A perfect moment

 
I am increasingly convinced that life is made up of moments; some good, some bad and some perfect.  I had a perfect moment yesterday.  We were on our first day of vacation on the Cape.  Jake wanted to go for a Bike ride, which up until this point has meant training wheels and struggling with those at that.   Yesterday the training wheels were off and he did awesome.  We rode laps around my mom’s block.  He was determined to do it by himself.  He struggled, fell, got up, struggled a little more, fell again and then actually got a few pedals under his own power.  We high-fived.  He got a few more pedals.  He was laughing and hooting and hollering.  “Let’s catch up with mom so she can see me ride.”Seeing him begin to succeed at something that has been a struggle, hearing those little boy giggles,  and running with him as he rode made up a truly perfect moment.

Great week in VT

We had an amazing time in Vermont rock climbing, taking on a high ropes course and canoeing.  We were all challenged; mentally, physically and spiritually.  I think the highlight of the week for me was seeing Danielle on the trip and thriving.  Last year, we (Danielle, her parents, myself and Rich) made the decision not to allow her on the same trip.  She was heavily medicated.  Her behavior at that point was erratic, sometimes uncontrollable and she was distracting to our other students.  I felt like I would be setting her up to fail if I allowed her on the trip last year.  It broke my heart to make that decision but everyone involved felt it was the right thing. She has grown so much over the last year.   I attribute a lot of it to the other girls in our middle school group accepting her and loving her as she is.  She was amazing. She had a great time and needed no more redirection than any of the other students.  My eyes are welling up as I am writing this thinking about how Christ has moved in her life; how other middle school students were Christ’s hands actually reaching out to her.

hiking in vermont

5 days in the green mountains with 20 middle school students. Lord, grant us safety, peace and energy. Draw people closer to you. Draw us all closer to each other.