Refresh. Regrow. Renew.

What an interesting week I have had! This year our church's vacation bible school theme was Velocity-the speed at which something moves. We made humorous references to our children with that theme but it was intended to refer to the speed at which God moves through our life when we accept him into our heart. I was blessed with a group of enthusiastic three year olds. Notice the careful phrasing of that statement. Blessed is accurate because I truly loved having these kids but enthusiastic barely covers their personality. They were rambunctious, unintelligible children who peed on the floor, hit their friends, picked their noses and put boogers in their friends food. I have truly learned my lesson and next year I will volunteer in an older age group. On the upside, my kids loved it and wanted to keep going. I would see them when we met up for kids church and would watch them singing and dancing with everyone else. We are still singing all the songs we learned this past week.

Naturally when Saturday came around I was really looking forward to sleeping in since I had to be up at 5:30 all week for VBS. So when I woke up at 5:00 I was more than a little irritated. I tried for thirty minutes to get back to sleep but I kept thinking about coffee so I gave in, got up, drank my cup of coffee and cleaned out part of the garage. That was really far more fun than sleeping and I might start doing it everyday. But first I should check myself into the pysch ward for evaluation because that would be crazy. Even for me. I spent the rest of the morning cleaning, reading and entertaining my kids. That afternoon, Tiffany and I had some girls time together as we searched for the perfect backpack and lunchbox for school. Five stores and one restaurant later after looking through the mall her royal heiness finally found what she wanted, a Tinkerbell backpack with wheels and a matching heart lunchbox. It was really cute and she wanted to take it with her to Lake Jackson the following morning but I finally talked her down explaining how Tinkerbell might fly away if we use the backpack for anything other than school. I really don't have a problem lying to my children when it serves my interest, I only hope I am not discovered since I am teaching her how lying makes God angry not to mention me. (sheepish smile) I am glad that she found what she wanted but that really pushed me over the edge and I was glad to be home so I could watch our new cable service that was being installed while we were gone. Oops! The cable guy was still here . . . until 1030! I was so tired by then that I crawled into Tiffany's twin bed and slept with her, while hubby and the cable guy worked out a couple of kinks. He is coming back today to finish, I hope!

Tim's cousin Jennifer invited us to her daughter's fourth birthday yesterday in Lake Jackson and we had a wonderful time. It was a Fancy Nancy party so Tiffany got to dress up and have make-up applied with her cousins and friends. The Bouncy Bus also came to visit. It was an old school bus and inside was a zip cord that ends in a swimming pool of cushy blocks; there were tunnels, a small trampoline and many other things to climb on, through and under. It was really neat and a great party idea. While all this was going on, I was able to visit with Tim's aunts. I have always loved his aunts because they are so nice and have a kind of southern traditional manner about them. Its like stepping back in time a bit with their devotion to the Eastern Star, their display cases full of family treasures and pictures and their bold conversational skills. These women are not shy about speaking out when they feel it is necessary. There was recently a situation where a family member . . . umm. . . secretly did something that the aunts found out about which offended them greatly and the shit hit the fan. To further prove my point, one of his aunts pulled me aside at the party and asked me if there was something I wanted to tell her. Perplexed and a bit nervous, I said no. Then she patted my tummy and said, 'are you sure'. That confirmed my suspicions that I have in fact gained weight. When I told her that I wasn't pregnant, she referred to how quickly I showed with Benjamin and she wanted to be sure. Even in that moment, I loved how she spoke so bold and lovingly to me, it was really hard to be offended. Although, I am now really bothered about my tummy and wonder if I sanitize scissors, needles and thread that perhaps I can perform my own tummy tuck . Hmmm. . . no I will just eat some salty french fries and chocolate cake. That always makes me feel better. If only all of life's problems could be fixed so easily.