october 09...i know that's not creative, but it is what it is.

october...max went to the pumpkin festival with his class from school and i got in big trouble with him because i didn't anticipate the event's arrival with my superb mental telepathy and i ended up having to work on that day. didn't get to go along and chaperone and he was not very happy with me. oh well, i told him he'd get over it, and he has, i suppose. he isn't still giving me the poutie lip as valentine's day approaches!
blake continued his involvement in YLC and they met at our church for the month's meeting. blake and luke both went to the homecoming dance at cmhs. blake took amanda and luke took kristin, both couples looked beautiful(ly handsome)and i think had a really good time. max and greg and i followed them around taking pictures of them, both in b'ville and at ritter park in huntington. i wasn't able to/ promised i wouldn't follow them to dinner. but coincidentally (and i mean that honestly) kathy was at the same restaurant having dinner when my boys were, so she was my spy and took pictures for me. score!
i chaperoned blake and luke's trip to NC with collegium musicum. they go each year to the renaissance festival there. i didn't get to go last year so i was really looking forward to it. it rained like crazy but it was fun and i got to know some of the other moms who had gone along as well.
the african children's choir visited our church again this year - what an experience, all the way around. the children are precious. we were able to keep 3 of the boys with us overnight - had a great time with them. beautiful eyes, smiles and laughter. we all enjoyed them so much and would probably have kept them if we could've.
the youth praise team was invited to lead worship at our friends kacey and ben's church. the kids were excited and they really did well. they love being able to share like that beyond what they do in our own services. a really talented bunch!
max had his last elementary school halloween party - an event i thought would be sadder for me than it was. those school parties get a little less exciting (even for the kids) the older they get. this and the Christmas party were 2 of the tamest parties i've ever seen in my life. parents who attend the halloween party are encouraged to dress up too, which i didn't do till i started hanging around with kathy smith. this year i went as white trash. max had seen the wig sitting on the couch but he hadn't seen me in the whole get-up. i went in his classroom when i got to school and he looked right at me when i came in the door - blank look, no recognition whatsoever. hilarious! finally i saw the light come on for him and he said "MOM! hi!" i wore it for trick or treat that night too, and neighbors didn't know me either. i always wondered how a wig kept miley stewart's friends from knowing she's hannah montana, and now i know. hair color really throws people i guess! october also brought a new addition to our family - miss karlee jordyn grim was born to my niece megan and her husband jon. a beautiful little sweet-faced girl, and we are so happy to have her join us. =)

do you remember?

some highlights...connie and i had a repeat of our sewing sessions from last year. luke made collegium musicum so he needed a costume. his took not nearly the amount of time that blake's did. he chose red, which we thought was just beautiful. he's kinda piratie looking....flag football games continued...we enjoyed a labor day cookout at nathan and kathy's with lots of friends...we spent an afternoon at the chili cookoff in huntington with jeff and donna. that was so much fun!!! how many years has this been held and we never went??? didn't know what we were missing. we'll definitely go back...max was able to take part in a program at st. mary's medical center called healthy heart university. a 12wk nutrition/exercise education thing - very good...blake began the process of dental implants. had 8 teeth missing before braces but still had to have 4 pulled and now is having 2 implants done. make sense?...max went on a hike with the webelos den he's in. one step closer to leaving cub scouts and being a boy scout like his brothers.

well. hello there.

it seriously is just time to bite the bullet and get back at this blogging thing. my last entry was in august. august. august 2009. it's now february 2010. holy cow, i'm a blog slacker. how in the world do i go about this business of catching up? it's been suggested that i just pick up with today and forget what i've missed. but i really don't want to do that because i know that by forgetting what i've missed, i'll forget what i've missed. and although, quite honestly, while there are some things i would totally LOVE to forget, it all is a part of my life and i don't want to forget any of it. i always write on my kitchen calendar - it has big squares so i can put it all in there, all those things we do every day. so i flipped back to august this morning and jotted down the major things and i'm just going to use that list to document those months so next year when i wonder what happened on a certain day (month, in this case) i'll be able to have a little memory jogging because here it will be. okay...

august 2009. our trip to tennessee is all blogged up. i believe i left off by saying that we were on our way to my mom and dad's place at sunset beach. as usual, it was wonderful to have time with them there. some people might not like vacationing with family, but we've been there without them before and it just doesn't feel right. our days were filled with the usual - beach and ocean time, pool time, watching the gator in the pond, putt-putt golf, sunset gourmet lunches and coffee, lots of 12A time, good family time. my mamaw was still in NC at that time so we got to visit with her, too - had silly gigglie laughing loud time . and i also was blessed with some precious, quiet conversation time with her. that is one thing that i hope to never forget, as long as i live. words just between my grandmother and me. the decision was made to take her to the seattle area to live with my aunt. and my grandmother will be 100 in april. realizing that i could still call her and talk with her, but knowing also that she would be so far away, in my mind and heart i treated this time with her as a goodbye of sorts. on a sidenote, my mom and i are going out to see her in march...we are very excited. =) we had our usual really good time at sunset - love relaxing with my family.

our cousin connie and her 3 crazy precious little men paid us a visit. it was so fun watching our 3 boys with her 3 boys, and i think ALL the boys loved it. great to have time with connie - we even snuck in a testosterone-free trip to starbucks.

my max turned 11...time truly flies by.

the boys went back to school...this year we have a junior, a sophomore and a 5th grader.

blake began his year in YLC (youth leader core), something that has been so good for him in so many ways.

luke has been...luke. he'll read this sometime and say "i never do anything!" he does plenty - he is our spice, which we notice most when he's not around. fortunately that doesn't happen very often!

max and luke were involved in upward football, in its first year here locally. august was just evaluations though, no pics from that. max got to play and luke got to ref. they had a blast and what fun it was to watch.

wrapping up our time in the smokies

our week in the smokies wrapped up with a day of playing...we just kind of lazed around the cabin for awhile, then off we went. first to get a waterproof camera, then to pick up some lunch, then to little river for tubing. it looked pretty fun in the pictures i'd seen on all those brochures that are everywhere, and everyone else thought so too, so that's what we decided to do. we picked the "lazy river" option, which would take us about 1.5 hours or so. then we could go back and do it again or not, whatever we wanted to do. only $8 for all day, open to close. pretty great deal! we hopped on the shuttle with our gigantic green inner tubes and were dropped off at a little spot where we followed a path to the river. that was it - walk to the river, hop on your inner tube and float on down the river. no problem, right? haha!! for some reason i was a little weirded out by the whole thing when we stepped into the river (NO idea why, and i got over it pretty soon) and greg flipped over in his inner tube as soon as he got in it. i'm thinking, "this is just perfect."....anyway, it got 3000% better from there, except for one more flip-over for greg. as i said, it looked fun, but not like a ton of fun...but i was wrong! we had an absolute blast! just the time together, and crazy little spots we'd get ourselves stuck in, and talking on the way down the river, laughing so much along the way...the water was pretty shallow and we ended up getting what i referred to as rock enemas and/or rock suppositories in some cases - at the very least, we received plenty of rock spankings... rough on the rear in many parts of the river! some of those little rapids were feisty and a little painful, but that produced a lot of the laughter. us yelling "OW!" down the river with every rock smack, stuff like that. luke and max are lighter than the rest of us, so they went a little faster than we did. if they got too far ahead, they just hung on to a big rock or a low-hanging tree branch and waited for us to get there. when it was time to get out, i was surprised we'd been in as long as we had. we decided not to go again - greg's back was tired of being in that position, which we all understood. we'll go again next time. when we asked the boys what their favorite thing of the week was, they all said tubing and rock hopping. =) we love it that they love that kind of thing. it's just time together and time doing simple things. and the simple things are what matter. after tubing, we went to a creek spot we'd visited last time we were in the area. lots of rocks to climb on and water to jump over. SO relaxing for us and fun for those boys! went on up the mountain to the tennessee/north carolina state line...then home for grilling those burgers and relaxing after all the hard work of our relaxation. haha!! had a great supper together on the deck again, overlooking those beautiful mountains. then back inside to just lay around the rest of the evening. we're just sitting there and greg says, "there's something in the trash out there.." i was hoping he wasn't going to make blake go out right then to put the lid back on, etc., and he didn't. and were we all ever glad - the next thing greg said was "it's a bear!" and it WAS a bear. a big black bear that pulled the trash can up out of the cord that held it to the cabin and carried it to the front yard to go through it. and go through it he did. (next morning when i went to clean up after him, there wasn't much to do!!) we held the flashlight and peeked at him through the window but i couldn't get a picture that satisfied me so i decided to step out on the porch (idiot) to get a better one. i held the door open with one hand and stretched out far as i could - used the zoom and just aimed the camera his direction. then i'd run in the house to see what i got. hilarious, so stupid, and it made me n-e-r-v-o-u-s. but i got my picture. next morning, we cleaned up, packed up and headed for NC and nanny and pop's for our 2nd week..

another good one =)

we didn't get into a whole lot yesterday, which made it pretty relaxing, which made me pretty happy. nothing in particular to wake up for, so everyone rolled out of bed when they felt like it. sat on the deck for awhile then had an invitation from max to do a little hot-tubbin', so i did. and greg did. and as blake and luke got up, they did too. 5 in a hot tub is pretty interesting. good as long as no one's too wacky (met luke?) and as long as everyone gets along. we made it through! go-karts were on the agenda for the day so when everyone was cleaned up and ready we went in search of the one that looked the best. ended up at one that had 2 tracks, one track was like a parking garage wind-up, just continuous circles up. and it had some pretty good steep downhills for the way back down. greg sat out because he was afraid the bouncing cars would hurt his post-op back, but the boys and i drove. i'll just lay it out here right now that this was my first go-kart experience and i S-T-I-N-K at it! i've spent too many years driving safely(ish) - i'm too safe for my own good apparently. naturally i brought up the rear, since i spent most of my time wondering things like why is this supposed to be fun? / man this car smells bad / gosh my kids are 2 levels above me on this thing / wonder how the way i'm bouncing up and down will look on the pics greg's taking? (notice there are none included) /is it over yet? / and (on the 1st downhill, which for some reason surprised me) CRAP! where's the brake?? (answer: big red pedal by my left foot). i tried to weasel my way out of my ticket for the 2nd track but did it anyway, mainly because my sons wanted me to. they thought it was funny that i was so bad at it, i think. the 2nd track was kind of kidney shaped, one tight curve, which (you guessed it) i played it safe on. don't want to spin out you know...ha! the boys smoked me again. blake and luke almost lapped me, matter of fact, but i refused to let that happen. next time they better look out. i might have something to prove..

next we went to the old mill area and walked around in a few shops we like. there's a kitchen/cooking kind of store i like to go in that is a hit with the boys because there are always food samples out of the things they sell. next door is a toy shop, which this trip is luke's favorite destination. lots of "old" toys from way back when i was little. greg found one of those little dogs that you pull around with the plastic red cord in the front. all these years later, i still remember the sound it made when it was pulled. there wasn't one out for me to play with. i found some crazy sunglasses and wore them around the entire time, to max's dismay. =) max bought handcuffs, luke bought a potato gun. nice. they spent the rest of the day handcuffing each other. luke had to wait til we got to the grocery store to buy some ammo, only to discover his tater gun doesn't work so well. next stop was the candy store. made a point to inhale in there - yummy smells. didn't do too much damage in there but did buy a little. it's chocolate, why not? had an earlyish supper at the old mill restaurant, went to the grocery store for luke's potato and for supper fixins for tonight and came home. hit the hot tub one more time (again, all 5 of us) and then hit the sack. so far today, only 3/5 of us are up. luke's awake, we saw him on facebook - but i think blake's still asleep. greg's reading a non-preacher type book, max is blankied up on the couch watching espn, and i'm blogging. good morning so far. today's plan is tubing on the river, an afternoon of creek/rock hopping and then home where it doesn't matter how we look (or smell) for grilling burgers and another supper on the deck with these gorgeous mountains.

still in TN...

since we took "big mama" up on her offer of free aquarium tickets, we spent a bit of the morning/early afternoon at the west gate resort hearing their deal about timeshares at their resorts. we were corralled in a lobby with the rest of the crazies who said yes to big mama waiting for our turn. a man named steven came for us - he turned out to be pretty nice and it seemed genuine, even though i know they're paid to be. they gave us a little buffet lunch of various salads and then sat us down for the kill. we listened (and listened and listened), ate, then took a tour of the place. it really was VERY nice. lots of amenities. a huge indoor water park that seduced our boys. and of course they did all they could "just for us" because we're such a "lovely family"...but we said no (nicely of course) got our $20 back, got our aquarium tickets and hit the road. it actually was beneficial for us as a family. greg and i got a chance to practice just saying no to something that would be awesome and fun but that we just don't need to make a priority. it would involve stretching our budget to the breaking point, and making time/work/family sacrifices that just aren't worth it for a pretty place to stay. and it gave our boys a chance to voice their opinions/desires as part of the decision. they loved it, but they love playing in the river, so they're really ok with whatever we do. and when we laid out the basic facts instead of all the pretty stuff the men were saying, and what it would involve for our family, blake said "just say no"...and his brothers agreed. i was really proud of them in those moments. =) off we went back into gatlinburg and to the aquarium. our boys love aquariums (so do i) and we've been several times, so nothing's a big shock marine-life-wise to us. til we saw these ginormous japanese spider crabs. CRAZY. wow, they're huge. we love the big tank with all the sharks in it. and luke, of course, loves the gift shop. when we were done there, we wandered around gatlinburg again. visited a different candy shop but it didn't compare to aunt mahalia's so of course we returned there. bought some candy there...hot almonds and cashews from another place...some popcorn...just strolled around and enjoyed it. and greg, blake and max got some more leather bracelets at the woodcarver place. we decided to fit in a game of putt putt while we were out so we hit hillbilly golf, which we all enjoyed last time we were here. it's putt putt built up on the side of a mountain, you just play your way down. then it was home - hot tube, grilled steaks, baked potatoes and supper on the deck to enjoy that beautiful view. i love my family. it was another great day. =)

tennessee =)

getting on with vacation, we're spending the first week in tennessee at warren and lita's cabin. we stayed here once before and it is just beautiful and comfy and homey. we love it here, and are so blessed to be able to be here again. there are a lot of things to do around here, or nothing to do if we'd rather. the boys love to be in the hot tub! yesterday morning max asked if he could get in the hot tub and was pretty shocked that i said yes. like that's strictly an evening activity or something. when we arrived, we were met with a gorgeous view. so beautiful here! we got all moved in then went to get some supper. at the suggestion of our friend brian, we tried out the wood grill buffet. he said it was the biggest buffet he'd ever seen in his life. he just might be right! we were more than full by the time we were done in there. went to the grocery store to get some things for the week then back to the cabin. got a good night's sleep then yesterday we played all day. spent a lot of time in the morning just being lazy - time on the deck sipping coffee (and facebooking haha!!), big boys sleeping in, that kind of thing. we finally motivated and went to pancake pantry for breakfast, which we'd been looking forward to. of course by this time it wasn't breakfast, it was lunch, but oh well. best story from this meal is this: max ordered "banana pineapple triumph" which was bananas wrapped in crepes, covered with a pineapple glaze/syrup and whipped cream. he ate his bacon and a little of my hash browns and some of his crepes. then he looked a little sad and when we asked him what was wrong he said he didn't feel so good. off to the bathroom he went and when he came back he told me his food was more like "triumph of the toilet"...eat and puke. oh well. too much sugar for max! we strolled around gatlinburg for a little while after we ate, visiting some places we liked last time we were here, like aunt mahalia's candy shop and a woodcarving place i can't ever remember the name of. on the way back to the van, one of those people who always hollers at you wanting to know if you want to buy tickets to something hollered at us and we actually stopped. she called herself "big mama"...long story short, today we're going to go look at a condo for 90 minutes, be fed lunch then we get 5 free tickets to the ripley's aquarium. hope it actually works out that way! the boys had been wanting to go there but didn't want to spend our "jar money" on that. so this will be good. at least i hope so. spent the rest of the day in water of some sort. most of that time was on some part of the little pigeon river. luke and max got in and went over to the other side in some very very (very) cold water. their bellies were so red! max was a little nervous finding his way back over to us. next thing we saw was blake taking off his shoes and rolling up his shorts to wade out to help max back over. we didn't even ask him to, which makes me so proud. good brother! i love it when they love each other. blake only got to encourage (heckle?) luke - luke didn't want any help. that made it pretty entertaining, because he really could've used it! beautiful day and gorgeous surroundings. we really enjoyed ourselves. on the way home we decided to go find a swimming pool we were told we could use. the boys and greg got in, i only just barely got in. holy cow, it was freezing! pretty sure it was just ice cubes newly thawed. left there to go home and grill some steaks and bake some potatoes, a plan which was thwarted by a thunderstorm rolling in and no power in a very dark cabin when we got home. so we took our worn out scummy little selves to pigeon forge where they had power and went to the apple barn for supper. excuse me - the applewood farmhouse restaurant. yeah, whatever, it's the apple barn. as i said, we were a little worn out, which made us a bit giddy. so of course they seated us in the center of the room, where our boys became the floor show. especially luke, who was in mighty mighty wild and crazy form. we ate too much, stopped by a "stupid store" as luke calls them so he could buy something stupid, then came home. yay for power! got a decent night's sleep so now we're going to get motivated for today. the aquarium (if big mama wasn't scamming us) and whatever else we decide to get into. =)

american idol tour 09 (WOO.HOO!!)

there is still a lot to catch up on that i've not blogged these past few months but i guess the best method is to just jump right back in. i'm still going to try to fill in the "missing months" but i need to concentrate on the now. =) "now", we're on vacation, which we started out with a trip to greensboro to see the american idol concert tour. we're all AI junkies but have never been to one of the tour shows. this year's top 10 was really the best ever, so we decided to splurge. we were headed south anyway and the date worked, so greensboro it was. and that involved staying in a hotel overnight, which is always a hit with the boys (and their mom) because for some reason we just love doing that. one of our favorite things but so rare. we had a GREAT time at the concert. i'm not sure who i expected to attend but it seemed kind of like a family affair. lots of families with young kids, lots of "elderly" as luke calls anyone over my age. =) better atmosphere for my kids than i thought might be and i'm grateful for that. soon as we sat down the guy (i think he was a guy) behind me said "who's ya'll's favorite???" he was an adam fan. the people who came in and sat next to me ended up chitty chatting with me (i can seriously talk to anyone) throughout the concert and passing their binoculars my way in case i needed a better view. we had good seats, really, even though we were in the back. corner/first row of lower level so no big noggins to block my view of danny, kris or matt! it was a 3 hour show and we loved every moment, except for lil and megan. yikes. they're just lucky to be there. after the concert we went to steak 'n shake for some burgers. it was late but we hadn't eaten since about 1:00ish. it was fun and took care of our bellies so then it was off to the hotel and dreamland. next morning was actually relaxing - we didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn to get going so we got to be lazy and sleep. greg made a coffee run so i ended up needing to be awake to drink my starbucks. such a sacrifice, right? i did discover that the hotel pillows are huge enough that it was possible to sip from a horizontal position.

sarah beth turns 30

a great part of our april was celebrating sarah beth's 30th birthday. it was a big surprise. kate and s.b.'s friend julie (and others i'm sure) worked hard to pull it off. on that day, some out of town friends took her to a movie and kept her out of the house. i believe that sarah beth was told she needed to be home for a family dinner later in the day. she was utterly and completely surprised, and overwhelmed with joy. chokes me up just thinking about her that day. she was surrounded by wall-to-wall people who love her. her doctors couldn't have prescribed a more perfect medicine.

a little of april

lots happened in april. and may. and june. and so far in july....the dreaded slide show is the only way to go. otherwise, i'll never get back to my normal late blogging. it's been suggested that i forget the months i've missed and just pick up with today. i can't bring myself to do that. it'll take me a bit, but i'm going to have it all documented somehow. here's some of april!

HA!

the previous post says "may 2", but that's because that's when i saved it as a draft during my first attempt at catching up. i posted it today, july 4!

madness! madness i say! i am beyond behind...

just to catch up a little...lets start with march.

there was a seagull in the starbucks drive thru one morning when kathy and i were there. pretty odd to see. and no idea what he was nibbing on, really. kathy was convinced she could go pet him. she couldn't. i'm sure i'm not allowed to post that picture so i won't even try.









blake and luke were in all-county choir. i think this was our last "all-something" event for this school year.









troop 59's annual mulch madness went well. blake and luke got to skip school friday and help out because they had a youth retreat friday evening through sunday and couldn't help out on saturday. messy work but they all seem to enjoy it.









blake and luke, along with the rest of our youth praise band, led worship ata youth retreat. i went to pick them up on sunday and made it in time for worship that morning. WOW. they did an awesome job. and they got a lot of encouragement from people there that weekend, which was so great for them. they just get better and better all the time.












blake got his very first "real" job, besides mowing grass...he's working at chick-fil-a. part of the deal was he had to get a haircut. he had been thinking about doing that anyway, so it wasn't that big of a deal for him. he loves it, we love it. and i can see his eyes. =)

more beth moore

a slideshow was adding to the LPM site after i posted earlier with pics from the conference. thought i'd share it. i got a little surprise toward the end when i saw myself signing one of the pink boxing gloves...blake said "but momma they don't show your face!"...i told him that's totally ok with me. =) proof i was really there right?


LPL Minsters' Wives Nashville TN from Rich Kalonick on Vimeo.

a little taste of "my" beth moore conference =)

in preparation for the ministers' wives conference in nashville, beth moore posted an entry on the LPM blog asking for comments from ministers' wives - to complete a sentence that went something like, "as you prepare to minister to ministers' wives we think you should know that...". she made it clear that only ministers' wives were to answer, and that all should be anonymous. and the comments were hidden, so that no one had access. at the conference she said that she'd received about 350 or so responses to her post. before each session, they rolled a few on the powerpoint for us all to read. some were sad. some were really funny. what i found interesting was that as we were silent and read each one as it went past, the audible reaction from everyone in that massive room (around 1500 in attendance) was the same. the feeling that comes over you when you realize you are not alone...that there are at least 1499 other women living a life quite similar to your own...that other women have some of the very same thoughts you have...that they get it...overwhelming. what we read is in her blog entry for today - it's called "the life of a minister's wife".

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.