Debbie and I were honored to be invited to Slinky’s 50th Birthday Party at the Roadhouse. Slinky is this really neat guy that loves the Lord, and he loves motorcycles.  Oh, yes, he loves a party too. There were lots of guests, and plenty of cake for everyone. The band was really good too.  Everyone had a great time.

First stop this weekend was out to Granite Shoals, to the club house of Dark Horse MC for their 4th Anniversary party.  We went out last year, and had a great time.  This year didn’t disappoint either, they had a live band, cranking out some good tunes to go with some kicking barbecue. A silent auction and balloon darts rounded out the activities. Debbie bid in the auction on a nice Mustang seat for her FXR, and won.  She was thrilled!  As usual, we saw lots of friends, and Debbie topped off her meal with some ice cream dipped BBQ pork for dessert.  You don’t see that every day.

I live in the moment, at least sometimes. But, I think that we are supposed to live in the moment all the time, and in every situation. So, what do I mean by that? Well, I can tell you that I don’t mean we should never plan anything. Planning is good, and we have all heard Proverbs 16:9, which says “The mind of man plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps”. So, do you catch the difference between the first part of that verse, and the second part? THe first part “man plans”, is what we do ahead of time, in preparation for an expected situation, meeting or trip. That is all good. But the second part “the Lord directs his steps”, is active and functioning in the moments when the situation, meeting or trip are actually occurring. You can think of it as God’s way of fine tuning our plans, or sometimes redirecting them completely. You see, we might put away some money for a rainy day, but God might tell us on one particularly sunny day that we need to use that money for something we didn’t anticipate. By the way, if you think I am leading up to asking your for money, you’re wrong. All I am saying is that be it money, food, clothing, labor, transportation, or my favorite pup tent, you can be sure God has a plan for that, and it might be the same, or it might be different from the plan I had made for whatever it is. So, how do we handle the fact that God not only changes out plans, but that He does so at the last minute. Well you can be like me, and go kicking and screaming with my nails scratching at the ground as God makes his plan clear, or…. You might want to consider a less painful approach that involves letting go and letting God do what He does best. That is He leads us moment by moment through the field full of land mines that I can’t see, but He can. And, He does this because He loves us, and he promises that “All things work together for the good of those that love the Lord and are called by His purpose”. Can it get any better than that? I don’t think so!

Today was one of the parties of the year, the Summer Sizzle. This year it was held at Hanovers in Pflugerville, and was of course well attended. We had a couple of new games this year, the strong man competition with Arm Wrestling, and the Chili Pepper competition, to see who could eat the most hot peppers in one minute.  Other games included the Wheel of Knives, the pop the balloon with darts game, and the always popular dunking booth.  I got pictures of most activities, but Debbie and I left for dinner before the dunking booth started up. Enjoy,

Here is the blog posting for days 3 through 12 of our vacation.  We had a great time visiting friends and various place around the New Mexico, Utah and Wyoming area.  This is the best of the best of the photos, enjoy.