In The Zone

Our Olympic Swimmer! She does look like she's in the zone - studying the waters before diving in... but in reality she is completely dependent on her floaties and only kicks her feet once in a while. She is floating around independent of mommy's hand which mommy will take any time over last summer's long pool days of holding baby while baby tries to get away bc baby doesn't understand the concept of drowning.... I digress...

We've been "in the zone" as a family. Last week we began some intense days of packing as we have decided to move to a house about 5 minutes up the road. It's a better floor plan for our family and we're excited. So we've been packing and cleaning and all the things that moving and selling a home entails. (Secretly, I really enjoy all the packing and organizing... I'm a little crazy like that).

Around the same time we started packing we made the less-than-desirable discovery that our new CD was encoded with the wrong info.... long, complicated story short.... we've printed 1500 copies of our new CD only to find out that the digital info (which pulls up when you put the CD in a CD Rom) is all wrong - in fact - it is the digital info of another band called "Ten Pound Handle" and all 5 songs have "Ten Pound Handle's" song titles. Our songs are playing and they sound great (in my humble opinion) but anyone who purchases the physical CD will not be able to find "All Praise to God" or one of our other 4 songs by the song title. As you can imagine, we were not exactly happy about that. We've talked with our mastering guy and our printing company. Basically we've had to download software that is licensed by Gracenotes and submit our entire CD and supposedly it will give our songs their appropriate identity so that anyone who puts their CD into their CD Rom and has Internet access will have the correct info. Not exactly sure how that works and we still have to fix the problem before we print more CDs, but - just know it's been a major hassle for our non-techno-minds.

At the same time we found out that the stroller our house church purchased for some friends ministering in an Asian country arrived (by the hand delivery of this couple's family) without half the parts it was supposed to have. It was a doubles stroller and the doubles kit was not in the box. On top of that, the brakes on the stroller do not work. Okay - so imagine me (Cindy) on the phone with PishPoshBaby's northern, male employee trying to convince him that there really is a stroller in Thailand (where the couple went to have their baby) without parts and now PishPosh should ship them another one - ALL THE WAY TO Thailand- AND FAST, bc the couple is only in Thailand until June 12. Well, PishPosh doesn't ship out of country (supposedly) so, not too far into the conversation I realized I was waisting my time. The doubles kit is coming to our house now and we will have to ship it out - and there's no way I can get it to Thailand by the 12th. So... while I didn't/don't mind AT ALL trying to work that out for our friends (it's my honor and pleasure to do so!) I do want to take a moment to shout out to the world: DO NOT SHOP AT PISHPOSHBABY.COM and DO NOT PURCHASE THE PHIL AND TED'S SPORTS STROLLER WITH DOUBLES KIT! They stink - both companies just stink!

So within the same 5 days of packing, CD encoding, and stroller drama we ended up with a little adoption paperwork drama that you can read about on Aria's blog. It got solved, but not without shortening the length of my life by at least 2 days due to the stress it caused (haha). Anyway - our adoption paperwork is DONE (which is truly a miracle and I praise the Lord for his provision!) and off to our agency for it's final processes before being shipped to Ethiopia.

And in the middle of that... we received an envelope with some tax info. When we read it, it seemed to us that it was listed as a Billy Foote Music tax thing when it was supposed to be a personal Billy Foote tax thing... It's hard to explain, but it was another moment that took some days off our lifespan. After discovering that it's all written out correctly we started breathing again.

Okay... so in the middle of that - we've also been working with the Somali people and the Karen people. Tuesday night at ClubRising we had a record number of volunteers - 32 to be exact! And God really displayed his faithfulness to me that night. Today, we started a new summer program for the Somali's called "Reading Picnics" in which we read to the kids and have unstructured conversation/playtime. Have I mentioned how much I love those kids. I LOVE THOSE KIDS!!!

So, there you have it. Blessings, busy-ness and now - a confession - In the zone of hectic activity it is easy to forget about my dependence on the Lord. I focus on the stress and feel the burden of getting tasks done and before I know it, I'm trying to do it all on my own, without resting in my Savior. So tomorrow - I rest! ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh.... long sigh of relief.... I am going to rest....I'm so happy - I'm back in the zone of enjoying my dependence on Jesus.

Enjoy 2 more photos and thanks for reading along.
Love ya - C


Libby and Maliah rest by the pool together.

Libby's new (and much more real - and much more loud) drum kit! Billy told her that the ear protectors are "in-ear monitors" so she wears it while she plays. But really - we want her to wear them because these drums are SO LOUD!!! Seriously, I must really love that girl bc those drums are going to be the death of me - or at least my ear drums and sanity.