My View

I thought I would show you what I see in the mornings for reading and devotion and checking email time. I love the view from my window, I remember telling you all that the courtyard in SJC would be hard to loose, and it is. But, the view from this window is so peaceful and the birds, squirrels and bunnies are usually busy outside in the mornings.

The other pictures are of the living room and the front of the house. I had a friendly competition going with some friends on picking the color of the living room. Well girls, I didn't choose any of the colors suggested so I won't be sending any cheese curds. Thanks for the help though.

God Church Camera

Mike couldn't stand me not having a camera anymore so great guy that he is I got the new improved model of camera I used to have...so I'm back in business. I haven't been writing for the past few days because without photos to back you up it's just hard to read and hard to write.

Today I'm sitting on my living room bench seat a place that I love, looking into the backyard. The kids are still asleep. There are two things I've wanted to talk about lately one being God and Church and the other is being lonely. I'll start with the God and Church: God has consistently directed me and our family, I never had any doubts about what choice we made when we decided to come here, I had tons of fears and sadness but I knew that this is the place that we needed to be. God continues to be ever faithful and whenever those fearful feelings come he comforts or sends or speaks to me just the right thing. The last few weeks I've been thinking that I accidently got put in the wrong place. This land is full of Lutherans, and the thing about Lutherans is they come in many different Lutheran denominations and I'm not kidding about this; there are Lutheran churches about every half mile around here.

Some Lutherans are separatists and they feel like they are the ones who have the corner on the market of eternity and are not allowed to fellowship with others. They have their own church and school so the kids don't have to mingle. Nicest folks and very....o what is the word...let's just say they are 'packaged very nicely'. They don't seem to smile very often or laugh.

The last few weeks I've been around a lot of Lutherans so I was very happy to go to church this last Sunday with our church which is called San Damiano which MET downtown until last Sunday. The bar that we have been meeting in is in the process of changing ownership so we are going to meet in a BAPTIST WEDDING CHAPEL!!! That ought to be interesting!

If I were going to try to find a church like Capo Beach Calvary this would be the church that would be closest. The pastor is great, it's a young congregation (under 1 year old) and the people who attend run the gammut of musicians who perform in local bars to retired folks to a few families. The worship can change radically from one weekend to the next, once we came and it was bluegrass, the week before last it was some recordings from Johnny Cash a great song called 'Help Me', this week it was Gilllian Welch's song 'One More Dollar' to 'Breathe' to an old Hymn 'Be Thou My Vision'. I love the eclectic mix of worship they do. Some of the people seem strong and some weak in faith but willing to grow. I've attached some pictures of church, the guy with the beer, he kind of looks like the pastor. I guess we get to take that picture with us to the Baptist Chapel, but that could be a problem.

Ok, from going to a place where I had a ton of people to talk with and hang out with to coming here is a bit of a shock to my delicate gregarious extroverted personality. Please pray for all of us to meet people that are a little crazy! if you know what I mean. There is entirely to much common sense around here.

I better get going! As I sit here there are big bees and bugs flying into the window trying to escape the heat today! Go figure the hottest summer for a long time! Bye all!

Free Phone Calls

I've been introduced to SKYPE.com this is a free phone calling service on the web. David Freese told me about it and now I have a camera hooked up to it so you can see me when you call on SKYPE. You don't have to have a camera but it is cool. If you need help just send me an e-mail. You do need a headset with a microphone in it (approximately $20.)

The Beach

Yesterday was our first "beach" adventure here in Wisconsin, it was a beautiful drive to meet up with Sister and Brother-in-law Scott and Julie and there children Bethany and Sarah Grace. So all 9 cousins spent the entire day digging on the beach in Sheboygan. It was very pretty there. The best part was watching the kids work all day together like an army of ants building their elaborate water system.

Driving back and forth was so pretty, it was amazing that it was consistently green with rolling hills and great looking barns.

Oh yeah, a few days ago Mike went on a business trip to Louisville, KY, he flew out of Green Bay so the kids and I went to Lambeau Field and did a drive by of "Brett Favre's Steakhouse", then to a place called "Bay Beach". This is an amusement park in Green Bay that was built by this very benevolent man that wanted to make sure that all kids would always have a fun place to come, so every summer the parks department runs the rides, they used to be 10 cents a ride, now they are a whopping 25 cents, did you know they took the cent icon off keyboards? Anyway, Sam went on the Tilt O Whirl all by himself, such a big thing for him. For the last year that we had Disneyland passes he never really did anything faster than the Dumbo ride.

Steve really made a man of him while he was here, he took Sam fishing on the little boat on Uncle Art's lake and Sam told me before we left that he was not getting in a boat or going fishing. Steve and Sam went out fishing in the rain for hours early one morning. Thanks Steve.

Geocaching

I'm going to try this with the kids in the next few days. Mike got me a GPS as a present before we left CA so I could find my way around here. This is like a new sport.

Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for gps users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a gps unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

I'll let you know how it goes.

Loosing Things

I lost my camera a few weeks back because I was overwhelmed and in a hurry, last weekend at the cabin I lost my new cellphone, I had it 2 days. There was a three hour drive to get to the cabin and of course I spent the whole time filling in all my vital information in that flip phone. One game of leapfrog later with Sam and it was gone.

I know you all remember me loosing things before, but I always found them.

Hmm....I guess I'll slow down.

Here are some random photos I like because I don't have any new pictures. The first one I call "Mike loves FLAT PAPER" and the other is "Isabel's First Playdate". Thanks for all the emails everyone.

Okay, I just lost one more thing, the top of my thumb. I had to go to the hospital tonight to get it sewed back on.

The Cabin

Today is Sunday, July 9th. We have had the pleasure of having our friend Steve Carter visit for a few days and we took him to Northern Wisconsin to Uncle Art's cabin. It was memorable to say the least!

Before we left Steve and I decided to rip down some kitchen cabinets that were blocking the view of the backyard. It was quite successful and Steve tricked it out so that it looks great without us having to have someone come and fix it. While we were getting ready, Steve asked me to turn off the power so we could disconnect some lights -- well, I turned the power off to everything BUT the lights!! (By mistake! By mistake!) Steve did survive but he probably had a small heart attack when his pliers cut the wire and blew the breaker. Steve accused me of trying to kill him.... but that was just the beginning.

Second day we went for a ride to Berlin, WI, about an hour away, so Steve could find some custom boots. Well, we had a little car accident (fender bender).

Then we made it to the lake and "The CABIN." They told us ahead of time that there were bats in the cabin but that they had got them all out. We pull up late Friday night and Uncle Art went in and, well, there were bats flying everywhere. The men caught them in nets and squished them, but all night we heard scratching in the walls, I don't know if they were bats or mice or both. Can bats and mice live peacefully together?

Next day, tons of good fishing (20-something bluegills and largemouth bass) in the rain (and later, sun), and then a lot of relaxing. Dinner with Uncle Art and Aunt Hallie and back to the cabin for another night of bats and bat hunting. They were everywhere! Steve and Mike were chasing them all over the place. They spent the next couple of hours patching up holes where the bats came in.

Steve had one more near-death experience. About midnight there was this loud crash from his bedroom in the cabin and then another crash, and mind you Uncle Art built that cabin at least 50 years ago by hand. Of course Mike didn't wake up with all the racket but I went to find out what was happening and Steve comes out of his room and tells me the picture above his bed (probably been there 50 years) had fallen from the wall, crashed into the back of the bed frame, and then konked him on the head! The picture wire had snapped!! We have joked for days about me trying cause Steve's untimely death, but this was getting FUNNY. He did survive with a sore noggin, so Sue, pay extra attention to him when he gets home.

I guess that Juice Plus really works!

4th of July

Last night July 3rd was the big fireworks show here in Appleton, I don't exactly know why they do it a night early, Elaine Grimes thinks it is because they sell tons of fireworks here and then the families can shoot them off on the 4th. It was fun, reminded me of San Juan fireworks - the park is one block from our house so our street is a zoo the whole evening, tons of people walk up to the park in front of our house. There were only two things missing, all my great friends and "fear" there was absolutely no fear of anything. This is the most peaceful place I have ever been. It really is going to take some getting used to.

The kids and I go on adventures every few days to find our way around, my in-laws have told me I have to slow down checking everything out because I'll be out of things to do pretty quick.

The house is coming along fine, we can't find a few things like our computer router, this is the most bothersome. Mike and I love to both be on the computer at the same time at night after the kids have gone to sleep. It is relaxing for both of us, we can catch up on e-mail and read. I'm ripping down wallpaper in the kitchen and testing paint colors, I'm actually getting tired.

I'm including a picture from our travels around Wisconsin last weekend. We were stopping for a latte and we found the Oscar Meyer Weinermobile. I guess Madison, Wisconsin is where they train all the people who travel around the country in the weinermobiles. The kids loved it.

These are from our trip:
Sam and Isabel in Virginia City, Montana and the other is Isabel and I in a hot spring in Idaho right before I slipped and bumped my head on a rock.

Mike and the kids

Mike has had his new job for one week and he loves it. This job was made for him, and the company he works for is really great. The building itself has a cafeteria, gym and someone to come to your desk and give you a massage! Mike says the kids can come and see his office but I can't because of the sensitivity of people's medical records - no grown ups.

Sam and Isabel both told me yesterday that they are going to like it here! This community loves kids, and they do everything to support the family and the children. The parks system is incredible they have swim lessons and every pool in Appleton all summer and they are all connected to the same system, you can't find private lessons anywhere. Each child has to graduate from level 1 to level 5 and it doesn't always happen. Luckily Sam and Isabel both passed yesterday and they were very happy and proud of themselves. The Parks and Rec Department runs everything through the summer. Each school has a camp in the morning and afternoon and it is FREE! There are other camps you can register for that have a fee but it isn't much. So families keep busy all summer.

Isabel has chosen paints for her room sky blue and frog green and she is getting new carpet for her room in a couple of weeks. Sam got the room with the two Orca whales on the wall it is still a disaster area. I think by next week we might have most all the boxes unloaded.

Appleton is a very nice town but the shopping is just not Orange County, so I have decided that instead of fighting the system that I would become ONE with the Midwest. So first thing is buying a Latte at the local Quick Trip (kind of like a 7-11) they are 95 cents and you push a button on a machine to get one and they taste pretty good. They do have Starbucks but I get lost pretty easy and they seem to be far away from us, it doesn't seem worth it.

I seem to have lost my camera, pray for me to find it. I love that camera.