Saturday, December 9, 2006

It's Been A Productive Day

This morning Bee and I were at Wally World by 8:30 doing our shopping for the teenager's Christmas Party Sunday night. As we were checking out, she announced to everyone that "all that stuff is for the teenager's party". I suppose the word "teenager" sounds pretty odd coming from the mouth of a three-year-old. Everyone laughed at her. I explained she's a youth pastor's kid and "teenager" is a very common word in our house.

So far today (what am I saying it's after midnight) I have made nacho dip and pizza dip, both to be baked on Sunday before the party. Bee and I borrowed some Christmas decorations from the unused stash in the church attic to decorate the youth room. When we finally made it home after we picked the boys up from school at 3:30, I started baking and talking to Ruby. I made magic cookie bars, scotcheroos, and gooey butter bars. My house smells wonderful, like Christmas. Tomorrow I have a double batch of chocolate-peanut-butter-chip cookies to bake and then I'm done until Sunday afternoon. I love to cook for the teens. Every Sunday afternoon I spend 3-4 hours making dinner for their weekly group time. I have a couple other people that help. It tires me out some weeks, but it's fun.

So now I sit with a clean kitchen and three sleeping children and post, finally. My kitchen was so messy after baking all afternoon, with Bee's help of course, that I was half tempted to leave it 'til morning, but I knew by then the mixture of flour and water that Bee had spilled all over the island would be permanently adhered to the counter, so I chose to spend the 20 minutes and get it done tonight. Thankfully the dishwasher was empty, so all I had to do with most of the dishes was toss them in and hit start. The counters had already been sitting for about an hour by the time I cleaned them, so they took some elbow grease, but alas they are perfect once again.

I talked to Ruby for quite awhile this afternoon while I was baking and while she was working on her Christmas cards. I felt so bad for her. Several weeks ago, they had to put their weiner dog, Animal, to sleep. She was 14 years old and old age just finally got the best of her. Ruby describes Animal as "my first dream that came true." Today while they were riding in the car, Missy Moo Moo, her 4 year old, said "Mommy, I miss Animal". Ruby was near tears while telling me this and at one point she actually cried a little. On top of losing her first baby, she is pregnant and probably more prone to emotions than usual. As we were talking and she was signing her Christmas cards, she suddenly realized that she had signed Animal's name to a few of the cards as she has done for 14 years. I was informed that I would be getting a card with Animal's name scratched out because she messed up too many of them to throw them away. That's okay, Animal's spirit lives on!!

Well, I really need to get to bed!! Pray for Temera. She really needs her sleep. She's been up before me many times lately and I'm three hours ahead of her out here!
Also pray for Inkling's family as they head back home!! Love to you all and goodnight!!

3 comments:

Farm Fairy & Bruno said...

Tell Ruby my heart aches for her. I still find myself breaking into tears. I think it would be way harder for Ruby..Funny Buluga and Animal where both 14! Blessing to her from me.

FarmWife said...

Poor Ruby. It's hard enough loosing a pet, but to loose it when you're pregnant has got to be really tough!

We had to have our 15 yr old weiner dog put down a few years back. She was my only dog as a kid. That was horrible.

Lauren said...

I'll be praying for Ruby and her family!

I'm almost willing to bet my youngest niece will be talking about doing things for the teenagers in a few yars. My bil is a youth pastor, and she is always around the church and youth group. It will be interesting to see if she follows in Bee's steps. (She does not, however, have older brothers.. just a daddy whose other hobby is comic shop games!)