Hello

Yes, yes folks we're still here.  Here is now somewhere else however because we've moved to Georgia again....for the first time.

My buddies, Paul and Brian, and I are hiking in Franklin Delano Roosevelt State Park in Pine Mountain Georgia. They both chided me about my obsolete website because of stagnant content.  So I thought I'd take a moment away from the campfire to put some more current information for those who might be interested.

Rachel, the kids and I have moved to Warner Robins, Georgia where I am now working at Robins Air Force Base. 

The kids are especially happy living in a home where the previous tenants kindly left a trampoline, two treehouses and a tire swing.

I like living 1.2 miles from my office and Rachel likes having a dedicated room just for homeschooling.

Anyway, that's the short update for now.  Shown here is a recent pic of us all!

Strawberries!!!

Today we left early and went strawberry picking up at Sweatmore Strawberry Farm north of Panama City.  We had a lot of fun and came home with fresh local honey and about 20 lbs of fresh strawberries.

The next chapter...

...has been revealed.  The announcement was definitely surprising to me in many ways and we are very excited about the possibilities that our next assignment brings.  To challenge your brain cells just an ounce tonight, here is an aerial of our next home.  Enjoy!

Church Bells and the attacks to happiness

Church Bellsby: Gungor
Let church bells ringlet children singeven if they don't know whylet them singwhy drown their joystifle their voicejust because you've lost yoursmay all jaded hearts be healed.Amen.
Let all men dancelift up their handseven if they are naivelet them danceyou've seen it allyou watch them fallwash off your face and danceMay all weary heartsbe filled with hopeAmen.

This is such a simple song with such powerful lyrics. It is liturgy that speaks to how fragile our happiness is. So fragile that someone else's happiness seems to chip at it. We start to invent excuses as to why the other happy individual is unjustly or undeservedly happy.
In "The Help" I watched a Southern Belle do everything she could to drown the happiness of another lady for no founded reason at all. It was so sad and ugly. The naive target of her jealousy was none the wiser and only made the situation worse by trying to be friendly and cordial. Strange how that was only received by an already bitter heart as disingenuous.
I felt that way a long time ago. When popularity was so ... popular. I'd try to be friendly and interested in the goings-on of other folks in different cliques only to be met with an often cold shoulder and odd glances. It saddened me then and it saddens me now as I think about it. See, every now and then, I still feel that way. And yet I pray, even for myself as I pray for others, that someday soon, all jaded hearts are healed and that the weary hearts would be filled with hope.
Amen.

Children's Church Tips, by Andrew

1. Let the kids have a certain talking time during class.

2. Tell a Bible story the kids will like and understand.

3. Have a 5 minute discipline in a time-out for disobeying and disrupting class.

4. Give quizzes to kids to answer questions about the story and other fun games.

5. Have a fun time.

Well, that about sums it up.

At the Present

Just look at the post below and compare to the pictures here! How they've grown! How our lives have changed! It's really so remarkable.

Hannah is here posing with a new birthday toy. She is four now!

Elizabeth is posing with the other member of our family, Baby Bear. Baby Bear is sporting a lovely orange scarf "finger knitted" by Elizabeth. Elizabeth will be 7 on April 4th.

Andrew is posing with his Valentine's Day LEGO mini figure. He will be 9 in less than three weeks!

God, grow with them and in them!

A Blast from the Past

These two pictures were the first thing I saw when I opened Picasa tonight. I don't ever remember seeing them before! I feel I hardly remember those two sweet little people on the couch with their sweet Daddy. I think this picture was taken in the spring of 2007. Andrew had probably just turned four; Elizabeth just turned two; obviously, this was pre-Hannah. This was still at our house on Maxwell AFB, which we only lived in for about 7 months. While nearly 5 years ago, I am struck with all that's happened since then. Let's just say there's been a lot of water under the proverbial bridge. They are precious pictures from a sweet Sunday afternoon of days gone by.

San Antonio Missions

Today I finally took a few hours to visit the remaining four San Antonio Missions that I missed when we visited the Alamo.  The first stop was the main visitor's center for the San Antonio Missions National Historic Sites at Mission San Jose.

San Jose was the first mission on my trip, though it was situated in between the other missions on the map with Mission Concepcion to the north and Missions San Juan and Espada to the south.  My favorite part of the entire tour was the flour mill at Mission San Jose.  There the San Antonio River is channeled to the oldest active grain mill in Texas where the water is held in a 9-foot deep reservoir before it is allowed to power the mill stone in an outlying building.  Inside, the volunteer working at the site was actually milling actual grain into actual flour!  It was basically awesome.

The next stop was Mission San Juan, on the south end of the Mission Trail.  This mission was under renovations and it was difficult to get a decent picture with the lighting and the construction equipment in the way but I think this one turned out OK.  What is interesting about the 200+ year old missions is that they all have an active parish with regular services.  The parsonage for Mission San Juan is actually just to the right of this picture and is still serving as a private residence.  Cool.

 

Between Mission San Juan and the next stop was a slight detour to visit the Espada Aqueduct.  It's pretty amazing what cultures were able to figure out so many years ago to solve problems like irrigation and diversion.  There are very few places in the U.S. to see this technology functioning as it did then.

Here is the "Where's Waldo" moment for you... See if you can find Mission Espada...  These are mesquite trees and they are pretty amazing.  If you look closely you can see the Mission peeking through the branches.

The last stop on the trail was Mission Concepcion, a few miles north from where I began the journey.  Concepcion had amazing paintings that had been preserved on the walls inside several of the rooms.  I did not take any interior pictures out of respect for the active parishes that these buildings represent.  I also did not get any pictures today of Mission San Antonio de Valero (The Alamo) but I did drive by just so I could say that I saw all of the five San Antonio Missions in the same afternoon. And what a beautiful afternoon it was!