Oops. Missed a day. Actually, I can pretty much guarantee that I'll be missing most of the other days! I just can't seem to make myself blog when I'm with Mom & Dad. I have so little time with them nowadays that I just have no desire whatsoever to sit in front of a computer when I could be spending time with THEM! In fact, the only reason I'm blogging right now is because everybody else is in bed and I'm not tired enough to sleep yet.

We left Pennsylvania at about 8:30 yesterday morning and had a good, long drive to Cleveland. It took a little longer than usual and we didn't get to Mom & Dad's house until about 8:30 last night. 12 hours. It's usually 10. Oh well, we made it and that's all that matters! Mom was still up at IYC, but Dad was here to greet us. It was soooooooo good to see him! It's been way, way too long. The kids were ecstatic. We got all moved in, once we figured out where our room was. This is the craziest house I've ever been in. For real--it's weird!!! It took me 10 or 15 minutes of wandering around before I felt like I could find any given room. Even now I have to stop and think before I try to go anywhere! The kids were even more lost than I was. "I need to go to the bathroom... um... where is it again???" I can't imagine what it would have been like if Jon & Em and the kids would have been able to come and we would have had ALL of the grandkids wandering around lost! ~sigh~ I'm soooooooo sad they're not going to be able to make it!!! Emilee, I've been wanting to write to you for days and days, but I never could figure out what to say! I'm just so, so, so, so, soooooo sad that you guys won't be able to make it. I wanted to tell you that, but I was afraid I might say some rather unfriendly things about that dopey brother of mine and I didn't want to encourage any more bad feelings toward him! Ha! Anyway, I've been thinking of you guys and praying for you lots and lots. And missing you!!!

Okay, on to happy things. We had a nice visit with Dad, had devotions with the kids, and put them to bed. James then reminded me that it was Dad's birthday (!!!), so I yanked the kids out of bed and sent them downstairs with Dad's birthday present (another neck tie with their picture on it) to sing to him! Not exactly a party, but it was the best we could come up with this year!

Aunt Kay & Sara got here at about 10:00, I think. Mom got home from IYC sometime after 11:00. I helped her unload the Suburban and get settled in and I think we all made it to bed at about midnight.

Today we loaded up and headed to Zion Hill, us ladies & kids for church and Dad & James for the Presbytery meeting. We had a good service, then Aunt Kay took the kids so the rest of us could go to the Presbytery luncheon. James was mentioning how different things felt this year at the meeting and luncheon. As he was sharing these sentiments I was exchanging childish expressions with Ray Adams who was seated at the head table. You know, tongue out, thumbs in your ears, fingers waving. "Why would you say that, James?!" Ha! It does feel so much more relaxed somehow. In fact, this was the first of the three luncheons I've had to attend that I wasn't utterly miserable. We sat at a table with the Dewberrys, the Smiths (from the northeast, not Arkansas) and the VanDeventers and I thoroughly enjoyed our visit.

Mom & I left the meeting a few minutes early to go pick up Aunt Sue who was waiting at the Chattanooga airport. She had a good flight and the luggage arrived with her, so that's a good thing. *Update* Aunt Sue says Hershey is being soooooo good for Stacey and that Brianna is in love with him. Wa-Hoo! It's Sam & Tammy's dog who is being bad! Ha! There's always gotta be one, you know. I'm just soooooo glad it's not mine!!! :-)

We came back to the house and the guys arrived with the kids a few minutes later. Mom & James headed straight back to Zion Hill for choir practice and Dad & I took naps. I thought the kids were being unusually quiet during this time. I found out later that they had escaped and were throwing rocks and exceptionally large tree limbs into the pond. Aunt Sue happened to find them, so she kept an eye on them to make sure they didn't get too carried away. All of this in their suits, of course. And their mother slept through the whole thing!!! I felt so guilty. I hate finding out that other people had to take care of my kids due to my neglegence! I had told them to go downstairs and play quietly and I truly thought they were doing just that. ~sigh~ Poor Aunt Sue.

We had a real good service at Zion Hill tonight--I especially enjoyed the singing. Brother Carter had a brother from England sing a special, then a sister from there, then Betsy Cox from Florida. I was so blessed! It's always such a blessing to be with our brothers and sisters from all over the place and feel the love and unity and "family" feeling that we have with one another. Just so good to worship the Lord together! And I'm always so blessed being at Zion Hill and thinking back on all of those wonderful years of BTI (8 of them, to be exact!) and what an amazing time of life that was. I don't think I realized at the time what in impact those services and the classes and fellowship would have on my spiritual development and who I am today. God was making me and molding me in so many ways through those times and I'm just soooooo thankful for the memories I have of His working in me and on me!

We went to Taco Bell, of all places, after church tonight. James has had a hankerin' for over a week now and this was our first opportunity. We came home and let the kids run for a little while, but everybody was in bed by 9:30 or so. That's good because we'll be leaving for Fields of the Wood at about 8:30 tomorrow morning. The boys still aren't asleep yet. They're sleeping on the floor in Mom's office, where I'm tying right now. You can hear all of the crazy critters outside and it really freaks them out. You don't hear bugs at night in Texas and this is a new experience for them. A few minutes after we put them to bed Joe started hollering for us in that on-the-verge-of-tears voice of his. "Mom!!!... Come here!... There's... There's... There's a big... Mo-o-o-o-o-o-om!!!!" Sam started screaming and crying, too, and went running through the "tunnel" to try to find me. By the time I made it up the stairs he and Sam both had tears just streaming down their faces. The cause of all of this panic? A ladybug. A ladybug!!! Can you imagine?! It was crawling across the floor a few feet from them and they had completely lost it. I made them come look at it and they were pretty embarrassed that they'd been so scared of such a friendly little bug, but still too nervy to just relax and go to sleep. They told me to listen--there are rattlesnakes outside and what if they come in the house and, and, and... ~sigh~ Bunch of cowards. I assured them that what they were hearing was not rattlesnakes and that they were a perfectly harmless variety of bugs and that they were not going to come in and eat them!!! I was hoping I could blog long enough for the boys to fall asleep while I'm still in the room, but I think Joe's still awake. Weird kid. Anyway...

Like I said, I probably won't be blogging much, especially this week. You know how things are during the Assembly! You're at "your room" so very little and when you are there you only have time to do the very necessary things: shower and sleep! But we'll see how it goes. Usually it's dumb to blog during the Assembly anyway because everybody is HERE and there's nobody left out there to read the blogs! But since so many people are missing this year, it might be nice if somebody had the chance to give an update now and then. But like I said, I'm not making any promises. ;-) G'night, y'all!