Day 6 & a Day Trip

Today my kiddos and I went for a little trip... down memory lane.  You all met Jamey from Zehlahlum Family when she guest blogged for me while I was in Mozambique, but I actually met her many years before that, when she was just the little sister of my friend Laura. :-) When you're a teenager, 2-3 years can seem like a lifetime, but motherhood tears down so many walls, and a couple of years is nothing.  So when Jamey and I reconnected on Facebook, I checked out her blog, she checked out mine... and over the last year we have done some serious mom-bonding.

And this weekend, she came "home."  Not home as in back from vacation, but home as in the place she used to live before she got all grown up and moved away.  And fortunately for me, that kind of "home" for Jamey is only an hour from my home-where-I-live-every-day.  So today, my kiddos and I went for a little trip.

But what you don't know is that Jamey lives in an area that I consider my old stomping grounds. It's actually not the town where I grew up--it was over an hour away from me even then. But I was in a competition called Bible Quizzing as a teenager, and many of the friends I made in quizzing lived in her town. And because of them, my high school sweetheart lived in that town. I actually think I spent more of my social time in her area than in my own.

So as we drove today, and the big kids were mesmerized by "Because of Winn-Dixie" on the DVD player and Roo was (thankfully) asleep, I had a chance to reminisce.  I looked for familiar landmarks. (It's been several years since I have been down there at all.) I tried to remember how to get to old hangouts. I turned on country music, because that's what I listened to with those friends back then. I remembered good times and bad, wondered where some of those old friends are today, and thanked God for Facebook that allows me to know the answer to that for many of them.

And then we arrived at a house that used to be oh-so-familiar to me, but that I never would have picked out in a million years... Jamey's parents' house.  And I got a chance to see Jamey, to see her younger sister (who was just a snotty little kid back when I was a teenager... sorry, Sarah...), to meet Pickle, Peanut, and Boohoo.  And I got to make new memories with new friends and watch my kids make new friends and... it was a great way to bring the past & the present together.

After our fun morning, I knew I wasn't likely to get much accomplished at home, so I decided to make it a big ol' Day o' Fun for me and the kids.  We left our visit with Jamey and drove straight to our favorite ice cream place, then stopped home just long enough to change clothes before driving to my aunt's house to go swimming.  We got home in time to have dinner, get baths for the kiddos, and put them to bed.

It's been a great day.

By the way, I'm not slacking on my Faith in Action tasks, though.  I haven't done my task for today yet, but it is just a simple e-mail that I need to send... and I need to read my Bible reading for the day.  But... there's no time like the present, right?  So I'm going to get on that now.  Can I just say, though, that this project has been great for me already?  I am so excited to see the outcome, to see myself starting to form some new habits... And tomorrow, the kids and I are making a homemade chocolate cake with homemade frosting to give away.  It's going to be so much fun!  Stay tuned for pictures... :-)