Is this heaven?

Our week in Iowa has been fantastic. Unfortunately, we have to leave the corn-filled rolling acres in the morning to get back to our regularly scheduled lives. It's been warm but not miserable for our stay, but I will say this: humidity makes a BIG difference in how 85 degrees feels.

On our way eastward across the state on Sunday night we got to stop and stay with Jase & Rachel (how did we not get a picture together, guys?). That evening we also had the privilege of meeting up with Mike & Katherine and their two-month old, Benjamin. LOVE that family. 

The other day Micah was using a plastic tub as a hat.

Jaron and a co-worker took Joel and I on a tour of his glass-manufacturing plant in Dewitt. It was REALLY cool. Somehow, I didn't get any pictures of Jaron on our trip (though he did take a few). Later, we all got to go swimming at my in-laws' place. You'll have to visit Pam's blog for pictures from that outing. Pam calls Micah "a bit of a wild man in the pool," and I just have to say that's an understatement. The kid seems neither to realize nor to care that when he steps off the side of the pool, or off the step in the pool that he will sink, and not be able to breathe, and drown. It felt like he spent the whole afternoon just testing to see if an adult really will show up any time he decides to throw himself in.

Today we had to say good-bye to Joel, Pam, Gabriel, Micah and Zaley, but first we got to hang out a little bit. Micah asked me to read him Corduroy... about three or four times. 

Then they both wanted to listen to their new book, Luke Goes to Bat (nevermind the hat... Micah insisted I wear it).

Here's Gabriel (and Elizabeth) listening intently.

Family photo!

In this video, Gabriel was "playing" the conch shell like a trumpet. Micah wouldn't stop asking me to "take a picture!"

So, after filming for a few seconds, I took his picture.

And those are our tales from Iowa.

Hound Dog

From a Skype conversation with a couple of my brothers last night...

Catching Up: Highlights from the last two weeks

- I had scheduled my last two posts to post on Friday, May 27, and Monday, May 30 - both really early in the morning. They didn't actually post (or at least they didn't show up in RSS feed readers) until sometime in the afternoon on Tuesday, May 31. I don't know what's up with that, but I apologize for two untimely posts this week. I'll try to get to the bottom of that.

- From May 19 until May 28 we were extremely fortunate to be visited by my brother, Jaron. It was absolutely fantastic having him around for more than a week. He's a hassle-free houseguest, and I love his idea of "fun." We spent a lot of time at the park playing with his super-long-distance frisbee. After I threw it into the tree once (and he had to climb up and pull it down), we managed to have a really fun time with it. What we learned is that to play with that kind of frisbee, you need a field about the size of 10 football fields that has NO ONE else playing on it.

- Tuesday we checked out Red Rocks Park and amphitheater, which is one of the coolest sights to see around here (I think Jaron would agree). After that we headed up to Evergreen and did a mild hike that Elizabeth and I have enjoyed numerous times. When we got back to the city Tuesday night we went to a Rockies game. The Rocks lost the game, but we all had a fabulous time (it was $1 hotdog night... and the dogs were Hebrew National, which totally made it worth it).

- Jaron took me golfing. First time I had swung a club in over four years. I had a really good time. I birdied a hole for the very first time in my life. Jaron was a bit disappointed, because the 9-hole course had just two par-4s and the rest were par-3s. We both felt a little silly for having rented a cart. It felt like the equivalent of riding the escalator up 3 stairs.

- Last Friday Jase and Rachel arrived from Des Moines. They were here to pick Jaron up and bring him back to the Motherland, but they drove through the night Thursday so they could be here for all of Friday and spend some time with us. It was a fantastic 24+ hours. We went out to Red Rocks Park to run around a little bit. Later, we pulled out the Saint Louis Cardinals-themed cornhole set that Joel built for us last year. It was the first time we'd ever used them. They are AWESOME and we had a great time playing. Jase, Rachel and Jaron took off on Saturday morning. Spending time with my family always makes me want to move back to Iowa as soon as we possibly can!

- Monday (Memorial Day) Elizabeth had the day off work, and was signed up to run one of the biggest and most famous 10k races in the country - the Bolder Boulder. So we headed up to Boulder early in the morning for her to run. It was a really fun race. A lot of people put on goofy and funny outfits to run it, and there are bands playing all along the race course. Elizabeth finished well below her goal time, even without ideal training conditions the week before with family here and everything. I'm really proud of her.

- Today I had two wisdom teeth pulled. It was an interesting experience. They gave me an IV and I was "consciously sedated" during the procedure. I was told that after the surgery I probably wouldn't remember much of it because the sedative gives you a mild form of amnesia when it wears off. I remember it pretty well, though (I think). It didn't hurt at all at the time, but since the numbing stuff has worn off, it's gotten pretty painful. Fortunately, I've got a bottle of vicodin to keep me company. I can't really eat solid food, though.

That's the last couple of weeks in a nutshell. Now it's June.

Family time

Yesterday we returned home from a week-long trip to California's beautiful Central Coast. Spending time with family is one of the greatest blessings of my life.

A few photos, followed by a couple of short videos (FYI: the videos were of much higher quality before going through Blogger's uploading process - not sure what that's about).

(We were both very tired) 

The little ones were dancing to a few of the ringtones on Elizabeth's phone.

Still dancing...

Alright, Iowa!

This is the obligatory post-Iowa trip post. I had hoped to blog fairly frequently during our trip, but I was unable to, so now you have to suffer one long all-inclusive post. To see pictures (and there are only a few) you'll have to read this whole thing (or scroll to the bottom!).

• Left home just before 4 pm last Thursday. I essentially walked out of my Thursday afternoon class, drove home, loaded the car, and left. After we accidentally missed our exit and took what I like to call "the scenic route" to find our way back to the right road, we made fairly decent time to Lincoln.
• Stayed in Lincoln on Thursday night... slept in a KING SIZE bed (which is always a highlight for me). We were able to sleep in a little bit on Friday since the next leg of our trip was shorter and we didn't have a real pressing time we needed to be in the Quad Cities. Our hotel offered a fantastic hot breakfast, so I took full advantage.
• Rolled into the Quad Cities at a little after 3 on Friday. We stopped off at Joel and Pam's. We greeted Joel and Micah (Pam was gone and Gabriel was sleeping) and checked out the in-progress Cornhole set Joel was working on for us.
• Headed to Elizabeth's parents house, where we'd be staying for the duration of the trip. Visited briefly with her whole family. Her parents had an obligation Friday night, so we went out with Clay (Elizabeth's super fun brother). We had dinner at Bennigan's and then went to the cheap movie theater and saw Salt (really good movie).
• Saturday Elizabeth and I were joined by her dad on our 9-mile run on a beautiful path through Davenport. The weather, by the way, was aMAZing for our trip. Highs were between 65-75, and no humidity the whole time. Reminded me of Denver weather with Iowa scenery. Kinda weird, but incredibly great.
• Saturday afternoon we attended the wedding of one of Elizabeth's best friends. It was a really great wedding, with a fun reception, great food, and we got to spend (all-too little) time with a couple of other friends of Elizabeth's from high school.
• Sunday we went to Northridge for church, where we met up with Jase and Rachel, Joel and Pam (obviously), and Jaron and the friend he brought with him from Texas. My grandparents and aunt cousins were there too. It was SUPER great to see everyone! I sat in between Jaron and Jase during the service, which turned out to be a not-so-good idea. We're all too big to fit comfortably on normal-sized seats, so we were quite friendly with each other. At one point, Pastor Doug made a comment that made Jase and I giggle, and we eventually both just lost it. I could not contain my laughter. Every time I giggled my body shook a little, so even though I wasn't making any sound, Jase would feel my laughter and that would get him going too. It was a cycle that could not be defeated.
• After church we all went to Joel and Pam's and hung out all afternoon. We played a little catch outside, had a really fantastic lunch and dessert (thanks, Pam!), and sat around chatting. Then we got Tropical Sno and then went disc-golfing in Long Grove. Turns out I'm awful at disc-golfing. I'm pretty sure I hit every tree on the course at least once... including one throw where the only tree anywhere near the path toward the hole was about a foot and a half tall and it was about 50 yards away. I hit it. It was actually an incredible shot.
• Sunday night Elizabeth and I had dinner with some of her extended family. We had brats and chatted with everyone.
• After dinner we headed back to Joel and Pam's where we all played Loaded Questions and laughed our heads off... almost literally.
• Monday morning was the "Run with Carl." Elizabeth and I were supposed to run 3 miles for our marathon training on Monday, so we had signed up, along with her dad, to run the 5k "Run with Carl." Joel drove into Bettendorf and ran it with me, which was incredibly nice of him to do. I really enjoyed it -- this was the first real "race" I've ever been in. I was more or less satisfied with my time, and I felt really good all during the run, even though it poured on us for about 10 minutes of it.
• After the race we showered and then went back to Joel and Pam's. We all decided to have lunch and dessert, but in reverse order. We drove to Whitey's for ice cream, then ordered some Casey's pizza, which we ate while watching Wipeout on the computer.
• Shortly after lunch, Jaron and his friend took off back to Texas, and then Jase and Rachel had to get going back to Ames. I was in desperate need of a tough-to-find journal article for one of my classes, and the nearest library that had it was in Dubuque, so Joel and I dropped Elizabeth off at her parents' and drove north. I had a really great time hanging out with Joel on our mini road-trip... but then we got to Dubuque and they didn't have the article (even though all signs indicated that they did). The student worker at the desk didn't seem to have much of a clue, either. We went to two other higher-education libraries in Dubuque where we struck out twice more on the article. So we headed back to the Quad Cities, having failed our quest -- but enjoying our time nonetheless.
• Monday night Elizabeth and I had a redbox night with her family. Turns out The Backup Plan is an awful movie (Joel and Pam warned me).
• Tuesday we took a 5-mile run in the morning. After lunch Elizabeth went shopping with her mom while I did some homework. In the afternoon Elizabeth and her mom and I had chiropractor appointments in Clinton. After the chiro we stopped at a few more stores to do some shopping. We went back to her parents' house for dinner, then we headed to Joel and Pam's one more time to pick up our finished Cornhole boards and say good-byes (thought I had a picture of the Cornhole boards Joel built us, but I don't -- I know for sure he has a picture of us with them, so he'll have to post 'em for you. They're impressive!).
• Wednesday morning we were on the road at 7:00 (Central Time), and we got to our place in Denver before 6:30 pm (Mountain Time) for a total of less than 12.5 hours on the road.

Some other tidbits:

• Elizabeth counted and determined that in 4 full days in Iowa I ate 11 desserts and drank 6 soda (for you Californians)-pops (for you Iowans). So I'd say my marathon-training diet is looking pretty great. But I'll have you know that it was worth it. My 11 desserts included TWO Tropical Snos (fabulous), and multiple different kinds of ice cream including home-made (YUM!!) and Whitey's (YUMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!).
• We really got to know our new Camry on this trip. We put almost 2,200 miles on that thing in less than a week.
• Came pretty close to hitting two possums, a couple of deer, and a cat (just missed it) while in Iowa.
• While on our way back through Nebraska on Wednesday, we had to call 911 to report a drunk driver. When we called we weren't sure if he was drunk or falling asleep, but he kept drifting out of his lane really badly. Nearly hitting a couple of other cars, and almost driving completely off the road. Right after Elizabeth hung up with the 911 dispatcher, the guy DID drive completely off the road and down into the median. Rather than it jolting him awake and scaring him and making him reconsider driving while impaired, he drove right back up onto the road and kept going. That's when I got especially nervous -- and pissed off -- about the guy. Oddest part? He was in a company truck. Elizabeth has called the company to not-so-kindly ask them to get their deadly drunk drivers off the road so that my life can continue to be lived.
• At the Run with Carl on Monday we ran into a couple of college friends we hadn't seen in awhile. That was fun.
• Funny moment: At one point Joel looked out the window of his house and noticed that a little boy and his teenage sister were approaching his door to try to sell him something. He began to groan about it, but then in an instant his eyes lit up and he raised his finger in an I-have-a-great-idea kind of way. He exclaimed, "Quick! There's a gorilla suit in the closet!" Both he and Jase sprung off the couch and flew down the stairs. In just a matter of moments Joel was dressed like a gorilla... and that's how he answered the door. It made me laugh pretty hard. We're a weird family.

I voted

I voted today. Since then I've had two free coffees from Starbucks and one free donut from LaMar's. I don't need incentive from food places to vote... but I won't deny them either.

P.S. My brother Jase (blog link to the right) posted a pretty funny post on his very first election vote.

the Weekend

Elizabeth and I spent Friday and Saturday driving to and from Omaha, with a few hours in the middle to spend with Joel and Jase, and to hear Dr. D.A. Carson speak about suffering. It was really a fantastic trip. It cost us less than a trip like that should cost, the fellowship with my brothers was fantastic, and Dr. Carson's talks were intellectually stimulating, theologically challenging, and practically helpful.

By the end of the drive home, we were both totally pooped and I think I slept better last night than I ever have since getting married (the last hour of driving in the dark in the eastern Colorado desert was NOT fun).

Today I did homework and watched football. The "watched football" part can pretty much go without saying for the next few months when I'm describing Sunday afternoons... but I thought I'd let you know.

the weekend

It feels like it's been a really long week. Here, however, is why I'm really excited: I have a two-hour class this afternoon and then I'm done for the weekend. Tonight Elizabeth and I have to do some minor apartment cleaning (like washing the dishes) and then pack up our bags for a trip to OMAHA tomorrow. We're going to get to see Joel and Jase and hang out for an evening, then go to a conference with D.A. Carson on suffering on Saturday, and then drive all the way home... and watch the Cowboys play on Sunday. It sounds like a fantastic 3-day weekend. The tough part is that my 8 a.m. Monday class takes 10 hours to prepare for, so Sunday might not be that fun after all (unless Dallas wins).

Anywho...

Snow in August?

Last week was pretty busy for us.  Our friend Amanda was able to visit for a couple of days, which was truly wonderful.  We hadn't seen her in more than a year, and she's a pretty great friend.  We hung out, relaxed, and watched the olympics.  After Amanda left, my youngest brother Jase arrived for an evening (we're his customary stop on his way from California to school at Iowa State).  It was great to see him and hear about his summer trip to Turkey (you can read about that here).  The day after Jase left, we had one more summer trip to take...

Elizabeth and I spent last weekend in Breckenridge, Colorado, with Elizabeth's folks (Mike & Deede) and her brother (Clay).  We stayed in a cabin high in the mountains.  While it was raining all weekend long here in Denver, it was snowing and hailing in Breckenridge.  I think there was a little bit of disappointment for most of our crew, because we had been excited about checking out some of the shops downtown, and doing some hiking... but we actually were able to fit both of those things in even with the weather.  I loved it.  It was about 45 degrees out on Saturday.  Elizabeth and I spent some time in the hot tub.  Elizabeth and Deede did most of the cooking for us (Mike grilled burgers and brats on Sunday night).  The food was great, the atmosphere was great, and it was much more relaxed and life-giving than either Elizabeth or I had anticipated.  We had brought some board games, and the cabin was equipped with an air-hockey table (I won the family tournament), a pool table, and a foos-ball table (oh, and a kitchen table).  When we weren't playing games, we were watching olympics (seeing Michael Phelps become the coolest olympic athlete of all time, or something like that).  Time seemed to crawl by, which was absolutely great.  We weren't rushed for anything all weekend long (until Monday morning when we had to hurry-up and get out so Elizabeth and I could get to our jobs here in town).  If there's a prerequisite I'm going to have for all of my future vacations, it will be to not be rushed.  Not having to worry about the passing of time does wonders for one's soul.  I hope we get to do it again someday.  Thanks to my family-in-laws for being great vacation pals!

(by the way, my chocolate cookie was fantastic)

Overdue pictures

Here are some pictures from our recent trip to Iowa to visit family.  The star of the show is our 9-month old nephew, Gabriel.

Family

My brother is visiting this week.

I love my family.  All of them.  I had the best childhood I think anyone could imagine.  My parents were probably as perfect as parents today can possibly be.  As evidence, let me point out that my folks raised four boys, the youngest of which is merely 5 years younger than the oldest.  Then, as soon as their youngest graduated high school and prepared to move out, they left their entire life behind in Iowa to move to California in order to continue being parents to foster boys.  To date, they have parented something like 14 boys... and they've done impossibly amazing things with all of them.  My brothers have always been the best friends a guy could ask for.  When I was young and we would visit or be visited by mom's family from California, I wondered how in the world a family could end up living so far away from each other.  Now I know.  I miss them all.  All the time.  If time and money were of no consequence, I would choose to hang out with my family every weekend (or close to it).  As it is, I don't get to see them nearly enough... but when I do it's great.  Jase has been here since Sunday.  Even though my wife and I have work and class for about five hours every day, he hasn't yet complained about being bored.  He doesn't even seem bummed about anything (yet).

Mom is flying in late tonight.  We thought she was going to get to bring her youngest foster boy, but she is unable to.  That's okay, though, because my mom is the greatest person in the world.  I'm looking forward to her arrival, even though she's only going to be here for about 30 hours.

So anywho... I just wanted to write a little tribute shout out to my family.  They're fantastic.

One Week

Since it's been one week since my last post, I decided to use a Barenaked Ladies song title for this one.  I happen to enjoy that song too, though I think "If I Had a Million Dollars" is funnier.

I'm really tired today.  My wife had to get up at 3:30 a.m. in order to finish up a paper that's due today, and I had to get up at 5:30, because her class starts at 7:30 and with getting ready and driving to school, the process is about two hours long.  I also had kind of a weird dream.  In it, apparently my brother, Joel, was living in our little one-bedroom apartment with us, and he woke up early and went out, and came home with three puppies.  We're not allowed to have puppies in our apartment, (besides the fact that even though I love dogs, I don't want one while we still live in this tiny one-bedroom, with, apparently, three people living in it) so I was absolutely furious.  Oh, that Joel.  What a kidder.

I also dreamed that Elizabeth and I went for a walk, and when we turned around to come home, I suggested that we run home.  That's weird for a few reasons, but the biggest one is that I don't ever choose to run on my own.  Unless there's a sport being played, you'll only see me run if someone very large is chasing me.

There's an elephant with a shotgun hiding in the closet of my kindergarten teacher's classroom.