The hotel where we stayed in Chicago that had a Coco Key attached to it. So, we purchased discounted passes that allowed us to come and go from the water park throughout our stay there.










The water park had a huge arcade. I purchased a card worth 100 games and Norah had a blast playing using it up.

She let me try a few games. I actually hit the jackpot on one game I played and Norah got hundreds of tickets all at once! It was a proud moment for me. I earned serious "cool points" from Norah over this.


Along with all the tickets she earned from the other games she (and I) played, Norah had the option to get a very nice, very large stuffed animal as a prize. But, she didn't want to spend "all her tickets on just one prize..." Inside I was silently screaming at this, but I let her do what she wanted. She preferred to get a ton of the little "cheaper" prizes in place of the one big one. So, it took her forever to "spend" all the tickers, but she had a great time choosing.

"I will be your man," the demon reared up and said in a deep, silky voice.

He was wearing a black leather jacket and was representing a perfectly false version of manliness. I glanced sideways at him and noticed that his shoulders were very broad and so solid... I knew this version of manliness was false. But, I had been craving spiritual leadership... and he seemed to know that.

His body language was perfectly inviting. He was very appealing to me at that moment, since he appeared so very confident. But, I was given enough grace and wisdom to resist him. I wanted to sink right into his chest, but instead, I searched for the right words and said, "No. I will wait on the Lord. I will wait..." as I bowed my head and put my hands out to God.

I am not sure why my spirit chose those particular words, "I will wait." I'd never had occasion to say them before. But, they seemed to fit the temptation perfectly and they did the trick because they set me free from the evil spirit's hold on me and I woke up from the nightmare or whatever it was... and felt God's presence there with me.

I knew God was pleased with me, but I sensed an urgency and felt like His Spirit was saying,

"Meet me outside."

I looked at the window.

"It's still dark out there, Lord."

I got out of bed and walked toward the living room.

"Can I just sit on the couch where I usually do?"

"I have prepared a table for you..."

"But, that's where the shadows are."

"...in the presence of your enemies."

"Oh."

I found my sandals, grabbed a Bible (even though I figured that I wouldn't be able to see the words in it) and decided to take my i-pod so that I could worship... I realized then I had an inexplicable yearning to sing.

I tipped-toed outside and sat down in one of the lawn chairs under our tree out front. I pressed play on my i-pod. I noticed it was set on shuffle and wondered what song would come up. I sincerely hoped that it wouldn't be something by Taylor Swift... Not that I don't like Taylor Swift. I just figured she would break the mood.

But, I left the song to chance anyway and settled into my seat, looking up just as the sun was rising over the trees down the street.

This is the song that starting playing.

Needless to say, I wept. And I sang along while the shadows fled.

You may not have even noticed that I was missing (because I set things to post on my blog everyday that I was gone). But, we just got back from a twelve day road trip.

Dwayne had to go to Chicago, St. Louis, Springfield, Missouri and then Tulsa for work, so we tagged along with him like we do sometimes. But, before heading all the way back home, we took advantage of the fact that we were in the middle of the country and met up with my dad's side of the family for a huge party/ family reunion in Arkansas.

In the next few days, I will tell you more about our adventures and share photographs from our trip. But, below is a collection of some of the more random, less important photographs I took while we were away.

Norah played on her new Nintendo DS alot while we were stuck in the car (and so did I). I finally figured out how to get ninety-nine lives on the New Super Mario Brothers game. It's a trick I've been wanting to learn since I was ten years old and my older brother was able to do it on the original Super Mario game.

Luckily, Avril stayed pretty happy in the car. It was only toward the very end of the twelve days that she started screaming from boredom or frustration, but even then, she'd fall asleep for a little while and then wake up cheerful again.

We always kept a cooler stocked full of drinks and bags of snacks. It helped cut down on the amount of stops we had to make. In this photo, Norah shares some raisins with Avril across the backseat. She's a great big sister.

Avril drinking milk one night at dinner.

Yes. We let our kids jump on hotel beds. Why? Because if they don't get to jump on their own beds and they aren't allowed to jump on hotel beds, which beds will they ever get to jump on??! See. I bet you mindlessly strict parents never considered things that way. ;)

Swimming in one of the hotel pools after a long day in the car.

Laughing at Mommy.

Happy to be out of the car seat and free to crawl around the room. But, she isn't just crawling now. She took some of her first steps on this trip and she's been walking a little everyday since.

Avril was constantly getting into "trouble" while we were in the hotel rooms. She's at that stage where she likes to explore.

She crawled under the beds when she could, wedged herself in between or behind hotel furniture, took laundry out of our bags and stuff out of our boxes. But, she'd been cooped up in the car all day, too. So, we weren't as concerned about setting boundaries as we are at home.

Norah swimming in yet another hotel pool.

Avril sinking her face into her very first yeast roll.

After as many hours as I played, I did eventually beat the game.

She sat here and watched television one night. Later, she stuffed a large beach towel (that she'd taken from the laundry, of course) inside this night stand to make it even more cozy.

I wore the girls out everyday. To get the most out of our trip, we just kept going till we had to drop dead-tired into our beds each night. Below you can see Avril sleeping in one morning with her butt up.

I'll post more photos from the trip tomorrow. Like I said before, these are just the random ones.

Norah's still participating in our library's summer reading program. She's doing well. You can see from the photo above that she has completed almost twenty five hours of reading or being read to (but has only received credit for fifteen hours). We will get credit for the other hours once we go to the library again.

So far, she has earned chances to enter several different raffles for the largest prizes given away when the contest is over. I've lost track of everything we are entered to win at this point. But, she's also received coupons for free or discounted items all around town. I've had to be diligent to stop and pick these items up in order to give her the rewards she is working for.

She may not win any of the big prizes, so this may be all she gets for the work she's put in. Below are some pictures of her holding, collecting, enjoying or even, at times, sharing, her rewards.

When you are feeling like your husband's a deadbeat and thinking to yourself, "He doesn't spend enough quality time with the children," you should take an honest look at your family's schedule. Your husband may actually be a deadbeat, but you should make sure that's true before you just assume the lack of quality time he is spending with the kids is all his fault.

If you are like me and your husband and you have agreed that you have the responsibility of deciding the "when" and "where" on the family's schedule, then you should ask yourself a few questions.

Do I make dinner at home on week nights or do we eat "fast" food?

Do I pack the family into the car and then run errands all day on the weekends?

I ask this because I've noticed that my family has a lot more time together when we eat at home and when we stay at home.

Even though I hate taking the kids to the grocery store alone, I am growing to hate even more the fact that I am wasting my husband's day off with the kids by going from store to store on Saturdays.

And, even though I am exhausted from a day alone with the kids and I've cooked and cleaned up after breakfast and lunch already and I don't even want to think about chopping peppers and onions and I know I will have to spend at least thirty minutes in front of the stove and thirty more after dinner cleaning up, I've noticed that the nights I suck it up and cook something, anything, just as long as we eat at home, are the exact same nights Dwayne has ten minutes to sit and read to the baby and almost half an hour to play Rummy with Norah.

So, consider your family's schedule, too. Start paying attention to how much time things actually take and then see if eating out and running errands together is really saving you any time at all.

Our new favorite Sloppy Joe recipe.

We bought Norah a Nintendo DS and the New Super Mario Brothers game. It's her first game console of any kind. After using it on and off for a day or two, she told me, "This game has changed my life. Before, when I was bored, I had nothing to do. But, now, I just play my game and I am never bored!" Exactly, Norah!

We're going on a very long road trip this month, so that's why we got it when we did (instead of waiting for her birthday next month). This will come in handy during the full days of driving in the car. She has been playing it quite a bit already... and so have I, to tell the truth. I had forgotten how fun these games can be.