Volleyball

Volleyball seems to run in our genes. After Matt played volleyball last year, guess who made her team?

At first, Emery was worried that she wouldn't make the team. Then she was worried that she wouldn't make the A team (vs. the B team). Then guess who winds up starting?

Emery is surprisingly super competitive so I guess it makes sense that she ended up doing well.

Since it was her first year, I had to keep reminding her that she's still learning how to play the game when she was frustrated that she wasn't doing better. But I think she ended learning a lot and improving a lot too. Great job Emz!

Happy Reformation Day!

No, the boys and girl don't celebrate it. Thankfully, they at least recognize it though. For them, the 31st is all about the candy...and the costume.

Emery always has ideas. It's fun to see her creativity at work. She started her costume about 6 weeks BEFORE Halloween.

It involved lots of cardboard, pink paper and glue. Lots of glue. Do you know what it is?

Barbie of course! As usual, pretty amazing. Great job Emz!

And she looked absolutely hilarious walking around in her pink box with 2 skinny legs sticking out!

Fabulous Friends

One of the highlights of our trip was seeing old friends. One of the benefits of having lived almost everywhere in the US is that God has blessed us with friends in Christ at just about every place.

Thanks to the Hughes for not only hosting us in Kentucky but also for the many years of incredible preaching, teaching, counsel and modeling of the Christian life. We learned so much from you in our early parenting years. Andrew was just a month or so old when we first came to sit under Jack's preaching. Crazy how time flies.

And thanks to the Bradleys for hosting us in Ohio! It was so great to meet Bennett for the first time! What a blessing it was to see how the Lord is continuing His work in you both after the years apart. It was truly gratifying to me and very healing too as your pastor to see how God used our brief time together in Albuquerque to bring such a deep and life long friendship in Christ.

Our summer vacation was a blast. And it only took me 4 months to finish blogging about it!

Toronto

The last stop on our trip was in Toronto. This was our first trip as a family outside the US. As we like to do in big cities that we've never been to before, we jumped on a big bus tour.

Strangely, Toronto didn't have much history. Several fires in the last century had burned down pretty much everything historical. So there were some random things like this car in the building!

And this building made with gold on the outside. I forgot to take a picture of it earlier but it's in between the other two buildings. It was just the windows that were gold plated.

And of course, we saw the hockey hall of fame. We're not hockey fans at all so we just drove by.

We took a little boat tour as well. And I must admit the view from the water was quite nice. Andrew thought so too.

We had grand designs to visit the St. Lawrence Market. It's the biggest or one of the biggest public markets in the world. We were excited!

But it was closed! So bummed!

We did some research about original Toronto foods. Did you know that about half of the people from Toronto are immigrants? It's grown so much in recent years as well. So when we looked up foods to eat in Toronto, we got lots of Pho and Thai foods. But we did find this butter tart as an original Toronto food. Emz wasn't that impressed though.

This picture just about sums up our trip to Toronto. Somehow it just didn't jive with us. We got doused by a couple of big thunderstorms. We were underwhelmed by the lack of history and the food that we did eat. In fairness, the boys and girl don't really enjoy any city. And this one seemed to not have much of any feel or character to it. It seemed so stale. I wanted to like it, but I couldn't. Oh well. We can't love every place. But it was a good experience to see some place different. We even had Korean food here that was very different too.

Niagara Falls

I must say, Niagara Falls was AWESOME!

We first viewed it at night. It was all lit up with colors. Above is the Horseshoe falls. There was also a fireworks show. Fabulous.

Here are Emz and Matt at the American Falls. Not as great a view here on the US side, but man we were close. It was SCARY to be so high and so close, at least for a scaredy cat like me.

It wasn't just me who was scared. The next day we came back and saw the Falls in their daytime glory.

But the best thing of all was the Maid of the Mist. Here we are in our ponchos, pre-boat ride. We're ready!

Here come the Falls...

Nothing captures what it's like to get right up in the middle of the Horseshoe Falls. Nothing.

It was absolutely amazing. Every sense was being overwhelmed. All I could see were walls of water surrounding me. All I could hear was the thunderous roar of the 681,000 gallons of water pouring over the falls every second. The boat was shaking and the mist was soaking us with water. I could smell the water and taste the water. It really was a fully absorbed experience of the greatness of God. It was scary to be so close to so much power. God is truly magnificent.

Considering that we had just gone to the Ark and thought about how God sent the Flood to judge the earth, Niagara Falls brought a whole new insight into the terror and power of the flood waters filling the earth.

We survived!

The ponchos sure came in handy.

I was so impressed with Niagara Falls that I feel that every Christian should go and go on the Maid of the Mist. Preferably, you should go to the Ark first. But this has truly expanded my view of God and my amazement of His splendor!

Pro Football Hall of Fame

In our travels, we just happened to be going right next to Canton, OH. Since Sandy kept bugging me about going to visit this place, I finally gave in. :)

Actually, I thought - why don't we make a quick stop and check out the Football HOF? After all, I have at least 2 future NFL linebacker prospects...

At least, I got to let out some steam after driving all day.

Emery is the spitting image of an NFL lineman. Haha! Just about her whole body fit (with plenty of room to spare) into the mold of the legs of a lineman!

We also got to admire some bling. This was my favorite Superbowl of all time. Go Raiders!

I wouldn't exactly call this the most inspiring place on earth.

But it was fun.

The Ark

We also visited the Ark by Answers in Genesis. It's a life size, biblical accurate yet creatively imagined (where Scripture is silent) Ark replica. It was INCREDIBLE.

The whole family was unanimous - this was one of the highlights of our vacation. First, off the sheer size of the thing blows you away. Clearly, all of the animals could fit on this ark.

Second, they did such an incredible job explaining the mechanics and science behind every aspect of life in the Ark including feeding, air flow, the physics of waves hitting the boat, lighting...you name it. We got a real sense of how Noah and his family lived for a year on the Ark, taking care of all those animals. Super cool.

Plus Emery got to ride on a camel for the first time ever.

Andrew wasn't about to be left out.

The grounds were lovely too. All in all, the Ark Encounter gave us a glimpse of what life might have been like on the Ark. It gave us a whole new appreciation for the wisdom of God to save Noah and his family and the animals through the Ark. Praise God for His grace.

The Creation Museum

Back in June, we took a vacation. One of our stops was the Creation Museum in Kentucky. Of course, I had to wear my Creation Museum shirt!

The grounds were quite lovely.

Mom even corralled one of her boys for a mother son pic.

The inside of the museum was better. It was a lot of reading and quite educational.

We did a lot of reading.

Well, one of us read faster than others and used his imagination a bunch.

We loved the dinosaurs, crazy insect exhibit and the iMax shows too. There was a lot of great stuff.

But it was special to know that we were a small part of making the Creation come to life. 10 years ago, we helped make this awesome, biblical and evangelical museum. Praise God!

Passed!

With much fear and trepidation, Andrew took his driver's test today!

He passed!! Thank God! We now don't have to, I mean he now has freedom to drive himself to places. I don't know who's more excited - him or me! But I am very proud of him for working hard to pass. Phew! I got him a car to use - it's not his! Nothing like starting out with a car that's almost 20 years-old with no AC to make you appreciate things and work hard. He's already job hunting. Great job Andrew!

Freedom!

How about that smile?!

The first thing Matt looked forward to after his braces came off, gum. At last, he can chew gum!

Wasn't Matt such a baby when he got his braces on? When did he start looking like a young man?! It happens to all of them I guess. Sorry for the gruesome close up of his bad teeth. 2 down with the braces, 1 to go.

Emery's Track

Emery has begun her track career!

Look at that form! Ok, we're still working on the straight arms. But we're getting there!

She tried the 100.

 

 But we found out that wasn't her race. She ran the 200. Her PR was 29.0.

She also ran the 400. Her PR was 1:13.65. That race TIRED her out!

But her favorite event was the triple jump. Her PR was 26'6". She got 2nd place in her league!

I think Emery had a great first season of track. She had fun with her friends and worked hard all season long. Great job Emz!