Blog Fail

For anyone looking for something to be posted on here, you can stop holding your breath. Sorry Mom, I guess it's time for you to get facebook... :) This just has not been at the top of our priority list lately.

To be continued...

Summer is in full swing

It's crazy how the summer goes by so fast. It is already half way through July... crazy. The blog is definetly on the decline as of late thanks to facebook and twitter. Blogging takes a lot more effort. I guess we will see if it keeps going or not. 

Ryley is doing great, adjusting nicely to the Gibbs family and our odd schedules. He seems to have his routine down quite nicely. He knows when it is outside time, time to eat, time to sleep.... Oh, Megan usually works on tricks with him in the afternoon. Getting him to shake was a cinch, but rolling over has been a little more amusing. Well today I got a treat and took him into the living room, where we normally practice, and he dove onto his stomach immediately and rolled over without giving him any commands or gestures. He just anticipated.... It. Was. Awesome. And so funny! I will have to try and catch it on video. 

I use to get annoyed when people would constantly talk about their dog, or when a friend had a kid... and that was all that they talked about. Well, now I think we are THOSE people. Oh well. 

Here is a photo from a recent disappointing outing to the Mariners game... How many days until football?

Ketchup Time

I guess it is time to do a quick recap of what we have been up to before summer kicks off and we get even more behind. We just switched computers and I have yet to transfer all of the pictures and everything over to this one, so for now here is a list of the posts to come.

• Megan goes to Kauai for a nursing conference
• Megan gets her tonsils out & we get a doggy to help Megan's recovery :)
• The Ippy's come to town
• East coast time with the Flynn's and McDowell's
• Hoopfest

Here is a photo of Megan and Ryley at Riverside State Park. And a link to a post by Jenny about our time together on the east coast.

Seahawks Draft

There is a buzz in Seattle and around the league about the Seahawks draft. Hopefully it translates to a difference on the field, it can't get much worse then the last two seasons... so far this year is off to a good start. This excerpt from and article in Sports Illustrated pretty much sums it up.

"Seattle Seahawks
What I liked: Everything. Not many franchises in the history of the NFL have had better three-day periods than the Seahawks did, when everything seemed to go perfectly and fall just the way they wanted it to.

What I didn't: In praising the Seahawks for their selections, it must be noted that they were extremely fortunate that Russell Okung, Earl Thomas, Golden Tate, and Anthony McCoy all came to them in the manner in which they did.

Moving forward: This draft along with the trade pick-ups they got in LenDale White and Leon Washington get the Seahawks off to a great start in the Pete Carroll era, but only time will tell whether or not they can get enough production out of the quarterback position."

That's My King

Not the first time I have seen this, but it is definitely worth sharing again... do you know him?

That's My King! from Albert Martin on Vimeo.

Carol is turning 50

While planning for my mom's 50th birthday I was thinking about something special I could do for her... she works so hard and is so selfless I thought that I should have all of her guests help contribute towards a nice gift. She called the other day with a plan of her own, and asked me what I thought about instead of people bringing her gifts, if they would use that money and make a contribution towards Ciyanjano, a conference center in Zambia that our missionary friend Steve Allen supports and is trying to develop. I just smiled, shook my head and thought... of course you would... I wanted to send her on a cruise :)

To all of our friends and family, stop by mom's house on March 7th from 2:00-5:00 PM for an "Open House." Come for five minutes or the whole thing, we would love to see you. And if you would like to know how you can make a donation for Ciyanjano as a gift for my mom then keep reading.

Steve is a missionary with Action Zambia, and all donations are tax deductible. There are three ways you can donate:

1. Mail a check to Action International designating it for "Carol For Ciyanjano - # 71140 (Zambia)"

PO Box 398
Mountlake Terrace, WA
98043-0398

2. Donate online by clicking here and select Zambia Ciyanjano Centre (71140) as the designation and under additional information put "Carol For Ciyanjano"

3. Just come to the open house and we can make it happen :)

Go to Steve's blog, Alive in Africa for a post and short video about Ciyanjano. Megan and I were in Zambia last summer with the Allen's and visited Ciyanjano, it is a great place and has tons of potential for the community there. Scroll down for a post of our time there...

they need more boots on the ground...

My friend Adam lives in New Orleans and is deploying to Haiti in 24 hours. Here is a letter that the team just sent out explaining whats going on... this all went down today. If you want to help Haiti and know where your money is going then here is a good place to start.

sonicsgate

Sonicsgate Trailer from sonicsgate on Vimeo.

Fall is just around the corner

Spokane is feeling more and more like home these days since moving in to our new house in April, and most of that is due to Megan adding her own little touches that make it our own. We don't know how long we will be here, but for now it's home sweet home. When we first started blogging, the idea was to be able to share what was going on with family and friends after moving to Spokane. While that is still true, the blog also acts as a journal of sorts that we can use to look back on for ourselves... while blogging isn't our top priority, it is still a fun way to keep track of all that we do.

Megan recently took a full-time position at the hospital that matches up great with my work schedule. We are both working nights right now and we get two days off together every week. (When Megan was supplemental were lucky if we had one night off together a week!) We are excited to get back in to the regular rhythms of Life that come after summer, but first here are some highlights from the past couple months.

6.28.09

I'm excited for my buddy Ryan who is getting married in less than month. I'm also excited that his future bride Emily grew up just not too far away from our house, which brings them to town once and a while. At the end of June, we got to hang out at a BBQ celebrating Emily's graduation. Afterwards we had some fun with the bocce balls.

7.6.09
For as long as I can remember Megan has had a heart for Africa. Since I started working with Horizon Air we decided to make the most of the flying benefits I get, taking at least one oversees trip a year. We try planning out trips where we know people, and our good friends the Allen's are currently in Lusaka, Zambia. So we flew south for the summer on a 10,000 mile journey that we will always remember. 1 hour from Spokane to Seattle. 5 hours from Seattle to Atlanta. 15 hours from Atlanta to Johannesburg. We spent two nights in Joburg checking out the downtown, Soweto and Nelson Mandela's house before the one hour flight to Lusaka.

Joburg

Soweto

We spent a week in lusaka with the Allen's. It was great to see Steve, Steph, Cam, Brady, Julia, Jojo and meet Rhoda for the first time! We had some quality time hanging out and seeing all that they are involved with. We visited an orphanage, school, hospital, retreat center, compounds, houses, attended a church service, I sat in on the class that Steve teaches, me met a lot of people and saw first hand some of the ways God is working in Zambia. One week was way too short... It was neat to be able to but names with face and places, to meet many of the pastors that Steve works with and hear their stories. Those are some amazing men of God.

Arriving in Lusaka

At the Allen's house after getting picked up from the airport

Lots of vendors on the side of the road. Selling everything from rocks and steel to produce and cell phone minutes


Pastor Jerry's Church

Megan with a bunch of the kids after church

Cute little girl that was fascinated with the big mzungu (white person). She sat in front of me at church and starred at me the whole time, and then followed me around everywhere after church... she was cute

Dinner the last night at the Allen's house. I'm so glad we made it down to see you guys. We had a blast. You were great hosts!

Safari
We also went on a Safari at Chaminuka while in Zambia. It was a combination of Safari, Feast, Fishing and Fun.




Not sure what Simba was snacking on


We BBQed up a couple of these Impala's for lunch...





Vic Falls
Zambia is home to one of the seven natural wonders of the world, Victoria Falls. If you combine the the height, 360 feet, and the width, 5,600 feet, Vic falls is argued to be the largest waterfall in the world. It was an amazing sight to see, it is so massive. We took the 5 hour bus ride from Lusaka to Livingstone. Our friend Owen, who was also in Zambia at the time, went with us. We took a greyhound type bus, but where there are normally 2 seats on each side of the aisle, this one squeezed in 1 extra seat just for fun, so there were 2 on one side and three on the other. So the three of us crammed in and lived to tell about it. (mind you there was no a/c and a good hour or so was spent on a dirt road) We had a great time hanging out at the falls (where we got drenched), Meg and I had a date night on a sunset cruise that went down the Zambezi River where we saw lots of wildlife like Elephants, Giraffe, Hippos and crocs. We also decided to all jump off a bridge with a rubber-band attached to our feet... this was my second jump and I loved it! This was Megan's first and probably last time. She had fun, but it took a lot of coaxing to get her to actually jump... :)






What an awesome trip! One we will always remember. We hurried home for Oma's 85th birthday celebration. Of course flying stand-bye we didn't make our direct flight back to the states to Atlanta, so we decided to go through London and then on to Seattle. Total time door to door to get home i think was over 40 hours between sitting in airports and on the plane. We got to sit by each other on each leg there and back, and oh, I forgot, we got first class going down there from Atlanta to Joburg! Thats the way to fly, but now every time we get coach Megan complains :)

7.30.09
When we got back from Africa it was back to work, so we celebrated our 2nd wedding anniversary a week and a half late. We decided to go camping again and headed out to Lake Pend Oreille in northern Idaho, the fifth deepest lake in the U.S. It was kinda last minute so when we got there there were no campsites left, so they put us out in a group site all by ourselves... It is great getting away and "roughing" it for a couple days. We love camping.





I think I won like 8 out of the 10 games we played of yatzee and sequence... Megan might dispute that claim.

8.7.09
Spann family reunion in Nampa, Idaho. That was fun. (time for work, need to hurry)




8.30.09
Josh and Mandy get married! I was a groomsman. That was a lot of fun. Congrats you two!

Rehearsal Dinner


Alright, the mother of all blogs is done. I'm late for work. Peace.

Busy Summer

This next weekend will cap the end to a busy summer with Josh And Mandy's Wedding. After that life will slow down a little as we settle back into our normal schedules. Looking forward to back-blogging about all that we have been up to!