June's 10 on 10

10 pictures on the 10th day of the month (Monday).

{Document a snapshot of your life; find beauty among the ordinary things in your day! }

This day was unique because we were traveling. Shaun had a conference in Seattle for his financial services business. We opted to go a day early so we could explore some of the PNW. And by early, I mean we were up at 3AM and then out the door headed to Boston airport.

I thought it was incredibly romantic that Shaun paid extra for our seats to ensure we'd sit together on the flight.

There are so many people in my life going through hard things right now. It was beautiful to pull back and see mountains (mountains!!)  looking small from our perspective and I imagined what it looks like from God's angle.

We rented a car and took a meandering four-hour drive down to the Oregon coast. But first we stopped for Starbucks and a little work.

Awe-inspiring beauty.

The Columbia River with Mt St Helens off to the right and an enormous lumber business to the left.

Our inn was right on the beach. We both put our toes in the Pacific for the first time. Its cold!!

After dinner we walked down the beach. This is a well-known landmark, Haystack Rock.

We waited up for the sunset, which meant we'd been up for 20 of the 24 hours this day. :)

State of the House ~ April

April was FULL!! We began the month with the last final push of dress rehearsals and then five performances for the Passion and the Cross. The fact that the kids had school vacation during performance week made the late nights manageable. What a privilege to be able to serve as a family in something that's bigger than ourselves, something that matters for eternity.

At the same time, we were finishing out the last two weeks of tax season. We were SO happy to have the season come to an end. It wasn't pretty or particularly graceful, but we got it done.

New houses going up in our neighborhood. Its a little sad to be losing our "woods" but its good to have new people, too. And fun to watch the progress on our walks.

The kids were on their own far too often for the final push of tax season. They mostly did well, definitely too much screen time though. This message was from the receptionist, when I was covering a different office. :)

The boys changing room....took Aiden about 45 minutes to get in and out of here, a patience test for me. Also, the smell coming out of this room!

Easter! So many people we love gathered at out house. It was fun and easy and beautiful. Easter is always such a special celebration. We have kids from 20 to 0, which makes it a lot of fun and all kinds of crazy.

Ahh Florida...our big exhale. Its come to be such a place of rest and reconnection, particularly now that the kids are older. We can leave them at the house and go out to breakfast, they can walk to the beach on their own and even apply their own sunscreen.

We didn't do any outings this year, but stayed at the house and switched between pool and ocean. Tough life!