it's been a full week!

last sunday was so beautiful and warm (though windy) that some of us decided to have sunday school outside. "some of us" being nathan and kathy followed closely by yours truly. this was a huge hit with our kiddos of course! i only had 1 little boy and 1 little girl that morning. and i did give them an abbreviated lesson before we hit the playground. our lesson was on adam and eve and their choice to disobey God. we talked about what the word "choice" means. i held out one hand and said it held the good thing and my other hand held the bad or not-as-good thing and asked which we should choose. i frequently like to present things in such a way that it seems like i'm not sure of the answer myself. most of the time they're pretty sure i'm kidding but sometimes they're not so sure. this was one of those times. my 1 little girl looked at me like i didn't have a brain in my head and said "just pick God's favorite..." in kind of a "well...duh!" tone of voice. i thought that was profound. i want a bracelet like that instead of one of those wwjd ones. i finally cut them loose and off to the playground we went. they had a lot of fun, even if they did have a hard time keeping their animal crackers snack from blowing away. kathy and i each got a freebie bag from the wv race for the cure komen folks last year and both of us have been using ours as a purse. andrew and aly always point out to me that their mom has a purse like that. besides that, we both have the same neon pink cover (or phone diaper, as she calls it) for our phones. we noticed on the playground that day that we both have the same pink clinique bonus bag in our purses, stuffed with who knows what. cracked us up. such goobs.

this weekend was the county social studies fair. max and his friends won first place in their category. he had fun and nanny and poppy and luke had fun getting to be there to see some of the other projects, including my niece ginny's. she won second place in her category. such smart little people in our family. luke was a quick thinker and ran up to get this picture for me. i'm so glad he did! it was also the weekend of blake's all-state chorus in morgantown. he said the concert went really well and he had a great time with his friends. here's the standard "creasy boy going out the door and far away for something without his momma" picture.

i didn't get to go to either of those biggies in those 2 boys' lives and here's my excuse. several years ago i had a ticket to go to the first ever just for ministers' wives beth moore conference, held in chattanooga. i ended up choosing not to attend. i forget exactly what it was, but one or more of the boys needed something that the money intended for travel/hotel could help take care of. i just hoped that someday she would do it again. well, "again" was this weekend. i've had my ticket for quite a while. i need to mention that some sweet and anonymous women from my church family quietly and sneakily took up a bit of money for me - gave it to me for my own use, in case i found something i wanted for that weekend. isn't that a great surprise? so kind of them, but that's the way they are. greg went along with me - not to the conference, it was girls only - but he planned to use the time to read or just hang around or whatever he found to do. so off to nashville we went. we went down thursday, just gave us more time to relax. we went to p.f. chang's for supper. i've heard that it's a great place but we'd never been to one, probably because i don't even think there is one around here. it was GREAT. if you have gross p.f. chang stories, don't tell me because we had a great experience there. YUM YUM YUM. my dinner was delicious but it was hot as fire, no joke. had moments when i thought my mouth might explode. they kept the water coming - sometimes i'd just take a big sip and hold it in my mouth just letting the tip of my tongue sit in the ice water. worth it though, so yummy. i didn't take many pictures while we were there - didn't want to seem too much like a dork who never gets to go anywhere. but i do have this pic of our cute little teeny tiny desserts. cutest desserts ever. they brought fortune cookies...get this...mine was empty! (now what the heck does THAT mean??) our server brought me another one pronto - confucious probably said something about having an empty fortune cookie. so i pull out the fortune of this one and it says "beef". (excuse me??) don't worry, i was looking at the wrong side. there was something inspirational and good fortune-ish on the flip side. saturday we went for a late breakfast to the loveless cafe. i'd seen that place on foodnetwork several years ago, i think on an al roker show. greg remembered seeing it too. it's not on any main drag, you have to mean to go there. and it looks like a dump. had we just been driving by and hadn't known in advance that it was good, we'd have passed it right up. they have pictures up on the walls of all the famous people who've eaten there. it looked like maybe everyone who'd ever been famous in that city has. and their curtains are waist aprons. SO CUTE. we both ended up with plates piled high of GOOD stuff and we ate more than our fair share of biscuits and jams. they're known for their biscuits, and i know why. deeeelicious. greg wanted to go see the opryland hotel and we were going to until we saw that it costs $18 to park. no respectable creasy's gonna shell out $18 to go look in a hotel. so we went to the mall. there's a bass pro shop there and greg's always wanted to go look in one. i think it must be the world's largest bass pro shop. HUmongous. they have maps available for everyone so you know where you are in the store. i wasn't looking forward to going in but i ended up really enjoying myself. they have lots of dead taxidermied animals all over the place. and mannequins dressed in flannel involved in various sorts of outdoorsy activities hanging from the ceiling. one guy was on a wooden footbridge and trying to get away from a wildcat that was after him...the bridge was falling apart..so much danger! they also had an aquarium. i was just expecting, oh, maybe bass. but they had a monstrous catfish in it. it probably could've eaten one of the kids that was looking at it. i got some hard candy for my dad - horehounds...they remind me of my papaw (my dad's dad) because he kept them in his pocket with butterscotch and cinnamon candies and was prepared whenever i might need a little something. =)

the beth moore conference was friday evening and saturday morning. as i said before, it was only for ministers' wives. there were about 1500 of us there. i found out recently that my friends denise and sandra were also going to be there, so we made sure to find each other and sit together. one of beth's goals in doing this conference was to encourage and love on us. i think that was the goal of all of those involved in organizing the weekend. everyone was so kind to us. and the pampering started from our entrance. on friday evening when we went in we were each handed a box of scripture memory cards. on the way out, we were given a book of quotes from one of her Bible studies. on saturday morning we were given another of those books of quotes (different study) as well as a 90 day personal Bible study/journal on Jesus. we had a special time of prayer for cindy winters, the widow of pastor fred winters who was murdered last week in maryville, illinois. it was recorded and is going to be sent to cindy and her daughters, along with notes from some of us and a pair of boxing gloves signed by some of us. (the boxing gloves were part of one of our teaching sessions.) the leadership team felt that this large group of ministers' wives could be of some encouragement to her. i hope that we are... travis cottrell and his praise team were there to lead worship and were incredible as always. i look forward to that about as much as anything. and the teaching sessions were so so so good. i'm still absorbing what she gave to us - what God gave to us through her. such a comfort and encouragement to feel understood, and not just on the minister's wife level, but on the woman level as well. i may say more in my blog someday about some of the things we talked about. but right now i'm just holding it closely and thinking on it all. so many things i need to do within myself in response to it. many things that God has been dealing with me about and working on in my heart were touched on. i've been reading in galatians in my life journal readings...and it's just like God to make sure beth taught from galatians this weekend. doesn't make me feel picked on, though. it makes me feel (and know for certain that i am) adored by God.