Smoke, Roly Polies, and Peter

Over the past few days . . .

. . . my not-so-favorite moments included . . .

. . .  our car shuddering, then emitting lots of smoke as we drove down the freeway on Sunday.

. . . the mechanic informing us that our transmission had blown holes in its casing, and replacing it would cost twice what our old car is worth.  We decided it was finally time to bid our sedan goodbye and look into buying a minivan.

. . . exploring multiple methods of affording said minivan, and having one after the other turn into a dead end.  We think we've finally figured something out, though.  Cross your fingers.

. . . my favorite moments included . . .

. . . Joy teaching a family home evening lesson about Peter walking toward Christ on the water, then starting to sink as he became distracted and afraid of the storm around him (Matthew 14:22-33).  Joy concluded her lesson by reminding us that we should always trust that Jesus can help us.  Phillip commented that her lesson was very timely as we try to figure out how to resolve our vehicular dilemma.

. . . accompanying Anna as she walked laps around our apartment building after the sibs left for school.  She thinks it's fun to explore our little world, over and over.  One time she was sidling past a crawl space when she lost her balance and toppled headfirst into the pile of leaves at the bottom of it.  She looked so funny there, upside down with her little, sandalled feet sticking up in the air.  I laughed as I hauled her out, then said, "Whoa!" to reassure her that it had all been a funny surprise, and nothing to fret about.

. . . carefully holding Joy's roly poly while she put on her back pack at school.  Joy recently discovered that it's fairly easy to spot roly polies in a certain planter, so every day when we pick her up she finds one and carries it along as we leave school.

And another thing . . .

. . . since we have had no car this week, Phillip has been giving the big kids rides to school on his motorcycle.  Joy had ridden before, but four-year-old Daniel never had.  I prayed about it and felt it would be safe to let him ride.  Still, my big boy looked so very small as he rode away holding on to his daddy that first morning.