wonderful worship and wild marine life

hello!! hope you all had a great weekend! We did. :) the weather has gotten steadily hotter but to be honest, we don't even mind the cooler weather that we had last week. Sometimes that is nicer for little kids than 80 degree heat. But we are enjoying the mid-70s this week. so whatever, (although hopefully not rain) it is just nice to be together...although i must say i wonder how the kids will do with 2 weeks out of routine, the dinners out seem to be getting wilder and wilder rather than that they are learning to behave. :( and sometimes the bad behaviour can get annoying, especially if you're not used to dealing with kids 24/7 (ahem, Daddy-o :) )...generally, though, sun sand and water is such a great combination for kiddos and we are all having a great time!!

Yesterday we hardly even noticed the weather, thats how much fun we were having at Grace Presbyterian Church in Stuart. What a blessing it was to worship with these dear people! We had never met Pastor Bernie Van Eyk before, although we knew his brothers Arie and John. It only takes one time meeting this beautiful family though and it feels like you have known eachother all your lives. And I've heard it said that a congregation will take on the personality of their pastor and in this church it is definitely true!! What a welcoming, gracious, interesting bunch of people. We even surprised my cousin Jeremy by being there, it was nice to get reacquainted with him again. We had an amazing Sunday. :)

Of course it goes without saying that Pastor Bernie reminded me of his brothers, with their passion for the gospel and their vibrant personalities, but especially i love how they scoop up children left and right and just love them. :) Pastor John used to do that with Ashleigh, and it must have made an impression b/c she still remembers how he told her he loved her. :) Lucy, if you're still checking, we miss you even though we rarely saw you! I can only imagine how much Riverside does! Anyways, that kind of love and enthusiasm is beautiful to see. :)
So, we hardly were outside yesterday as we spent the WHOLE day visiting with this wonderful, inspiring church and experiencing their amazing hospitality and being encouraged by the preaching of God's word. Even the kids were really welcoming, less than five minutes after the first service Ashleigh was running around with the girls her age...you know how shy Ashleigh is, they obviously drew her in. If you are ever in the area, you must visit them to experience it all for yourself. :) oh, and Anita, Nicks parents are wonderful as well! it was so nice to meet them, what a blessing for you to have great in-laws! :) (my keyboard is doing funny things, the question mark and apostrophe are coming out like this È)

so back to our hotel, it is on South Ocean Blvd, across the street from the ocean and backing onto the bay. The other day we were hanging around the pool and happened to see dolphins swimming around in the bay, really close to us! Wow! I already mentioned the sharks (there were more sighted today, although not sighted by us :( ) and today it was interesting at the beach because of all the fish that were jumping around in the water, really close to the shore! you can even see it in some of the pictures, but it was really amazing to watch, there were hundreds of them and they would jump right out of the water!) I guess that is partly why the sharks were close by today, they had the flags up warning of dangerous marine life.

so the pelicans would patiently float around in the water, and the fish would jump right around them! i realize that this is probably nothing interesting for many of you, but we city slickers haven't seen many fish jumping like that and thought it was pretty neat. :)

this isn`t a good picture of it, but Josh is into funny faces. :) he loves to make people laugh. He just loves people in general, it is embarrassing sometimes because he just marches around talking to everybody and as he walks past them he will touch their hair, or their feet, or whatever, to make conversation. until today most people around here are older and think its adorable, but now there are a lot of families and younger people arriving and a nosy child doesnt seem as adorable to them. :) Kev and i are always having to retrieve him from the middle of other peoples space, because he settles right in and makes himself comfortable. with whoever. You remember that Ashleigh and Jaden are really shy, so dealing with this type of child is all new to us. :) We think he is precious, though. He just loves people!
have a great week, everybody!!