Works of God: God ALWAYS Provides

God has always provided for us. Sometimes, however, he provides just enough to keep us on our knees. Last week was such a week. Matt did not have a lot of work. (We did get a lot of extra family time in, though :-), and Matt was also able to use the time to get some stuff done for Vacation Bible School at our church). So far this week, however, Matt was contacted for jobs or estimates by FOUR new customers - and it's only Monday!!

While I'm thankful that God has provided for us yet again, I'm also so very thankful that He lets us go through uncertain times in order to show Himself powerful and to draw us closer to Himself.

Collin is 2 1/2!

My sweet baby boy is two and half today. I intended on making cookies or something today, but the day kind of got away from me, so we took him to McDonald's for ice cream tonight.

Here are a few of his favorite things lately:

• "Two minutes" - His new stalling tactic is "two minutes to play".
• Rita's Water Ice - He asks for it all the time.
• Huggles - An extra snuggly hug, I think "huggles" is one of my new favorite things, too.
• Talking to Jenna - Every day he tells me multiple times, "I want to talk it to Jenna." They love to "talk" and play together
  
• Checking on Jenna - "Mommy, I need to check it on Jenna."
• Swinging from anything and everything - Yesterday he swung on a bar at the playground. No big deal, he does that all the time; but this time he swung out over nothing and the bar was over 6 ft high. It freaked his mom out a bit, but he loved it.
• Measuring - In an effort to be like his daddy, he carries a tape measure with him and measures stuff all day long.
  

I took these pictures this weekend. He's definitely turned into a kid and is not a baby anymore.

1st Annual Catan Cup

To celebrate Matt turning 28, we hosted our 1st Annual Settlers of Catan Tournament. Eight friends joined us for dinner, cake and ice-cream, three rounds of Settlers, and a chance to win the first place trophy that came with a $10 Wawa card.

PRELIMINARY ROUNDS:
During the first two rounds, we had three games going on at once. We limited these games to 35 minutes. After the first 35-minute game, we switched around the boards and who was playing who for the second round. We added up each person's scores from the two timed games to determine who would make it to the championship game.

CHAMPIONSHIP GAME:
The four players with the highest scores were to move onto the championship game. Unfortunately, one of the top four had to work early the next morning and could not stay to play in the championship, so lucky number 5 got to take his place. Of the four highest scores, the player who had accumulated the most points in the first two rounds got to pick her position (1st, 2nd, 3rd, or 4th) in the championship game. Then the second highest scorer picked her position, etc. The championship board was set-up by someone not involved in the game, and the game was played with the standard rules to ten points.

SPORTSMANSHIP AWARD
In addition to a trophy for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd place and Wawa card for 1st and 2nd, all participants voted on a losership - um, I mean sportsmanship - award. To no one's surprise, nobody voted for any of the top three scorers (poor losers, we say). We were all pretty much surprised, though, at who actually won the sportsmanship award, because well, he's not really known for being a great sport. :-)

The preliminary rounds

Breaking for cake (I'll do another post about the cake later)

The birthday boy was not turning two, but I didn't really have room on the cake for 28 candles. That's what happens when you get old.

The super-official scoreboard, the Wawa cards, and the trophies


The championship game board

The top four players and one cheerleader (clockwise from top: me, Tammy, Matt, Melinda, Rob who was cheering Melinda on and "helping" her)


Awards "ceremony"
Left to right:
Me - 1st place, Tammy - 2nd place, Matt - 3rd place, Rick - "sportsmanship"

Many thanks to everybody who came and made the 1st Annual Catan Cup a success. Everybody else, there's always next year. :-)