#2. We just got back from Hawaii. Darren was recruiting for CBU and so McKinsey and I decided to tag along. I’m glad that we did. Kins loved the beach. She was obsessed with the sand; although surprisingly, she never tried to eat it. We were able to meet a friend from high school and her husband for dinner and had a great time catching up. We had some great family time- especially on the weekend when Darren was done with work!

#1. We also went to Colorado for Darren’s work/ visit his brother, Barry, his wife, Alyssa, and their sweet daughter, Kendyl at the end of September. Darren and Barry worked all week while Alyssa and I got to hang out and play with the kiddos. On the weekend we took a trip to the mountains and stayed in a cabin near Breckenridge. It was a lot of fun and we have lots of good memories from that trip.

You can see it written all over their faces. It was a looong ride to Breckenridge and back.

#3. Now in less than a week we will be flying to Florida for Thanksgiving week. Darren’s dad’s side of the family lives there so it will be really special to spend some time with them.

I was looking through pictures and came across these jewels. One Saturday morning, Darren let me sleep in and got up and played with McKinsey. Yes, God has blessed me with an amazing husband.

This is what I woke up to see…It was a little chilly that morning. So being the thoughtful daddy that he is, he made sure Kins was warm enough. He managed to find a hoodie that was too small, added pants on top of her pajamas, and added slippers without socks. But at least she was warm:)

This Sunday November 8th is the International Day of Prayer for the persecuted church.(IDOP). There will be churches gathered for this event all over the world, although unfortunately not as many as you would think because many either are unaware or just simply do not care about the persecuted church today. If you are in the southern California area there will be a gathering for IDOP at Northpoint Evangelical Free Church in Corona from 6:00pm – 8:00pm that you are welcome to participate in. You can get the details from the flier below and also watch a 2 minute video that highlights last years here: IDOP 2008.

Don’t be fooled by the blue and brown pajamas- that cutie is McKinsey. The other night I was at my sister’s and I forgot pajamas for Kinsey so I borrowed an old pair of Brayden’s. When she woke up the next morning, she looked so adorable. Don’t you love how babies don’t know the difference or care what color, brand or price things are that we get for them? It makes you think-  is a lot of the stuff that we do/get for our babies really for them or us? Food for thought…

Here’s some pics of McKinsey eating for the first time. I was pretty impressed with her eating skills (or maybe it’s more accurate to say drinking skills since the rice cereal is more of a liquid consistency). She ate the whole bowl (except the stuff that dribbled down her chin of course) and was still reaching for more after it was all gone. She loves to eat! It was special that her Uncle Dan got to be there to witness the fun. It was nearly impossible to keep Bruiser out of her face; although, he helped make cleaning up easy since he licked up anything she dribbled or I dropped.

Darren had the day off on Friday for his birthday so we met Darren’s parents down at the beach. It was a fun and relaxing day. Darren and I even got a romantic walk down the beach thanks to Lolo and Lola (Darren’s parents). McKinsey loves being outside so she loved every minute of it- except when I stuck her feet in the cold ocean water. That made her mad.

Then on Saturday we headed down to Hemet to celebrate Darren’s birthday with our families. Birthdays in our family tend to get celebrated over the span of a week or even more sometimes:) We had a typical Darren style meal- flank steak, garlic mashed potatoes, corn on the cob, cheese bread, and to top it off marvelous mocha pie for dessert. Darren’s mom makes the most amazing marvelous mocha pie.

We are so blessed that we have family that lives so close. Darren’s cousin Leah and her husband Travis just recently moved to the area from Washington. We were so glad that Leah (Travis had to work) was able to join us and meet McKinsey for the first time. We hope to see more of them since they are so close.

Here’s a picture of Brayden and McKinsey playing in the ball pit that Brayden got for his 1st birthday.

There are more than 100,000 Burmese Karen refugees in Thailand along the
border.  About 5,000 of these are "new arrivals" having fled their homes
during Summer 2009 because of the brutal genocide imposed by the Burmese
military junta ruling against the wishes of the voting majority of Burmese
for he past decades.  The recent refugees are not in camps authorized by the
Thai government, under the monitoring of the U.N. Higher Commission on Refugees,
but have been granted "unofficial"asylum because of the humanitarian
concern of the Thai government, at least temporarily.

The area where the refugees are presently settling is mountainous, and
although very warm during Summer and monsoon season can be quite cold and
windy in winter.  We have observed refugees sleeping exposed to near-freezing
temperatures with bare feet and only a T-shirt and trousers for warmth.

Please consider helping us provide blankets for these Burmese Karen refugees
by Christmas 2009.  One warm wool blanket can be purchased in Mae Sot or
Chiangmai and delivered where needed for slightly less than $3.  Thus ten
blankets are $30, and a bundle of forty as they come from the factory would
be $120.  Contributions marked for "Blankets for Burmese" will be 100%
invested in those blankets if sent to:  

INCOR, P.O. Box 531, Kent, WA, 98035-0531. 

If you would like to visit the INCOR website it is www.incor.org.

Due to the overwhelming amount of requests that I have received, I have decided to re-post the picture of “Carrotus Goliath”, this time zoomed in for the full affect. Here it is again in all of it’s glory…

Darren here again…

The other day at work I walked into a conversation and within a minute or so of listening made a really dumb stereotypical comment that I wished I could have taken back. Don’t you just hate it when you put your foot in your mouth?

A Post from Darren (Janelle made me preface this).

The carrots that we planted in our garden have been quite a disappointment this season. Our tomatoes are bountiful and plump, our green beans are long and crunchy, but week after week we have had nothing but scrawny carrots like these…

The Little Guys

And then one morning to my utter astonishment and delight, the day of recompense {from all of my blood, sweat, & toil} had arrived. Before my very eyes, CARROTUS GOLIATH!

CARROTUS GOLIATH