08.29.09 Helfrich Family Gathering

We have some dear friends down here that have adopted us into their family. I can't tell you how much it means to me that we are even invited to their family gatherings! While we try not to go to EVERYTHING and allow them their own family time, we always enjoy getting together with them and being a part of a family while we are so far away from our own. They have definitely been a blessing to us over and over again! This time we went to a local lake and played in the water. Mr. Hult brought his sea-doo and we all took turns riding it! So fun!

It was naptime, so I layed down in the van with Mason. He finally fell asleep, and took a good 2 hour nap in the trunk of the van with the trunk up and windows down. He was out!

Grant and his little friend, Victoria...they're like two peas in a pod!

On our way home after a lovely day at the lake, we were just driving along, minding our business when we saw a cop pulled off along side the road. Chris slowed down a little bit and asked me if I knew what the speed limit was because he didn't have a clue. Nope, I didn't know, either. Sure enough, the blue flashing lights came on, and we pulled off the side of the road. The Officer came up to the car and said, "I pulled you over today because you were going 20 over!" Whoa! We had no idea that the speed limit had dropped down to 35 mph! Oops! So he asked for our license, insurance and registration. I had just put our new registration on that morning. Whew! He asked if Chris' license was correct - nope. We hadn't changed the address on it since we moved. Oops. Then he asked for our insurance. We had just gotten new insurance cards and they were sitting on the kitchen counter. Same policy, but expired cards. Oops! We could really get in trouble for multiple different reasons! This could be one hefty bill! So the officer walked back to his car, and Chris is sitting there sweating bullets while I'm trying to explain to Grant that we have police officers who keep us safe and part of their job is correcting us when we do something wrong. So if we speed, sometimes we get in trouble, but it's good because they're doing their job and keeping us safe. I really wanted Grant to have a positive image of police officers. Well, it seemed that all he got out of the conversation was that "Daddy was in trouble!" So even when the officer came back up to our car, that's all Grant could talk about. How embarrassing! It turned out that he merely gave us a warning. I don't know how we got so lucky! But we definitely drove slower the rest of the way home while we listened to Grant saying, "Daddy's in trouble." And to this day, if Grant sees a police car, he says, "Uh-Oh...Someone's in trouble, Mommy!!" So much for a positive police image!