Two In The Bag, a Lifetime To Go

Well, yesterday Eli celebrated his 2nd birthday. This time in Michigan without me his daddy. Kinda sad about that, but that's how it goes sometimes. He blew one of his candles out but decided to pinch the other one out with his bare fingers. He's okay, but I think he's learned that fire is HOT!

I'll be leaving out Friday to drive home. I'm looking forward to the trip. It'll be fun to be on the open road. So, I'll see y'all soon...

The End is Near!

Hi again,

Today marks the first day of the last summer camp of the season. It sure has flown by. Jess and Eli leave next Wednesday to fly home to Ohio as we begin a long fall break from Juneau. We hope to see many of you, our friends and family, while we are at home. I will be leaving on the 1st of September to drive home. I am really looking forward to that.

Lots of kids at camp this year. It is the most we have had in many years. Cool huh? It has been a good year overall.

Eli will turn 2 years old on Aug. 26. He's 37 lbs and 36 inches long! He's a monster!! He's off the charts. Luckily he's proportional or else he'd make a great bowling ball.

Blueberries and Birthdays

Here are a few pictures from my birthday and from today's Sunday afternoon wild blueberry picking. Eli ate quite a few berries. He was like a BEAR!!

4th of July and the Other Days Too...

The 4th of July is a big day here in Juneau. They have several parades filled with floats and what seems like a never ending supply of dogs. (Alaska is a dog-loving state if ever there was one.) Echo Ranch marches in Juneau's parade each year, so that is what we did this year too. Eli seemed to enjoy it and was entertained by all of the crowd waving and cheering for him. I'm sorry, in my head they are all cheering for him. It's my job you know to get him prepped for what it will be like when he wins his first of what will undoubtedly be many Super Bowls or World Series! Hey, I can dream can't I??? Anyway, we all had a good time and I hope you all had fun on your 4th too. That's Eli on the peddle go-cart with a friend In the other pic you see Jess and Eli marching in the parade. Eli is munching on a saltine and Jess is talking to a friend from camp.

The rest of the month has been busy with camp. we've been blessed to have lots of kids at camp this summer so that has kept us busy. Last week there were 100+ middle school kids at camp so it was a madhouse out there! We like a lot of kids!

Bear count for this year stands at 7 for me and 6 for Jess. Kind of a slow year.

Eli is talking more now with every other word seeming to be "bus." He's pretty funny with these new words of his. His vocabulary now includes bus, yes, no (a word he uses often, but doesn't seem to always understand when we say it), stuck, more, mama, didi, Leah, bath, Elmo and others I just can't remember at this early hour. He babbles a lot so we think we may have a chatty little boy.

I had my 44th birthday on the super lucky day of 07-07-07. Jess made a fancy cake and overall it was a nice day for me.

Okay, so I'm not the best blogger around...

Hi,

Sorry it has been so long since my last posting. My neice Erin questions why I even have the blog if I don't post occasionally to it. She is ever the logical one, my little clown.

Things are going well here. We endured almost 200 inches of snow here this winter. That's a record for Juneau. Eli loved it! He didn't have to shovel the stuff!

Camp is almost at the mid-point for the summer. We have been blessed to have lots of kids this year. That has been awesome. They are why we are here.

We will be home from mid-August until January this year to visit with our supporters and churches. We hope to see as many people as possible.

We sold the "Pig" recently. The "Pig" was our name for our 1990 Suburban which we bought in Glennallen and used to haul all of our stuff up to Alaska a few years ago. It was big and not so pretty, thus the name "Pig!"

Eli is well. He gets bigger each day and is sure to be a middle linebacker someday. His vocabulary is also getting larger each day. It's a little scary.... He loves momma, anything with buttons, anything electronic, driving the camp's school buses (pretend of course) and anything with cheese. He's our little boy!

I have seen 7 bears this spring, one right here in our parking lot! That's life in Alaska...

New Year Greetings

Hello and Happy New Year to all of you out there. We hope you will enjoy the best year ever in 2007.

We spent most of December and the first few days of January in Ohio, Georgia and Mississippi visiting friends and relatives. It was great to see everyone again and enjoy just being "home." It was also great to show off Elijah. He is something else! He recieved his first haircut while we were home. He had had long curly hair and was often mistaken for a girl, but now he looks like the All-American boy he is. He traveled pretty well, but we think he was ready to get back home to his own bed by the end of it. I know we were.

On our way back to Alaska we had to spend the night in the Seattle airport. We arrived in Seattle at 2AM and our next flight was to leave at 8:30AM. Eli was wide awake with so many things to see. We walked him all over that airport before he fell asleep. He woke an hour later and we walked him again until he fell asleep again. We were so tired!!!! We were so happy the next day when we finally made it home.

Two mornings ago we were awaked at 6:50AM as the house was shaking. We were having a 6.1 earthquake! Nothing was broken and there was no damage around Juneau. The earthquake's center was located about 50 miles north of us between Haines, AK and the Canadian border. What a way to bring in the new day.

Most of the missionaries are here this week for our annual winter meetings. It's a time to see how everyone is doing and to make plans for the coming summer out at camp. It's nice to see everyone again. Please pray for us as we prepare for the coming season...