It’s a Surprise!

I walked into my friend’s house thinking I was merely picking up an air mattress I needed for house guests that were coming. Instead, I was greeted with a room full of friends and flashes from their cameras. What a happy surprise!

With my usual attention to detail, I don’t consider myself a person who is easy to surprise. But my friends somehow managed it when they threw me a surprise baby shower two Saturdays ago! I think part of the reason they pulled it off so well was because I was extremely busy and tired. Of course it was mostly because they had planned it so thoughtfully. From the parking, to the invitations (including sending them to my family and friends back east), to the goodie bags, games, and thank you notes–Rachel, Sylvia, & Jen spoiled me!

My Saturday was packed full. We had just kept our first house guests, Jeremy VanDelinder (a church planter to Austin, TX) and his family. They left our house that morning after staying with us for two days. Then we headed to a picnic at the preschool where I work. We were to have our pastor and his family over for dinner that night as well, since missionary Mike Smith and his family were arriving from out of town to stay with us and to speak at Crossroad the next morning. After the picnic Stephen suggested we drive to the Horkavys’ house to pick up an air mattress that we needed in order to host the Smiths. It was unlike Stephen to want to drive all the way out to Buckeye when we’d be seeing the Horkavys in a few hours, and they could bring the air mattress then, but I went along with the plan since I didn’t mind being prepared ahead of time. When we arrived, I was so tired and pregnant that I offered to stay in the car while Stephen got the mattress. He nonchalantly said, “You can come in.” And so I did–to a room full of smiling faces from all over the valley!

My friend from elementary school, Stacy, was there. Her husband pastors a small church in Surprise, Resurrection Baptist. Becky, who graduated from ICA with Stephen, came. Other friends included: all the Crossroad Baptist ladies, a friend I worked with at the census, a girl I graduated with from BJU, the wife of another ICA grad, and Stephen’s boss’s wife. It was great to see so many different friends all in one place!

We played a game I had never heard of before where each lady took a length of streamer that they thought was equal to the circumference of my baby belly. Then they measured my belly to see who had guessed correctly. (I’m now 41 inches around!)

I don’t have many pictures of the actual shower yet, but here’s some of the goodies Baby and I were given.