Out with the New, In with the Old

Yep, that's right. We're getting rid of our newer, used truck that we bought last year because we bought an older, but more heavy duty, used truck. A guy Bruce works with was selling his Ford F-250 for a decent price, so now our Ford F-150 is for sale. The 250 will pull the camper more easily.

I told Bruce that the guys he works with need to stop telling him when they have vehicles for sale. He's bought two motorcycles and now a truck from different coworkers.

The weekend before New Year's Eve Bruce stayed home with the kids while I went to Chattanooga, to help chaperone our church's youth at a conference. Usually, this is Bruce's forte, but they needed more women chaperones than men, so I went. We stayed at the Chattanooga Choo-Choo hotel, which is neat. Bruce and I visited Chattanooga as newlyweds, so I kept thinking back to that time during the weekend. I missed Bruce and the kids fiercely.

I roomed with an older teen girl who I haven't spent much time with before, and her friend, and one of the young ladies in the Sunday school I co-teach. I really enjoyed getting to know her better. During the conference, she buddied around with another girl who is on our Sunday school class role, but has attended only once. So when shopping time at the mall came, I went with both of them and another girl from our class. What an experience, shopping with three very different in personality 13-year-old girls! Gives me great insight into the things to come with Allison.

The conference was different than anything I'd been to before. I thought it was probably a bit over the heads of some of the more immature youth. But one of the conference speakers nailed it when he said that we dummy down stuff for youth, and we shouldn't. He pointed out that most of them take classes in advanced math and science, so they should be able to grasp spiritual matters. He also told the young guys to grow up, saying, "This world can't wait until you're 35. Be a man now. Learn the ways of the Lord." That got me fired up, as a parent, thinking about my boys.

More than once, a speaker told the youth they should be spending time with godly adults. Boys with men and girls with women. He pretty much told them their friends were silly and couldn't be counted on to teach them proper behavior, that they should model themselves after adults. I'm not sure what the youth thought of that, but I saw either nods or huge grins from nearly every adult there.

Allison had a funny take on the weekend without mommy. Bruce had taken the kids with him to get new tires put on our new (but old-ish) truck, and while there, they befriended an older man. Bruce said the kids were talking his ear off, so Bruce told them to calm down, to which the man replied, "They aren't going to settle down as long as they've got me talking to them." Seems he was enjoying them. After a bit, he asked them if they were it or if there were more family members at home. They told them about mommy, and Allison said, "She's on vacation. With the preacher." Bruce said the man looked at him and asked, "Did she just say what I think she said?"

Bruce doesn't take advantage of teachable moments the way I do, so once I got home I talked to Allison and the boys about my weekend with teenage girls... not the preacher!

We didn't go anywhere for New Year's Eve. I thought it was wonderful to be home. We watched two rented movies in the den, and the kids watched a movie in the playroom. They had their sleeping bags spread out down there and were patiently waiting for the summons from us to come up and watch the ball drop. They all stayed up that late, watched the ball drop on TV, and then Clay decided to go to his bed to sleep. Spencer and Allison stuck to the plan, though, and slept in the playroom.

Bruce went back to work this morning for the first time since before Christmas Eve. Clay goes back to school tomorrow. And I'll be cleaning the house from top to bottom. We put away all the Christmas decorations a couple days after Christmas, because I wanted them gone before Bruce went back to work. But now the scrubbing begins!

Oh, a plug for a movie. If you haven't seen "Amazing Grace", rent it. Wonderful acting jobs and some history to boot. If you don't get teary-eyed by the end, then there's just something wrong with your ducts!