Christmas Humor

I was walking through Wal-mart the other day and passed these items for sale I thought were cute and humorous. These were on 0-3 month old baby onesies.

Joke of the Week

We were shucking corn to freeze and Marlin says, "This corn is sunburnt!" Melodie and I look at each other and I say, "What makes you say that?" He said, "It's peeling!" We had a good laugh!

Day Camp 2008

This was a busy week. We took Pauline Nunes to the airport to fly to Greensboro, NC. Melodie made arrangements to pick up some of Marlin's friends that live in Albuquerque. They spent Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday morning with him. Wednesday and Thursday Marlin had some other friends come over and they had quite a time. Wednesday, Melodie made homemade pizza. Everyone's favorite. We ended up having 12 children at some time during the day and a former student for lunch. We kept them busy...

in a water fight,

stacking them,

and with other games such as "Uno Attack"

Thursday we went to the Navajo Nation Zoo. The only monkeys were imported.

This one wanted to know WHOOOO they were? They tried to escape... well I don't think they would have gotten far in this.

Family Get Together

My brother and his family flew to NM in July. William wanted to visit Auntie. In planning we asked where they would like to go. They decided Durango, Colorado. So we packed up and... There were 10 of us in the van with our luggage.

Our first stop was at Four Corners.

Next to Durango where we met Miriam, April & Isaac. We ate supper together at the Bar D and enjoyed the evening there.

Riding a small train. Eating supper together. The next day we went to the ski resort and went up... then we came down...We camped in cabins and sat around a fire...

Crossed the Animas on a swinging bridge

Before it was all over we took in a sunset.

VBS 2008

In the second week of July, 7th through 11th, we held our VBS and one at Free Trinity Navajo Mission. The missionaries there are Rev. & Sis. Dennis Gardner. We had theirs at 10:00 in the morning and ours at 2:00 in the afternoon. That kept us hopping, then in the evening we prepared for the next day.
Our Giant - had a new name each day

Our theme was, "Campsites of Victory." Overcoming giants in our lives. We studied the life of Joshua and the conquest of Canaan.

Trekking through the Wilderness
Our Campsite

Monday and Tuesday was the conquering of Jericho and remembering how the the giant "Fear" caused the Israelites to wander in the Wilderness 40 yrs. and the report of the 2 spies Rahab hid and helped to escape.

Achan's hidden goods revealed

Wednesday was about Achan's sin and the defeat at Ai because of the giant "Rebellion."

Achan and his family stoned (with the help of the kids)

Thursday reminded us about the giant "Self Sufficiency" when Joshua relied on his own "wisdom" and made the alliance with the Gibeonites.

Friday we saw Caleb at 80 yrs old telling Joshua, "Give me those mountains!" Those mountains full of giants and walled cities. Then the death of Joshua and his challenge that is with us today - Choose you this day...

This "Giant" got wrapped around the back seat of the van. Becky Plummer, the secretary of Northwest Indian Bible School, Alberton Montana, helped us out this year. We could not have done it on our own. A Special thanks to Becky, NIBS, and Sanders Family!

Automatically a Preacher

A preacher one Saturday night had a dream. He dreamed of tailpipes & mufflers. When he awoke he was totally exhausted. He went to church that morning and preached on the manifold Blessing. By the time the message ended it had backfired on him. One car salesman had one catalytic converter and he quit smoking immediately.

Look who came to visit!

Yes, that is Pauline Nunes. She flew in Friday, July 11 from Jamaica. She sure has livened things up around our house this week. She will be with us until Aug. 5, she will be flying to Greensboro, NC to see a sister and then back to Jamaica to start school again. Please pray for her as she returns to her students. Her students are special needs children. Many come to school without having had breakfast and no money for lunch. Learning is hard for them to begin with, then add the empty stomach.

What's Up?

Definitive explanation of the word UP that you may think confusing: A drain must be opened UP because it is stopped UP. We open UP a store in the morning but we close it UP at night. We seem to be pretty mixed UP about UP! To be knowledgeable about the proper uses of UP, look the word UP in the dictionary. In a desk‑sized dictionary, it takes UP almost 1/4" of the page and can add UP to about thirty definitions. If you are UP to it, you might try building UP a list of the many ways UP is used. It will take UP a lot of your time, but if you don't give UP, you may wind UP with a hundred or more. When it threatens to rain, we say it is clouding UP. When the sun comes out we say it is clearing UP. When it rains, it wets the earth and often messes things UP. When it doesn't rain for awhile, things dry UP. One could go on.and on, but I'll wrap it UP because my time is UP, so ... it is time to shut UP!

Where? Oh, where have you been?

Time sure flies. Many are wondering, "Are you Lost?" Well, we have been enough places to be lost and done enough to lose track of time. In May:

Kindergarten Graduation. May 1

Revival with Beechers. May 4-11

End of the year School trip. May 12-14

End of School and Awards night. May 15

Trip East to Pa.

Oklahoma

Oh yes! We have two extra passengers. "Where do you go?" they asked. "Come and see," we said.

Indiana

at the Beecher's

Kentucky

Creation Museum

Waynesburg, PA

at my Brother's.

In June

Hershey Chocolate World

Amish Country
Bethel, PA

Family Reunion at Pioneer Coal Mine

Ashland, PA

Trip home.

Top of the World! Well, 630 ft above the flooding Mississippi.

Yes way up there!

Arrived in Grants on June 14, home on June15 in time for service. The last 3 wks we have been preparing for next week. Vacation Bible School July 7-11. Can you believe it, we have even been talking about school starting... Whew!! WAIT A MINUTE!

No Snow? No Problem!

We didn't get a chance to go sledding this winter so we waited until May to do our sledding. The temp was just right - about 75'. It was a little windy and conditions were a little uncomfortable but the children enjoyed it very much. "What might that white stuff be?" you ask. It is gypsum sand. For the End of the Year Trip we did something a little different. We took a 3 day trip. The students elected to forgo some trips earlier in the year to take a longer one at the end and see something farther from home. We decided to go to Carlsbad Caverns in SE New Mexico. On the way to and from Carlsbad we stoped at some sites. The one pictured above in White Sands National Monument. Nearby is also the White Sands Missle Range where the first Atom Bomb was tested during the Second World War. While there we were able to use the dunes to do some catching up on sledding. It was a little distressing trying to wash the sand out their hair that night but it was fun.

Signs

I enjoy taking signs and reading them literally or twisting them a bit. Here is one that is at the edge of my sisters yard. It reads:

Speed Limit

20 Children

Isn't she cute?

Can you guess who this cutie is?

Lost & Found

Who? What? Where? This is a little friend who was lost and now is found. I'm sure we have seen this little guy crawling around in the church sometime but suddenly disappeared. Then it was found a few weeks ago. A friend of ours cleaned out the furnace and what did he find. Yes it was "Lizzy" although not in any shape to do any harm to the insect population. Not really charred but surely dried. However it was still able to surprise folks. I decided to bring i=him home and forgot him in the car. Wakaine was going someplace with Melodie and found him. He carefully brought him in and said, "I don't think you really want this in the car, do you?" He was not sure he wanted to ride in the car with it. We had a good laugh.

Extremes! of another kind

We have had quite the winter this year. It seems we have had unusual weather. I Looked at the almanac for our area and it was predicted that we were to have a mild dry winter. Well whoever was predicting that must have been from another continent. It has been any thing but mild and certainly not dry. By the Way we are very grateful for the moisture. Temperatures were in the highs of the mid 20's and lows around the single digits a few nights even below zero. However this changed - rapidly! With about 6-8 inches of snow on the ground and the temp rising above 32 the once beautiful snow disappered. This happened in at least two cycles - 2 weeks of cold and snow then 1 week of thaw and melt. Only the second time the ground didn't freeze and more snow then cold on a ground that was already saturated. This created quite a few problems in Western NM and Eastern AZ. I heard that the tribal President declared a state of emergency in some areas. Maybe a few pictures will help. It was on the way to pick up a student for school that I had this happen to me. The student called a 2nd time and asked, "Is Bro. Seth picking me up?" when Melodie started to look for me. I had already started to walk and was almost home when they started to look for me.

Extremes!

I was looking through some pictures I had taken on my cell phone and ran across these extremes. It's amazing how people seem to like the EXTREME. Its not only in vehicles - its seems to be anything.

Update!

The little church mentioned below is located in Western Nebraska north of Ogallala. The little village is a ranching community. It is nestled in a small valley among the sandhills and suddenly appears as you are rounding a curve in the road. There is an interesting welcome to the travelers. Starting about a half mile or more from "town" each fence post is topped with a worn out cowboy boot. Then suddenly as you round that last curve there is Arthur and a half mile later its behind you. I'll bet their crime rate is really low. Too busy working to get into much trouble.

Where there's a will, there's away!

Back in 1928 there was a group of people that wanted a church very badly. The depression was severe and money was tight. Supplies were even scarce for this community. Not much timber around for lumber, and if there was it was expensive. This was a ranching community in the sand hills of Nebraska. The group of Pilgrim Holiness people got together and came up with an inexpensive way to build a church. I'm not sure what the cost was but it was built. Can you guess what the building material was? I'll post a couple pictures and see if you can guess. I enjoy traveling the back roads and enjoy going through this area. Its kind of lonely through there.