July 2010

Life has been very busy and the summer is flying by.  Joe will be going to a football clinic next week and the first part of August practices will begin.  I better stock up on the Gator Aid!  Joe and I do a lot together in the summer and when FB starts I guess I have withdrawl symptoms.  I like to go to the FB games, but I usually go home around half time.  Joe jokes to everyone that I watch the scores on TV so I'll know for sure who won before he gets home. 

This summer we were able to go visit Mike and Maria in Raleigh, NC.  They have plans to remodel and build onto their home, and the work should begin soon.  We enjoyed eating out in some different places with them, going shopping and also seeing the beautiful scenery.  Most of the latter was on the way to SC to visit with Joe's sister, Sharon, and her husband Jack.  We also saw their two daughters and some of the grandchildren -- our great-neices and nephews.  After seeing flat land and blowing dirt in TX, the trees and ocean were such a welcome change. 

But now it has been raining so much here in TX lately that there are some "lakes" where none used to be.  Some of it is drying up and we can get into the Wal-Mart parking lot that is closest to Shallowater.  When it floods, that lot looks like a lake, too.  In KS we had drainage ditches on every curb and sometimes in between.  They don't have things like that here in Shallowater or Lubbock, TX.  I guess the planners thought it would never rain enough to need them.  I doesn't rain that much too often, but when it does we try to go into Lubbock with the truck so we won't float away. 

Joe bought two pools for the grandchildren this summer.... both the blow-up kind.  One is deeper and Sophie and Barrett enjoy swimming and jumping around in that one.  I think Keaton likes the little one better.  It came with a detachable slide, which Sophie likes to put in the bigger pool and lay on it.  Then it flips and knocks her off and she has a good laugh.  Sophie and Barrett both took swimming lessons this summer and we were able to see their progress.  Sophie is getting good at diving and learning to lift her head to breathe while she is swimming.  Barrett can swim under the water and jump off the edge.  Keaton played in the baby pool while they had lessons, but he likes the water a lot better this summer than he did last summer!

Barrett turned four in May, and had a party at the Jumping Jungle at the mall.  It was a lot of fun, but Joe had to miss it because of a regional track meet.  We let Barrett open his Thomas the Train gift from us when he was here visiting before the party so Joe could play with the train with Barrett and Keaton. 

Sophie is going to take a cooking class soon, and I get to pick her up three times after the class because it is right during the boys' nap time.  Yipee!  I love every chance I have to keep any of the children.  They are so much fun.  Now when they spend the night Keaton sleeps with Joe and Barrett.  Joe can even change his pull-ups if they are not stinky.  Those of you who know Joe realize this is a major event for him!  It's a good thing they invented pull-ups because he never did master the diapers.

A few months ago I started teaching the Cradle Roll class on Sunday mornings.  (I still teach 2s and 3s on Wednesday nights.)  I've been working on a curriculum for the Cradle Roll age, and hope to publish the first of two books in a few months or maybe a year.  Hanna Publications didn't get off to a very good start in 2010 with the slow economy, but things have been picking up lately and it is up to where it was this time last year. 

On Saturday, September 11, 2010 I will be speaking at a Ladies' Day in Odessa, TX on the topic of JOY IN THE MORNING.  I will speak about the trial of losing close loved ones as well as overcoming other trials in life.  On August 30, Angie will be gone from this earth seven years.  We still miss her, but we have much joy and happiness in our lives.  I hope my talk will inspire others and give them courage from God's Word to face the trials that come to all of us at some point in our lives.  "Knowing this, that the trying of your faith worketh patience.  But let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing" (James 1:3,4).