Premiere Performance

One of the best choices I made this fall was to join a Community Bible Study (CBS) held at a local church. It's made up of women of all ages, walks of life, faiths, etc, and we meet as core groups (small groups) to discuss the lesson we've done on our own over the week, then meet in the sanctuary for a lecture on the same lesson. The studies are really deep and require you to actually OPEN your Bible (something I have somehow not found the time to do as much since the kids joined our family!) - we have been doing Joshua, Judges and Ruth. The nuggets that we have found buried in the depths of the Old Testament have been a real blessing to me.

But the BEST part about CBS for me has been the amazing children's program they have. Skyla is loving the 3-year old class, and Brody is in the 2-year old class (he started out in the 1-year old class since his birthday wasn't till mid-September, but got moved up a few weeks ago because he was bullying on the younger ones. Everyone is much happier now! I have visions of future report cards - "Brody doesn't play well with others...). The teachers are absolutely wonderful, and the lessons and crafts they do with the kids are so thoughtful and purposeful. Skyla does the pledge of allegiance to the Bible, the Christian flag and America, and they have memory verses (put to song) each month. Ironically, their first memory verse was "I am with you always," which was the first verse Kevin learned when he became a Christian. I love hearing them sing the songs while they're playing at home. And Skyla always grills me about what I learned when I was in my class. :-)

Yesterday was our last class until after the New Year, and the kids did a little performance on the stage in the sanctuary at the end of CBS. Since this was the first "performance" either of our kids have done, Kevin came for it too, and we were armed with zoom lens and video camera. We watched Brody walk in and stand on the stage with his little friends, then all of a sudden he made eye contact with me and he was done before he even got started. He made a beeline for me and went hysterical when I tried to get him back up on stage. So he sat in my lap and we watched Skyla do all of her memory verses and a few other songs - it was so sweet! As you can see from the pictures, I was the only parent who didn't think about dressing her children in Christmas colors. All the Christmas plaid and black velvet, and my child is in her blue & purple flowers.

Brody, next to Skyla, crying his little heart out because he sees Mommy but isn't in her lap. At least we got one picture of the two of them on stage!

Hand motions and all. It was so fun to watch her sing & join in the fun, all the while peeking over at us to see if we were watching!