Pearls of Wisdom

 

Here's Madison at the end of the Zoom small group meeting tonight - because of the new school schedule, she's on that meeting with Camille and the other girls at 5:30, and then at 6:00 she's in the car with me - still on that Zoom meeting - all the way to Gainesville where she has her piano class.  It's a tight schedule, and thank goodness for technology so she can actually enjoy the Zoom small group with the others, even in the car.  By the way, we were parked at this point, and she doesn't actually sit like this in a moving car.  

Tonight's small group was pretty neat.  Camille was broadcasting from the Florida panhandle, and yes that's not far from Hurricane Laura.  She's okay where she is, and she was using some nautical illustrations to help out with the class tonight.  Her co-leaders had used illustrations about a starfish, and the other one about the sand dollar, both classic illustrations that you can find online.  The last illustration involved an oyster shell that had a pearl inside it.  I got that for Camille to use, and it was gross, but she opened up that oyster shell and sure enough there was a pearl inside it.  I know it's a terribly gimmicky product, but it was fun for the kids, as Camille went on to talk about the Pearl of Great Price from the Bible.  

These small group gatherings have been very nice.  Madison gets a lot out of them and doesn't miss them! And, of course, she doesn't miss piano either.  The small group ends literally in the parking lot of Funderful World of Music, when Madison gets out of the car and goes on in for her piano class.  She did well for that tonight, although this week she hasn't been practicing as much. We'll have to see about squeezing that into the schedule some.

This morning, Mommy and I went to the dentist, and it was quite a procedure down there in Fulton Country.  Oy!  First of all, there were two $30 surcharges for COVID.  So yeah, we paid $60 extra to go to the dentist.  Next, we had ponchos on, plus mouthwash, plus special one-time use plastic goggles.  The dental hygienists had on masks, plus face shields, plus ponchos.  There were temperature checks, plus places where we needed to use hand sanitizer.  The building literally had signs that told us to use the elevator buttons by pressing them with our elbows, instead of our fingers.  What a production!  The worst part is that we have to go back next week for a quick follow-up for Mommy.  Our teeth were fine, but good grief!

It was a good day today.  Madison was doing a bit of homework while Mommy and I were watching the new Muppets show on Disney Plus.  Which we love so far.  It's so much, much better than that last Muppets show that nearly destroyed the franchise.  But this seems to have the spirit of the Muppets once again, and it has some laugh-out-loud moments and so much more heart.  Yes, there it is, what I think was missing earlier:  heart.  The heart of the Muppets seem to be back, at least in the first two episodes, and we were all enjoying it.

Of course, Madison watched another episodes of "Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D." once the ELA homework was over with.  We had time for about one episode, and then it was time for our night time reading from the devotional, and also from our book.  Tonight, Darth Vader shows up, and he's somewhat cranky as always.  Not that I'd say that to his face of course.

We said our prayers tonight, prayers for healing and prayers for those in the path of another potentially devastating hurricane named Laura.  It's a very difficult night for some people already struggling with the year 2020.  We're praying for supernatural protection for us all.