Ladies Retreat Here We Come!

This weekend is the annual Matthias Ladies Retreat, and boy am I excited! Little Bean and I are packing up and ready to go... hopefully it will be Collin's first and last women's retreat! : ) I am interested to see how Little Bean will do while we are there... since we are in "family style" accommodations that bunk 5 or 6 to a room, it might be a little tricky with LB's night waking. Luckily, he's only waking up once in the middle of the night (which can be anywhere from 1:30 a.m. to 3:00 a.m) and then waking up in the morning around 7 (at which point I feed him and lay him back down for about an hour or so). He will be in a portable crib, so at least that is somewhat similar to his sleeping environment at home, although everything else about where we are staying will be totally different.

The location of the retreat is at Windermere Baptist Conference Center, it's about three hours southwest of us in a town called Roach, MO... what a name for a town, huh? Anywho, the grounds look like a ton of fun, as they have tons of recreational activities, like para-sailing, a zip line, fishing, a pool, and beach volleyball, to name a few. There's this big lakish/riverish thing (I think it's Lake of The Ozarks) that the grounds run along so it will be nice to see some clean water... not that the Missouri and the Mississippi Rivers aren't clean their are just dirty. It will be great to get away for a weekend and spend some time with my friends from Matthias.

So I've gotten word that the theme for the weekend will be something along the lines of rebirth, awakening, etc. A dear friend, Michelle Williams will be the speaker for the weekend. She was a student at Columbine High School when the shootings occurred. I don't know the whole story, but I am sure that she will share her entire testimony at some time throughout the weekend. The bit that I do know is that she was able to escape during the shootings, but they were unable to find her younger sister. Her family believed that she had been one of the people killed, since immediately no identities were released and no one knew the exact number of students massacred.

Michelle's family grieved through the evening, truly believing that, since she hadn't come home, that she was dead. They prayed for her. They wept for her. Miraculously, late that night Michelle's sister arrived home. She had been one of hundreds of student who had locked themselves in their lockers, fearing for their lives as the shooters prowled the school. I have read that the students were so afraid for their lives that they didn't make a sound, and were in there for hours - even after SWAT teams invaded the school. With the 10 year anniversary of that horrific day landing just a couple of weeks ago, I'm sure her version of the story will be heartbreaking. I can't wait to here what she has to say!

If you get the chance, be sure to pray for us this weekend... I'll have my work cut out for me! :)

Much Love,
Mama Bean

Here's a pic of Little Bean for ya... enjoy!He's very skeptical when it comes to the camera....