July Pictures

Pics from Elia and Emmanuel’s wedding:

Here comes the bride

Elia saying her vows

Emmanuel saying his vows

Elia

Exchanging rings

The newlyweds! 🙂

Read Full Post »

Guess who’s been procrastinating?

Yep, that would be me. Guilty as charged. *headslaps self* Bad me, bad me.

Anyway, fall has fallen here (somehow that doesn’t sound quite as catchy as “spring has sprung”). Though you’d never guess from the temperatures we’ve had the past couple of days. I hate ADD weather. 😛

But enough about that. Fall means riding classes, which in turn means lots of dirt, sweat, aching muscles, big grins – and the occasional mishap when running up the ponies. I thought I’d seen and heard it all with the Triple-R herd (over 65 horses), but these guys have provided me with some brand new adventures.
The ponies’ pasture is roughly half a mile from the barn. They usually draft about 4 or 5 people to bring them in (depending on the day, there are usually 10 or 11 ponies). Each person rides one pony bareback and leads one or two others. Sounds simple, right? Well, with these guys Murphy’s law seems to be in effect all the time. Saturday before last I got stuck with two knuckleheads whose only interest was eating. Every five steps they’d stop and start munching away. Halfway to the barn, Poncho (the pony I was leading) yanked his lead rope right out of my hands. I had to jump off the pony I was riding, grab him, and then continue the rest of the way on foot. One of the other girls was in the same predicament. Needless to say, we were both a little miffed. Granted, this wasn’t nearly as spectacular as the time the entire 3R herd turned around and ran back to the barn just as they reached the pasture (the work of two very dumb horses – yes, they do exist). I did not, however, have to jog a quarter of a mile while basically dragging two several-hundred-pound knuckleheads that time. And that was after an hour-long jumping class in which I rode a rather hyper mare. Getting out of bed and to church the next morning was something of a challenge.

Speaking of church, it appears I’ve been drafted to lead worship on Friday nights (or at the very least on a regular basis), and I’m now in the rotation for Sunday mornings as well. I’d been expecting it, since they’d been talking about that for months, but it still feels a little strange. So far it’s been going really well, despite me feeling like I’m just flying by the seat of my pants. Then again, I understand things tend to go a lot better if you just let God take over. 😉

In other news, as of last Saturday, I’m an aunt! Sort of; my “adopted” brother and his wife (who also counts as an adopted sister) had a baby boy. His name is Joshua, and he is absolutely adorable. (Unfortunately, my pictures are on a different computer, so you’ll have to wait until the next post to see them.) He’s a very special kid. I don’t know exactly what God’s got planned for him, but we’re all pretty sure it’s something extraordinary. 🙂
On a side note, when we went up to Grenoble to see the family, we discovered that it is a city that requires an actual map in order to navigate. We’d bought a GPS for the car precisely because we kept getting lost there, and wouldn’t you know it, we managed to get lost anyway. The funny thing is, we’re usually pretty good at finding our way after we make a wrong turn. Go figure. 😛

That about wraps it up for now. Until next time, keep an eye out for Lucy:

Read Full Post »