Happy Birthday Sam!!!

Last week, I traveled all the way back to Bend to help Sam celebrate his first birthday. As you can see, Sam was completely overwhelmed at the depth of my commitment to our relationship. He could barely contain himself!

My enthusiasm for the celebration flew out the window though when my mom and aunt dressed me in this ridiculous costume and stuck me outside to roast in the hot afternoon sun. What kind of party is this anyhow!!!

Luckily there was some good sides to this party thing; Sugar!

After meeting Mr. Brown at the party, Sam and I are considering growing some facial hair of our own. So far we haven't been able to talk our moms into it though.

My great grandpa Johnson told me this great story about a goat; that is the only part that I really understood. I laughed anyhow!
Great birthday party Sam, we should make it an annual event!

Nashville

Well me, David and Lorelei just got back from Nashville, TN. We were there to participate in the Call which was a prayer rally where over 60,000 people gathered to pray for America. While we were there, we took some time to have a little fun. We dined with some wild animals at the Rain Forest Cafe...

David is slightly nervous about the gorillas since they periodically shake the trees and call to each other across the restaurant.

He loves Chai Chai the frog though! If you couldn't tell, that is his excited face (with just a little nervousness still resonate from the gorilla experience.)

The lizard didn't actually move at all and yet David was completely freaked out by it. By now you are probably wondering if we had any fun at all during our wild dining adventure.

You guessed it, this was the really fun part for David! Lots of Nemo's and Dory's swimming around. (Disney features have become a huge part of our lives as parents of a toddler) David still gets Nemo confused with Elmo though (the word, not the puppet), so in his case there were lots of Elmo's swimming around.

We boarded a massive paddle boat for a three hour tour on the river. The boat had four stories and David enthusiastically explored each one of them.

Contemplating life while floating on the riverboat. Oh the life of a toddler!

Contemplation over after approx 10 seconds. The conclusion was "enjoy the moment before mom makes you go to bed."

Happy Independence Day!!!

We celebrated the 4th of July today by participating in the city of Caldwell's festivities. Our youth church had a float in the parade with the worship band playing. We won the award for Best Theme! Danny and I walked with a group of our youth and passed out candy and over 1400 touch cards to people attending the parade, David rode in the air conditioned truck with Grandma. Randy and Linnea drove the truck that pulled the float. They got more than they bargained for as kids, babies and even dogs climbed into the truck to escape the intense Idaho heat. Our float ended up on the news and the Press Tribune is writing up an article on our youth church for tomorrow's edition.
It has been a great Independence Day celebration!