Rob walked it and K and L plus our good homeschooling friends, joined the Finish Line team water station to hand out water! This is something I have had a lot of fun doing before..... basically we get up very early and set out and pour thousands of cups of water. Then we give the cups of water to the runners and walkers and cheer for them as we do!
It's hard to describe the energy of this kind of volunteering! All the runners and walkers giving their very best effort, and being so thankful to the volunteers who are handing out their water. Everyone has so much fun with it!
The kiddos were into it for a long time. They gave themselves breaks to spell their arms, and lasted for a looong time. Much longer than I thought they would! Especially since we were all up at 5 am and they hadn't slept in the car! Jamie and I were fueled by Starbucks, I have no idea what was fueling the kids! By the very end, when it was just the slower walkers and things had trickled off, they began to blow bubbles for the walkers instead of hand them water....... it was so fun and sweet!
I love the idea that I can encourage this kind of volunteering for our family. That the kids have so much fun, and really enjoy themselves helping others in a very tangible way..... it makes for a really memorable experience in community service.
K had a day or injuries yesterday, which led to another tooth falling out! (Notice how she is not showing it in this photo!! Also note the bandaid on the knee) She sure is 7 and a half, and seems all lanky and giggles and loves horses....... paying attention to everything around her...... so 7 and a half!
She rode along with daddy on a swarm capture last night, and came with me for a swarm lure today. When Rob started putting his name out there as someone who will come to capture feral swarms, we had no idea it would be so crazy. We've had a call a day for the last few days. We are pretty much out of equipment!
An idea is begining to take seed in my imagination...... I am wondering what it would be like to do this next spring- I have already roped my bee-keeping, home-schooling friend Jamie into thinking about doing this with me! We could begin a list of bee-keepers who would like inexpensive bees, and work from the list- first come first served. We could go out and swarm capture, and re-home the bees at a small cost to the beekeepers. Our homeschooling schedule would free us up to respond to swarm calls on a very flexible basis. The kiddos are interested and curious, and could be helpful. It would be an interesting hobby.....
L's made-up word of the day- fragilous! Apparently fragilous is a portmanteau of fragile and maybe marvelous? It pertains to something wonderful and very small/fragile/delicate. Usage: "Mama, look at this baby kitty, it's very fragilous!" "Mama, that tiny moth was so fragilous!"
I love the word, and am adding it to my own personal lexicon.
We have been looking at how we worship for a while now. Talking and praying about making a decision to worship at a new church.
When we made the decision to buy a house here in I'ton it was a big decision for our family, because it meant that for now, we would choose to live here, not Australia.
We have done a lot to create community where we live, and we have rooted deeply in a variety of ways in Irvington. One thing that is important to us is our spiritual life as a family.... we were still worshiping at the church further away, the church we had been going to since we moved to Indy. It's a lovely little church, but what would it look like for us if our spiritual home was in our neighbourhood? We have been giving it thought and prayer and while we will still go back to our old church to worship now and again, this feels important, to put roots down in our neighbourhood in a spiritual way as well.
Biking to church this morning was a meditation and prayer for this mama before we even got to church!
K's friends G and F came to her recital on Saturday. Afterward we all went down town for ice cream on the circle. Then I took the girls to the Earth Day celebration downtown. They had a blast! There were so many educational displays, game-show style quizes to play, *Plus* a whole tent of kid's crafts and activities and music! I collected enough lesson ideas and learning jump-in points to last for quite a while....
K's first recital was this weekend! She has serious stage nerves, and has so far refused any kind of recital experience, even though this is her second year of lessons. So this was a big deal for her! I think that it helped for her to play in an ensemble setting, and the children were not facing their audience- they were facing their pianist acommpanying them. It was the sweetest thing ever, they played two pieces and sounded so wonderful!
