Children's Museum

I love San Jose's Children's Discovery Museum! We recently purchased a membership so we can take Caedmon any time without additional cost. Because of this, we go all the time! We normally only stay for an hour and a half or so in the morning because I don't want to mess up his nap time (I treasure naptime!). But we always have a great time. I don't think he could ever get bored with it because there are so many different things to do. And it's something fun and active to do on a rainy or chilly day. Below are a few pics of Caedmon having a blast exploring and just being a kid!

Sand table with my mom

Fireman Caedmon

This is an actual firetruck that the kids can play on.
They also have an ambulance, old carriage, and an old Model T.

Caedmon's Favorite: Water Play!

Taxes are not my friend

I just finished my taxes...talk about waiting until the last minute! I am REALLY hoping that I didn't make any major mistakes. I'm a little paranoid because I tried to do them myself for the first time this year using TurboTax. The thing that freaks me out is that TurboTax wouldn't let me submit my federal tax return through efile because it said "the original tax return was amended"?! No idea.

So, I'm really hoping that some IRS guy doesn't show up on my doorstep to take me to jail! I'm having images of a front-page story in the Mercury entitled, "Pastor's Wife Involved in Tax Scandal." Surely there's some kind of protection clause for those of us who sincerely tried our best but are just ignorant when it comes to taxes!

Happy Easter!

Highlights from Easter:

• Caedmon's excitement as he looked for eggs around our living room right after he woke up
• a bag of Ghirardelli chocolates (dark chocolate with mint filling) to greet me at the breakfast table
• beautiful weather
• new clothes (Is it vain that one thing I love about Easter is buying a new outfit?)
• 284 people in attendance at South Bay Church
• 60+ amazing volunteers who served joyfully with all their hearts
• a new set design to usher in a new series (My Upside Down Life)
• watching my husband preach with the passion of a 19 year old but the skill and wisdom of someone far beyond his years
• 12 people indicating first time decisions to follow Christ
• 12 more people indicating that they are considering following Christ
• having the HOPE that Jesus is alive and one day I will be with Him forever!

The Hunt

South Bay hosted our first ever Easter egg hunt today at the park behind our meeting facility. Last night Andy and I babysat for the Santos girls, Lily and Cailyn. So, in preparation for todays events, Andy and I took Caedmon and the girls out to a field last night and did a few trial runs on the basics of Easter egg hunting. We explained the necessity of moving quickly and not stopping to look in each of the eggs until after all of the eggs had been collected. We were grooming them to be Champion Easter Egg Hunters!

Well, today was a huge success and everyone seemed to have a great time. There was no way to count how many people were there, but definitely hundreds and hundreds...perhaps over a thousand? No idea. It was definitely a little chaotic, but that kinda added to the party atmosphere. We had balloons, face painting, bubbles, pictures with the Easter bunny, prizes, refreshments, music...and it was all FREE to the community! It was fantastic.

In addition to all of that, we prepared 10,000 Easter eggs for the kiddos. You know how many Caedmon got? None!

We divided the age groups 0-3 and 4 and up. We made it very clear that no adults were allowed to enter the older kids field, but unfortunately did not make that clear about the little kids field. So, even before Filipe said 'Go!' (he was actually yelling, "Wait, wait, don't go yet!") mobs of parents CARRYING their children ran out on the field and got overflowing baskets of eggs! I'm not bitter. I'm just saying...

The entire hunt lasted about 2 minutes and I was left standing there with two very confused little boys. (Caedmon's buddy, Gavin, didn't get any eggs either!) They seemed confused, while Gavin's mom and I felt like we were going to cry! But no worries, I knew that we had kept a box full of eggs behind the table in case some kids didn't get any. (I just never thought my kid would be the one who didn't get any! I mean, what about all that practice?!) So the kids were happy and everything worked out just fine!

Juliane, aka Vova, we three of her many grandchildren

This is Filipe's mom and Lily and Cailyn's grandma, but Caedmon claims her also!

Caedmon with Madison and Livy.

Those girls are amazing at keeping up with him! My little babysitters!

My friend, Vivian, with he sweet son Gavin.

Gavin's saying, "Hey, who took all the eggs?"

Facepainting
Caedmon got a shark...but that's not him in the pic

PRIZES!

Three of the precious ladies in my small group!

We probably had close to 80 volunteers today!

You can click on this picture to enlarge it and get a better look at the crowd.

I think this event definitely gave our church a positive image in the eyes of our community!

Dropping the Ball...And Then Picking it Up

Do you ever feel like you get a bad case of "Dropping the Ball"? I am feeling that in several areas of my life right now. Each area is something that I value, but it tends to be the thing that gets pushed down on the priority list when the urgency of everyday life creeps in. There are five main areas where I'd like to get back on track:

1- working out. I enjoy running and feel much better when I prioritize the time to do it, but it requires me to get up at 6 instead of 6:45 and lately I've been wanting sleep more.

2- blogging. I value blogging for 3 main reasons: 1- I really enjoy writing and it gives me an outlet to be creative and practice my writing skills. 2- It's a great way to keep in touch with out of town friends and family. 3- When our church grows larger, it will be a great tool that I can use to encourage, inspire, and influence the women in our church.

3- planning learning activities for Caedmon. Caedmon is 2 1/2 now and is ready for a little more intentionality in his learning. I'm an early childhood certified educator and there is no reason I should not be providing a rich environment for his development. I just need to get a little creative and do some planning.

4- scrapbooking. I am not crafty. In fact, I kinda hate doing crafty things. The only time I might think about enjoying them is when I'm with my sister, who is very good at them, and then I just enjoy her company while she does all the work. However, the thing I DO value is having a succinct chronology of our family history. So I'd like to create a scrapbook for each year. Last time I used Picaboo and I just need to carve out some time to get caught back up.

5- reading. Reading, for me, equals growth. Last summer I had a lot more of a relaxed schedule and was able to read two or three books a month. I'm not sure that I've read two or three books since we've moved to California! I know this is has been an extremely busy season for us, but I have an ever growing list of "must reads" waiting for me when I slow down long enough to catch my breath.

One of the key ingredients to change is being discontent with your current situation. It's our primary motivator that pushes us enough to say, "Life CANNOT stay like this. I'm willing to make some hard choices to see change." I think that's where I am right now. I need to evaluate how I'm spending my time and apply a little discipline and wisdom to prioritize some of these goals.