Into spring break

Hello again!

Well, the first part of my spring break was a great success! Saturday I ended up not doing much homework, but instead got a text from a friend asking me to help her learn how to change the oil in her car, so instead of doing homework (never fun) I went and worked on cars (almost always fun). Saturday evening I joined several friends of mine at their cousin's house in Tyler for a time of fellowship and reading from "The Life of Pi" (interesting book, at least the section of it I heard), then in the pouring rain we all drove back to Canton, getting in about 12:30 Sunday morning (pre-time change). I wanted to make sure I wasn't in the way as people were getting ready for church and everything, so I got up at 6:45 (post time change) and got ready; it turned out, almost everybody in the house had forgotten about time change, until Alden called at 8:30. There was a mad dash as everyone tried to get ready (not counting myself, there were eleven other people in the house), and we made it to church almost on time, and definitely before most other people. There was a lot of good fellowship on Sunday, making for a very enjoyable time.

Monday I got up, then after breakfast most of the kids had dentist appointments, so Jonathan, Bonnie and I figured out what we needed to get for our 8 person camping trip, then Jonathan and I went to town to buy food. We headed to Tyler State Park about 1:00 Monday afternoon, and were very blessed in being able to camp. We hadn't been able to get through when we tried to make reservations; when we arrived we were informed that the had completely booked out all of the campsites, but a large group had not made it in, so a few campsites had been made available. We were able to get one of those, so we set up camp, changed and went walking around the lake and swimming. We went back to our campsite, hung out, then eventually got the fire going and I cooked hamburgers that Jonathan had made. After supper we talked, played some games, and sat around the fire with Jonathan and James playing their guitars - overall a very fun time; the evening ended with everyone going to bed shortly before midnight.

Just before 2:00 this morning I woke up to a sound coming from very near my head; one of the multitudinous raccoons in the area was apparently at the tree that the head end of my hammock was tied to. I scared him off, and went back to sleep. I ended up waking up about 5 or 6 times and scaring the raccoons away from our sleeping area. It was still a quite restful night, though. This morning we got up, and eventually I started cooking our breakfast of cheesy scrambled eggs with bacon, onion, and tomato in them, while Jonathan was making toast for everyone over the fire. Breakfast took forever, cooking everything with just one skillet, but I believe the overall consensus was that it was good enough it was worth the wait. We hung out for awhile more, then finally broke camp and headed out a little after 11:00 - I came back to Longview, and the others all went back to Canton.

So far break has been very good - now for a less fun couple of days studying and writing papers, then I will be heading to Dallas on Friday, is the current plan.

I'd love to hear from you and find out what's going on in your life, and how I can pray for you.