Surprise!! - Day 11

Family Night

Thursday night is Family Night at the Hayes home. Most of the time we have dinner together and do some kind of activity. We've had reading nights, movie nights, game nights and craft nights. Whatever we choose to do together, Family Night is always fun and surprising. Tonight was no different.

We decided, for this Family Night, to go to another family's home for dinner. Terry and Tricia Cooper, some new friends of ours from church, invited us over to eat chili and hang out. We gladly took them up on their offer, and it was a great choice. The Cooper's are a lot of fun, and they, like us, have a large family. It's always surprising to find out new things about new friends. There's usually one fact that comes as a complete surprise and is worthy of further exploration. The Cooper's proved to be very surprising folks.

One of the big surprises with them is that they have 4 kids. Well, they actually have one foreign exchange student, one adopted son, and two birth children. They adopted their oldest son because they couldn't have children. Imagine their surprise when they found out, five years after adopting, that Tricia was pregnant! Child #2 came along, and then another surprise! They had their third child 17 months after the second was born. Pretty amazing stuff.

Anyway, I'm convinced God uses relationships to surprise us, and I'm thankful for the surprises I recieve each time I meet folks like the Cooper's. It's always encouraging to know that God uses our stories to surprise and encourage others.