When we woke the kids up this morning, I mentioned to David that it was "your mother's birthday!" and his immediate reply was, "Ahhh, she wasn't with me on my birthday (July 13), and I'm not with her on her birthday (July 24)". Smart kid.

We slowly starting getting the kids awake this morning like at 6:30am, because we needed to be at church by 8:30am to start the enrollment process . It was a 30 minute drive to Cherry Hills Community Church. And we did pretty well. We got the kids fed, dressed and out the door - and we were pulling away by 8:00am. Instead of driving on I 25, we decided to drive up through Daniel's Park Road. Very, very scenic route. There were buffalo herds. And the skyline of the city was spectacular. Not to mention the mountains. This road is winding and lots of bicyclists and joggers were on the trails.

We had made a prior commitment to reconnect with Dr. Whaley at CHCC. Dr. Whaley was professor and head of the missions department at Moody back when Glenn and I attended. His sister-in-law is Doris Rising (Ray's wife) friends with WBT and Bolivia days. Dr Whaley was responsible for the implementation of the Sweeting Building, Solheim and Moody Alumni Student Center besides focusing on the accreditation of the school and changing it from a 3 year program to a full 4 year program. The Whaleys are good friends of Don and Beth Campbell (Mary Campbell Beekman's parents) . Mary Beekman introduced Glenn and me together!

We got the kids checked in - signed up - and had their stickers and release information signed. We attended Dr. Whaleys SS class. After the SS class, Glenn and I stayed in the fireside room which was empty and we visited during the worship hour. We talked about the influence of Moody on our lives. Since Dr. Whaley was a student at Moody back in the 60's he remembers very well Glenn's g'mother, Ma Gamble. We also threw out other names such as Eberline, HE Singley, Joleene Kolenberg, Dr. Callagher to name a few. But the under-lining theme of the professors is not that they were necessarily good teachers, it was the fact that they had a personal influence in our lives. We mentioned that Glenn and I completed our degree and graduated with Karen in 2010 and we really appreciate the education that we got, even graduating when we were 55 years old.

We gave Dr. Whaley a bag of Guatemalan coffee and prayed for him and thanked the Lord for his service .

After church we gathered up the g'kids. Lucy was "wasted" - no morning nap. She just hung on to G'dad neck - I love that. As we were walking out, there were bubbles blowing out from the 3rd floor. Since we were in no hurry to go anywhere, we let the kids play and try to catch the bubbles.

Then I googled for the closest place that had a PlayPlace. McDonalds - just 3 miles away on Highlands Ranch Road. This was a "high tech" place. They had 3 computer screens that Lucy and David mainly played on. After eating their cheese burgers and fries, they played more on the computer screens.

However, it was a different story for Lucy. She conquered the 2 story spiral steep slide. She loved it. She had a routine. After coming down the slide, she would run over to our table, giggling and take a drink of water with the straw and then climb back into the "obstacle course" and climb the 2 story up to the slide, slide down, then run over for a sip of water, and do the slide again. She was so funny. Over and Over again. She even got to the computer screen for about 20 minutes. I think we were at the Play Place for about 2 hours.

As we drove home (Katy's house), we drove through the Ritzy area of Highlands Ranch. Glenn wanted to do some "dumpster diving" with the trash and broken furniture that was set out for trash collection - but I said "NO". We taught David this new word. David would say, "What is dumpster diving?"  We drove back through Daniel's park, and G'dad got out to pet and feed the Buffalo that was right up to the fence. We even saw a flock or wild turkey.

We also stopped to watch the train drive by. We got the engineer to toot his horn. G'dad and David counted out loud the number of cars. 86.

We came home and we went "camping" again. Straight down to the basement. The kids played and we watched and played with them. We also talked with Ellen and each of the kids wished her happy birthday.

I fixed grilled cheese sandwiches for supper. G'dad is putting the older kids down now. Lucy went down right after we ate. G'dad and David and Emily finished watching something on TV, then Emily slipped into her pink princess tent and David slept on the floor.



.