recess & lunch

am i the only one that wishes i could be a baby again? i mean, talk about an easy life. eat, sleep, empty the stomach, repeat, repeat. does it get any easier? you don't have to worry about eating too much turkey, putting on 5 pounds, picking out clothes to wear tomorrow, balancing a checkbook, etc.

okay, i would settle for elementary school. times were easy back then. lunch and recess were the most important parts of the day, get off the bus and play until dinner, play after dinner until dark, take a bath, mom picks out your clothes, still not worries about watching what you eat or paying the bills, and tomorrow is a lot like today.

i am guilty of wanting to be older when i was a kid, but every adult wishes he/she could be younger again. when you're young, the stress level is low, no one expects much of you, you don't worry so much about the intentions of others, you just give people the benefit of the doubt. faith is easy, and dreams are big!

i guess this is why JESUS said we all need "child-like" faith. all our intelligence, planning, and stress gets in the way. moral of the story? when it comes to the important stuff . . . the GOD-stuff . . . don't complicate it . . . just believe!

i am guilty

today, the valantine family hopped in the envoy and headed to grammy and papa's house. i have to admit, i began searching the channels of the radio as soon as we hit the highway. what was i looking for? you'll never guess, christmas songs. i know, i'll hear them for the next 30+ days straight, but i still needed my fix.

i heard one song sung entirely in latin. i took 4 years of latin in high school. it didn't mean much, i couldn't translate any of the words. i did shoot my 80+ year old high school latin teacher with a staple gun (it was an accident). i can still hear her voice yelling my latin name . . . MARTINUS!!

ahh, christmas songs and the good old days!

scrooge

it's 8:48pm on a tuesday night in november. you know what that means . . . scrooge practice. this is my first year in the play and i am loving it! i have enjoyed several opportunities to hang out with so many great people at dayspring.

tomorrow we leave bright and early to see our extended families. we will miss BG, but we'll be back for Sunday and the Turkey Bowl.

I want to wish you all a very Happy Thanksgiving!!

going for it

alright, this is day one of my attempt to be a good blogger. if i go more than 2 days without blogging, feel free to send hate mail reminding me of my commitment

it's a cold monday in bowling green, ohio today. this is that time of year when we refer to our great city as "blowing" green because of the crazy wind that is known to blow small children off their feet.

i'm bummed today that my beloved steelers lost in overtime to the jets (who were 1-9 before yesterday's tragedy). i'm optimistic of ohio state's chances to "sneak" back into the national championship picture. (i'm rooting for UCONN to beat West Virgina and for LSU to lose in the SEC championship)

we had a great fall retreat for XLR8 this weekend. 32 students and 6 leaders ventured to Camp Cotubic. we laughed, cried, prayed, ate, cheered for the Bucks, played volleyball, train wreck, and some crazy game about tomatoes (thanks Suzanne!).

my parents had Kaitie and Nash for the weekend and Amanda and i missed them like crazy. we picked them up last night and things are back to normal (crying, dirty diapers, less sleep - a perfect recipe for our lives).

i love being a dad. annie (6 yrs. old) called and left me a voice mail last week that just made me smile. she sounds so grown up when she calls. i remember bringing her home from the hospital just the other day. wow, i'm trying to soak it all in.

i am so thankful i get to spend some time with my extended family this week as we celebrate thanksgiving. we head out on wednesday for columbus and friday we head to youngstown.

the turkey bowl is sunday - let me know if you want to sign up a whole team or if you want to play and need a team. e-mail me at pastormatt@dayspringassembly.org

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