Wembley Stadium

We got to go to our first football game (soccer). It was really fun, I always like being at live sporting events much better than watching them on TV.  In the picture above is our friend from church Ken. He got us amazing tickets through his work. We were only five rows away from the field. It was awesome.  

England vs. Bulgaria

Dedication

Truth 4 Youth

Here are just a few pictures from the summer youth camp we took our kids too. It was an amazing weekend filled with great teaching and spiritual growth.

Well we are back from summer camp, and so tired. We had a wonderful trip, everything went really smoothly and the teaching was amazing! I have to say this might be my favourite camp ever.  I was shocked at how sound the teaching was, it really was very edifying for our youth (and me too). The kids loved Carl Kirby from AiG, they were talking about his talks all week! Paul Wilkinson, whom I'd never heard speak before, was amazing. I think it was the clearest talk I have ever heard on Revelation. Another thing that impressed me was the amount of time we spent in the word, most of the time was spent in group or mini-group sessions, which was hard for a couple of the younger kids but worth it. I seriously could go on and on about the teaching. Well I think you get the picture....we had a really good time. 

It's not that I am slacking :)

Ready for a super random post? Like I said in the post title, I'm not slacking on posting it's just that I haven't been taking pictures. And  Alan was ill for a little while, and now I am have caught this wonderful cold as well; and really who wants a picture taken when you feel like your head is going to blow up or deflate? 

Alan spoke in church this past weekend, and did great! (Oh I love him so) He spoke on evangelism and when is that topic not convicting? He is also going to teach at our church's Christmas service as well! We're excited. Next weekend we are headed to our youth retreat, and I am really excited. I've already told parents I would post some pictures from it, so I will have to follow through,  so you may not have to wait as long in-between posts. Not that you wait in high suspense for my little posts. :)

Earlier this week (pre cold) I went for lunch with a friend (which ended up consisting of ice cream :).  We spotted a very cute little store called POD. It had some seriously cute random things in it. It is one of those small little boutique stores that are fun to poke around in. I found this little drawing of the store on-line, so it might disappear. But it's on the high street here, it has lots of great little things for gifts. I've already plotted how to drag Alan in there :)

I also want to say an extra Happy Birthday to my mama! I hope you had a really good day out with Tim. Love you lots and lots. Ummm can you come visit? I miss you. 

I love summer

I love youth trips :) It was so fun to have one again! Last summer we were still pretty new to the whole living in England thing so we weren't able to do any proper summer youth activities. Since we are now pro's at this living in a foreign land thing (not so much, but we make it work :) we were able to whip up some stuff for this summer. Here is Calvary Chapel Oxford's first summer youth trip ever! We went to Thorpe Park (kinda like a six flags) and had lots of fun. I included a couple of pictures of some youth who I know parents won't mind me putting on my blog.

Ryno (pronounced Ray-nu) and Jake getting off a ride

Leana and I in line for a ride. No we aren't burnt, we took Alan's little camera with us and the colouring is off. It was a great trip for us all to hang out and have fun. We only had one hick up the whole day. One of the other girls was carsick on the way to the park. I will spare you the details...but I am surprised it hasn't happened to us before with all the trips we've taken.

 In just a couple of weeks we are going to camp :) I am really excited. This camp looks really good. It's a small camp but they have some great speakers from Answers in Genesis and New Tribes Mission. 

 In just 3 sundays Alan will be speaking in Big Church :) Please pray for him if you think about it. I am so weird, I get more nervous for him than he does. I think I know how nervous I would be if I had to speak in front of that many people and for some reason I get that nervous for him as well. I know he'll do great though, he is pretty amazing. 

This morning I enrolled in a photography class! I am really excited. It's a twelve week class and I will definitely let you know how it goes and hopefully post some of my assignments on here.

testing...

Just wanted to see what an xlarge  picture would look like :) Sorry, none of this stuff is new.

changes

Hi, as you can see I am changing up my blog, I got a notice that the background I was using before was not going to be available much longer. So this change is out of necessity rather than want. I will be changing it up until I find one I like and then playing around with a new header in photoshop. Then maybe I'll start posting again...maybe

Our Whirlwind Life

We just got back from a rather whirlwind 4 week stay in CA. For people who didn't hear we found out on the 28th of April that we needed to get a new visa in a hurry because of a law change and we flew back on the 3rd of May. It was a little crazy but the Lord totally provided everything we needed and people to cover the ministries we were involved in.

Oh man it was so good to see everyone. So so good. I had missed my close friends and family a lot. We weren't planning on going to visit in May but maybe we should have been. We were home for Mother's Day, 3 birthdays, My sister shared her testimony in School (she did SO amazing by the way), one of the bestest families ever had a baby boy while we were back, and the LOST finale :)

It was the first time we had been back since we moved to Oxford, there are things I would do differently but all in all a good trip. Here are just a couple of pictures :)

That great family I was talking about, here they are. Alan is holding Luke in the above picture and I am with the girls below. We LOVE the Jacksons. It was so good to spend time with them.

We got to meet our nephew (below) and celebrate his first birthday with him. He is adorable! All of our nephews and nieces grew so much in that one year, it was a blessing to see them and spend a little time with them.

We spent a day in Solvang with Alan's Parents and here is a not so good picture to prove it. We really enjoyed being able to go there and spend time with them.