What's UP in July?

We were invited to our friends' (the Heppners') for supper and then a fun game of croquet.  Their rules are that as you get to the end, you become poison.  It ended up being the classic case of "the last shall be first" as the early "winners" killed each other off, allowing the late comer to be the winner!

 A rare picture of our family photographer.  She is usually on the other side of the camera.

 On July 4th, we had free tickets to the Bandimere Speedway on Thunder Mountain.  We had gone once before in 2001.

 Quil and Micah liked it a lot.  We got rained on several times, but overall had a fun day.

 Jewelyn did get a nap, but when she was supposed to take her second nap, she had gotten acquainted with the people on the row behind us and they were too distracting for her to go to sleep.

 The most exciting part was the jet engine cars.

 Group hug in the kitchen on a Sunday afternoon.

 One of our evening walks

 Tim, Brenda, and Charissa came out July 10-12 for their 7th anniversary.  Charissa spent a day with Grandma and Aunt Emily while her parents went to the mountains alone.  In this picture, she is looking at the personalized calendar in the bathroom.

 She liked the trampoline!

 and the flowers..

 and Grandma's new puppet, Akili...

 and coloring with Aunt Emily...

 and long parade of cars...

 and singing and playing with Aunt Elizabeth.  She loved being with us at our house, even though it had been so long since she had been here.

 The next day we all went to the Rocky Mountain National Park to have a picnic, surprise Randy and Joy and family, and to drive up Fall River Road and drive down Trail Ridge Road.

 We beat Randy and Joy to the meeting place and Tim and Brenda hid out in the woods with Elizabeth and Emily until they got there.

 Randy's family was really surprised to see Tim's family come walking toward them!  We didn't know if we would be able to pull off the surprise, but it worked!  Joanna had just gotten back from Missouri a few days before and she was surprised too.

 Aunt Brenda was glad to get acquainted with Jewelyn.

 Charissa liked her pretty well too.

 It was fun for the cousins to be together!

 Jewelyn is walking all over now, so she likes to be on the go!

 Uncle Tim was entertaining the kids with a story about a bug, I think...

 The kids and their aunts played Duck, Duck Goose.

 We had a nice picnic together.

 Uncle Tim loved Jewelyn too.

On Fall River Road, we walked down a steep trail to a waterfall.

 Another hiker took this picture of our group. 

 Some of the group went further down on an unimproved trail.

 When we got to the top of Trail Ridge, we found a friend from Loveland we hadn't seen in a couple years!

 Emily on top of the world!

 Grandpa and Charissa.  It was cold and windy on top, and very hard to find parking spaces!

 The bravest members of our group hiked on up to the very top!

 On our way back down, we saw lots of elk!

 One of the overlooks we stopped at on the way down. 

 Micah and Charissa liked hanging out, talking, and watching the chipmunks.

 The next day, we had Sunday dinner at our house and spent the rest of the day together.

 We ate supper on the deck.

 Then we took a walk.

 It was so wonderful to have Tim, Brenda, and Charissa out for the weekend!

On July 18, the Johnstown Historical Society had their 2nd annual benefit Car Show.  Here are pictures of some of the cars that were in the show and some of the people who enjoyed looking at them.

 We left the car show before it was over to drive down to Colorado Springs for tent meeting.  Our dear friends, Derold and Kim Hunt were the singers.  We enjoyed hearing them sing so much!

The tent after the Saturday night service.

God's Bible School President Dr. Michael Avery was the evangelist.  He is one of our favorite preachers so we really enjoyed his messages.

 We appreciated getting to partake of the Lord's Supper in the Sunday a.m. service.

 We had a nice visit with Uncle Alvin and Rowen's cousin, Katie, Sunday afternoon.

 July 20-24 was VBS at Federal Heights.  We had 20 or more children every evening, with 30 being the high number.  In total 36 different kids came to VBS.

 The theme was Mount Kilimanjaro, and finding wisdom through Proverbs.

 The puppet stage

 Decor in the back of the church

 Emily and Jonathan

All of the workers who could, wore animal or Africa themed clothing.

 The registration hut, manned by Emily and Rosie Lucas

 Every night had a skit to present the theme.  This one was about Listening up!  Joy had to remove all her headgear so she could hear!

 Joy leading the singing

 Randy presenting the mission project.  We raised money for hungry children in Africa, collecting enough money for over 1200 meals!!  Praise the Lord!

 The following five pictures show different stations teaching different aspects of controlling our tongues.  In our small church it was noisy to have five different things going on at once!

 Every night, we had a souvenir store where the children could spend their tickets to buy stuff!  They loved it and it was a good incentive to participate and cooperate!

 We served snacks every night and meals twice.

 Akili, the puppet, was probably the most loved part of each evening.  The children were very attentive to Akili and the lessons she was learning in wisdom. 

We are so grateful for the Lord's help through the VBS and pray that lasting good was done in each child's life.  We were thankful for the extra helpers we had:  Krystal and Julie Hunt, and Carrie and Rosie Lucas.  God is good to help us!