December 18 – “A good cousin”

At our home group party last night, after our white elephant gift exchange, we gave each of the little kids there a gift of their own to open.  It wasn't anything big – coloring books and crayons.  But when it became obvious that all the gifts were given and we were moving on, Micah (the three-year-old) turned to his Mom and whispered, "But Zakary didn't get a present."   She explained that Zakary wasn't there, but he would get one when he came is a few weeks.  Now that's a good cousin for you.    I worked some more on the Christmas Eve service.  I talked to Lanny to coordinate the songs with him.  I also asked what he thought about color of paper for the handout.  He had several recommendations, the only one of which I recognized was parchment.  Not that I would have been able to tell the difference, anyway.  That is, until he said, "Either parchment or the color of sand.  We are in Galveston."  Sand I can do.  Or at least ask about.   Chris and I went over to Office Depot to check out sandy paper.  We ran into a problem, though.  The bulletin was put together as a landscaped legal sized fold-in-the-middle document.  They had two colors of legal sized paper: green white (That was intriguing, but I discovered that meant it was recycled), and super white.  That one I think was washed in Clorox or something.  Anyway, I decided to see how hard it would be to shrink the document to letter size and use the paper I already had at home.  I thought it was parchment.  Turns out it was called Royal Linen Natural.  I have no idea what that means.  Looks like sand to me, but I better check around before I hit print fifty times.   Big night tonight.  Today was the last day of school for Jachin and Micah, so Nana promised that they could spend the night here.  Word is they were packed before they ever left for school, but that's not confirmed.  We ordered some pizza, Jachin and I played some football in the street until the pizza got here, then we followed it inside.  After we ate me and the boys went back outside.  They heard a large dog barking.  Actually, they couldn't see it, but it sounded large.  It could have been like Heidi, our daschund.  She's a shrimp, but her bark is deep and raspy.  We walked over to check it out, and stopped to look at some Christmas lights.  About that time a neighborhood cat strolled out from behind a bush.  Jachin hollered, "A cat!  A cat!  I'm allergic to cats!"  and he started running back to the house.  Micah has heard enough about Jachin's peanut allergy to know what that meant, so he squealed and ran as well, joining in the chorus, "A cat!  A cat!  I'm allergic to cats!"  Now who in the world would not rush back with them and reassure them that the cat was OK?  Well, I would have tried, but when I stopped laughing, Jachin was in the bed of the truck saying, "I was just kidding, Micah," and Micah was in the house peering out the storm door, keeping watch for the evil creature.  Cats.    Psalms 63:7-8 says, "Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings.  8 My soul clings to you; your right hand upholds me."   Father, thank you for a relative pain-free day.  It's been a long time.  Amen.