...

 

Hebron,  Texas Roadhouse, chiropractor,  taekwondo,  galentines, Olympics , Night Watch, UFO, updates coming....

Warming Up

Back at Hebron Christian Academy this morning for another fun service with the kids - it takes me a little over an hour to get there, so that's been a lot of driving this week.  But the kids are having a great time with all the fun and games, and then after that the messages and music are just powerful.  It's almost like a Summer Xtreme, the anticipation, the explosion of fun, the moving services.  We're making quite the impact, I think.

Back at home, back at the church.  The crew is keeping up with the greenery, pruning trees and laying out mulch and pine straw.  It feels like spring out there, over seventy degrees.  Just to make us pay for the warmth, next week I hear it'll dive back down to the twenties.  But in the mean time, I'm enjoying this weather immensely.  Tonight I was with another large group of people enjoying the weather - we're on this outdoor track at the college, and even as it was getting dark, the temperature was just magical.  It's a neat little place, with a lot of people out there using the track for exercise. Of course, I entered my milage on the virtual path I'm taking through Dublin, virtually.  

While that was going on, Maddie was in taekwondo, back again and helping out with the kids, and then on to her own training with the leadership class.  She had a good day, going to get some coffee this morning with Emma and then off to chapel.

Today was a huge day for USA in the Olympics, just an amazing day.  Firstly, there was the long awaited women's ice hockey final.  We've been watching a good number of these games along the way.  I think one of the things that's been great this time around is that we have the option to watch the entire events, and that really gives a lot of context to things.  We've been watching the whole games, and we know the character, playing style and talent of each of these athletes on the team really well by this point, and we also know that Canada is a tough nation to beat on the ice, dominating this event since the beginning, although we've managed to squeeze in a few victories here or there.  We came in with an incredible record, only allowing one goal and just destroying all the competition, including Canada, who we beat 5-0.  But here at the Gold Medal Final, things got intense.  Canada scored early in the second period, and it stayed at 1-0 for a long, long, brutal time.  The second period ended and we had twenty minutes to score, and despite the onslaught of our offense, nothing was getting past their goalie.  It was getting desperate at the end, and you could sense the inevitable coming:  Canada was going to win again.  Even worse, they were going to win after we had done so well this time.  And we would have to wait another four years.  Time was not our friend, the clock winding down.  Only two minutes to go, and it would be all over... and then it happened.  What a shot!  Edwards slapped one from further back, right into the mix of defenders towards that goal, and Knight redirected that puck right past the goalie... and into the net.  Just like that, the score was tied.  The Canadian team and fans were stunned.  And as the clock wound down to the end the third period, it was now the moment for overtime, and sudden death:  the next goal ends the game.  This was an edge-of-your-seat contest, three-on-three with the goalies sitting there taking shot after shot.  And right when the Canadians were switching out players, right in that mix, Keller raced forward towards the goal, slid around a defender and shot this amazing score to seal the comeback.  USA won the gold!

We haven't seen something that thrilling since Shaun White's thrilling gold medal run at the half-pipe.  Really amazing stuff.  And on top of all that, we did really well at the figure skating rink too - all at the same time.  We're watching that entire competition tomorrow, because it's late.

Tonight we finished "The Fifth Elephant," and everything's all wrapped up there with another solid story from the Discworld.  We're moving right along to the next book in the Watch series, one called "Night Watch," which I read some time ago, pretty much when it first was published.  Wow, I remember stopping by a bookstore on the Georgia-Florida line and always looking for these Discworld novels to pick up.  We'd look around this book store for a while, just checking things out on our way home.  I forgot how much we used to do that, just staying there for almost an hour looking at books.  

Anyway, we said our prayers after all was done tonight.  One more day at Hebron tomorrow, so it's time to get some rest.

...

 ...

ice hockey, Princess and the Frog, Hebron, Marcom presentations, warmer weather, watching skiing, Factor meals, Exploremores, updates coming soon...

Lunar New Year

Happy New Year!  It's the Year of the Horse, the Lunar New Year celebration kicking off today, and we did our usual outing for some Chinese food tonight, spending some time talking with the employees there and wishing them a happy new year.  Maddie and Nate had a table to themselves for a nice little date night, and I got some take-out and brought it home for Mom, so the two of us could eat together.  I plugged in a CD of some Chinese music I bought in Nanning, and Mom had some decorations out too!

 

Later on that night, we watched "Kung Fu Panda," the last movie we saw before heading out to China to get Maddie.  That was nice.  We saw some Olympics too, but tonight was all about celebrating Chinese New Year.  

This morning, we were at Hebron Christian Academy again - KidPak is doing a week of services there for Spiritual Emphasis Week.  It was lots of fun for the kids there!  Afterwards, we continued the tradition of going to Waffle House afterwards together as a team!

And here's my favorite part of that tradition:  Elvis' "American Trilogy." For more than thirty years, every time I stop at a Waffle House, I use the jukebox to play that song at least once.  Today... three times!  Here you can see Pastor Lance and I singing along with the King of Rock and Roll!

Here's my first post card I got for walking today, the virtual path to Dublin.  While Maddie and Nate were eating at Wang's, I was at the Gainesville College track getting in some walking.  

It was a good day today - also Mardi Gras, believe it or not.  We'll honor that tomorrow with a viewing of "The Princess and the Frog."  But today was all about the Lunar New Year, and speaking of lunar activity, we read some more from "The Fifth Elephant," which of course features some villainous werewolves... but don't worry.  Sam Vimes knows how to deal with those.  We read tonight, and then it was time for prayers... and a good night's rest!

Easter Production

Okay, calm down.  There's no huge epic Easter production this year.  Nevertheless, Maddie and her fellow students were tasked to come up with a few different marketing ideas should there actually be an Easter production.  These are actually all ideas she came up with, and as a bonus, she actually took all of these photos.  That gave her a huge edge with these different ideas - here's just a few of them, and they all look great!

She's having a good time with her courses, learning a good bit and making some great projects.  Meanwhile, the rest of us have been working at KidPak towards this weekend, and also with a meeting at the church we've been working towards the week at Hebron.  Here's something else:

Valentine's season is over with, and so it's time to put on the green.  I started a new themed walk, one around the streets of Dublin!  It's a virtual walk, and here's the race bib for it that I can print out and have around for the next month or so as I walk around in Ireland.  Fun!

We were watching some curling and ice hockey tonight, and we've been checking out the figure skating too.  And we're so close to finishing "The Fifth Elephant" now - the story is starting to wrap up, although there's still a villain lurking about.  We said our prayers afterwards, and it was time to get some sleep!

Helping Pizza

 

It's been a while since we did a song-and-dance routine, but this one was a lot of fun.  I was feeling a bit silly on Tuesday or Wednesday and was thinking of a stand-alone song where we told a slightly similar story of Rebecca and Isaac, but we did it with the main characters being a hot dog, a slice of pizza and an ice cream cone.  Our series has these food characters on the booklet, so Mom got all these costumes last year, so why not?  The question of our skit would be who is it that can help our poor slice of pizza?  It was super fun and quirky, and on top of that, I asked Pastor Lance's young daughter to join us, and you can see she's having the time of her life!

The rest of the service was really great too, a service all about generosity and going the extra mile.  But the worship with the kids was really powerful, and it made for a great day.  I had a concentration/memory game that followed the "Better Together" theme, where kids matched up Bible characters, and by the end of it all, we just had a very strong morning at KidPak.  These are just a few of the pictures Maddie took today.

We got home, and it was a relaxing day the rest of the day, a "day of rest," which was somewhat like yesterday.  There was still some further cleaning up to do, but also on the agenda was this "webinar" that Mom and I attended, joining Perry Stone and Bill Cloud online for a few messages.

Mom had food ready for us this afternoon, and we enjoyed a good big lunch - Maddie had her pizza, but I had shrimp, and that was good.  We watched a few more Winter Games today, including a really great comeback for the US Women's Curling team against China, and then the Mens Ice Hockey team winning their match against Germany.  We've got some great players on that US team!

Tonight we read a bit more from "The Fifth Elephant," getting closer to the end of the book there.  The issue of the stolen dwarf bread is resolved, yes.  But Wolfgang is still out there, and despite already being bested, he'll probably be focused on coming back for a bit of revenge.  We'll see as we continue to read tomorrow!

We said our prayers tonight before bed, and got to sleep fairly quickly tonight.  It's been a nice weekend!

Happy Valentine's Day

Happy Valentine's Day!  Mom and Maddie woke up and found some goodies on the table, but so did I!  You can see quite a table full of stuff up there.  And yes, you can see some stuff from Buc-ee's there - there's Buc-ee with the Valentine's Day lollipop, along with a soap sponge from Buc-ee's.  And Maddie got the Buc-ee's rubber ducky, playing cards and some Buc-ee's spicy Cheez Puffs too.  

And check out the gifts I got!  Mr. Peanut is there, along with a Funko Pop of Mr. Peanut, and a big tray of peanuts there too!  You may be wondering about Clarice up there, and yes that's a gift for Mom.  She brought that up at Christmas time, wanting a plush Clarice to go with the Rudolph we have.  Clarice is there, as well as a copy of the movie "Hairspray" from the 1980's.  We haven't seen that one yet.

Anyway, lots of nice gifts today, plus flowers and cards - it's almost like Christmas, but with more hearts.  Oh, but look at the chocolate!

Looks like a big chocolate hockey puck!  Speaking of which, you can see that ice hockey game in the background there - we were definitely in the Olympic zone today watching all kinds of curling, ice hockey, speed skating, skiing, and skeleton racing too.  We got a few things done today, cleaning up the basement somewhat and moving some furniture about.  But it was a pretty quiet day throughout.

Tonight we watched "Eddie the Eagle" and afterwards watched the full big ski jump competition.  Lots of stuff to see!

Maddie had a nice day with Nate, her first Valentine's Day with Nate, and of course estate made it special.  He liked the gifts that she gave him, and she herself got some flowers, and some gifts including a pretty nifty weighted blanket.  That thing has some serious weight to it!  They spent the day together at his house, finishing off "Wonder Man" and just hanging out together, which was nice for Maddie.

It was a quiet Valentine's Day, but a nice one.  We closed out the day with reading from "The Fifth Elephant," and then after that it was time for prayers and some sleep.  We have a big morning at KidPak tomorrow, so it's time to get some rest. 

Sneak to Buc-ee's

Maddie had a great time at camp - here are a few more pictures from the retreat.  I picked her up around noon or so, and she spent the rest of the day resting and settling in again.  Mom had done a good job cleaning up and we did a few things around the house and her room in particular that worked out pretty well.  After dropping off Maddie off at home, I made a little trip west... 

So this was a spontaneous visit to Buc-ee's today, and by me only just because I wanted to get one thing:  a plush Valentine's Day Buc-ee the Beaver for Mom tomorrow.  Of course, while I was there, I just had to pick up a few other items as well, both for Mom and Maddie.

Of course, there was also the car wash there too, which was much-needed after all the recent road treatment for ice and snow.  I was happy to see a projection of a Valentine's Day Buc-ee there on the windshield at one point!

I got home again, and you'll have to see how things look tomorrow, but we're ready for Valentine's Day, I think.  We got Maddie some flowers as well, so I think it'll be a nice day tomorrow.  Tonight we wrapped up things with more Olympics, watching the US Women's Curling team defeat Canada with a real close game.  We saw a few other events as well, including half-pipe, snowboard racing, and a few other events.  We even watched some of the men's figure skating, but not all of it.

Tonight we were back in Überwald again, reading from "The Fifth Elephant" at a point where we just want to keep on reading because the end of the story is approaching, and some final conflicts are approaching.  I'm sure Commander Vimes and company will come out on top, right?  We'll see!

Time for bed.  We get to sleep in tomorrow.  And it should be a pleasant day.  Time to get some sleep!