the weekly 'what's up.'

This week was SO crazy, though I have very few pictures to show for it.  Sorry in advance.  So I'm going to start off the post with a seemingly random photo, to offer up the illusion that this is a photo-heavy post.

Todd started teaching the kids the Bridge Model of evangelism this week - this is Penelope's first attempt at doing the entire thing from memory.  Pretty impressive, I'd say!

We jumpstarted the weekend by driving up to my mom's Friday night, which was an eventful trip in itself as Atticus gets car sick.  This was the worst case he's ever had, and none of my typical go-to remedies were helping - Ginger Rescue, Altoids, peppermint oil, nux vomica, sea bands, Motion Ease, even Dramamine.  All options were exhausted, with no relief.  We stopped multiple times to clean up (and bag up) the mess, and he was still vomiting by the time we arrived.  It was so bad we wondered if it was a full-blown virus, but he woke up absolutely fine the next morning.  Just extreme car sickness. Poor child.

The next morning we attended a baby shower for my sister, who's due in just four weeks!  Of course, no photos, but trust me, it was an adorable shower for an adorable pregnant lady.

We headed for home early Sunday morning to hopefully make it home in time for naps.  Traveling really wears everyone out, and it's nice to have the whole afternoon to sleep and recalibrate before the new week begins.  We grabbed pizza for dinner and hunkered down for Family Movie Night.  Sundays are my favorite!

Unfortunately, between the drive up and the drive home, it became apparent that some of the issues that the van has been having lately were going to need to be dealt with immediately.  Perhaps the shaking and rattling was what set Atticus' car sickness off so badly, now that I think about it.  We stayed home all day Monday, but on a quick drive to the store on Tuesday, it was clear it was no longer safe to drive.  Combined with the fact that Todd's car has been completely dead for a while, that left us as a no-car family of eight.

The Kristy Chrysler has been gunning for an early retirement for most of the time she's been under our care, but we refuse to submit to her frequent requests.

To complicate our lives, I got in the bathtub later that morning (because I'm pregnant, and I always have a difficult time controlling my body temperature when I'm pregnant*, and baths temporarily relieve this problem).  Laurelai came busting up the stairs to tell me that there was water pouring from the ceiling in the basement.  When I went down to check, the carpet was all wet, and there was water dripping from the pipes under the tub.  EXCELLENT.  (When Todd went down to check later, he discovered that the ceiling drywall was absolute mush - his thumb accidentally went right through it and we now have a thumb-sized hole in our ceiling.)

THEN! On Wednesday, our beloved Todd Henry Van Voorst turned 40 YEARS OLD!  I think it was very anticlimactic for him, as he spent the day getting in touch with mechanics and plumbers and the like.  But we tried to spice things up a little bit once he was home - all the kids had made him presents throughout the week, and the four oldest even wrote and performed a Martin Luther play in his honor!

We'll continue our celebrations tomorrow, with pumpkin painting (a friend of mine drove up to the Amish in my stead this week, and was kind enough to bring home all the pumpkins we'll need for our annual tradition), and a birthday dinner, and a bonus Movie Night.

To top off all of the pure adrenaline from the week, I will tell you that God has proven himself faithful, yet again.  The plumbing problem was fixed easily (by a great friend! for free! with materials we already had on hand!) and the van... well, the repair costs so far have added up to nearly $900, which is a chunk of change in any situation, but it's especially hard to swallow considering the van itself is only worth $1500.  However, someone, somewhere, is miraculously responsible for the fact that the mechanic didn't charge us a dime of that.  We are still really confused, and really grateful, and kind of manic over the miracle of it all.  There is still work to be done next week, work that could potentially add up to much more (two cylinders are still in need of repair, which we've heard is not cheap to address), but we cannot believe that we're somehow absolved of paying $900 of the overall costs.

I will tell you, God proves himself.  He really does.  EVERY SINGLE TIME, he has proven himself faithful to meet our needs.

We are heading into the weekend with so much joy!

*I'm sure you saw yesterday's big announcement?!  We're fifteen weeks pregnant with the most adorable little peanut and could not be more excited!  More details to come!