completed

Ethan has been working so hard on his AWANA verses every week. He enjoys learning the hand motions that I make up for him, he enjoys hearing the story behind the verse and really enjoys doing the activity/craft for the week, to go along with the verse. I think his all time favorite activity, was the week where he was learning about serving others and he needed to find someone to serve that week. He went to our neighbors house and got his first "job" taking out our neighbor's trash for him, 2 weeks in a row! I got the biggest kick watching him both times, taking the garbage down to the street and then bringing it back up. Our neighbor was super nice and made a big deal about how much it helped him to free up some time and have time to get to mowing his lawn. He told Ethan "if you hadn't helped me with that, I'm not sure I would've had time to do my yard work!" Ethan was quite pleased. :)

Tonight was a big night for him... he was on his last 2 verses in his book. The l-a-s-t two! He's been working on them for 2 weeks, since we had a break in there for Easter. Tonight as I was kissing him good bye (as I dropped him off) I said "Be an obedient boy and a good friend tonight" and his reply was "Okay, but I'm soooo nervous to not finish my verses, because I really want to do it." I told him I knew he could do it and reminded him to ask God to help him remember. He smiled, gave me a thumbs up and walked away... and I stood there thinking "Lord, how did I get here so fast?? Wasn't he a baby like... last month?"

When we picked him up, he ran to me and said "I did it! I remembered my verses; I said the last two and I finished my book!" I told him I was so proud of him and so happy that he has so many verses from God's word memorized (understanding how many are still in my head/heart from my AWANA years) and he said... "Yes! Now I can be a Pastor!" I asked him why he thought he would be a Pastor and his reply was, "Because I memorized the Bible and now I need to go preach about it to everyone!" :-)

I'm so glad Ethan is able to experience AWANA. I'm so thankful for the Dad's, Mom's, older sisters, brothers and church members that give of their time every single week, to teach our kids about God, to get them excited about learning His word and to show God's love to them in so many ways. Ethan has a special place in his heart for his AWANA leaders and I love to hear the way he talks about them. I'm so excited that Rachel gets to join him in September (as is she) and cannot wait to see how God uses this in their lives.
The awards night is on May 17th and Ethan asked me tonight if "we could make a chain, like we did before Kara was born?"

He's just oh, so excited. :-)