Sitting on a porch in a hollow with Duane, guns, and cameras

I got three new siblings at kids club a week ago. I love them! At the community cookout this week I went out back to the playground where Amilia asked me to lift her up to something on the playground. I decided we should try to sneak up on the teen mission trippers who were sitting at a gazebo, so with her in my arms we snuck over, but they spotted us. I asked her what we should do, and we ran away to hide on the playground. She giggled with glee as we ran off. Then we tried a couple more times. One last time, she asked her sister if she wanted to come. The three of us quietly made our way over, but alas, we were spotted! The sound of their laughter as we ran away is one of the most beautiful things of my summer.

Friday night after grocery shopping the weather was fine for a run, but I wasn't feeling compelled. I felt like playing some basketball instead, so John, Haley and I shot around for a while. I'm no good when I laugh, because what skill I have drops a couple levels. John is twice my size and intimidates me enough that I don't want to stand in his way when he's running to the basket, and Haley made me laugh so much I could hardly move. At one point, John said "argh" after missing a basket, and Haley decided he was Irish. That quickly became pirate talk which ended with Haley and I speaking in British accents. She decided that a good guarding technique would be to stick at her arms like in the Father Abraham song while saying "father Abraham, father Abraham" in her accent. To top it off, every time John came near one of us, she would shout "Giant." Needless to say, I may have gotten more of an ab workout laughing than anything else.

For a Saturday off, we went to Duane's house, where we go every Tuesday for a hike up the mountain with our youth participants. He, his brother, and his mother have pretty much adopted us as family from day one. We were there to fulfill a goal - Haley, our program staffer, wanted to shoot a rifle from the hip. And that we did. She almost dropped it when it kicked back, but caught it by the barrel. I evidently have some innate skill with cocking a gun, however, when it came to shooting it, I just looked like I was hoping it would go well when it kicked back on me, but held on to the butt. Then we moved on to the pistol. Haley hit the target first try. It was impressive. I aimed over the target, but it was the right direction... after the guys went, we had a photo shoot wearing the pistol holster and holding the shot gun. It was kinda loose on me, so I looked pretty hard core. For awhile after that, we all just sat on the porch talking while a little storm rolled in. It was good.