The herd is back!

Okay, just to start out, I will finish blogging about vacation, but it may have to wait until after VBS is over. Oh, wait, then I'll be in preparation for the beginning of school. Well, I guess I'll just have to finish it before VBS. It will get done. I promise.

So, yep, the herd is back home again. Not to be confused with "Back Home, Again in Indiana". They just came from spending two weeks in Indiana. No, they are back home in good 'ole Illinois. We had gotten several complaints from the neighbors about our children missing. I'm serious. The ones across the street even came over to greet them this evening. Yeah, our street is pretty quiet without our children around. There is only one other house with kids on our block and they only have two girls. Elementary girls tend to be quieter than 4 & 6 year old boys who are outside playing cowboys. Within thirty minutes of being home Nathan had been a cowboy, a superhero, and an army guy.

So I've been transitioning from an eerily quiet house to a somewhat organized chaotic one. How is the patient, you may be wondering? John is doing fine. Our biggest issue right now is trying to balance the activity. It is kind of hard to "play quietly" when you have three other siblings that really have no desire to do that. And it becomes apparent very quickly that he really doesn't yet have the stamina to sustain a day full of imaginary play with the others. They had a superhero/cowgirl club meeting this morning downstairs and that was about all he could handle.

This post wouldn't be complete without a quick comment on what I learned while my kids were gone. I'm convinced that God designed us to have personal interaction in part so that we would recognize our desperate need for him. I was feeling pretty good about myself...rather self-righteous, to be honest...after spending close to two weeks with either no children or one child. My sin nature was downright under control. It literally took about 30 minutes of my children being home for me to recognize that, oh, I guess I'm not has righteous as I thought. I'm thankful for that though. I'm thankful that I have four kids and a husband that help reveal to me (not by their actions, but by relationship to them) the edges that need to be refined by the Lord. I pray that once my kids are gone I will be wise enough to build close enough relationships with others that I can continue to recognize my sin and my need for a Savior.

On the agenda for tomorrow: a free movie at the local movie theater and maybe a stop a the new HyVee. Yes, we have HyVee now. I'm so excited! This one comes equipped with a sushi bar. Now we just need to add a Fareway and a Meijer to make our shopping repertoire complete.