M-I-C...K-E-Y...M-O-U-S-E

Well, one week from today we fly down to Orlando to Mickey Mecca. Sandi, myself, our three kids, and my Mom will be making the trip this time around. It has been a few years since we have been to our time-share in Orlando, and we are all looking forward to the trip.

We plan on spending only one day at the "Magic Kingdom", maybe 2 days at SeaWorld, and one day at the ocean if the weather cooperates. And after the sub-zero temps we have endured over the past 2 weeks in Michigan the idea of a little Florida sunshine sounds really good!

We are very excited to have my Mom make the trip. The last time I was in Florida with her was about 20 years ago. (and about 20 lbs. ago, but who's counting?) This will be her first time ever on an airplane, so join us in praying for a smooth flight.

I hope to have a few nice pictures and some good stories to share with you after we get back home.

College Days

One of Sandi's and my favorite movies of all time is "Raising Arizona". It came out in 1987 and starred Nicholas Cage. It was one of those quirky comedies that you either loved or hated, and we loved it.

There is a line in that movie that we still laugh about to this day. At one point in the movie Cage's character reflects back on a time when they were happily living in a run down trailer park and sighs, "yes, them were the salad days". That line still cracks me up.




Well, as I look back on this picture of our friends that we went to college with at Grand Valley State University, I must confess "them were the salad days". The year was 1988, Sandi and I got engaged in November, and I was finishing up my bachelor's in English Lit. at Grand Valley. Sandi was going to a college in Grand Rapids. I was living with my best friend, Greg, in an apartment not far from Sandi. That next spring Greg and I drove to San Diego to look at a Graduate School (that was the formal reason I gave my profs - we mostly just wanted an out-west adventure). And the following summer Sandi and I got married.

I was young, in love, living with my best friend, and becoming good friends with the 3 couples you see pictured here. These were my "Inter-Varsity" friends at Grand Valley. We all belonged to a group called "Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship" and as fellow Christians on a state campus we stuck close together. We were in small group Bible studies together, ate meals together, and by the end of my senior year started becoming good friends. That next year or two all of us got married, and within a couple more years all started having children. Between the four couples we now have 12 children (6 boys and 6 girls). We all still live in Michigan, are still married, have most of our hair (although some is growing in odd places) and for the past 17+ years have all gotten together about twice a year.

My favorite thing we do together these days is camp every Labor Day weekend at a great place called "Spring Hill" in Evart, Michigan. We pull our pop-up campers and bring our kids, the dogs, and enough food to feed a small army. We catch fish, shoot guns, do crafts, play catch, attend worship services together, and sit around the campfire.

I have a feeling we will one day look back on these camping trips when our children were young and say "yes, them were the salad days".