We arrived there on Friday, which was my and Amanda Shirey's birthday, and the girls all sang to us after our devotion that night. We had cake and then sang a lot of songs around the piano, which I loved! We stayed up talking for hours that night. On Saturday, we had two devotions by Janet O'Neal (who did a wonderful job!) and spent a lot of time in our small groups. We ended the night by having a Communion service and listening to Susan Downey sing while LaRae Thurman played the piano- both incredibly talented ladies.
Our main lesson for the weekend was to not expect so much of ourselves. Try to be a good Christian woman, wife, mother, friend, co-worker, etc., but don't push yourself to be perfect. This really helped me to realize that I cannot be the perfect person. As a new wife, I feel like I have to have the house spotless, dinner cooked perfectly, the laundry always done, and so on, all the time. This won't EVER happen! There are always times when we sacrifice time spent with our families to work instead, whether it be with our jobs or work done at home. Sometimes, we should just try leaving that laundry in the hamper while we spend quality time with our husbands and/or children. I'm not saying NEVER clean house or get anything done, but we shouldn't make it our top priority as we sometimes (almost always) do! Not only should we spend time with our families, but we should give our time to God. I realized this weekend how we can always make time for what we want to. For example, I've said before that I didn't have time to start going back to the rec center, yet I always find the time to watch my favorite TV shows!
I was really blessed this weekend by the music and by everyone sharing things about themselves. I found out just how much we can learn from each other if we just open up. I'm also glad I had the chance to get to know a lot of women from church on the trip. I'm already excited about going next year!!
Last year, some of my friends and I got together to catch up while everyone was home for Christmas. I'm so glad we had the chance to do that again this year! We met for dinner and then went to Brittany Reed's house for dessert. It was wonderful to see everyone again! I had not seen Megan since last year at our get-together! The first picture is (from left to right): Me, Megan Lindsey, Mattea (Crow) Pavlick with her cute daughter Addison, April Fox, Heather Godwin with Britt's dog and Brittany. I had to include the last picture showing Heather laughing at the dog licking her hand! It's too funny!
