Sunsets

The Plague of Cicadas

We have been blessed with the plague of the 17 year cicadas. There are millions of them. The have invaded every tree in the neighborhood. In fact, they are so loud you can barely stand to be outside in the afternoon. The worse thing about them is their ability to fly at you and land close to your ear or in your hair. Kiah has been deathly afraid of them. Luckily, they will be dying off in another week or so and we won't see them again for 17 years. Here are some pictures from our backyard tree.

You can read more about the cicadas here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magicicada

A big storm came last Monday night and
destroyed the only tree in the yard.

Kiah the Artist

Kiah has become quite the artist. I became one of her subjects, well I was until daddy came home and she said it was a picture of him. It is still me though, I am the only one in the family that wears glasses. She drew circles around the eyes. Whoever the picture is I think she did a fine job.

Graduation

Sorry about the lapse in the posting, we have been busy. I will try to catch up and post a few things everyday. On May 24, Jon graduated from Asbury Theological Seminary. Here are a few pictures.

Quotes from Kiah

Here are a few random quotes from Kiah recently:

I have to wash my face slow and brush my teeth slow because I am a slow person.

My belly needs a donut.

That muffin is as big as the biggest giant ever.

After Jon had some flowers delivered to the house for me, Kiah said:
Who gave you flowers? You don't need any flowers. Daddy must have given those flowers to that lady and she gave them to you. That is how it has to work.

Pictures

On Saturday, we headed off in the car and took a photo shoot of the kids.

back from the hollers

This past weekend we headed back to the hollers of Eastern Kentucky. Saturday was Jon's 5th year college reunion at Kentucky Mountain Bible College, so we spent most of the day with some of his good college friends. The rest of the weekend we spent at Oakdale. Jon and I worked at Oakdale before we went to Africa. We always love going there. Jon spoke at Oakdale's baccalaureate service on Sunday morning. Jon used this quote from G.K. Chesterton in his message:

A child kicks its legs rhythmically through excess, not absence, of life. Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, "Do it again"; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough... It is possible that God says every morning, "Do it again," to the sun; and every evening, "Do it again," to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike: it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

Almost all the parents laughed at Oakdale. They know what it feels like to have your child say "do it again, do it again" until you are about to pass out. I thought I would post a few pictures of Kiah and Jacob in the things that they love to "do again."

Kiah spent all morning jumping from the couch
onto this ball and flying across the living room.

Jacob eats, sleeps and breathes trains. He
never gets tired of playing with them. He loves
to watch them go around and around.