Monday, July 09, 2007

Happy 4th of July--a little late

Isaiah's second Fourth of July was spent with lots of family. We are still in Baton Rouge with Thomas' parents, and having a great time, I might add. We were able to spend the day with Thomas' parents; brother and sister-in-law and their four children; sister and brother-in-law (no children yet, but they do have a really cute dog who stayed at home); and sister-in-law's brother and his two children. And if that's not confusing enough I have a few Trivial Pursuit questions for you from the game that we played. :)

Thankfully Isaiah took a good afternoon nap, which hasn't happened in several days. We were hoping he would get to have his first water playing day (other than the bathtub, of course), but we had a great big storm. Oh well, the swim diapers will have to stay in the package a little longer, I suppose.

All in all the day was quite relaxing and enjoyable. Isaiah even had his first game of catch, throwing a ball back and forth with Grandma. Naturally, though, by the time we were able to get someone outside with a camera, he decided to be more interested in the camera than in the game of catch. We'll get him eventually!

Thursday Thomas, Isaiah and I were able to go to Slidell and part of New Orleans to see how Thomas' old stomping ground was recovering from Katrina. This was my first opportunity to see firsthand any of the areas affected by Katrina. Some areas were completely abandoned, even two years after the storm. Other areas were works in progress. A few neighborhoods were absolutely perfect; I had to remind myself we hadn't left Slidell yet.

Kind of ironically we were caught in some flash flooding. We were eating lunch in a Mexican restaurant (not a bad place to be stuck, one of my friends said), when the rain started coming down. When we were ready to leave, the rain had all but stopped, but we had to wait a little while for the street to become visible. We finally braved the rapids in our sturdy little Camry and made the rounds of Thomas' old haunts. Being able to see the way that people have persevered and fought back to have their town again reminded me of the common grace of God. I know that there are Christians in that area and God has blessed them specifically. Then, think about how God gives grace to other people because there are Christians there, too; or how God gives grace just for His glory to be proclaimed. I pray that I will be faithful to give Him the glory for all that happens in our lives, what seems to be "good" and what seems to be "bad".

No comments: