Erik's Ordination

Here we are sitting at one of our many meetings.

This is at the morning meeting where the delegates agreed to accepting Erik for ordination.

For lunch we were able to get together with some good seminary friends.
Jason, Ethan, Trish, Maren, Courtney, Joel, Erik, Alia, Greg and Jen

We haven't seen eachother in almost two years. Jen made this comment..."you look the same as you did last time we saw you." I was pregnant then too!

Dinner with more good friends. Benj, Erik and Jared

Marit, Courtney and Chrissy

The Ordination service was such a special time. It felt like one big worship service celebrating all these men and women that God has called to ministry. I know they all felt very affirmed in their call to serve around the country. I was so proud of Erik, he has put in so much time with papers and interviews, it feels great to be on this side of the whole process.

They were all given a nice Bible and these stoles, handmade by a seminary professors wife!

This picture was taken by Barbara...we LOVE the Covenant Crown!

Tim Johsnon

Chrissy and Ginny Larson

Nathan and Barbara Nordlund

Jeff G

Mark Novak

Benj Ecker

Jim and Erin sent us a fancy cheese and fruit platter so celebrate the day!!! Thanks!

Portland!

We got in to Portland really late Tuesday night (3am Chicago time!) In the morning when we woke up we had a message from Peter asking if we wanted to go see any of the mountains. We chose to go to Mount Hood. We waited for him in the parking lot and he pulled up in this! Luckily it was a gorgeous day so we could drive with the top down.

We were shocked to see people skiing and snowboarding on June 24th!

The three of us on the chair lift.

Mount Hood

We were just in awe of the beauty around us...often wondering why we live in flat Chicago.

We had a great trip to Portland...too many photos to go through right now. Here is my new favorite taken just before we left!

Jackson turns 2!

He measured exactly the same as Caleb at two!

Opening presents. He is so excited about his "dozer" that I got at the Jewel!

In the middle of breakfast we heard the garbage truck. Erik had to run out with our garbage and the boys, of course, sat and watched as he came around our little cul-de-sac.

Coloring in his new Thomas coloring book.

Both boys have really been into coloring lately. Caleb has gotten real excited about coloring in the lines.

Watching the rain...it rained ALL day today. We had plans of going to the pool or the botanic gardens but ended up spending time at home together and went out for lunch.

There's a new train restaurant in Glenview! Jackson loved it.

Tonight was the final night of VBS. It was one big party for Jackson! We ended the night with "Happy Birthday" sung by everyone at church.

Caleb...

Tonight at VBS the kids got to decorate their own bags. Caleb got really excited about writing his name. Here is what he did! I was so proud. He has never been a fan of letters or practicing his name, so I thought this was great!

Finally! The bush is gone. We were so excited to see the Groot truck pull up this afternoon.

This is one of our neighbors, Nicole, but Caleb calls her Nickel!

Erik left for the boundary waters yesterday morning and I had to call in the reinforcements to help me with a few things. First was bundling up the bush we cut down....sorta frustrating. When we set up our account with Groot we were told to just bring it to the sidewalk, two weeks later it was still sitting there and they finally told me it needed to be bundled. We had a great system and got the job done quickly.

Caleb and his "work" gloves...actually his winter mittens!

The next project was taking off Jacksons railing. On Friday night he decided to climb out of his crib four times! Thanks for helping mom and dad!

We had this group over for dinner and some playtime.

Roller Coaster

The boys and the neighborhood kids have been enjoying our roller coaster. This is Jackson going backwards with no hands...the newest way to go is eyes closed!