Friday Brain Dump

Well.

My mom mentioned I've been kind of scarce around here (hi, Mom!)  Yah.  We've been a little busy lately, and I don't say that like it's a badge of honor, y'know?  I'd rather not be so busy.  One year I wrote in our Christmas letter that I felt like I was waging a one-woman battle against a hectic pace of life, and let me tell you, friends, this week I'm LOSING!  But we had so much good stuff to do...

Like...

*  Wyatt started his job working the gate at the local motocross, on Thursday afternoons.  He seems so grown up when I hear him tell someone, "I was at work..." or something like that.

*  The boys are in charge of three lawns (and hoping for more).  I don't know what it's like where you live, but around here the grass sort of lies dormant all winter (too cold and dark to grow).  And then spring comes.  You take the warm-ish weather, lengthening days, and lots of moisture and, stand back, because the grass starts growing like bamboo on steroids.  Of course, it still rains.  A LOT.  And then it's too wet to mow.  So when we get a sunny day and it dries out they have to drop everything and go mow RIGHT THEN.  Good thing we homeschool.

*  Wyatt and Tate went to a Marksmanship Training Activity, hosted by a nearby CAP group.  Oh my word, they were - as my dad would say - in HOG HEAVEN.  They camped out at a gun club and got to shoot .22 rifles and do archery.  Fortunately they remembered my advice to pack up their tent and sleeping bags first thing in the morning, before the rain hit.  So they came home tired, soaked, and happy as fleas in a doghouse.  And I was happy, too, because at least all their gear stayed dry.  (Because I do not enjoy the aroma of soggy sleeping bags airing in my living room.)

*  They made it back just in time for (or a little late for, since someone got lost picking them up...) a chapel potluck and game night.  Oh, it was a little piece of heaven, since the theme was "Comfort Food".  The pastor's wife, Jane, made chicken with home-made noodles that made my taste-buds want to cry for joy.  I think we have Dan and Emily to thank for the teriyaki chicken.  And there weren't any leftovers of my Lutheran Funeral Potatoes either.

*  All that delicious food, won't be fixed - I'm afraid - with this.  And who in their right mind decided that this was exercise???

*  While they were gone, none of Gunnar's friends were available to play - a great tragedy, from his perspective.  Meanwhile, I was trying to get school planned for the next week, finish my Sunday school lesson, and prepare for our Bible study (which I'm co-leading... must be prepared!) and there was Gunnar.  Lonely and bored.  And good heavens, I love that boy, but he can talk the paint right off the walls.  I have to confess that he had Quite A Bit of screen time on Saturday.

*  And then came... Wedding Week.  Sweet, sweet friends from the chapel were married yesterday.  We've occasionally hosted Jim (missionary to Myanmar) when he passed through town.  Bless that boy, when I offered him a spare room with a lumpy futon, he took me up on it and we have loved getting to know him over the past two or three years.  And when he revealed an interest in Breanna, (Gunnar's first Sunday school teacher when we came to the chapel, adored by all of us, and a creative and godly young woman) we were practically giddy.  Not many people get engaged after ONE DATE (and an email/facebook/skype relationship), but these two were meant for each other.  So...

*  We hosted Jim's friend and fellow missionary and his wife, in town for the week for the wedding.  Let me tell you, if you're feeling a little hospitality-challenged, missionaries from third-world countries are really low-impact house guests :D  And fun and interesting as well.

*  I did something I'd never done before - made home-made potato salad (for the wedding reception).  I kind of favor the more eggy potato salad, with sweet pickles, so when they handed me their recipe for an egg-less dill-relish variety I was a bit skeptical.  Still, I followed the plan, made my ten pounds of potato salad, and it was FIIIINE.

*  I had fun putting together a little assortment of a wedding gift - mugs, teas, and treats - and then forgot to wrap it until an hour before we needed to leave.  I know, genius, right?

*  We had to leave early, to drop Wyatt off at work (he joined us for the reception) and got five minutes from the house before I realized we'd forgotten the salad.  (I couldn't exactly leave it out on the counter so I'd remember it with mayonnaise in it, now could I?)  We had just enough time...

*  And the wedding.  It was fabulous.  Extra fabulous because we all have such unreserved joy for these two.  The wedding was reverent, yet fun and very personal.  The boys all came away from the wedding and reception talking about what a fabulous time they had, and how they've never been to a wedding like that, and guess what - there wasn't anything about it that would uniquely appeal to adolescent boys.  Which tells me something even better...

they get it.

Okay, not completely.  I mean, they are still adolescent boys.  But they get it that we are freely and truly celebrating this relationship, this marriage because it is glorifying to God, and that's a joyful thing!

*  So, now I'm ready for some down time.  Wyatt and Tate are working at the Guard Building where CAP meets (probably mowing, weeding, cleaning, etc.) tomorrow afternoon, and then we're BBQing at my parents' in the evening.  And I can't forget that on Sunday we're in charge of "Greeting and Treating" (bringing snacks), so is it any wonder that...

Wish me luck.