this is gonna be fun

Thursday the girls participated in a cross country "meet" organized by the international schools in our city.  I had NO IDEA what to expect.... but was greatly encouraged by Luke who, as we pulled into the parking lot, loudly exclaimed, "oh this is gonna be fun!"

His comment's awesome-ness was amplified by the fact that he 1)  had no idea what a cross country meet was and 2) had never ever been in that parking lot before.  

But he was right.  It was fun.  

The girls participated as part of "team home school" - basically the home schoolers in the city form their own team and are able to jump in to events like this one.  It's a pretty sweet deal.

The event was a smidge more competitive than I was prepared for... and neither of the girls were ready for the sprint-madness at the starting line.

And neither of them were really ever in a position to win.  But they enjoyed it!  And I am so thankful!

There were six (or more?) age groups and three different distances.  The girls fell into the same age group and ran 1500m.  They started and finished on the track but the route followed a paved path through a boarding school campus.

I hope that they will grow up to enjoy running.  I'd love to share that with them.  But maybe they won't.  Neither of them really 'love' it now.  Mostly I just hope they grow up healthy and confident and.... if things like this are enjoyable, then we'll do more.  If they aren't, then we'll try something else.  But I'm pretty sure we'll be back at the cross country meet again next fall :)  [though Julianna is a bit intimidated that she'll jump to the next age group and her race distance almost doubles.]

and then as we were leaving - a surprise flat tire in the parking lot.  This part of the story is tremendous testimony of God's provision for us.  Late afternoon, I was with my friend Ashlei, and between us we had 8 children, four of whom missed their afternoon naps.

And one of the local drivers in the parking lot (who Ashlei knew as a friend of a friend) is the one who pointed out the tire, offered to change it, recruited another local driver to help him, and then graciously performed the task - with an audience.  

It took a while, especially since I'd never had a flat on this car and couldn't find the wrench and was exceptionally distracted trying to keep an eye on the littles.... those of you who know JP know how much this must have got his motors running.  That boy is never far from a tool!

But in the end I profusely thanked my new friends the tire-changers and drove away on the spare.  Oh, and Ashlei and I decided that we could have totally changed that flat.  But with all our "help" on the ground it was crazy-blessing that we didn't have to!

So yeah, Luke, you were right buddy.  It was fun.