The past few days have really been a blur!

Friday I had no choice - I had to suck it up, go to my desk for a bit to do my month end stats, and run a bunch of errands that had been piling up all week. It took 7 hours to get it all done, and I'm sure it would have better to stay in bed resting....

Saturday we thankfully got to sleep in. It was the only "free" Saturday we've had since mid-September and it is the last free Saturday I'll have until after Christmas. Sigh.

I had to take Johnathan to a water resource center to do an extra credit project for his science class. David came along and we had a good couple of hours exploring and learning. The rest of the day was spent doing laundry, napping, and getting ready for the trick or treaters that would be coming by. The boys manned the door for the night (our first year EVER not having the boys trick or treat....they're all grown up!), and we had a fun time admiring all of the cute costumes that came by.

Yesterday (Sunday) we had a long day - our annual Harvest Festival dinner and Auction was in the evening. So we just stayed down at the Corps after Church and worked on the details. The event went VERY well...we had a full house, laughed A LOT, and raised around $500 to benefit the Training College!

Today we had a great Advisory Board meeting hosted at our Family Services office (our Board is SO on the verge of becoming something good!) and now I'm home for a bit before it's time to head to the Corps for Craft Club this evening.

This week will be insane...Johnathan has marching band practice every single day after school, and this Saturday will be their final competition. It will be the longest day, yet. Johnathan needs to be at school by 5am, and won't get home until nearly 1am. We'll head the 90 minutes south to the stadium where they'll be competing, and will have to leave the house by 7:30 am. We'll stay as long as we are able, but it is going to be SUCH a long day!

Hope your week is going well....

Yesterday was a great day....but a COLD day!

We went to Johnathan's marching band competition, and for a change it was right here in town. Just a 5 minute drive from the Corps, even! It was incredibly cold and uncomfortable outside, but we stuck it out and were able to watch Johnathan's band not only sweep all of the awards for their division in the preliminaries, but to also take several top awards in the finals, as well as take 1st place over all the bands! It was SO exciting!

Because we didn't have to travel far, we were home early for a change (by 8:00 pm, rather than 10:30 - 11:00 pm as we usually are on competition Saturdays), and got a decent night of sleep.

Unfortunately, both David and I woke up feeling pretty rotten this morning. He's got a sore throat (but no fever), and I've got a congested chest (but no fever). We are both heavily medicated and hoping we can shake off whatever it is that's trying to attack us!

Church went well today. Attendance was down a little, and people were in a "quiet" mood (....if you squinted, you were ALMOST able to see their lips moving while they were singing ) but it was all good. Ron left right after Church to head north for the band concert he was participating in. He took both boys with him, which meant I could have a quiet afternoon.

I had to run to Kinko's copiers so they could work on making 100 copies of our Kettle Worker manuals, came home for a few hours, went back across town to pick the manuals up, and then came back to watch the Angels play the Yankees (we're in the bottom of the 4th inning right now, and things are NOT looking good for the Angels.....we just gave up our lead and it's now 3-1 Yankees) with the bases loaded. Ron and the boys should be home by 9pm.

This week will be crazy and busy. We start taking Kettle Worker applications beginning tomorrow, and I'll be spending the week getting ready for our 5th Annual Harvest Festival dinner and auction on Sunday. For the first time since we started doing these, there doesn't seem to be a lot of interest from the congregation in bringing things to auction.....I hope we make some money this year....I hate putting time and energy into something that nobody supports in the long run.

This Saturday will also be the first one in a month where Johnathan DOESN'T have a marching band competition....I am SO relieved to have one quiet Saturday left. The next Saturday Johnathan is in his final competition (and it will be a BIG one, with more than 20 bands competing, and some of them being the top bands in the Northwest), the next Saturday will be my Home League's Fall Bazaar and Harvest Cafe (our first Fall event, and I'm a little nervous about how it will work), and the next weekend kettles start.

So....here's to a good week.....

Time to catch up and let my handful of readers know what is happening around here....

The past week has been absolutely nuts, and I am pretty wiped out!

Last Friday night Johnathan's band played the half time show at a football game, did great, but didn't get home until well after 10pm. He had to be up and out the door by 7am the next morning for his band competition....

The band competed all day at Oregon University (2 hours south of us) and did fantastic. They took top awards for their color guard and drum line, as well as coming in 2nd over all. Ron, David and I arrived at the competition about 11:30 am, didn't even stay for the whole thing, and STILL didn't get home until 11pm. Johnathan and the band didn't get home until 1:30 am.

The next day we still had to get up and lead our Church services as usual, followed by a lunch and Corps Council meeting.....and then we booked it home so we could pack, load up the car, wait for the babysitter....and then Ron and I had to make the 7 hour drive to Idaho.

I can't even BEGIN to tell you how exhausted we were by the time we got there.

We went through a long week of meetings at Officer Councils, Monday through Friday morning. Although the sessions were fantastic, there were some times of real spiritual blessing, and Ron and I had the GREAT honor of being part of the Worship Team for the week (we led 9 different sessions...Ron on the drums and me as part of the vocal team), we were POOPED by the time we got on the road after lunch on Friday! We pulled into the driveway at home around 8:30 pm.

On a side note, with the meetings and the long drives, I only was able to follow the start of the baseball playoff games via the internet on my phone..... I am VERY frustrated with the Angels and Dodgers right now. They need to find their game and HUSTLE!!! I would LOVE to see an all Southern CA World Series (cheering for the Angels, of course) but if these two teams don't pull it together it's not gonna happen. I'll tell you this, though...if the Yankees get into the World Series, I will instantly be a HUGE fan of....whichever team they play against!

Anyway, after getting home at 8:30 pm on Friday we were up early the very next morning to get Johnathan to THIS weekends band competition. Thankfully, the competition was only 30 minutes south into Oregon so we were able to stay for the entire thing, getting home by 9:30 pm. Johnathan's band had MUCH tougher competition this time....but they did come home with the top award for a soloist, and 3rd place overall.

Johnathan is completely exhausted at this point....this marching band schedule he's keeping is unreal. But, the good thing is that he has Friday off from school this week (parent teacher conference day) so he can get some rest, this next weekend the competition is going to be right here in Vancouver so he won't have to travel far...the next weekend will be competition free....and then the push for the last competition the first Saturday in November. This last competition is HUGE (twice as many bands participating, and a much higher level of competitors than they are used to), so there will be practice every stinking day after school that week....but then, it will all be over for the season. Thank goodness!!!

Today we had the Divisional Commanders with us as our guests for Women's Ministries Sunday. It was a WONDERFUL service, and we had a great time of fellowship with them over lunch afterwards. Once we got home, Ron, Johnathan and I all collapsed into sleep.....

Tomorrow I have a dentist's appointment in the morning, will get the grocery shopping done, come home to do some SERIOUS house cleaning, and then prepare for tomorrow night's women's Bible Study.

Phew!!