Wesleyan Women District Ladies Retreat

For several months now, I have been on the planning committee for our Indiana North District Ladies Retreat, which was this past weekend. I was the secretary for the committee as well as in charge of registration. We had almost 200 of us at the retreat, so it was a lot of work, but fun as well! Our theme was "Latte & Love: Learning to Reach Out to Others", which was a fun theme to have! We stayed at the Farmstead Inn in Shipshewana, Indiana. Our speaker was Adelle Dickie (really good!), and for music we highlighted various musical groups from Brookhaven Wesleyan and College Wesleyan Church.

All the name tags...our centerpieces for the tables.

3 of the 6 of us

It was amazing to see how God brought everything together...there was one point that a lady and I just sat on the floor in the midst of what could have been a frustrating situation, saying to each other - "I can't believe it! It was completely God that brought this together!" We had many instances of that throughout the weekend - and it was exciting!

Knowing that the leadership can really determine the personality of a retreat, our prayer before the retreat began was that this retreat would be a time of peace, rest, and refreshment for the group, and I really feel God answered our prayers. I really enjoyed the retreat, and getting to know the ladies on the committee.

In family news...

Stephen is really enjoying the flag football league that he started...and the kids like going too (in the picture above they were enjoying the whistles :) )! We have had some really nice weekends, so that helps! One problem: Stephen is not sure if it was football that caused it, but he has a torn meniscus in his knee :( Our friend is an athletic trainer at IWU and he looked at it and is almost positive that Stephen will have to have surgery. It is a pretty quick, easy surgery, but Stephen is dreading it a LOT. He would be the first to tell you he hates going to the doctor and having any type of procedure done. I have many great stories of just getting cavities taken care of :)

Damaris just went to the doctor's office for her 18 month check up yesterday, and she is in the 20-30th percentile on pretty much everything...not a surprise :). She is 21.75 pounds and 31.5 inches...but she had tennis shoes on, so I would be surprised if she was over 31 inches. To compare, Titus at this age was 21.5 pounds and 29 inches tall...so they are pretty close! Her iron count is pretty low, so we need to put her on drops - which is NOT fun. When Titus was anemic and had to be on them, we finally gave up because it became ridiculous, and decided it would better for him to eat than not eat :) We will see how it goes...it was definitely not a huge surprise since she is really picky right now about eating any sort of meat, and definitely is not into green vegetables. She used to be a good eater, so hopefully she grows out of this soon!

We asked about her not talking, and the doctor said that he is not concerned for now...a lot can happen in the next 6 months. We just need to try to work with her a little more and make her say the word instead of pointing or whatever else she does. She does have a few new words...she says please ("pee"), baby, and puppy ("bah-pee")...and there is a reason on the last one...

Right now we are kind of foster parents to a dog that has been rescued, and may end up keeping her...Stephen wants to, but I am still hesitant and want to give her a few more days. The funny thing is, she meets all the requirements I had for us getting a dog - female, housebroke, fixed, calm, medium to large size, etc. And she really is a great dog - we can leave her out all night and while we are at work, and she doesn't get into anything. She leaves the kids toys alone, our shoes alone, etc. She is very much a people person, and is careful around the kids, making sure to not run into them. She is loyal and gentle, and loves people. It is sad, because we are not sure she was allowed outside much, because she pulls really bad on the leash and always tries to bolt for the door when you open it. She gets REALLY excited if you ask her if she wants to go out.

My biggest two hesitations: she tends to jump when she gets really excited - but is responding well to a spray bottle for correction. She definitely seems smart, and she may catch on to that one. But, she still gets on the furniture (it is obvious what she has been allowed to do in previous homes!), which is a little harder to correct because she does it when we are gone or asleep. The bigger concern of the two is her breed...Pit Bull. We did research, and it looks like they are only dog-aggressive and not people-aggressive, and are better when they have been fixed, but obviously it is still a huge concern. Much of the research indicated that this breed has gotten a bad name because of bad owners, but definitely still cautioned owners to be aware of the breeds tendencies. She is such a nice dog, I can't imagine her going after another animal, but then sometimes things just snap for some dogs. But I suppose any dog (or animal!) could snap - not necessarily just this breed. Anyway, enough rambling :)

That's it from our neck of the woods...at least for now :)