Spring Camping 2009

We had a great camping trip last weekend! Being back in Alabama and seeing so many friends and spending time with my family was a wonderful vacation. We did enjoy some warmer weather, but it was also a very wet weekend with rain from Friday night until Monday with only a couple of breaks.

Ever since our fall camping trip, John wanted to make a camping meal. So, we packed up some ingredients in our suitcase and made an Indian meal for our group. Everyone seemed to enjoy the food!

John and I enjoyed camping together once again! This was John's 3rd time camping (and all have been with us in Alabama). I've gone camping probably for 25 years with my family. The last 13 years have mostly been with this same group of people in Alabama. We hope to go camping in South Carolina with some of John's friends in May and do some Ohio camping this summer as well. I'm quite thankful that John enjoys the outdoors as I do! Its a wonderful way to spend time with each other and our friends without the distraction of work or computers :)

The wet weather did change our camping weekend a bit. We didn't get to take any hikes on Saturday, and our typical endless games of volley ball were nowhere to be found. There were a lot fewer people this time, but those who came did enjoy themselves.

Friday night we had only a little bit of rain, but by Saturday afternoon, the ground was saturated. Several tents had been completely soaked and most of the rest of them were getting damp. So, everyone except my parents(!) decided to move into the convenient buildings. We spread out camping style all over the floors and had a nice dry night camping inside.

This camping trip was characterized by a lot of inside games: card games, ping pong, pool, Foosball, group games and more! I think this was one of our most unique camping trips thus far and will definitely be remembered for some time!

Going to Alabama for camping trips has been a lot of fun!

For those of you seeing this on facebook: Elijah showed me how to import my blog posts to facebook. I know that many of you are both blog readers and facebook people so just ignore one or the other. Some of my facebook friends don't check my blog so I want to try sharing it both ways for a while.

Spring Camping Trip This Weekend!

Early tomorrow morning, John and I will fly to Alabama for our spring camping trip. The weather looks rather bad this year, but I do see a glimer of hope. Just this afternoon, the rain forecast has decreased 10% on Saturday (now it's only 70% instead of 80% and only 30% on Friday and Sunday). The friends we camp with are pretty tough so there will have to be a lot of rain to keep them away. So far, a camping trip has never been called off due to weather. We'll see what happens this time.

Here are some memories from Fall 2008:

A Superb Evening!

Back on January 1st (when we visited Alabama), we spent the day with one set of friends and then headed over to see our friends, the Pace family that evening.

We enjoyed a game of crazy way skip-bo. The rules of which are crazy indeed. My sister and I made it up way back when I was 10 or 12. Being able to exchange skip-bos, pick the number that matches your pile and discard all your cards each turn makes the game a lot of fun.

She's not sure if she should show off her octopus. . .

While her brother is glad to do so!

After the younger children went upstairs, us "older kids" had a wonderful dinner together. We enjoyed ourselves with some great conversation.

I have been so blessed to have a great friendship with this family over the years. They were so gracious to share their anniversary evening with us. We had a wonderful time together!

(This picture is just for fun - I guess you can tell which ones are the engineers who aren't any good at looking at the camera before we're told to smile!)

Our first Christmas and New Years together as a married couple was spent with many friends and family members. We definitely had a great time with everyone we had a chance to see!

The Blood Song

Susie sent me this cute video - what a voice on a three-year old girl. Watching the video made John and I laugh this evening as we are packing a bit for our camping trip in Alabama this weekend. I hope you enjoy the video!

Six Month Anniversary!

Six months ago today . . .

Surrounded by so many wonderful friends and family members. . . .

My dad gave me away . . .



I became one with John . . .


Our parents blessed us. . .




Our Pastors challenged us. . .

We had our first kiss ever. . .

And left that ceremony as husband and wife!

I am so thankful that by God's grace, we met and have been married now for 6 months! We often think back and are amazed at all that has happened. It was only 2 years ago this month that we were matched on eharmony. I had already determined to only correspond with a guy who showed initiative and leadership by initiating contact. John had determined to only contact girls that were of the type he thought he might one day marry. Thankfully, I was of that type! We were engaged about a year later and now we're a married couple.

John is such a blessing to my life. He's changed just about all the external things about me - my name, my titles, where I live, where I work, where I go to church. Along the way, we've experienced so many new things together. We're endeavoring to learn each other. I'm finding that (shockingly!) John doesn't think and act like I would in every situation. Of course, we're also finding that in many areas we think and act a lot alike. John is very sweet and kind and encouraging. I am so thankful to be married to such a wonderful man!

So far we have celebrated our 1/12, 1/6, 1/4, 1/3, 5/12 and now our 1/2 anniversary in various ways: For our 1/6th, John surprised me by putting a card and a big chocolate kiss in my car the night before and I found it when I was leaving for work that morning. For our 1/3, I gave John some candy and a card and he took me out to a nearby italian restaurant. For our 5/12, we went out to the Cheescake Factory for a fun dinner. Celebrating for any little reason is a lot of fun!

Today, I think we will celebrate as we prepare for our weekend guests! John's family is driving out to visit us this weekend. We are definitely looking forward to their arrival. I think we will be doing some cooking this evening as they drive so we won't have as much to do once they are here.

Drive home

It always feels great to drive home at the end of a work day. For those of you who know I love cameras, I got a small pocket sized camera (Leica D LUX 2) used on eBay recently.

This afternoon I went to the chiropractor who is in Utica, about 8 miles south of Mount Vernon.
It is a beautiful drive. I really like the Ohio landscape that is in the area that we live. There are nice rolling hills all around. Below are some pictures that I took at a few points along the way home from Utica.

Also a nice scene is my beautiful wife waiting at the door as I park in the driveway. The days of
coming home to an empty apartment are over! Miriam has definitely been worth the 30 year wait to get married.

Don't be like Miriam

Numbers 12

1 Miriam and Aaron began to talk against Moses because of his Cushite wife, for he had married a Cushite. 2 "Has the LORD spoken only through Moses?" they asked. "Hasn't he also spoken through us?" And the LORD heard this.

9 The anger of the LORD burned against them, and he left them. 10 When the cloud lifted from above the Tent, there stood Miriam—leprous, like snow.

13 So Moses cried out to the LORD, "O God, please heal her!" 14 The LORD replied to Moses, "If her father had spit in her face, would she not have been in disgrace for seven days? Confine her outside the camp for seven days; after that she can be brought back." 15 So Miriam was confined outside the camp for seven days, and the people did not move on till she was brought back.

It seems that Miriam was jealous for recognition. She felt that Moses had done something wrong by marrying a Cushite (possibly Zipporah). Maybe she felt that his wife was beneath his social standing. Maybe it was that she and Aaron were no longer able to influence Moses as they had before his wife was around. There are many theories about why they spoke against him because of his wife.

What we do know is that they were not happy and that Miriam felt somehow slighted. She felt that Moses had done something wrong and wanted to play judge.

God didn't look at it this way. He judged Miriam with leprosy for her comments. Thankfully he was also merciful to her and she was healed after one week.

What can we learn from this story?

1) That we shouldn't look for recognition beyond that which God gives
2) God doesn't look with favor on jealousy
3) God answers prayer and is merciful
4) We shouldn't feel superior as Miriam did because of the supposed sin of others. Let God be the judge

I'm sure there's more to be gleaned from these verses. Is there anything else you see?