also. We're praying that's what happens.

I know we may be small, but that's never been a good excuse. God's eye is on the sparrow, and I know He's watching for something great to happen in our little corner of the backwoods this weekend.

Matthew 10:31