Church Shopping

This last Sabbath was our official first Sabbath away from our old church. We went and test drove a church about 10 minutes from our house (even closer than the last one), and we were pleasantly impressed. It's a church plant, a small church, maybe 50 members, but they did have a lot of children our kids' ages and everyone seemed to be very involved in the activities and also were very friendly. We felt right at home there. There was even a nice mother's nursing room with a window and speakers and a comfy chair and some cribs... There are speakers throughout the building so you don't miss much if you have to step out. The chairs were comfortable, the preacher was young and talented (he can sing and preach :), and there were quite a number of other homeschool moms in the church. I think with a little tweaking (adding a class for Geo so he doesn't have to go to Sabbath School with the babies, replacing snacks with a craft time, and eventually moving the ladies' rest room from its current spot near the front of the sanctuary to a better place in the entryway hall [which is in planning]...), I think we could be very happy there. It's only been planted since October and it seems to be growing fast so that could be good. It won't be this tiny forever. And it's super-convenient. But we do think we owe it to ourselves to check out 3 or 4 other churches which are sort of in our area as well just to make sure we find the best fit for our family. We want a church that has good programs for our kids so that's definitely a consideration.