The Perfect Birthday… In The Mountains!

So…. what did I do for my 42nd birthday? I blew off work and took my family and went and did my favorite thing… I went hiking! I recently got a great new hiking book called Colorado Lake Hikes that I highly recommend. This was the first hike I’ve done in the book. We decided to visit St. Mary’s Lake and “Glacier.” On the way, we spotted this beautiful water fall on the side of the road. That’s one of the things I love about living in Colorado – there are gorgeous spots like this all over the place. We can just pull over and Luke can get to play in Creation just off the side of the road. It was simply beautiful! Soon we were on our way up the mountain. This was Luke’s second “real” hike. I haven’t had a chance to blog yet about our family vacation in Yosemite yet, where he hiked up to the top of Sentinel Dome! He is very proud of that feat! He is proving to fit into nature just, well, naturally. I wonder where he gets his love of the outdoors from? Luke wants to climb on top of every rock…

Continue reading

It’s a Bird, it’s a Plane, it’s a Model Airplane!

Saturday the family headed to the Pikes Peak Radio Control Club’s “Warbird’s Over Pike’s Peak’s Air Show”, and it was incredible! (Don’t miss HIGHLIGHT VIDEO at end of this post!) NOTE: Click on any image to see larger in a new window. For Luke, it was a real treat! He brought a box of toy airplanes and enjoying playing with his planes while watching grown men play with their toys. As the saying goes… The difference between the men and the boys, is just the price of their toys! It was hard to believe these things were not real! Especially when the jets went straight up into the air spinning until they were a speck in the sky! They even SOUNDED like real jets… well, actually, there WERE real jets… just smaller and without a real person inside! They literally flew up to the clouds! I had to use a telephoto lens to keep up with them! Luke enjoyed chillin’ out on Daddy’s hammock, which I got for Father’s Day way back when he was just a baby… (remember?) Everyone had their cameras out trying to capture these birds in the coolest pics possible – the pics in this post…

Continue reading

A Dads iPhone Camera Roll Tells It All

Being the Dad Today is something I am passionate about! I am all to aware that these days are precious and fleeting and I want to make the most of them. There is an old saying that you can tell what’s important to someone by looking at their date book and their checkbook. Well, I think that saying needs to be updated to the modern world to be, “You can tell what’s important to someone by looking at their iPhone camera roll.” Just glancing through mine and you can see what I’ve been up to. We went to the local carnival this week, just Daddy and Boy and had a blast. (Well, my wallet didn’t but that’s a separate issue!) We also enrolled in Swim Class. I’m not very impressed with the place – I was hoping they were going to push him a little further than Dad has, so far – blowing bubbles in the water is about all they have done… Dad is working on patience as he watches through the glass as they do stuff I’ve done with him for years… hopefully in the next week they’ll teach him something new and I’ll get my money’s worth,…

Continue reading

Just Thinking About Kids… and Behavior

Children get enough discouragement from adults telling them constantly what they are doing is wrong or needs to be better. They need to hear more often how they are loved, forgiven and believed in. They need to be encouraged and reminded that while their behavior may not always be good, their value and worth is good beyond description! They are good kids in God’s eyes because He made them and whatever God made IS good! After all, every day of creation God finished by saying, “It is good.” As we shepherd the children in our ministries it is critical that we focus on their hearts more than their behavior. When we see bad behavior, our impulse needs to be not to correct the behavior, but to mold the heart that determined the behavior. There are plenty of techniques out there that can shape children’s behavior, but if we only succeed in changing behavior, we will have only created little Pharisees who know how to behave at church. But it will be unlikely that we will impact much how they behave at home and even less how they behave at school and after they outgrow children’s ministry. But if we reach…

Continue reading

Gotcha Day at the Zoo

Five years ago today – I got the phone call that forever changed my life, and MADE ME A DAD! Ever since, we’ve been celebrating “Gotcha Day” on April 1st – the day we GOT LUKE! So this year, we asked Luke what he would like to do, and he chose The Denver Zoo! It ended up being a treat because his next store neighbor friend was able to come along for the fun! But Luke loves gorillas, so we had to head over the Primate Area! I spotted two primates lurking right at the entrance to the area! They must have escaped from their cages! Oh No! In case you are wondering what a “Primate” is… here are some sample: First, some little primates… And even littler ones.. But finally, we got to the GORILLAS! Luke’s favorite non-domestic animal (he loves dogs) is Gorillas! He loves to play with them, had a t-shirt, discovered Gorilla snacks at the grocery store, and I’ve screened a few old-time King Kong YouTube videos for him! And of course, Casa Bonita here in Denver has a kid-friendly Gorilla he loves! I’ve even cued up the Gorilla sceen in Old Dogs for him –…

Continue reading

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...