Summer's End

Well, we made it through the entire twelve weeks of family camp! The last week was especially fun, as some friends of ours came up as guests - Pike, Andria and Nash Wisner from Dallas. It was my first experience knowing guests before their arrival, and it makes me look forward to next year, when we'll greet returning guests as friends. It's been hard to see our staff go home, since they've been the source of so much fun this summer. I've been amazed at the servanthood, leadership, and Christlikeness that we've seen in this staff - some as young as 17, and none over 25. It's the staff that makes this place special, and they've ministered to our guests in many ways.

I have a lot of great memories of this summer's staff, and this is my favorite:
For most of the summer, I worked with three lovely Tennesseeans in Kid's Club. I had a particularly rough morning one day, and I needed one of the other ladies to take the kids on a scavenger hunt for me. I asked one of them, Hannah Jo, if she would mind taking the kids on the hunt, to which she shrugged her shoulders and replied, "I don't care to." I was surprised that she turned me down so easily, since she knew that I needed the rest that morning.

Confused, I went on to Sarah, and posed the same question. Sarah shrugged her shoulders, replied, "Sure!" and took the kids out for me that morning. Later on at lunch, I overheard another staff member from Tennessee ask Hannah if she'd like some sweet tea with her meal, and I heard the same reply from that morning: "I don't care to." She then held out her glass and her friend filled the glass to the brim with sweet tea. That's when I realized that a Tennesseean saying "I don't care to" is the same as a Texan (or anyone else) saying, "I don't mind". Hannah was mortified that I'd thought she declined to take the kids on the hunt that morning. In fact, she didn't understand why I asked Sarah to take the kids out after she'd agreed to do it. We went round and round on the phrase, and I never could convince her that she was saying it wrong...silly Tennesseean.

We have just three weekend conferences in the month of September, and then we can settle down and get ready for the winter and for Levi. At 27 weeks, Levi is about two pounds in weight and nine inches in length. Now that he's bigger, I often feel simultaneous kicks and punches on opposite sides of my belly. He wakes up a little bit after meals and dances for me, but almost always settles down by the time his daddy comes near to feel him move. A good friend of mine sent some baby clothes and supplies in the mail, and the newborn onesies and diapers look unbelievably tiny - it's hard to imagine taking care of such a small person!

Now that things are slowing down, we're finally settling into our house. It's been challenging going from a three-bedroom to a one-bedroom house, because we have a lot of stuff! We're getting creative with our storage space, and I hope that we'll have most of the boxes emptied or stowed by the end of the day. I haven't been able to do anything with the nursery yet, and it's driving me crazy. I was thrilled when Rob found a nice crib in the ranch's storage room, but we still need to find a changing table and the nursery bedding. My mom is coming up this weekend(!) and we'll go hunting together for these things. I'm really looking forward to having this time with my mom, and I'm glad we're going to get to go shopping for baby things together, since I've had to share the last few months with her from a distance.

Before I go, here's the latest belly picture, taken a few days ago. Rob decided to sit this photo session out.


And on request, here is a picture of all the family's boots: Dad's, Mom's and Levi's:

The sad thing is that since Levi has two parents with large flipper feet, he won't fit in those tiny boots very long!

Lynda