Racing, riding and rejoicing

This weekend I've really been enjoying my children. Not that I don't usually enjoy them, or being around them (well, granted, there are occasional moments when I wish they would just disappear for a short while). It's just that I've had several opportunities to watch them grow and learn new things and just interact with eachother.

The first event of the weekend was with the kid's AWANA group. They started going to AWANA at GBC while we were in California. So we wanted them to continue while we are here in Dallas. Both Matt and I grew up going to AWANA and we love it and want our kids to have the opportunities to be involved in it as well, and learn that memorizing God's word is good, and a fun thing to do. Anyway, after searching online for a nearby church with an AWANA program, Matt found one he thought would work. So our first week here in Dallas he took them. THAT was NOT a good experience. Basically the AWANA program at that church was totally chaotic and was the babysitting program for the Wednesday night church service. So the next week they tried a different church and it was a good experience, and that's where they're staying.


Anyway, all of that to say that Friday night was the "Grand Prix" car races. The kids got to race cars that they picked out and painted. It was fun to cheer for them as they watched their cars race. And it was especially fun to see Nathan's car keep doing well. He made it to the final round and finished 6th place with his car. Go Nathan!



Today was a beautiful day. After several freezing cold days and rain, it was wonderful to see the sun, and have a warmer day. The kids got to go outside and play, and Matt worked with K and N, practicing riding bikes. And today was the day! All these days when K has been so scared to try something new, and always was saying "I can't do it", she finally got over that and rode her bike! It was so fun to see how excited she was, and I was so proud of her for continuing to try until she got it.

Because of the beautiful weather the kids spent a lot of time outdoors today. Hooray! I loved to see them all playing happily together, pulling eachother (Julianne included) around in the wagon. So many times they are competing with eachother, or arguing over toys or something, so it was beautiful to see them working and playing together.

Then they came in and spent hours playing together with one of Matt's board games. They didn't have a clue as to how to actually play it, but they had fun putting all the pieces around the board and creating their own games. I love how my children can be so creative with whatever they are doing, whether it's playing a board game, or crawling around pretending to be dogs, or running a bus route on the sidewalk.