Too Many Milestones!

Today, our friends' The Loud's (I love their name!) invited us to go to their church and Lifegroup.  When we first moved here we were very proactive in finding a church.  We tried several and a few we went to several times.  But none of them stuck with us, we just couldn't really find what we were looking for.  Nick and I were raised in very different religions and finding a happy medium is much harder than I thought it would be.  So sadly we have not been going to church for awhile.  We were doing daily devotionals and scripture readings but even that has fallen aside with Ashton.  Once the kids are asleep, we generally either want chill out time or sleep time too.  Now that Caden goes to school at the same church and is learning a lot, it has peaked my interest again in going to church.  Just as I decided I wanted to have a church family (again with Nick leaving soon), Sarah asked for us to try their church out.  I decided this must have been a sign and that we should try it out.  It took several Sundays to get our schedule worked out with company and sickness, but today was the day!  I had several fears going into today.  The first was Caden, Mr. Routine, would be in a different classroom than he was for school.  I was scared he would freak out, but luckily he was excited to try out a new classroom.  The second fear was leaving Ashton.  He is almost eight months old and this is the first time I have really left him alone.  My mom and sister have both watched him for a quick errand but nothing big and these were strangers.  If you didn't know this, I worked in a church nursery for almost 10 years so I have standards.  I generally haven't liked a church in the past because of their inadequate nurseries.  Let me tell you, this was the coolest nursery ever.  They probably have about 10 rooms, so they ages are really broken down.  In order for me to pick up my child, I have to give my fingerprint!!  The scan then will check in/out my kids, by photo recognition!  I had never seen such a thing and think that this is so cool.  So once I got to Ashton's room, I knew he would be fine.  He loves to crawl and play so he was golden.  I acted like an incompetent parent, not knowing what direction to give and just said do whatever you want.  He of course was fine and didn't cry when I left, but did give me a huge smile when I returned.  We really liked the size of the church and the message hit home.  The pastor was able to relate to the real life and had many funny stories, which I enjoy that type of sermon.  The Lifegroup was very intimidating at first glance.  There were several couples and I was scared of what would happen.  I am more of a sit back and take it in, I hate being forced to speak about something unless I feel I have a useful viewpoint.  This group was very welcoming and I didn't feel pressured to talk and was able to listen and learn a lot.  The only bad part was the introduction.  Neither of us like public speaking and when it was our turn to talk about ourselves, Nick looked at me as if go.  So I had to do the talking. . . brat!  But I survived, so that is the important part!  We really enjoyed the church, the message, the people, it was really a good day.  Afterwards, we did lunch with the Loud's : ) at Red Robin.  It was entirely too busy and with the time change, my whole family was cranky.  So I am afraid we scared them off from restaurants.  I hope Ashton gets better soon, he is really hindering my social outings.  : )  The kids fell asleep within second of the car ride home and slept for awhile once at home.  And then when Ashton woke up, we saw this:

 He is such a big boy now!!  We immediately lowered his bed to the lowest position which made me sad.  I am not ready for him to be this old!  Today was again a great day.  I feel like I have changed so much in just the time I started writing this blog.  It is funny how fast life can change for you.  Hopefully optimistic Lindsey stays around for awhile.  Post and Carry on with the rest of your day.