Neighborhood Fireworks

For the longest time, we didn’t have much of a 4th of July celebration. We would have low-key celebrations in Mexico alongside our other expat friends, but we couldn’t actually go out and do fireworks.

Since we’ve moved back to the USA, we’ve really gotten to know our neighbors and enjoy being around them. It’s been a fun few years. Almost every evening this summer we have spent time outside with them, and last Monday we had a Fourth of July celebration, complete with some fireworks (no big ones lit by us).

Here’s a video I made:

How did you celebrate the Fourth?

Mother’s Day 2017

I forgot to post this video here on Mother’s Day, but in 2012 we made a video for Janell in our “bodega” in Mexico City.

Since five years had passed, we decided to make a new one with the kids in our basement in Kentucky.

Maybe we’ll make another one in five years if the kids are still into it.

Four Rules for Hammocking with Kids

I love my kids. They have definitely changed my life for the better and recently, I have learned that we share an affinity for hammocking.

My kids ask me almost every day if we can hang up our ENO hammock, but I think we enjoy using it for different reasons. Personally, I prefer the relaxing part of being in a hammock while my kids love to swing like peas in a pod or stones in a slingshot. At 10, 6, and 4, I really couldn’t expect them to want to do anything else.

I tried to figure out the best way for our whole family to love our time in the hammock, so I thought through these four rules. Using them, my kids get to enjoy their hammock time and I get to enjoy mine as well. Sometimes we get to snuggle together, but no matter what, we’re all happy in our hammock.

Read the rest on the ENO blog.

Painting

We started cleaning out some of our closets, and Shiloh and Benjamin found some painting supplies. Since we didn’t have any painting paper, Janell had the brilliant idea to cut up some cereal boxes (we have plenty of those) so they could do some painting this weekend.

Here’s a little video.

What did you do this weekend?

New Van and Blessings


If you follow along here, you already know that we were in desperate need for a new van. Last year, we started a campaign to try to raise some money to purchase a van that we could use everyday in Mexico City. We were overwhelmed by our friends as they poured on the support of our family. So when we returned from the USA in early December, we started the hunt for our new ride.

After many “downs” and very little luck, we finally found a van that suited our family’s needs. In fact, it is so much more than we could have asked or even imagined. The van is well taken care of, has all of the service receipts, and everything checks out great. Our lawyer friend who was helping us check it all out was extremely enthusiastic about this van. It is perfect.

We always joke when we rent vehicles that it would be nice to have a radio that told you what was playing. That might not be anything new to you, or you might not even consider it a blessing, but as I pulled away in our new van and put on the radio, I realized that God takes care of little things as I could read the artist and song that was playing on the radio at that time.

God takes care of us, and we have seen it time and time again in this journey on the mission field. As one of my friends told me, “See…it was worth the wait.”