Small things with GREAT LOVE...

What a weekend we have had already! Our family was able to play a small part in our church's global outreach this weekend. In partnership with Feed My Starving Children, Nappanee Missionary Church prepared 1.2 million meals to be shipped worldwide. Here is a video from one of the local news stations talking about the effort (click here.)

Before I packed meals with my family though, I had the privilege of working with these delightful young ladies last night. No, wait...

It was these delightful young ladies. ;) I'm sure you are wondering how I ended up with this crew of beauties...

As you may know, Madeline's twelfth birthday was last month. We had promised her a slumber party, but October (not unlike other months in the Renfrow household) got a little crazy, and the sleepover was rescheduled for this weekend.

We planned on taking the girls out for a fun night and then bringing them home to chat until the wee hours, but Madeline found out that our church's youth group was reserving a block of volunteer slots for the FMSC event on Friday night, and she wanted to be involved. Our family was signed up for Saturday, but Madeline (knowing her sweet friends well) thought that her buddies would have an interest in packing meals with the effort as well. So...we reserved our places during the youth group time. (10:00pm-12:30am, oh my!)

The gals had some pizza and then we headed out for some fun....mini-golf...

...bowling....and go-carts too!

Then, about the time I'd like to go to bed, we showed up at Nappanee Missionary Church to work our shift. The girls donned their hairnets and gathered in the sanctuary with hundreds of other youth to hear about the organization, what they do, who they serve, and what our jobs were for our two hour shift.

Here are the girls gathered around one of the work stations getting the flight attendant style briefing before beginning.

Station 3!

Working hard....our mantra for the evening: Chicken. Veggies. Soy. Rice.

This young lady was very happy to seal our lovingly packaged meals for us...

At the end of the shift, the volunteers were given the opportunity to join in prayer over the boxes that had been packed. In our two hours of work, 520 boxes were packed. Each box contains 36 packages, and each package is six meals when prepared. They told us to remember the number 307. Three hundred seven is the number of children who could have one meal a day for an entire year from the meals we packed that evening.

I am so grateful to the parents of these young ladies for entrusting them to me and allowing them to participate in this event, because it was such an honor to be with them. I was so impressed, so very impressed, by their tender hearts as they learned about the vastness of the problem of hunger, and I loved to see the conviction they had as we started towards the gym on our mission. Most of all, I loved to see their joy. These girls were absolutely joyful as they served. Yes, I know they were up way past their bedtime, hanging with friends, and bopping to really loud music, but it was more than that. What we did was a very small thing. Two hours of our time is a small contribution in the grand scheme of things, but it made a difference, and the girls knew it. It made a difference for the children who would eat the meals, in the girls who packed the meals, and in the old mom who got them there too. ;) I would definitely take them all again.

Even if this is when we got in the car to make the forty minute drive home....

Happy and blessed (and maybe a little tired too),

shannon

Running Renfrows!

This morning our whole family, along with Uncle Matt and Aunt Hannah, participated in the IU Health, Ball Memorial Hospital 5K! All of the "grown-ups" had been planning on running for a few months, and before I left for WA in September, I talked to Madeline about running with us as well. She jogged with me several times in preparation, and then last week, Timothy decided he wanted to run as well!

This was their first race ever, and both of them ran nonstop for the whole 5K! They were awesome!

Here's a shot of all us crazies trying to stay warm before the race starts.

At the start.....

....and off we go!

Brother and sister after the race!

My little running buddy....this little guy had more speed left in him than I did at the end!

Madeline ran hard! Taking a few minutes to recover....

Cheesing it up with Aunt Hannah!

The Renfrow ladies.....Mom's first outing since her second knee replacement. She is doing great!

Beautiful lady and a guy in tight pants....

I love that Madeline ran with her daddy, like I used to do!

Me and my running partner! (He was so cute....when people would cheer him on during the race, he'd yell back, "haven't walked yet, no water either!')

The Renfrow boys with Mom...

Can it be....is our little man drinking water?

Can you believe that a hotdog entered this race?

Timothy on the podium receiving his award for FIRST PLACE in the men's aged 9-10 division!

Madeline WON TOO....here she is receiving her award for the ladies' age 11-12 division!

The kids had a lot of fun, and Mike and I didn't fall apart.....so we think we'll do it again! =)

I hope you read until the end, because this was the highlight of the whole day for me. When Timothy stepped off of the podium, he walked over to me and his grandma, who was telling him how proud she was of his hard work and winning the race. He looked at us and said, "but Grandma, it wasn't me. It was The One in heaven who gives me the strength."

I have the best kids in the whole wide world and I am so blessed to be their mama.

-shannon

We have a new hobby!

-shannon

Yeah....I did this.

-shannon

P.S. I loved it!

I guess I should blog, huh?

Much has happened, here is first installment of an update! I spent the month of July in TX on active duty with the army. I worked with their obstetrician/gynecologists, in the departments of urogynecology and maternal fetal medicine. I also spent a lot of time on the labor deck. I love labor and delivery....but, as you can imagine, that is where the crazy hours come from! I was exhausted by the end of the month!

There are five places that the army has ob/gyn residencies and our top two choices are TX and WA. I have been leaning more towards WA, but Mike and the kids have been pushing me hard to like TX. After spending a month down there, I'm pretty sure this will be our first choice on our rank list. Of course, it is a match, and it is the army, so certainly no guarantees. I was impressed with the ability of the residents and I really loved the teaching staff that I worked with and interviewed with....plus San Antonio turns out to be not so bad when you're not in basic training! =)

Mike and the kids came down and visited for a week while I was there. They looked at real estate and hung out by the pool while I was working and we went out and had some fun when I was off duty. It was hard to be gone for a month, so it helped a lot that they came down to visit.

Before I left, we were able to get together with several friends and enjoy some time as a family. Mike got in some target practice while we enjoyed the company of good friends.

This picture is kind of awful because of the sun in the kids eyes....but it was after church on Sunday, July 3rd, the day before I left for TX. We had service out on the hill....it was a gorgeous day, and I absolutely love standing outside in God's creation with so many others just lifting our praises to God.

This is a pic of the kids after dinner one night down in TX. We ate at the Spaghetti Warehouse....I'm so glad my kids love each other! =)
We got to go to Sea World too! Here I am with the kiddos after a show in Shamu Stadium.
They were even brave enough to go on the big water ride you see in the picture behind them...even Timothy! Plus, as you can see from the video in the post below, they enjoyed lots of time in the pool!
Maybe I'll post more....maybe even today...we'll see. =)

-shannon

Our Little Fish!!!

Getting our Greeeeen Belts!