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a fun day

We drove to meet up with one of Bobby's nieces today. It was amazing to see how much the littlest ones have grown. Natalie is actually talking and wasn't scared of Bobby today (actually set across from us at the table and laughed at his faces and told him he was silly). I think her favorite food is ketchup. She not only dipped her chicken pieces and french fries in it, she mostly dipped her finger in it and licked the ketchup off. At one point she even lifted the little cup holding the ketchup and attempted to drink it. I couldn't help but think about two people in my church who have t-shirts about ketchup, one which reads "I eat ketchup with my ketchup."
We had a small rocking horse for the youngest, who is not quite two. It has plastic runners on the bottom, and stuffed horse on the top. She was terrified of it. Natalie showed her how to ride it, but she was still having no part of it. We couldn't help but laugh.
The older siblings seemed excited by their cartoon character sheets, but the two oldest were most excited by the $5 McDonald's gift cards  - "credit cards" one of them called them. The parents took the cards to hold so they didn't get lost, but Charlie took the little cardboard cover and put his "wallet" in his pocket. He also wanted to know if it was Thursday. Evidently their McDonalds has a special on Thursdays where Happy Meals are $2, and that's when they get to go.
I don't think there's ever been a time when we've met with this family when we haven't left encouraged and uplifted. I pray we can be the same encouragement to them.

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