When Ann asked me if she could go on a camping trip with a friend and her friend’s parents I was a little surprised.  The first time I had taken the kids camping was the final night of a summer vacation in 2009.  After that Ann had vowed that she would never go camping again.

A few weeks ago I bought a basketball hoop for the kids.  I didn’t want to get one of the inexpensive portable ones as they seem to get beat up pretty easily.  At the same time even your entry-level in-ground model was several hundred dollars plus another few hundred to have installed.  After a bit

The idea for this vacation started with wanting to see Mammoth Caves in Kentucky.  Since we were driving all that way we decided that we might as well head to Nashville as well.  I didn’t want to schedule more than four hours of driving at a time, so we filled in the rest of the

Tonight Ann wanted to attend a Nerf gun war with her youth group. William, however, was too young to attend.  Although we wasn’t expressing any sourness toward the situation, (he even eagerly discussed the various pros and cons of the various Nerf guns that have accumulated in the house over the years with Ann before

10 Things I Learned Today About Shoveling Snow And finally: Remember how blessed you are to have to deal with “burdens” like this and pray for those who don’t have the protections and comfort you will tonight in these frigid temperatures.

6/9/2013: A morning flight out of Detroit brought us to Oakland around 1PM local time by way of Phoenix.  The hotel was near the airport, and we checked in quickly.  The room had one king-sized bed and a pull-out couch, so the kids shared the bed while I took the couch.  This turned out to

Ann went over to a friend’s house the night before and was spending the day over there, so William and I had a whole day to ourselves.  In the morning, we played Minecraft for a while and built a long path through deserts, jungles and mountains full of tunnels, bridges and other markers that would