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I feel Pace watching me while I read John. Suddenly she says, through a big bite of cheese omelet, “Mommy, will you read that to me?”

“Pace, there are no pictures in this book. Why don’t I read to you from your Bible later.” In my mind I’m thinking, “Come on, I just wanted a quiet devotion this one morning.”

“Please Mommy. Please will you read it to me for just a second?” Ok, I cannot sit here and refuse to read to my child from the Bible. I acquiesce. I start reading somewhere halfway through chapter 1 of John. I read a bit and then try to explain in more simple terms what I am saying…The child is enthralled. “More Mommy. Will you keep reading?” This went on through Jesus’ first miracle of turning water into wine at the wedding. Nicodemus coming to Jesus in the middle of the night, and then Praise Jesus!, I sat there in the morning light and tried my humble best to explain John 3:16 to my 3 year old. It was such a gift…

Now, I will tell you that I had to fight Satan, who kept drawing my eyes over to the wedding invitations scattered all over my dining room table. Beckoning me to stop reading and come be productive. Thank goodness the Holy Spirit spoke more loudly than the devil that particular morning. Assuring me that if God laid out the opportunity before me to share Him, with my own child for goodness sake, He would also provide the time for those stupid invitations. And you know, He did. They were all sealed up and in the mail by 2:30 that afternoon.

After we read from my Bible, Pace ran to get her Bible so that she could see the pictures of what we’d been talking about. I will tell you that there was a line about Jesus being raised up like Moses’ staff–which turned into a snake, and this was by far more intriguing to her than water into wine or salvation. However, I trusted that a seed had been planted in her heart and we’ve spent most of the past week reading about Moses, the burning bush, and that snake/staff incident. So this morning, a week later, I was amazed to see just how well she had been listening.

Jeremiah got a break from work and called to see if we wanted to meet him at a coffee shop for breakfast before I took Pace to MMO. Since you all know how much I love to go out for breakfast :), I threw the girls’ clothes on and we were out the door. After we’d finished eating, I pointed out to Jeremiah that I felt bad because (while we’d been sipping away on coffee) the girls had not had anything to drink. He went up to the counter, and the girl who worked there put some water in a coffee cup, lid and all, and handed it down to Pace. As Pace walked back to the table with her cup, she handled it very carefully, expecting that it held hot coffee. She lifted it gingerly to her lips and you could see the shock register as she discovered she was drinking cold water instead of hot coffee. She looked at me and said, “Did Jesus turn my coffee into water?!”

Y’all, Jeremiah and I both started laughing so hard, I almost spewed my coffee. In her mind, Jesus was in the business of miraculously changing beverages. If water into wine, why not coffee into water? And just as we’d read together a week before, about Jesus explaining to Nicodemus that he would need faith like a child in order to be saved, we saw that childlike faith in action. She never questioned if the miracle was real or not. In fact, she believed so completely that she expected Jesus to be doing the same type of thing in her own sweet little life. I am utterly convicted about doing my devotions more regularly/in front of/with my children. Just as she watches me drinking out of a coffee cup and wants desperately to do the same; I know that watching my hunger for the Word will spur her own hunger. Thank you Lord for the lesson, I pray you’ll help me be consistent, but real, before my little minds.

Change is hard, and we’ve been having some around here. This is a picture of Pace on her first day of school a few weeks ago. I’d picked out this dress the night before. We’d eaten breakfast, packed her lunch, and in all of our excitement were ready to walk out the door an hour before it was time. If you don’t know, it’s not fun to have a 2 year old pumped up about doing something and then have to tell them over and over they’ll have to wait. I agreed that we could go outside and play to help the time pass, even in her sweet little white dress. As she was swinging in the neighbors swing (like superman)…a bird took a big fat crap on her back!! Now, her little white dress is purple, no other clothes are cute AND clean for her to wear, so I start scrubbing the back of her dress. Purple poo is bleeding on it like crazy and any sane person would have just taken the thing off and started over. Not me! For whatever reason it was in my mind that THIS was the first day of school outfit, and I couldn’t have her going in and making a bad first impression in play clothes.

Eventually, I got the nast (mostly) out, loaded the girls in the car, and managed to go from one hour early to 10 minutes late for the first day. As we walked in, Pace’s eyes wandered over to her class (and teacher) from the year before. Now, we’ve been building up the new class and new teacher at our house for a solid month, but suddenly all thoughts of anything new being good were thrown out the window. She ran up to Mrs. Denise (last year’s teacher), clung to her leg like a vice and begged to come to her class. Meanwhile, Mrs. Debbie (the new teacher) is doing her best to sell her charms and both teachers are inquisitive as to why she’s soaking wet. So, I proceeded to try and explain about the bird poo situation while also holding the very amused Mary Aplin and dragging the very distraught Pace into the proper room. The “Hold me, Mommy, HOLD me!” chant has begun from the damp child, and I give in. One hip is holding Mary Aplin, the other hip is holding Pace, and my mind is cursing the high wedge shoes I’d chosen to try and make my own good impression on the first day. Pace has broken into tears at this point, and I have moved from cajoling to stern, “Pace Maddox, you stop that crying or we’re going to the bathroom and we’re going to have a LONG talk. This is Mrs. Debbie, you’ve been so excited about her, and you better get down right now and show her how sweet you can be.”

Poor Mrs. Debbie, who was still trying hard to win Pace’s affection, reached out to pry her from my arms (while not actually making contact with the wet poo poo back of her dress) and what did my daughter do? She grabbed onto my ponytail and wouldn’t let go. I was being drug towards Mrs. Debbie’s arms by my HAIR, when the school director came in and told me to just go, she would call my cell phone in ten minutes if Pace hadn’t calmed down. “Don’t worry!” she assured me. “All the other kids did the same thing on their first day.” Thanks for the encouragement, but I’d be willing to bet all the other Mom’s didn’t get their hair ripped out by the roots. I was humiliated. I was one of those Moms who don’t have control over their children in public.

I went home, and a few minutes later got a phone call telling me that Pace had cheered up almost immediately after I left. Then, four extremely short hours later :), I went to pick her up, and y’all the child was dressed like a princess, dancing around the table with other children. I stood with a group of other Moms to watch the cuteness. She saw me, started shooing me away with her hand as she said, “No Mommy, I don’t WANT to go home YET!” What a change. Embarrassed when I dropped her off because she clung to me like we’d never been apart a moment in her life. Embarrassed when I picked her up because she acted like she could care less about going home with me.