How did it get to be mid-August?

Wow.

Hi.

Remember me?

I know I'm in big trouble with some of you who have been checking in regularly (thank you for doing that by the way) and finding nothing. Nevertheless, here I am! Da ta da!

As always, the easiest way to catch up is in bullets.. and backwards, I guess. So here I go:

• Matt and Josh left for church camp on Sunday. I'm excited for the experience for both of them -- Josh especially. I've been holding down the fort with visitors and a delicate balance between busyness and laziness! I started back to part-time lessons last week, all the while working hard to fill my fall schedule.
• My parents also left to go home on Sunday. Mom was here for a whole week and Dad drove in just this past Friday. We really had a nice time. And the weather, oh, the WEATHER has been GORGEOUS! I don't ever remember August being so non-humid and nice :-)
• While my mom was here, we observed the third anniversary of Caleb's homegoing. It was a weird day, as it always is in some form. We kept the day pretty loose and mentally observed our own individual ways. We did go out to lunch and then on to the cemetery with flowers. Sorry I didn't do my usual reflective and lengthy blog. It certainly doesn't change the fact that it's still a difficult day and I still miss my boy...
  
• The day my mom flew in, Matt and I arrived home from two full days away to celebrate our anniversary -- 16 years. We usually only go out for dinner or at the very most, away for one night and home the next morning. But this year, we had the time in our schedule and the responsibility of our 14-year-old to hold down the fort and were really able to get away. We drove to Wildwood, New Jersey (on the Jersey shore) and stayed in a charming little bed and breakfast. We had a whole little cottage to ourselves. It was really a couple of days like no other. We had no schedule or obligations, went to restaurants, walked along to boardwalk, drove around Wildwood and Cape May and, the highlight for me, walked on the beach in the moonlight (Matt even made a sand angel!). I can't even begin to explain how wonderfully relaxing it was and how badly we needed it!
• About 10 days prior to our little getaway, we returned home from a concentrated month of Chain Reaction. We started in late June with our intern, Jess, arriving from Massachusetts. A few days later, Matt's mom and sister, Allayne, arrived for a week's visit as well. We were busy in our training and preparation for our first week: Baltimore. On a personal level, I was particularly excited about the Baltimore week. Not only was there a group coming from Howard county and another from a Mennonite church in Ohio, but there was a group coming from Trinity Baptist Church in Marion, OH; the church in which I grew up. Three of their leaders were people I had literally known since I was a child; two I grew up with in church and the other was my best friend in elementary school who lived down the street! Also serving as an adult leader was a woman whom I met and became friends with at a Women of Faith event last year. Not only was the week wonderful in hanging out with these old friends, but the true highlight was in the group itself. They came with such an amazing attitude to serve! They worked so hard and were truly open at the same time for God to do things IN them as well as THROUGH them. The rest of the teams were incredible too. Matt and I felt it was one of the best Chain Reaction weeks we've had to date. From there, we went to New York City to be a part of Abounding Grace Church's annual outreach -- Jesus Loves You New York. We got the opportunity to work with teams from Maryland, Minnesota and Florida. It was a hot, but good week. From there, we headed to our last leg: Haverhill, MA. We kidnapped one of the young adults from NYC, Frankie, and took him with us. This was the first year we went to the Boston area with no real service assignment, which was strange for us. We took a few days to be with the beloved Yeo family and to celebrate Micah's 9th birthday. We explored some parts of the area to which we had not yet been including a New Hampshire beach, Portsmouth and Kittery, Maine. We headed home from there sans our intern and via New York to return Frankie. We drove through a pretty nasty rain storm to come home, but were so glad to be back!

That's it in a very large nutshell. If you read the whole thing, I'll buy you a Starbucks or something!

School starts a week from this coming Monday. Hard to believe, yet true. I think the boys are ready to go back. Josh is both nervous and excited about starting high school. He's been working hard to get ready for football -- weight training since early June and starting two-a-days this coming Saturday.

OK. I'm going to finish watching tonight's installment of the Olympics and head off to bed. It's good to be back among the blogging. Big blessings to you as always...