Long Days

We had a busy day of fun school yesterday. Art consisted of making placemats with some leaves we had pressed a few weeks ago. They look so pretty on our table for the fall. Then reading and math were covered while baking cookies (read the recipe and measure). We shipped a box of cookies to a Marine in Iraq and needed some for tonight's Home Fellowship meeting. T had gymnastics in the afternoon and then we had to make the dreaded trip to the post office (my #1 hated errand with kids). Everything was mailed with the correct address on them (I think) and we made it out of there without too many admonishments. Our sweet friends, the Sims, made us dinner on the spur of the moment. She called at 3:30 to see if we had plans for dinner and I told her I was trying to decide between cold cereal and oatmeal so she invited us over for some great potato soup and we provided the cookies. Then everyone rushed out of their house for our Wed night activities. Poor A never even made it for dinner (he's had some very long days at work this week). I met him at his office and handed off a car full of kids (4 boys to be exact) while he handed me the keys to his nice, quiet car. It was a wonderful trade at that point in the day. He dropped three of the boys off at AWANA for 2 hours and then got to spend some time with just C, which C had been waiting for all day. I got to go to the Institute which is my Wed night bible study that I just love. We covered the books of Hosea, Micah and Joel (all minor prophets). Very interesting, but my mind just wasn't all there so I didn't get as much out of it as I would have liked.

A friend dropped off her two kids at 7:30 this morning so she could go to a sale for both of us. This at least got the boys out of bed earlier than usual so we had an early start on the day. C and R went to gymnastics. Now R is not only helping C in class, but he jumps in to help anyone that needs it. He is so sweet. I watched him help push one little girl over so she could do her summersault. His teacher wants him to move up to the next class level and asked him to try it this afternoon, but when the time came to go he didn't want to. I think I've finally learned not to push him in those situations because there is no changing his mind and it ends up being a miserable time for all involved. He knows exactly what he wants when he wants it and he doesn't waiver, unlike T who is always willing to change his mind if he's talked into it. R also hates trying things when he doesn't know what to expect. Maybe next sesssion, after the holidays.

Since we passed up the oatmeal last night that's what everyone got for dinner tonight (dyed orange though to make is somewhat exciting). Home Fellowship met at our house. The kids always have a great time (they learned about the lamb and forgiveness tonight - my favorite lesson was about the pelican and his generousity) and we (adults) are having a good discussion going through the book of Habbakuk. Unfortunately, T had to leave just a little way into it for his first group music lesson. The lady he takes piano with does these group lessons at night once a month to introduce them to a different instrument. He did have a great time though. He knew several other kids there and his teacher brought in a bagpipe player which he thought was cool. T also had to perform a song for the group. He said he was the first one to go and that he played Yankee Doodle perfectly. He loves to perform and he's always so calm about it. He's such a great kid and I'm so proud of him.