It's Been A While

Micah was loving this attention, don't let the body language fool you.  Check out his grin.

Athan after a long walk, enjoying a snack while a crazy looking bike rider enters the square from behind him.

Morgan.  Sweet girl, full of life and imagination, riding the purple bike statue. 

I thought we needed an update.  Life is full and wonderful- not always happy and stress free, but full and wonderful.  We enjoyed a visit with our friends the Strebecks who stayed with us over a weekend while Ryan spoke at a youth event nearby.  I love these friends, and the boys do too!  Morgan and Athan are such special kids who love wholeheartedly and without reservation.  Their mom and dad are pretty great too.

We've been playing outside LOTS since spring weather is finally here, enjoying backyard baseball with the neighbor kids, skateboarding and roller blading.  Eric and Erin are both in stressy season right now.  Local church conference and Easter back to back have Eric at lots of evening meetings, and Erin is recovering from mid-term projects and tromping on toward final projects.  Everything feels controlled right now- not chaos, and I can tell we're not overly busy because we still make time for weekly family movie nights, walks with the dog and movies/TV time without kids too.  And, we just finished up a round of swimming lessons for the kids.  Everyone can swim to some extent- some better than others- but we all have basic skills.

School has afforded us lots of opportunity to learn about how other people live differently than we do.
- My friends play video games whenever they want.
- Everyone I know is allowed to watch Spongebob
- What does "retarded" mean when someone says it in a mean way?
And other lovely conversations like why calling a girl on the bus "sexy Lexy" is not the same as "Funny Lexy," or "Silly Lexy."  Isaiah and Elijah both got into some trouble on the bus recently, but it was a case of dealing with some name-calling.  They may not have made the best choices in handling the kid who was doing the teasing, but again, more opportunities to talk about patience, and grown-up skills like ignoring the kid who is bigger and older and should know better but doesn't.  And, the administrator at school who talked to them both called to tell me how wonderful they both were as she disciplined them- how sorry and genuine and lovely they both were as they respectfully took their consequence and didn't argue or get angry.

And I'm probably most excited to write about our very recent evening Bible and prayer times.  I think the trials they've experienced at school this year have helped them mature into a sense of why we need God.  They have caught very small glimpses of the sin in other people and in themselves, and it is changing them.

We had taken a break for a few months from bedtime Bible reading and family prayer.  I'm not sure why, but we had, and I don't feel like it was a negligent thing, just a season.  We started up the tradition again recently, and it's different.  Everyone is silent and still while Mommy or Daddy prays and we pray slowly and deliberately for quite a few minutes ( a far cry from our hurried, pray, pray, stop-that, pray pray, be-quiet, lay-still prayers of before).  Elijah has started joining in to pray a few words here and there when he feels that I haven't given enough detail- all on his own and very sincerely.  There is peace and stillness that surrounds our prayer time and it is genuine instead of rushed and "required" as a part of the routine.  They are growing and changing inside and out.