My First Attempt

Hello Family and Friends!  This is my attempt to keep you all updated on our life down here in Arizona - ministry is keeping us busy and our kids are growing up so fast...don't blink! Hopefully this will help in sharing with you the goings on of my family.  

The kids are almost done with their first quarter in school...we start early down here in AZ but get longer breaks during the fall, winter, and spring.  I think I like that set up but summer goes by way too fast.  Maggie is in 3rd grade, Sophie is in 1st grade and I am homeschooling Eli for preschool - he will be in all day Kindergarten next year.  They all love their teachers :)  Sophie just finished an after school art class that she loved.  I was so impressed with what she brought home - God has given her a wonderful creative gift!  Here is a picture of my favorite one...

Maggie will be starting a cooking class this week - she is super excited but is hoping that she won't have to learn how to make eggs.  As soon as it gets a little cooler Eli will start playing soccer again, he had so much fun with that last Spring.

Matt is working on multiple things at church - he seems to be the go-to guy for alot of different things from getting the budget done for the next year to getting over 150 people placed in Lifegroups.  On the side, he has had fun working on an album that a band called Safe Haven is putting out with LiveLove records - a record label that he has helped start.  He is also in the beginning stages of creating a worship album for the ELIC teachers over in China, Mongolia, Vietnam and Laos.  He'll be traveling to Thailand again in January to lead worship for their conference.  We're thankful that God is giving him opportunities to use his gift in worship.

I'm staying busy with several different things too.  Aside from homeschooling Eli...we're having so much fun with that...I'm helping to lead our Women's Ministry at church with overseeing the small group leaders within that group.  I think there is about 18 leaders - our group is growing! 

We're studying the Life of Christ this semester and praying that the women grow in their love for Jesus even more.  I am also helping to write a curriculuum for a Mother Daughter Bible study called Kindred Daughters that the girls and I are involved in - we're studying the Fruits of the Spirit .  And then there's Live Love, an organization founded by the Highschool pastor and his wife, that goes into neighborhoods in downtown Chandler, AZ and helps the residents to clean up their properties and fix their homes while spreading the love of Christ.  I'll be heading up the projects in one of the neighborhoods on Oct. 24th for "LiveLove Day"  - we're expecting to have close to 1000 volunteers of which I'll have 300-400 to place.  

As a family, we're looking forward to a much needed vacation together coming up at the end of September to... Disney World!!  It's a vacation we've been planning for about a year now - we'll do a week at Disney and then down to Marco Island for another week - that was strategic so that Matt and I could relax :)  

I'll do my best to keep posting with news and pictures!  It may not be until the end of October though - I expect I'll be able to breathe by then again :)