Skookum Butte Part 2

I had to add more pictures of Skookum Butte, it is truely the most beautiful place I have been to.

Its also a really fun hike even though we got kinda lost.

Blue Mt. lookout and Skookum Butte lookout and hike

Picnic with the Partains and Cook out with the Canhams

We celebrated the 4th with our friends in Lolo.  I love how Cooper is pulling up his shorts just in case the puddle reaches them.  

Then we went to the Canhams were they were very festive.  I love the Canhams and will really miss them.  At night we enjoyed fire works from the Stewarts/Williams deck.  

We also did two amazing hikes this weekend which I will post after I take a nap!

Pictures to PUMP you up

Here is the start of our trip. We took the kids to Multanomah falls.  Its so beautiful even with 5 million people there.  

There is also some shots of our decorations.We taught about endurance so we have a man running around the world.  

The last one is of Katelyn wearing the armor of God.  She is the cutest kid...she reminds me of my sister when she was little.

More to come...

We've been PUMPed!

Nathan and i just returned from a week long mission trip in Portland.  We took our youth group to PUMP...Portland Urban Ministry Project.  The kids experienced more new things in a week than they have in a life time.  I feel like they exceeded my expectations of working hard on this trip.  The teens did an amazing job of jumping right in and making the most of every opportunity.

For me this trip was so refreshing.  It seems like we were constantly around people who all shared the same goal.  They all wanted to be better in their spiritual lives.  They were all passionate about Jesus and wanted to know him more.  I had almost forgotten how great that feels to be around a family of God.  Its gotten me thinking more about serving and how important it is.  Nathan told parents when we returned that if you say yes to God it can only be good.  How true that is.  

I hope to someday make it back to PUMP.  I have always been a huge fan of inner city ministries and hope to get the opportunity to do more soon.  

Now we start packing and are making plans to move soon.  So many life changes lately.

I will post some pictures soon of PUMP.

A visit with Morgandy

A got to visit Mo for a week.  We had a great time playing, she is so cute.

I'm puttin' the Christmas tree back up! Winter is back and summer hasn't even started!

I think we missed our summer here in Montana. This is what is left of our snow storm we had Tuesday night.  I am so thankful to get to go to Austin tomorrow!

The Mo Family in Montana...

Our family from Missouri came to see us this past week. Here is just the beginning of a great week. We went to the park after some pizza, and rolled down a great hill. I only did it once...that is not something that old people do. We also took them to Glacier National park and hiked up to Avalanche Lake. It turned out to be a perfect day with family, and God's amazing wonders. More to come in a few days...

A weekend in Portland...

This was my first weekend to be away from Nathan, thats why his face is not happy here.  I went to Portland, OR to see my family.  We had a great time and I am so grateful that I got to see some of my favorite people.  I am also very glad to be back here with my favorite person ever!

PUMP

Some of you may know that Nathan and I are taking our teens to Portland this summer.  We will be putting on a VBS at PUMP(Portland Urban Ministry Project). I am super excited about this opportunity to serve and grow and to see our teens grow.  

One of the best parts of mission trips is raising money.  Its also my least favorite part.  Asking for money is so uncomfortable, no matter how you do it.  But it also opens doors to sharing your love for Jesus and telling others why you want to spread the news.  

This past weekend we had a church wide garage sale.  I don't think that many people had faith in what God was going to do that day.  We ended up raising 15oo dollars.  It was a truly amazing day and I praise God for the things that He is already starting to do for our trip.

Childrens Museum, a hike, and McKenzie River Pizza...

The park, carousel, and a hike...

We met Angie, Cooper, and Sawyer at the park/carousel. Cooper was the only one who really cared about the carousel, the others were too little.  After naps that day, we took Mo on a hike at Blue Mountain.  The one of her by the tree is her in time out.  Its a cute picture.  Still more to come, for my mom and aunt K, the only ones who read this...

A visit from the fam...well half of them...

Here are only some of the good times we had this weekend.  I'll post more later...including pictures of all the time outs morgandy had.  She is a really good girl, in fact one of the best behaved I have ever seen.  But I still took pictures of time outs, its kinda funny...