Last Dinner

Tonight we are having dinner together for the last time as a family, before Zach gets married. While we have been very excited for Zach during the entire process of his courtship, engagement and now preparing to move to Arizona to set up his first apartment, we can't help but feel a little sentimental about starting the "empty nest" process. Our first sparrow is flying the coup!

For 25 years we have been having kids: raising, training, nurturing, discipling, homeschooling them, investing in their lives - and it has been all for this time. This time where they grow up and leave us - grow up and become independent - grow up and begin their own lives - just as it should be.

Tonight we are celebrating our family. The memories, the special moments, the first of five treasures that God used (and is using) to grace and enrich our lives. We're celebrating Zach's life, grateful that God gave him to us and eager to see him launched into this next phase in his life.

While tonight we're marking an end of something - an end of "just us," we are looking forward with joy and anticipation to when we will be celebrating the beginning of other things, some firsts: the first time we have dinner with Zach and his new wife, Andrea, after they are married; our first family vacation together; their first home or their first child.

So, tonight we are looking back and remembering - full of memories, gratefulness and love. And, tonight we are looking forward- full of anticipation, gratefulness and love.