On the Road

We're on the road to Utah. Gracie said yesterday, "I've been waiting my WHOLE life to go on vacation!" Shayne said to me, "You know it sure is hard to be patient when you know you're about to leave on a trip." And Aubrey is "so 'cited!!"

You've got to love that kind of enthusiasm. We are all so 'cited to go and spend the weekend with both the Moore and Nelson families, and it's been a whirlwind the past several days getting ready for the trip.

Speaking of...this morning I had to teach before we left, so I hurried out the door with a head full of lists, suitcases, and laundry. It's a habit of mine to pray along the way to school, and so today as I pulled out of our neighborhood I began to give thanks for all that we'd been able to accomplish in our preparations and then asked that as we continued through our morning, things would continue to go smoothly. The moment that that last part exited my mind in prayer, I immediately realized that I was in the wrong car. I was supposed to have taken Brendon's truck to class so that he and the kids could clean and load up the van while I was gone, but in my rush and out of habit I had taken off in the van. I quickly flipped around and headed back, grateful that I had realized it so soon. Once back home I gathered my things from the van and hustled over to the truck. It wasn't until I was throwing my stuff into the truck that I realized I had left an entire class's graded essays in the house--essays that had been one of the major stressors of my trip prep. I would have been SO upset if I had gotten to school only to find I had left them behind. All of that work and stress for nothing. As I hurriedly retrieved the forgotten essays and got on my way again, I realized what a tender mercy I had been granted. In the moment I needed it, in the very moment that I asked, my prayer for help in a smooth morning was granted. If I had not been prompted to realize I was in the wrong car at that very moment, my day and our trip would have started out VERY differently.

It was a great reminder that Heavenly Father is so very aware of our lives and our concerns. He is in the small as well as the big.

So, here we go...tonight Brendon and I will be celebrating our ninth anniversary at someplace like the Quanah, Texas Wal-Mart for dinner. Try not to be jealous.

(Aubrey was so 'cited that she wore herself out before we really even got started.)