The Strangest Church Service

So this morning was one of the strangest Sunday morning’s I’ve had in a while. Our church gathering was moved to Livestream only, with no in-person gathering. Except that I was on the praise team, and Jeff was on the tech team, so both of us still went to church this morning. So all three of us got dressed & ready for church, just like usual…

Jeff dropped me off at church, and then dropped Emerson off with Grandmommie at their house. My parents had left on a little pre-wedding vacay, so it was just Grandmommie and Emmie today.

After we finished worship rehearsal, we had some free time on our hands during the Sunday school hour, so Jeff picked me back up and we ran up for a little breakfast & coffee morning date at Dunkin.

This was taken just a few minutes before the service started. This place is usually brimming with the conversation and activity of hundreds of people. But today, there were only about 34 people in attendance total! That includes 14 on the worship team, 12 staff/spouses/others, and 8 on the tech/broadcast team. It was just so very strange! But also super neat. I think that we had close to 2,000 views throughout the day on our FB video & website, so that’s absolutely amazing! The church is NOT the building, and today, we definitely weren’t. But we still found a way to gather & worship, even amid the craziness in the world lately!

It was the strangest church service, but it was also so great as well. It felt really intimate in the service, even though it was almost completely empty. Some of my favorite things Pastor Ronny said today was: “Worship over worry. Faith over fear. Prayer over panic.” Amen, right!?

After church, we picked up lunch from the Zaxby’s drive-thru, as did Uncle Keith & Aunt Suzanne, and we all went out to eat lunch with Grandmommie and Emerson. And then we went back home, so Emmie could get a good nap at home.

Right before getting her down for her nap, I got our dinner started in the crock-pot. I made a new recipe I found, for Slow-Cooker Salsa Verde Honey Lime Chicken.

Emerson napped for about two hours, and Jeff and I just kind of rested and watched some YouTube videos, and rested on the couch.

I took this picture solely to monitor the red splotch on her cheek & send to her pediatrician/my friend Abby, but she just looked so sweet and precious with those bright blue eyes! For the record, Abby things it’s exzema, but since we’ve tried a couple of things that aren’t really clearing it up, we might try a prescription steroid cream next.

We ended up having to go back out in the world today, to Walmart, because I broke our coffee pot caraffe yesterday when I was washing it. It was approximately 4-5 years old, and it was probably only like $15, so I think we got our money’s worth out of it! So after Jeff did all the comparisons and checking up, we decided to splurge for the $25 one this time around 😉

Since we were in such a hurry yesterday morning, we only put away the cold groceries, and left all the other bags laying around the kitchen floor, counter & stove. So I finally made myself put it all away, while the brown rice simmered on the stove, and Jeff & Emmie played in the backyard. It took a little rearranging and creativity to get it all up in the cabinets & such, since we don’t have a real pantry. But I’m crafty, and I got it figured out. And then I joined them in the backyard as well!

Once the rice finished cooking, I went inside the finish up everything else, like shred the chicken and get all of our toppings put together. And I was thrilled when I cut into this avocado, to find that it was prefect & beautiful!

We ate the chicken as part of burrito bowls, on top of brown rice with toppings. And it turned out really good! There was a lot of really delicious flavor in the chicken, but it wasn’t spicy. Now, honestly, it wasn’t as easy as my usual crock-pot chicken taco recipe, so I don’t know it will replace that recipe, but it was still delicious!

At first, Emerson told me she didn’t like the chicken, before she even tried it. Then she put one bite in her mouth, and wanted to spit it out. I made her swallow it though, even though she was really pathetic about it. But I suggested she try a bite of the chicken with sour cream on it, mixed with the rice like we were eating ours, and she liked the idea. And it turns out, she LOVED it! And I had to go re-fill her plate, and then she ate a TON of rice, chicken & sour cream all mixed up.

And then we went back outside to hang in the backyard a bit more before dinner time! And she decided she wanted to wear some panties and practice going potty, so Daddy decided to just bring it out to where we were playing. And we looked a little bit redneck, but she did keep practicing, and she was so cute!

After a little bit more playing in the living room while I put up all the leftovers and made us some containers for lunch, we got Emmie ready for bedtime.

She was extremely sweet and precious and cuddly at bedtime, and didn’t cause us too much trouble getting ready to sleep. I still need to go finish up the dishes, but there’s not too much dirty stuff today thanks to our easy dinner meal, so it shouldn’t take too long. And then it’ll be time to rest up on the couch, before a crazy week!