God's in it all

I've had a good 2nd week of "vacation". We are putting rock in our backyard, which until this point has been dirt and weeds. The plan was to get some dirt to fill the holes, remove all the weeds, get the sprinkler system set just the way we want it and get the rock on Thursday morning.

I've been amazed at how God has been there every step of the way to help me finish this. The first two days I worked mostly alone. The weather was hot but cloudy almost all day so I could keep working.

On Wednesday Candi put school on hold to help and Candi's dad, Dean, who arrived Wednesday morning, helped, too. The McKee's are a hard workin' family. The bad part is that it rained hard for half the day. The cool part is that God, knowing that it was going to rain, turned it into 3 vs. the yard.

The Wednesday rain seemed to be a problem at first. I had to postpone the rock delivery, in fear that they would tear the whole yard up with wet ground. In reality, though, I wasn't ready for it yet anyway. I pushed the delivery off until tomorrow and was able to get everything else from the to-do list done.

Once again, my time table wasn't in accordance with God's, but as always, His worked better! And He's involved in the little things.

Day 6

Well, I fell behind on the last day of vacation and couldn't post the days events. Actually, it's because I was driving from 7pm until 3 am.

So this is how that day went. We left my cousins late, around 9:30 or 10, after an unusual dead battery experience. I'm glad God took care of us there. I would have hated for it to be the alternator or something worse.

Then we drove to Bible John's abode in Burbank. After surveying his pad and seeing some of the work he does in the Hollywood business we headed out for some fresh air. Our first stop was to eat. But our second stop was IKEA. This was our first time there. I had heard a ton about it from our friends but never felt the desire to go in. John said the place is cursed - no one enters without buying something (actually, he said one cannot enter without buying a lot more than one actually came for). I have to say that IKEA was one of the vacation highlights... I'll leave it at that.

Our next stop was a railroad engine museum. We expected Wyatt to really like it, but in reality that was an understatement. He loved it. There's pictures below.

Finally, we went to Griffith Park, which actually has a lot of things in it, but we played at the playground.

Overall the day was awesome. Any time I get to spend with John is good time. The weather was beautiful. The kids had an great time.

In closing, Nori and Christian made me so proud. They had somewhat of an allowance on our vacation and they had both saved most of it. Nori decided to buy Wyatt a $10 Thomas the Train toy and Bubba asked out of the blue if he could buy Wyatt ice cream at the park. I'm cheesing now just thinking about how proud I am that they would consider others so much.

Tribute to a man I met once

I got these quotes from this blog. It was about the FPF's dad, Mike, after he had died. One of the things said about Mike was that he held a confidence rarely seen in adults; I completely agree. Here are some things that Mike said, in case you didn't check out the blogs that FPF put up. It takes confidence in God to say these things and mean them whole-heartedly. Thank you, James, for the opportunity to spend a dinner with your parents.

“Hold steady and depend on the Lord, Be shed of the anchors that hold you down, be ready to move freely. Let us be faithful with our income, tithes and offerings.”

“Watch the eye gate - the things you see. Watch the ear gate - the things people say to you.”

“Take authority over the enemy.”

“Be the leader of holiness in your family.”

“Don't talk so much. Be quiet and listen. Let the Lord get a word in edgewise.”

Day 4

Well, we had no more to do in San Diego besides visiting the beach so we decided to drive up to my cousins, Pat and Burle's home, in Malibu. I know it sounds kind of funny to be staying with a 4th cousin, but they are extremely welcoming and gracious. We left SD around 10am and drove to the famous Zuma beach in Malibu. Bible John, as Nori titled him, arrived at the beach from Burbank around 1pm.

 

John, Candi, Wyatt, and I dug holes and swam. In fact, John has been in California for two years and until today has not been in the ocean. He's been to the beach, but never got in. We couldn't let that crime continue. Peer pressure can be an awesome thing.

 

Nori pretended the day away and occasionally got in the waves. Christian practiced balancing on his boogie board the entire day. I think he's working his way to a professional career. I can't wait to see him ride the tube!

 

We stayed until 5:30 and then ate at Subway - they have 'em in Malibu, too; weird! It was an awesome day. I'm overcome by how beautiful the weather is in California. And I thought we had it good with the AZ winter!

We finally went to Pat and Burle's around 7pm, washed up, put the kids to bed, and then visited and watch the Olympics until 10:30.

Here are some pictures of the day.

Day 3

It was, indeed, a SD Zoo day. There were a lot of things to look at. Definitely an awesome zoo. I had no idea it was so big. Seeing the pandas was an awesome experience. #2 on the list was the bug house - those bugs are amazing! Evolution, my big toe!

Tomorrow will definitely be a beach day. I'm pretty sure we'll be in Malibu by then.


I don't have too many pictures though; I forgot to charge the battery after all the ones we took at C World.

Day 2

Whew! Today was Sea World. It was better than I remembered it - I went to the one in Orlando when I was about 10. We were there from 9am until 8pm. I am completely drained and not really sure what we're going to do tomorrow. I couldn't imagine walking around the SD zoo but you never know.

One of the cool things was a new attraction made for younger kids (37 - 51"). It had a huge net maze 20' above the ground and a bunch of cool play areas underneath. There were also three rides that Nori and Christian could go on.

We also took in the dolphin show, fed some bat rays, saw a bunch of sharks, and touched a sea cucumber - yuck!

There's no way to get pictures of everything on here, but here's just a few.

Day 1

Up @ 3am.
On the road @ 4.
Good breakfast @ Daybreakers Cafe in Yuma, AZ.
San Diego @ 11.
Beach @ 11:20.
Walking the boardwalk @ 1.
Sunburned @ 2.
Checked in at the home of the Navy's Top Gun school @ 4.
Half asleep now.

It's beautiful here...

Hasta Pronto

We sail to California in the AM! I'm excited to have this family vacation. We have a lot planned, but not too much. We plan on dropping anchor at the beach plenty! Thank you to the FPFs for watching the ship mascots for us. I'll put some pics up when we get back.

- The Captain

Long break

It's been a while since I blogged. Sorry. I'll blame it on our camera. It broke and honestly, blogs without pictures tend to be... boring.

Camera problem fixed! Here's some pictures we took with the new one.

For Better or For Worse

I was talking with a friend the other day about the effects that one person can have on us and in particular things that we love or value.

For example, I can trace my love of rock climbing back to a friend that was passionate about it. Even after eight years, mentioning his name or climbing brings a smile to my face. I'm sure we can all name things like that.

Unfortunately, it goes both ways. I've had two negative experiences recently.

The first is the class that I just finished on Daniel and Revelation. Normally, though some might not be interested in it, I would look forward to writing three papers on the Millennium in Rev 20, interpretation of Revelation as a whole, and Daniel's 70 "sevens" prophecy in Daniel 9. However, the professor was very strict and impersonal in his correspondence throughout the course. By the last week I was dreading writing a paper and actually nervous over whether or not I would meet the "guidelines" and remember the strict format. Honestly, I now have to force myself to study the bible! That's like forcing myself to eat lunch - something necessary for life.

The other is with something I deal with day-in and day-out in the AF and generally in life - leadership. I've been promoted in my career far enough that leadership skills are extremely valuable to me, but I'm not a great leader. Until last year, I was reading a lot of books and focusing on my abilities. However, I was also interacted with someone who "promoted" leadership a lot, but he abused the people under him and ignored or broke leadership rule after leadership rule. I now have a sick taste in my mouth over the whole subject. Opposite of rock climbing, I now immediately put a frown on when "leading" is mentioned. I have to force myself to remember that leadership is a good thing.

So I ask myself, where could I have that kind of influence? And what kind of influence am I perpetuating?

Good memories

Mrs. Pipes and I went out on a date Friday night courtesy of Mrs. FPF (thank you again!). We weren't too sure what our plans were. As we strolled down Speedway on the momo, we decided to go to Takamatsu for a little Japanese. Since being in town we haven't found some place to eat our few but favorite foods from Japan - Japanese curry and a good bowl of ramen. Takamatsu makes really good food and has the best of both dishes in town.

Every time we go to a Asian-dining place I find myself falling back into the habits that we developed in the Land of the Rising Sun. I bow instead of saying "Thank You" and answer "Hai" as opposed to "Yes." I just forget that we still in Tucson.

Anyway, Candi and I had a great time talking about our past, what God did to us in Japan, how it's shaped us now, and what He may have in the future for us. Here are some great pics from our time there.

At the park.... Future F18 pilots...

American Day... Oriase gorge...

One and only ice skating trip...