Hold on for a long post.

Forget about dates. The following events happened some time in the last two weeks.
Wes and Butch lead teaching and music at the Rescue mission service for our Career Impact sponsored night. I saw the guys downtown getting into the service whole-heartedly with Butch's joyful worship and Wes' grounded and transparent testimony and lesson.
A couple of Peoria's McDonald's restaurants got to compete for drive-thru bragging rights. I went through Ryan's a couple of times, just to make sure the service was equal each time. Here he's on his way out to whip the guy holding the sign because it's just not bringing in the traffic he'd like.

Janell's Store took FOREVER to drive through. It's like they had alot of business or something :-) And she handed them to me personally. I have the picture to prove it. Really.... I do.

School's fun. We've got characters. Even more at the Middle School campus than the main one. Mr. Rumba can sniff out food just as well as I. Here, he found some coffee cake of which he said "40% of this piece is calorie free". Get it? Funny man.

Half the classes have a sugar stash of some kind. The teachers understand that I must enforce a food tax every time I make a classroom call.

Luckily, we've only had to use this button on rare occasion. Or over and over again when someone brings a baby and gives them the stupid button.

My discipleship group had to put me on 24-hour hand mutilation watch after stabbing my left twice in a few days. First hit bone, then went through some nice muscle.

A doctors appointment (something unrelated and boring) had me in the waiting room for over an hour. This was a bummer because I had alot of work to do. But, being one of the first nice days of the spring, I realized how lucky I was to have a decent view and lots of sunlight while I waited and caught up on my soaps.

Master Kim, my TaeKwonDo instructor, observes Matt, a purple belt (or blue, can't remember), testing for his next. Matt is always helpful when we practice together and I'll miss having him around when he graduates sschool. Master Kim is a great instructor keeping a close eye on everyone and helping us to be patient as he makes sure we are trained correctly before moving on. I had a whole spiritually relevant comparison thought up, but after waiting so long to post about it I have to pay the price. It's gone. Poof. Oh ya by the way, I'm taking TaiKwonDo lessons. Don't ever be impressed. I rolled my ankle tripping over a balance beam...and then again jumping rope.

Happy Birthday Owen! It's my first one year old birthday party. Not what I expected. Thought it was going to be a bunch of other one year old kids put together in the same room with no clue why they were together. A bunch of Owen's parent's friends watching Owen have no clue what was going on was much better.

No clue there was something edible on his plate.

It's the Tawfiks!!!! (so sorry Jan...)

This was followed immediately by a big boy birthday at the Christian Center for Joe. You know, one of several dudes spending all his free time helping setup the technical equipment at the new church before it goes (more) live on Easter. Not many pictures taken, but some guys I rarely get to hang with were having a good time with the ping pong.

Peter 'bout to get whoooooped by Treyvo.

This post needs some Chicas. Here ya go. Sunday lunch pose by Becky and Alyssa.

Whatcha Been Up To?

It's sorta gratifying to have so many people ask (one way or another) about one missed Sunday morning. That's what I got after missing yesterday because I was sick. And thanks to Andrew's prodding, I've got my glass of green tea and a blog to get to.

Work kicks my rear during this season. It's the same season I started in last year. Back then, I thought it was going to be a year-round paid workout, but it died down. Turns out this season is just tough every year. A big one is the Equip Conference. We pack all the high school desks into a few rooms. Last year, someone else was in charge of the stacking (left). This year, I was (right)....Back off, it got the job done.

Sometimes the only rest you get during a weekend school event is fueling the buses. Apparently I had a free-loader stealing my phone and taking pictures.

There was some blog-worthy fun stuff too. Thursday was the class' official tour of the new church building.

A tour with the Ushers a few weeks ago showed an awesome transformation, but thanks to a couple of curious troublemakers, I still found new things. Look at them, up to nothing good.

Here's the new server room. Ryan set up the network to direct all page requests to McDonalds.com.

Our Sunday school class found our recently upgraded classroom. Ryan and Ben found a couple of ways to get to the roof.

The next night, I enjoyed a relaxed dinner and card game with the Stubes, Janna and Jill. Sorry Jill. It was either you or Janna not smiling. Jed is not performing his diaper smelling duty, but I'm sure this is what it would look like if he were.

Forgot It Was Valentines Day

When 50% of the people you know try to remind the other 50% how single they are all the time, it's hard to believe you could miss this holiday. But, with the expectation of a full day doing the same kind of stuff I would normally do, I pretty much forgot it was valentines day from Saturday until today, when I gave my boss a really hard time about it.

Stuart Scott, who had just gotten done speaking at over a dozen session over the week in Lafayette, conducted a short marriage seminar at church Saturday morning. During the seminar, the predictable help was needed for childcare. I still get called for those, go figure. I was with the two year olds, which included having a great time with Tyler. Near the end, however, I got selfish and broke Treyven out of his pen and let him roam our room. After getting bullied a little bit, Trey finally showed me that he can do something other than smile. So sad, but this seasoned Trey fan knows exactly what to do. Trey can't not turn a frown upside down for a photo shoot.


Next, the hospitality of Brooke (right). Our Thursday night Bible study group was invited to her place for a small get together.


We had food (of course). Thank you Joanne for saving me from myself!


Euchre (of course)


Fuzzy Scrabble (of course). Valiant effort Kels.


Settlers (of course)



Joanne distracted (of course)


Aaaaaaand Sarah causing trouble (of course!)

NOAH!!!

Beach Time

Tuesday morning we kicked it over to the beach town of Destin. First stop was some food and shopping at the Destin Commons, a pretty sweet outdoor mall.


Lunch at a 40's type diner there. Huge burgers and fries. Caleb started displaying the inevitable genetic signs of mental imparedness when he failed to figure out why the piece of food would not get in his mouth.







Destin Beach. We were here last year, as well as Okaloosa. White sand and open beaches. Mike and I couldn't enjoy a simple sandcastle or sand seahorse though because Nate took too much joy in destroying them. Jerk!





Sea shell hunting. Yup.

Those waves will kinda surprise ya...


I totally wore those shorts to choir practice Wednesday without washing them.


Threw a little foosball





Next, we stopped by an outlet mall. Pretty cheap clothes, but I wasn't in a mood to shop for anything seriously. I think at this point, Mike finally realized that I really didn't have anything specific I wanted to do. Just hanging out with the Manthey fam is enough for me.


There aren't many movies out right now that sound interesting to me. We checked out the preview for Max Payne and decided that a shot'em up might be cool. On the way to the movie, where Holly would drop us off, Caleb spewed up his lunch milk like a fire hose. It was pretty gross. Holly still insisted that we go to the movie and she would clean up and keep the kids occupied. Thank you Holly!!



Nate had a different plan though. Five minutes after getting dropped off, Mike got the call that Nathan had just blown chunks. Not knowing what was going and, and just imagining the mess, we turned back.


Nate looked at me as if to say "Are you happy NOW that you made me finish my chicken at lunch???"






With everyone clean and settled at home, we headed out for dinner and movie back near Destin. Alot of folks talk about the new restaurants in Bloomington that people have been waiting for so long. Chipotle and Qudoba's. Apparently, Bloomington also has a Moe's, which is what we had in Fort Walton. Build your own burrito type stuff, very nice. Ironically, we got away from the kids at home just to find ourselves at Moe's during Kid's night...funny.


A little time to kill at the book store and a pet store. Mike will be working on a veterinary degree next year and needed to start cultivating his Dr. Doolittle skills.




The movie was cool. Lots of guns, but after the night's election turn out, it won't be long before the only gun you see is the one someone is holding you up with.





We already knew the news by the time the movie was over, but after getting home, we caught up on some election results around the country, then popped in the Gilmore Girls and played some cards and Dutch Blitz.



And some Emmy puppy time.

While I hope to keep my eyes fixed on the prize no matter what joyful distractions life brings, I am enormously excited about Mike and Holly's exit from the military next year when they will be in Peoria for four months and then Bloomington-Normal until God calls them elsewhere. Thank you for having me around for a couple of days guys!