Finally sitting down on this rainy Sunday morning to work on the blog. We've been busy, busy with summer fun-- water by day, dinners on the back deck, fire pits, 10:00 bedtimes, and most recently watching some of the RNC and DNC, and...the Crossfit games!!! Summertime...it's the best!
Monday, July 11th
Senior High camp. These boys have been the best of buds since the toddler room. (missing Justin. He was 'delayed' in his arrival. I think he muttered something about Kelly.)
From camp drop off we headed to Muriel's funeral. It was a beautiful celebration of her life. As a wise man once said, "It's easy to celebrate people who celebrate people." Many shared about her, her life, and her legacy. Bob spoke (wearing his Dad's suit) and shared the family's gratitude to all of Muriel's community who loved and supported all of them over the last 15 months as she battled pancreatic cancer.
Unique things I liked about the service:
-along with the picture boards, etc on display, was her Bible- open with all of her highlighting hand notes. It was evident that her Bible was well-used.
-the family procession to start the service- attenders could easily identify who was family as they entered the service (to "All Arise")
Lisa had kept the kids for me, so I zipped down to her house to scoop them up.
July 12th
We decided at about 9:00 the night before to do a beach day with the little guys.
...and it's not a beach day until there's a sand war.
We **finally** pulled together a little party for Rocco and Trevor. It happened to be Aiden's actual birthday, so PARTY x 3 = tons of fun!
After the party, Rocco got to go back to Aiden's for a sleepover. He attended an evening of Mega Sports Camp (VBS).
Only picture of the day. We're enjoying our garden dinners.
Lucas joined our family for the weekend. We went blueberry picking before it got too hot.
After much discussion, debate, figuring out, aligning schedules, and figuring out camp drop-offs, we left C4 and Nathanael behind and the rest of us headed up to Portland, Maine for 'cousin's weekend' / Nick's birthday. The 3 hour trip took us 4 1/2 with traffic. But we made it.
C4 left for Kids' Camp as a counselor. Poor guy was only home for 36 hours! He and I had a sweet morning together picking up a few last minute toiletries and waiting for the bus.
side note: Camp packing almost killed me. Well, that's a tad dramatic, but 9 times in 3 weeks I had to pack up people, including random items like suspenders, colored duct tape, and Christmas accessories! Thankfully the older ones do most of it on their own, but it's still a lot of laundry, collecting, coordinating, and double checking to be sure nothing's missing. At 9:00pm the night before camp, it is not fun to hear, "Mom, do we have green body paint?"
Nathanael left for camp too. His second camp. He and Sean wanted to try Word of Life at Schroon Lake. They bravely went, not knowing anyone else or even what to expect.
Laurie handled the drop off since we were supposed to be in Portland.
"Mystery" rehearsals kicked off! We run at Crossroads the last weekend in August and tour three cities three weekends in September.
We were privileged to be a part of celebrating Kandie's 50th.
