When night falls and I sit down to download my pictures, I always wonder what number will appear on the screen. Have I been a picture, snap-happy fool or a more sedate, busy person with little time for picture taking?

Tonight the magic number was ninety-one! Now that is an impressive amount but hardly excessive. I know one day in January I took at least 150 pictures. When Tim is involved with WNW Day Camp he takes hundreds and hundreds of pictures in a single day. Ninety-one is way below hundreds and hundreds. It’s even below a hundred. With ninety-one you know it has been a good day. You know the camera has been well used and the day thoroughly documented. Since the Project 365 only requires ONE picture, some would say ninety-one is a bit overkill. Those people probably get things done in their home rather than just sit around blogging all evening. For the time being, let’s just ignore that sort of riff-raff (as my mother-in-law would surely call them).

So, please be forewarned. This is a blog of many pictures. If each picture really was worth a thousand words, we’d be in real trouble. Whew, the mind boggles.

Daniel and Adam and a few ‘gun poses.’

Rachel and Sarah spent the night at a friend’s house. We, in turn, brought home Adam with us. Although the boys are rowdy, noisy (which is trouble on a Saturday morning) and full of energy, I think we had the easier group of kiddos. Poor Sarah got scared and turned around in the middle of the night and, um, putting it delicately, didn’t quite make it to the bathroom in time.

Thank you so much, Jennifer! You took excellent care of Sarah in her hour of distress.

Fifteen minutes before we were supposed to leave, I got an overwhelming urge to cut David’s hair. It was SO shaggy and messy looking, I just couldn’t take his sloppiness any longer. He said he would love to take a shower (a requirement after a haircut), “I’ve been wanting to take a shower again sometime.” What does that mean? Is someone stopping him from showering? Has he been sitting around contemplating showers for days now? I guess perhaps the last shower was quite an experience and he’s been eager to try again? Baths are blasé showers are the new ‘it.’ These are the things that a mother contemplates late at night when she reviews the day and the comments from her very precocious six year old. A definite sign the mother should stop staying up so late and get some sleep.

After Sarah and Rachel were returned to us, we set off for a dinner with Tim’s parents and some old friends. We used the drive time to go over our Proverbs chapter of the day. It being March 3rd, we read Proverbs 3. We don’t normally have Tim with us for these Proverbs devotional/study time. He has such an amazing gift for teaching. We were able to really look deeply into the meaning of the different verses. It was awesome!! It was enlightening!! It was really long!!

It was the longest Proverbs discussion time we’ve had since we’ve begun this practice. Since I’m normally the one who handles the study time, I’m not sure if I should be embarrassed by that or relieved.

Rachel listens intently from the back seat, but Sarah just can’t stay awake for Proverbs.

I find myself convicted about the length and depth of our typical Proverbs discussion. What a blessing it was to have Tim with us today! I am very challenged to take more time during our school Bible time and look carefully at the verses with the children. I DO NOT have Tim’s gift for teaching and applying word pictures to a study but I DO have the Holy Spirit living in me and there to help me understand God’s Word.

We stopped along the way to visit some friends and see the progress on their house. I took all sorts of pictures. Tina and Greg, these are for you. Enjoy. Everyone else can skim along at a clipped pace.

Now a few photos that include some kiddos (lest you think I only took pictures of boring old, I mean, new houses).

How cute is this little face!

Joshua and David play tetherball while Z. takes a ride on the tire swing.

Sarah loves her friend, A.

Look at this gorgeous face – and no braces!!

The men folk visit and tour the new house.

After a wonderful visit with our dear, house building friends, we went off (late at this point, sorry Mom and Dad) to join Tim’s parents for dinner. Tim’s dad immediately gathered the children (our five and the visiting two) and took them all off to race boats in the creek. Mom worked on the dinner preparations while Tim and I had few minutes to sit down and talk with the B’s.

You’ll have to envision the pictures of the boat race since I stayed inside where it was cozy and warm and chatted with grown ups, not taking a single picture (for the first five minutes anyway). It was grey and wet and very fun down at the creek. Two of the seven children came back with soaking wet shoes and socks. My goodness! Somebody should really talk to their mother about proper creek etiquette and the importance of keeping your feet dry. Oh wait, that mother would be me. Never mind.

We had a delicious dinner followed by a yummy cherry cobbler. The grownups sat around talking about everything from parenting to eschatology while the children watched a movie.

At one point the three girls dressed up and snuck around, presumably on Spy Duty.

Sarah wasn’t interested in the movie so she set up the doll house and played contentedly for a long time in the hallway.

She also spent some time chatting with Grandma. Aren’t they sweet, matching girls. Did you plan that, Sarah?

It was a very full day. Three of the children fell asleep on the way home. I finished the last chapter of our school book, Young Fu of the Upper Yangtze. Hooray for long drives and a good book. We spent the last 15 minutes of the drive describing for Tim the other adventures of the main character. I’m not sure he was interested in the story but he was interested in staying awake so he listened cheerfully. I was pleased to see how much of the story Rachel and Joshua were able to recount. Hooray for listening children!

So that, dear reader, if you are still here and awake, is the story of our Saturday in full pictorial glory.

Kathy

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