February already?!

How is it February already?!  Wow!  The last couple of weeks have been just as busy as the first few of the year.

As usual, Ship 1000 and DSPS events are keeping us out and about.  On the 20th we drove over to Lafayette, LA.  Huge thanks to to Tom & Renee Spencer for putting us up.  After a late-night drive and a few hours' sleep, we made another (much shorter) early-morning drive over to Lake Charles for the US Power Squadron District 21 Incoming Officers' Meeting.  Adam will be Administrative Officer and I will be Membership Chair for the Dallas Sail & Power Squadron beginning in March.  This meeting was a good networking and learning opportunity, as we head into this new venture.  We were able to spend a wonderful evening and a slow start on Sunday with Tom & Renee, which was an added bonus to the weekend.

The next week brought a particularly exciting Ship committee meeting, where we gained a new member of the Ship!  We are especially excited about this as the new member is a 14-year-old girl, who already knows our current 14-year-old girl member.  We're glad each of them has someone they can be buddies with as they learn through Ship activities.  On the 28th these girls completed a course and received their Texas Boater's Licenses, and then we had a FABULOUS sail with the Ship kids on Sunday.  Thanks to the recent rain, we were able to get out on the water for the first time since November. It was a great day!

Last weekend we also had two really great nights with family and friends.  We finally got Adam's parents and our friends Danny & Kellye together for what turned out to be a fantastic evening.  Then Saturday night we hosted a poker night to celebrate Danny's birthday, which I ended up crashing (it was a boys' night until I joined the game).  It was another great evening of lots of laughs.

This week has been especially busy with Ship stuff.  Wednesday night Adam taught the fifth chapter of the Seamanship Course we're taking the kids through; Thursday night was the "roundtable" meeting for all scouting units in our new district; and last night was the last District Dinner for our former district.  Today we're enjoying a slow day: we slept in, watched a little TV, Adam got a workout in, I got my car's oil changed, and now Adam's playing a game with a buddy while I update our family & friends.  It's a nice Saturday!

For my inspirational thought...  You probably know that I'm a big fan of TOMS shoes, mostly for thier commitment to provide a pair of shoes for every pair sold to a child in need - "one for one".  Last year TOMS started producing designer eyewear as well, which provides a vision exam, glasses or sight-saving surgery for a child in need with every purchase.  (The founder - an SMU alum! - also wrote a book about the concept of one-for-one in business, and for every copy sold TOMS is providing a book to a child!)  I get these emails (click the link to read about a TOMS giving partner) occasionally, which share specific stories about what TOMS is doing world-wide.  If you have not yet, please check out www.TOMS.com.

Some excitement for this week: Super Bowl Sunday tomorrow, my mom's birthday on Wednesday, and (hopefully) another great sail next Sunday.  We hope you're all well.  :-)