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We are terrible bloggers!

2008-12-15T21:46:00.000-08:00

Just in case you can't tell, Tyler is a fireman, JJ is a bat, and Emilee is a Lovebug, and we had many candy brakes along the way, this one is Emilee eating smartie's

Family picture at the pumpkin patch

So sorry to all who read our blog. There are a couple of reasons that blogging has been difficult. One we have been too busy. Second, we have had some problems with our computer, we haven't been able to upload our pictures onto the computer, the ones from our trip. But I will post a few older ones.

My Wife is Gonna Hate Me!

2008-10-13T18:47:00.000-07:00

sorry for the bad blogging habits. we are very busy, kellee is getting a small business going (that is going incredibly well btw) and I am having a busy fall....anyways, funny video that she wont want on here...

Camp Awesome!

2008-09-05T20:45:00.000-07:00

Once again for our third annual camping trip to Point Roberts, WA, USA...it was a blast. We have named our camp...Camp Awesome. It is awesome because we: eat too much, play all day, have fun, have races, relax in the afternoon sun, swim, stay up way too late, and attempt to sleep in. Here are a couple of the pictures that I was able to take.

Some of our Summer Fun!

2008-08-19T11:53:00.000-07:00

Us and Nemi...our Japanese student

Camping at Beaver Lake

Skylar, Amy, Shawn, kellee, Pete, Brenda, JJ, ATyler, Chris, and Emilee

wedding cake i just did

Tyler and JJ

2008-08-17T15:20:00.000-07:00

here is the video of tyler and jj performing at their kidz kamp wrap up...well jj isnt really doing much, but tyler sure did a great job!

Kidz Kamp

2008-08-11T13:45:00.000-07:00

It has been a while since we have blogged. Sorry about that...

Life was very busy for us for a little while. Kellee was very involved in our churches 2 weeks of Kidz Kamp. She led the preschool portion of the program, and did a fantabulous job! And in the midst of all of that we had a japanese exchange student here for 2 weeks. That left dad running people all over the city and still try and get his own stuff done....but that is all over now and we are breathing a big sigh, just in time to welcome some visitors.

In about 2 hours my dad, brenda, and skylar will be arriving for almost 2 weeks. And in the middle of that Shawn and Amy will be coming for a few nights...so our 3 bedroom townhouse will be very full with 10, thats right 10 visitors...yikes.

well here is a little video of Kellee leading some songs at kidz kamp and as soon as youtube cooperates there will some really cute video of Tyler

I'm 6 Right Dad!

2008-07-21T07:27:00.000-07:00

Tyler was a little confused on Friday. We celebrated his fifth birthday with a basketball themed party. That was not confusing. The confusing part was that we celebrated his birthday with Shawn and Amy the Saturday before his birthday, then he had his birthday on Monday, then we had another party for his friends on Friday. So all day on Friday he kept asking me with a confused look, 'I am 6 today right dad?' His logic was he turned 5 on Monday, how could he be turning 5 again? We helped him figure it out and had a blast at the birthday party. Here are some pics:

Tyler with his brand new air hockey table

Ty sporting his new favorite Lighting McQueen helmet from Shawn and Amy

Emilee playing with her new doll house.The boys shooting hoops at the basketball birthday party. Dad was the ref!

Playing hot potato. The big kids were invited from the youth group.Ty's cake.

July 5th 2003

2008-07-14T22:05:00.000-07:00

It was five years ago today, around noon when our lives were changed forever! I remember it so vividly, spending several hours at the hospital, waiting, wondering when our little, soon-to-be bundle of joy was going to come bursting out. Then it happened, the doctor broke Kellee's water, and we were off to the races. I remember there being some panic. A constant monitoring of his heart, counting beeps and watching of numbers (couldn't they turn the beeping off???). The nurses came rushing in, the doctor came rushing in, and it was time for Kellee to push. There was a brief interruption when Dr. Glenn's cellphone rang, I answered it for her at her request, and it was her daughter, 'Is my mom there?' she said. 'Well she is, but she is delivering my baby right now?' I replied. 'Oh!' she responded. Dr. Glenn actually took the call if you can believe that.

And a few minutes later, Tyler came bursting out, purple and crying, sort of looking like a jellyfish, but cuter. I began to cry, Kellee cried, and we had a Tyler. Lucky us!

Tyler is an amazing boy. He is very smart, not in the traditional way, but in other ways. He can do puzzles, lots of them, and big ones, ones that his dad can't really do without getting a headache. He likes to know how things work, like the mechanics behind his bike, things like that. He is very orderly for a five year old. He likes things done a certain way, and when a babysitter comes over for the first time we tell her if she isn't sure of something to ask Tyler, because he will know. And we assure her that he won't lie to her, because he is very honest. He is athletic. He loves to ride his bike (which he could do without training wheels at the age of 3) and play a bunch of different sports. He can climb trees, pretty high ones. He has muscles, like biceps and pecs, and abs, he has been doing crunches since he was born. He also has a soft side, he gives out kisses at will and he is very affectionate with his words. I do believe he is going to be a very good man. He shows signs of that already. He embraces his role as the big brother, and sometimes when all the kids are outside playing we can hear him sticking up for his siblings, reminding them that those are his little brother and sister they are picking on and they better stop right now. He is well behaved, and will be the kind of man who opens doors for lady's and says please and thank you all the time. The kind that you would actually want to take home to meet your parents and you would be proud of him.

I know, I am bragging, but it is his birthday and my blog, and heck I am so proud of him!

It so much fun having a Tyler. And today on his birthday it was fun to celebrate him. He is a gift from God and I remind myself of that everyday, and I remind him (and JJ and Emilee) of that everyday.

Our Father's Day Festivities

2008-06-23T14:29:00.000-07:00

We have started a tradition of making Daddy breakfast in bed. Tyler loves making his dad breakfast, and helping with the whole thing!
The best part is eating daddy's breakfast.
After a relaxing morning, we went to the Saanich Historical Artifacts Society, it was a blast, we really had a great time.

Waiting in line at the mini train.
Mom and Emilee didn't get to go for a ride...to bad!
So we waited in the grass, and made cute faces instead!

Tyler love his new Varnet sunglasses!

Great Day!

2008-06-22T23:51:00.000-07:00

Today was a great day. I had the privilege of participating in a baptismal service at our church. For those who arent familiar with what baptism is, it is quite simple really...in the Bible Jesus calls all people to follow him. And to identify ourselves as his followers (or as a means of telling others publicly of our decision to follow him) he commands us to be baptized. The New Testament is littered with instances of people making a decision to follow Jesus with their lives and then being baptized.

Well today our church did something that we dont normally do. Following the sermon, the pastor invited anyone who wanted to be baptized to come forward and do so. We provided the change of clothes and towel if they didnt want to go home wet, oh yeah and we also provided the water.

It was a very fitting end to a sermon that our pastor preached on commitment. We were reminded this morning of what makes God vomit. Our indifference toward him. In fact he says so in Revelation 3:16, "So, because you are lukewarm - neither hot nor cold - I am about to spit (or vomit) you out of my mouth." Ouch. And our pastor asked a question that really resonated with Kellee and me...when this week did you have to depend on God? Sadly, I had to think about that, I have most of what I need, why do I need God?

And it was these same thoughts that people were challenged with as we gave our congregation the opportunity to step forward in baptism. Between our 3 services we had 13 people come forward for baptism. Most of them not planning that when they left their house in the morning. And I had the joy of helping these people take their next step in their relationship with Jesus. It was a great day!

My Arch Nemesis

2008-06-06T13:40:00.000-07:00

It seems like every two years my arch nemesis rears its ugly head. And not only does it happen every two years, but it seems to happen at the worst possible moment!

About two years ago I was visiting Ontario and preparing to stand up in my best friends (Jay Grimes) wedding. It was the day before the wedding and Jay picked me up early in the day. It was then that I noticed I had a scratchy throat, sore neck, and just didnt quite feel 100 percent. But I knew that I would feel better after a day with the boys. So we did our thing that day, played paintball, had dinner, went to the hotel, shaved Jay's legs, it was fun. I still wasn't 100 percent but I certainly wasn't near death. We went to bed, had a good night sleep and then...

I woke up Saturday morning and I felt like I got hit by a truck. I couldn't open my mouth, swallow, or even breathe without being in excruciating pain. A friend of mine, Tim, drove me to the doctor, and I have very little memory of what happened after that, but the doctor told me I had tonsillitis. I ended up missing the wedding and spending the next 2.5 days in bed, pumping myself full of meds and trying to recover.

Well it happened again. I woke up Wednesday morning around 5am. I couldn't swallow, and something wasnt right. I went about my day, definitely under the weather, but I was alright. However when I woke up Thursday morning I was lights out sick, soaked with sweat from a fever, and decided to haul myself to the doctor. The doctor told me, that yet again, I have tonsillitis. I dragged myself back home and I am stuck in bed recovering.

This time I am not missing a wedding, I am missing our youth group's annual surf trip. Fortunately we were able to hire a bus driver to take my place for a mere $1500 and my leaders are able to hold down the fort. And my hope is that by Saturday morning I will have recovered enough to drive myself up to Tofino.

Curse my tonsils!

Happy Birthday Emilee!

2008-05-18T22:53:00.000-07:00

And Happy Birthday Jacquee!

We have had a great birthday celebration. We have been working with Emilee for a few weeks now to hold up her finger when we say "number one...number one" and she does it, it's super cute! This morning when we woke up I sang happy birthday to her, and she seem to know that it was a special song for her.

After church we had a little birthday party for her. It was lots of fun! There are the things that Emilee really enjoyed from her day:

pink icing,
her new baby
Papa
tissue paper
"number one..number one"
her new (noisy) piano

We had a nice day, and it was a lot of fun for us Mom and dad to celebrate this day with her, she sure is a special girl and we love her so much. A special thanks to Amy and Uncle Shawn for coming, and Grammy and Papa and Uncle Brennen for sharing in the special day.

Here are some pictures capturing some of the fun.

What about ME!!!

2008-04-11T21:02:00.000-07:00

My lovely almost 30 year old wife forgot to mention me in her little update. Things are great and I am undertaking a few rather large projects at the church. One is getting our church active in the local highschools which has been really fun. And the other is challenging our youth ministry to raise $6000 to put Freddie (who I blogged about a few weeks ago) through college. Our goal is to have the money by the end of May.

Here is the video we are using to 'promote' this idea:

Jeff and Nadia please note the free Keats promo!

We're still here!

2008-04-11T08:54:00.000-07:00

Once again, it has been a while since i have updated our blog...sorry to those who come here regularly. There are several reasons why... Our life has been boring lately, there hasn't been anything to blog about. But now saying that...there has been some exciting things. Mostly I haven't blogged because I have been having camera problems, but i think i have it worked out.

We have purchased our first investment home, with much appreciated help from Brigitte (who will be supervising and attending to our property). At the beginning of the week we but in an offer and it was accepted. Our property is in London, Ontario. So it will be interesting to see how this goes...if it goes well, we may do it again. Fun, fun, fun!

I have just completed a course at a local cake decorating store, creating occasions, learning how to make super paste, or gum paste flowers. It was lots of fun, and I learning lots.

this is one of my creations

My sick little Emilee...not wanting her picture taken
"I'm not going to smile!"
JJ doesn't like to smile either
Tyler on the other hand, is my little poser..."look at me mom, take my picture!"
One of Aunt Jacquee's crocheting creations...very cute!

Our Visit to Cold Calgary!

2008-03-28T11:07:00.001-07:00

The kids and I had a fabulous time visiting Aunt Jacquee and the kidos in Calgary. The traveling part went so smoothly. I was very happy with how the kids did on such a long trip, but they were great. And we made it with record time as well. We didn't do a whole lot while we were there, just relaxed (as much relaxing as you can do with 7 kids). We did enjoy the company of sisters though. I love being with my sister and spending time with her family. I hope that we will get to do it more often with them being closer! Here are some pictures that Jacquee took, because my camera has issues.

Sunny drive!

We celebrated Zac's 5th birthday, and what a celebration we had!

Madison modeling some slippers!

We did a lot of baking, so that we could do a lot of eating, and those pumpkin cookies sure were yummy!

Madison and Danica loved taking pictures and getting pictures taken

Not sure how this happened, but they were enjoying it!

My littlest, but biggest (also adorable) nephew, Brycen.

The birthday boy loving his sister!

Emilee enjoyed taking all the Kleenex out of the box, boy was she good at it!

I Lied

2008-03-24T15:12:00.000-07:00

Okay, I found some pictures on facebook, not sure how well they will translate into blogger...

this picture was everywhere...hilarious.

this is the bus the family was living in. this is the finished house, with shower room and outhouse to the right.a picture of us buildingthere is no electricity but we use solar energy to charge to batteries which can power some lights and a plugwe build 6 bunkbeds in the one bedroomthis is the kitchen area, with a little propane stovethis is the family receiving their house. that is Freddie on the right.

Back to Normal

2008-03-24T14:27:00.000-07:00

Life is finally back to normal. It is Monday morning, following the Easter weekend, and all 5 of us are bagged, and catching up on sleep and catching up on how the last couple of weeks have been for the all of us. For Kellee and the kids they were in Calgary, visiting Kellee's sister who just recently moved there. For me, I was in Vicente Guererro, Mexico, just 6 hours south of San Diego, with our new church on a missions trip. It was an unbelievable week.

43 of us left early Saturday morning, and via ferry, coach bus, airplane, and van travelled from Victoria to VG in about 36 hours. We spent most of our week building a house for a family of 6 who were (until last Thursday) living in a dilapidated bus. The living conditions for this family were horrendous. Last summer some people from our church met this family, and we used our thanksgiving offering to purchase the family some land, and then our team built them a house. It was a very modest house, about 400 square feet, all wood, no running water, no electricity. It would make a really neat play fort for our kids, but to this family it was the beginning of a new life.

Besides the house build we did several other things, we visited a local church, we spent an afternoon at a housing (if you want to call it that) compound where migrant workers lived while working in the fields all day, and of course we did some sight seeing, and had some fun.

God was really at work in my own life, and I can only imagine in the lives of the rest of the team. A couple of significant highlights for me were when Rosario, the single mom of the family we built for made our whole team lunch. She makes between 3-7 dollars a day when she can find childcare for her 4 youngest. To think about how much that meal must have cost her made it a truly humbling experience to eat it. Also the ceremony we had with the family when we actually gave them the keys to their own house was unbelievable, not a dry in the place. We had a meal together, we spoke through translators and we just enjoyed the blessing of being together.

It was at the ceremony when God really spoke to me. There I met Freddie. He is 18 and the oldest child in the family. I decided I would spend some time with him, and through a translator learned alot. He is currently in his last year of 'prep school'. Which is our equivalent of high school. In order to afford school (no free public education in Mexico) he has to work in the morning from 8-1230, and then go to school in the afternoon. In Mexico they have huge celebrations for children when the finish grade 6 because it is so rare, so the fact that Freddie has made it so far is very special. Especially because of his family's economic situation. Nonetheless he is going to be graduating from prep school at the end of this school year with straight A's and really wants to go to university to be an agricultural engineer. University costs a mere 1000 dollars a year (that includes his tuition, books, and extras), and his program is 5 years. However for him this is almost impossible. He will either take 10 or 12 years to finish university, or not finish because his family will need him to work as they grow and get bigger.

So for a mere 5000 dollars Freddie would be able to graduate university. Now here is where the rubber meets the road. If Freddie were able to do that, this would change the economic status of his family forever. He would then be able to provide for his current family, he would also be able to send his kids to school, and they in turn would be able to get jobs that would enable them to do the same. This actually changes everything for this family.

The house was a huge blessing, and a wonderful start, but if nothing changes for this family in 10 or 15 years the house we built will become their new bus. It will deteriorate, get dirty and fall apart. But for 5000 dollars we can remove this family from the vicious cycle that is poverty.

I had the privilege of going back to the house on Friday with a video camera and a translator, and we interviewed Freddie to hear more about him and his dreams. My hope and prayer is that we will be able to show that video to people and they will contribute to his scholarship fund that we will (God willing) hopefully be starting soon. I have a dream that this wouldnt end with Freddie, but it would just start. What if we had a fund that incurred enough interest that we could pay for impoverished children to go to school and not just give them a house, but give them hope.

Sorry for the ramblings, but that is what God did in my life this past week. I didnt take a single picture, but I will post some as soon as people put them on facebook. In the meantime here are some links you can check out to read a bit more about the trip.

http://www.engagemexico2008.blogspot.com/ - this was the blog we kept while in Mexico

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=8516319537&oid=6294605778 - this is a link to a video we showed telling the story of the bus family before we went to VG to build for them, you may need a facebook account to view it, not sure???

http://idtmissions.org/index.html - the website for the people that we partner with in VG, we have 3 missionaries that are there that we support.

another video

2008-02-27T13:45:00.000-08:00

Sorry to those who visit our blog. I have been horrible at updating the blog, for several reasons: every time i try and upload video to put on this lovely computer overheats, and it's kind of frustrating; I have been really bad at taking pictures of the kids, so there isn't much to put on. So I'm sorry!

We have been doing really good. Chris is in the full swing of ministry. He has been busy preparing to go to Mexico for spring break. I have taken on a bit of new business. I have started making sheep skin booties for a company called Little Dot's. I have had so much fun making these adorable little slippers. Other than that, we have been getting more and more settled, and trying to play more outside, seeing as how it has been so beautiful. I have started running again. There is a 1.5km path with a nice field, and trees behind our house, so I have been running there, and running up and down the stairs until I can't feel my legs anymore. It certainly feels good to be active!

The kids have been pretty good. We have all been battling colds, so it will be nice when there are no more runny noses. Well I should go and get the never ending laundry started!

it's been way too long

2008-02-25T12:35:00.000-08:00

Last Couple of Weeks!

2008-01-31T11:43:00.001-08:00

We have been settling in nicely to our town house. The kids are loving it! Chris and I have been working so hard on getting to know people and remembering names. That seems to be the greatest challenge. We are really enjoying the church, and our new youth group. Keep praying for us as we are trying to figure out if we should buy a house or stay put for a little while.

Here are a few pictures of the last couple of weeks .

JJ is making good use of his new smelly stickers from his favorite girl Kenna!
Here is Tyler Cinderella cleaning...cleaning...and....

...taking care of the baby.
JJ thought that he would help himself to some milk and pancakes while mom was resting!
Emilee sporting her first hair clip....isn't she so cute!

Moments With Emilee Renee

2008-01-18T13:49:00.000-08:00

Getting Settled

2008-01-15T12:54:00.000-08:00

We made it! On Saturday we packed up all our things. We had tones of help, which was so greatly appreciated. A special thanks to the people who directly helped me (Sharon, for doing an amazing job cleaning; Kerri, Amy, and Bethany, for taking good care of my kiddlings). The day went pretty smoothly. The only ripple was having to get an additional trailer to pull the things that wouldn't fit in the truck. But that ended up being no big deal.

It was an emotional ending for me. Chris urged me to go into the house with him and have one final look after all was cleared. As we surveyed the empty, beautiful, little town house thoughts and emotions of memories of the past four years made tears come pouring out. (Tears that I had been fighting all day). It was our first house and all three of our children were born there. There were many great things that happened there. After our long hug, we came out of the house awaited by our close friends and family and said good bye. We jumped in our van and paused for a few last moments with the kids and reflected with them what a blessing from God our house has been. The kids were so cute, confused but so cute. JJ kept tell me that "it's okay", and Tyler was searching for sadness in saying goodbye. Chris and I prayed with them, and thanked God for what He has given us, and prayed for our new adventure in Victoria. Chris reminded us that it was the people in the van that made the house so special, and the people in the van were coming with him.

God has been teaching Chris and I a lot lately about generosity, hospitality, and giving. In our new house we want even more, to make it a place where God is glorified. It it His house! When we tell people to come and visit, we meant it. You are welcome to come, and stay. We are excited to see what awaits us this new year, and to see what God has planned for us in our new house and our new church. Here is a video our our new house that I put together real quick just to get an idea of what it looks like.

beginning of the end

2008-01-07T21:15:00.000-08:00

So we are in our last week here in Surrey. It is bitter sweet to say the least. We are very excited about what lies ahead for us in our move to Victoria and the ministry at Saanich Baptist Church, but at the same time we have to move out of house that our 3 children were born in, that we have started our family in, and a great bunch of friends and to us as close as family...

Tonight we had a 'farewell party' with our great friends, the Frews, the Oldhams, the Vanderkuips, and the Unruhs. They are all great people and over the past 5 years we have really grown close together (well the ladies have, guys don't really grow close together, we save it for the women). It is weird to say goodbye because we really aren't going that far, with the ferry we are about 2 hours from our old house, but we know that it is enough to certainly make it different, and of course it eliminates any spur of the moment visits. We had a great time saying good bye at 'Go-Banana's' doing what we love to do, letting our kids run wild, while we eat food and talk, it is a great combination. Thanks guys.

As for our future, many likely haven't heard all of the details. We have found a place to rent. It is a 3 bedroom town house, about 1300 square feet, very similar to what we are currently living in. It is very expensive, we will be spending about 50 percent of our income on housing alone. But on Saturday morning the moving truck and our army of helpers will be showing up and we will be loading the truck and then jumping on the ferry. It should all be done by 5pm if things go as planned.

As for phone numbers and stuff, not completely sure yet. We have one, but Kellee wants to change it to something that is easy to remember, like our old number 9665. But I had to remind her that that number wasn't easy to remember until we dialed it a bunch of times...

So if we don't post for a week or so forgive us, we are up to our ears in boxes and goodbyes this weeks. But please email us. chris_synesael@hotmail.com or kellee_lin@hotmail.com

A Smattering of Christmas Pictures

2007-12-25T14:49:00.000-08:00

Here are some highlights from the last couple of days...

the boys looking for a Christmas tree

ty and jj decorating Jesus' birthday cake (appently he is 296)emilee all ready for the christmas eve servicethe boys opening up their christmas eve pj'sty showing papa some of the pictures he has taken on his camerauncle shawn and auntie (one day hopefully) amy holding emilee on christmas eveemilee opening up her first presentty got a shaving kit for his mad skillsjj opening up one of his carsamy holding emilee on christmas afternoon

in the afternoon on christmas we are going over to some friends from our old church. hope everyone had a great christmas we sure did!

Dancing Sister

2007-12-24T21:22:00.000-08:00

this is some video of kellee getting emilee to dance. i would have rather seen kellee dancing....

Home.

2007-12-20T22:50:00.000-08:00

Well it is official...we are home. We arrived home late (10:30pm) on Tuesday night. It was earlier than we anticipated, but once we left California we really saw no need to hang around. I longed for a bed where my feet didn't hang off the end, and a shower where my head doesn't hit the ceiling. And I know Kellee is excited about not going to laundry mats and lighting pilot lights when she wants to use the oven...oh yeah did I mention that I no longer have to dump our feces out of a drain anymore either, an definite bonus to being home...with that being said though Kellee and I both agree that this was the best month of our lives!

As we were crossing the boarder I was in the way back seat putting Emilee to sleep, Kellee was driving (cute blondes make crossing the boarder easier), and the boys were in the middle bench. I put my arms around the boys and reminded our family of how lucky we are to have each other and what a blessing the entire trip was. At that point I got a little misty (there was dust in the van I am sure) and Kellee started to cry. There were a couple of things that made it emotional, the fact that our trip together was over (and it was sooo good), but it also marked the end of our time in Surrey, because we now have to begin the moving process and all of that stuff. It was a sad but happy moment, one of those bitter sweet kinda things.

The tears pointed to how great our trip was. I am not sure I can put into words how we experienced this trip, but it was just what we needed when we needed. The only word that comes to mind is 'beautiful'. That sounds girly and I hate sounding girly, but it is true. It wont be the sites that we saw, or the weather, or some of the cool things we did that I will remember (some of them I am sure will not be forgotten). But rather that the 6am wake up calls from JJ declaring 'it's wake up time!' or the new catch phrase around our house, 'peanut butter jelly smack on the butt!' or the concerts we had in our underwear with the boys playing guitar, mom on the piano, and me being the lead singer, those are the moments that made this trip what it was for us, 'beautiful'. There I go sounding girly again.

It will forever be a passion of mine to create experiences like this for my family. I do not think we will duplicate this one, each one will be different and special on their own, but I can't wait to make more memories. For those of you with families, please take opportunities to be alone, together. If you get the chance, pile in a van, a trailer, a tent, whatever, and get away, with no agenda, just being together.

Here are some pics. My plan was to blog about San Francisco, but it got hijacked with the girly stuff. I will say this about San Fran though, cool city, crazy streets, stupid expensive (40 bucks to park for the day!!!)

my family with the Golden State bridge in the background, it is big!

this is the most crooked street in the world...it is crazy

me and JJ on the trolley car...like the one you see in the Full House intro

me and Tyler on the trolley cartoken shot of the Oregon coast, it was super nice

Some people wanted to see what photos of our house when it was all dolled up to be sold. My brother was kind enough to snap some shots for us.

our kitchen.our living room.more living room.emilee's room.more emilee's roomthe boys room.our room

So our house is sold. I start as the Youth and College Pastor at Saanich Baptist Church (www.saanichbaptist.org) on January 15th in Victoria and we have no house there...please pray for us. We are going to spend the entire day on Saturday looking at rental and purchase homes.

San Francisco and Beyond

2007-12-17T20:18:00.000-08:00

hey everyone. just throwing up a quick update for all those who have been reading and curious about our current geographical state. we left malibu on friday and spent friday and saturday night in san francisco. we had fun, i will post more about that time and photos later, the camera is in the car right now.

we left san francisco and landed for the night in eureka (sp?) california. then we got stupid early (6am) and left to hit the road again. we landed tonight (tuesday night) in portland. we are pretty close to being home. we are going to take 2 days to get home so we can do some shopping in the seattle area.

that should have us home around the 19th. a day ahead of schedule.

also want to say a happy birthday to my brother shawn. he is 23 today!

A little sumptin' sumptin' for ya...

2007-12-15T11:22:00.000-08:00

The Long Road Home

2007-12-15T08:11:00.000-08:00

A couple of days ago when we looked in the atlas the amount of space between where we were and home was daunting. So daunting that we have decided to extend our trip by another month...

Just kidding. But we are definitely having such an awesome time that we never want it to end.

We spent a couple of more days in San Dimas. We loved our little site, it was on the end of a row, there was a large field and fire pit behind us, and the view was amazing. It overlooked a small lake with some huge houses and mountains on one side and a great view of the city down below on the other side. A couple of campfires and a whole lot of just hanging out we left on Wednesday morning.

the view from our trailer

Emilee looking all cute on the swing

JJ and Emilee going down the slide
Ty and JJ creatively getting a drink
Kellee and I being all in love

the boys watching a movie during the campfire

Kellee eating her staple of oreos and peanut butter

We decided we should start heading north, since that is the direction of Canada, so we did. We drove right up to the coast and started heading north. Our plan is drive basically right of the coast all the way home. It is not the quickest way, but we would really like to avoid snow if at all possible and the coast is the best way to do that.

Our journey north ended in Malibu where we camped on the beach for 2 days. You remember that awesome place we stopped at on the way down, we loved it so much that we stopped there again. Only this time we did 2 nights. It was fun because there was actually nothing to do. You couldn't just make yourself busy, you actually had to sit and do nothing. Although the boys and I killed a decent amount of time making a 'princess path' for Mom and Emilee that went from the trailer to the firepit. We went out and collected rocks to make the path and to make a sign that said 'The Synesaels', it took alot of rocks to do that. We had a couple of huge beach fires, I read a bunch and chopped wood. The boys did lots of bike riding and exploring, Kellee and Tyler actually saw a seal in the ocean, he swam by a couple of times and once he stopped to play. Kellee made out with me on the beach under the stars by the campfire (that was her highlight I am sure), knit and held Emilee because she is a little sick and seems to be needy (although she seems fine today). So on we woke up early Friday and hit the road, it may seem ridiculous, but we were actually packed and pulling out of our site at 8:22am. JJ has this knack of waking up at the first sign of sunlight and yelling 'It's wake up time!'

the boys helping dad set up the trailer

she being cute again!!CJ Parker to the rescue!
our 'princess path'The Synesaels
the sunset (kellee did something cool with the camera to make it those colours) Emilee and her daddy at the campfire

So we left and we drove until we hit San Francisco. We pulled into here around 4:30, got settled, got dinner, did tonnes of laundry, and are now just planning our Saturday. We are going to go and do some touristy stuff while we are here, go to church on Sunday (if anyone knows of any neat churches we should check out let us know) and then leave again.

A few people have been asking, 'What about Mexico?' Great question. We decided pretty early in our trip that we weren't going to go down there for a couple of reasons. One, because we couldn't bring the trailer down, which would mean paying to store it up here. Two, because it would have meant tacking 3 extra days of straight driving to the first leg of our trip, and the kids would have gone batty. Bigger than our desire to go to Mexico was our desire to relax, have fun, be on our own schedule, and be spontaneous. So that is what is up with Mexico.

Pics from the last few days

2007-12-10T09:54:00.000-08:00

JJ passed out in the car on the way to Palm Springs

Palm Springs has hundreds of these huge windmills to generate power. Who knew?The fam feeding the ducks in our Palm Springs trailer parkPalm Springs is know for its hot springs. Our trailer park had 4 of them. They pipe the water into little pools. It is sort of like a hot tub.My girlsJJ's butt cleavageBeverly HillsThe church was just off of Santa MonicaThe fam checking out the scenery at The Grove after churchthey are both soooo hot!
The Hollywood sign
the best shot of one of those star thingys on the sidewalk I could get without getting out of my van.

San Dimas

2007-12-10T09:27:00.001-08:00

Why the random picture of Poly Shore and Brandon Fraser? Great question! We are currently resting our heads in San Dimas, California. For those of you who don't know, this movie was filmed in this city. It's kind of cool for me...I'm weird like that! We are in a nice trailer park (yes those words do go together) overlooking the lake and a great view of the city. We are about 40 east of LA. We decided after 2 nights in Palm Springs that it was time to move on. The weather was horrible, there was a storm coming in and the wind was crazy...and the area is more of a retirement place then it is family friendly.

So we left town, but hit the hugest outlet mall I have ever seen, it was wild. Probably about 200 stores or so. So we shopped from 9-2. Ate lunch and hit the road. We got some cool stuff, great deals, especially with the dollar right now.

So at about 7pm on Saturday we arrived in San Dimas. We woke up in the morning and loaded up the van and drove into Beverly Hills to attend church. We went to Mosaic which is a 'movement' (I don't think they like being called a church) that gathers in various locations in the LA area and is led by a guy named Erwin McManus. It was very cool. They met in Beverly Hills High School, which was an experience all on its own (brought back memories of Dylan, Brandon, Brenda, Kelly, and the crew, you 90210ers know what I am talking about). It was the polar opposite of our Saddleback experience. Mosaic was very artsy, and reflective. It was neat to see how they are obviously meeting a need in that area. If I could give you an image Saddleback would be like a shopping mall out in the suburbs, it has everything you could every want. Mosaic is more like Starbucks, only not Starbucks, more like an independent version of Starbucks, it is slow, methodical, and highly relational. It was neat to see 2 polar opposites making a difference because of they are presenting truth in a way that resonates with the culture they are in. God is good.

After church we toured Beverly Hills for a bit, people are crazy rich there. And we went to an out door mall/market thing called The Grove. If you could imagine a shopping mall inside out that was The Grove. All the stores you could want and more, but they were situated around this huge park/sitting area that had a trolley running through it, a massive Christmas train, fountains, etc...It was a little overwhelming, Beverly Hills is not super mini-van/double stroller friendly. But we just hunkered down and did our thing. Emilee stole the show. Kellee had her in a sling (www..coastalsling.com no problem Niki!) and a really cute hat on her and she was smiling at everyone! I thought everyone was going to swww.top shopping so they could announce that there was a really cute baby that everyone had to stop and admire. Well not quite, but they should have!

Then we left there and drove up the road to Hollywood. My wife has this goal of seeing a famous person before we leave. It almost happened. We drove by a movie theatre and there were tonnes of photographers around, but no famous people. Hollywood is a total dump. So we left. We got home around 8pm or so. Then we had a really nice campfire, some dinner and went to bed.

JJ woke up puking and had diarrhea. He seems better now, but who knows with him. I took took all the kids to McDonalds this morning so Kellee could get some extra sleep because she was up a lot last night. Today is just lazy reading/laundry/sterilizing the trailer day. We are going to stay one more night in San Dimas and then go back towards the coast. We will likely be staying somewhere around Malibu tonight for a couple of nights, hopefully on the beach again. We will likely be without internet for a couple of days.

Believe it or not but we are slowly working our way home. We should be home in 10 days. Then the real world hits. Poor us.

The Desert

2007-12-07T08:14:00.000-08:00

We are now in Palm Springs! We are actually staying in a little town called Desert Hot Springs just 20 minutes outside of Palm Springs. We were originally going to spend a couple of nights on the beach at Carlsbad, but a really bad storm was on the way so we thought it better to get outta dodge!!

We had a good couple of last days in San Diego. On Wednesday we did a boys-girls day. Kellee went to a fancy pants shopping mall and did some serious shopping (gone from 9-3) with Emilee. They boys and I stayed at the trailer park and sang lots of songs, played basketball, video games, ate tonnes of junk food, and played on the beach. It was a blast and I think Kellee really appreciated being alone for a while.

Then on Thursday I did something completely random. I heard that the San Diego Museum had a special exhibit featuring the Dead Sea Scrolls. For those who don't know what they are, they are the oldest existing copies (that we have) of Biblical and non-biblical writings. I had the privilege of seeing copies of Leviticus, Isaiah, Psalms, Job, Deuteronomy, and others dated between 265 BC - 60 AD. It was awesome.

When I got home we piled in the car and here we are in Palm Springs. We don't know how long we are going to be here and we don't know where we are going next. So far Palm Springs is quite dry and sandy with lots of Palm trees. Hopefully it gets better.

Sunny San Diego

2007-12-05T08:54:00.000-08:00

For the avid blog readers out there (mainly family, I would imagine), you are probably thinking to yourselves, 'Man, those guys are having so much fun that they haven't blogged in like 3 days!!!' While we are having fun, we haven't been overly busy, it just was seeming redundant to blog the same thing 3 days in a row, so I stored up some ammo to have a worthwhile entry...

We arrived in San Diego late Saturday evening. We woke up Sunday morning and left our trailer around 8:30am to head out to Lake Forest California to visit Saddleback Church. It is a huge church. I expected it to be huge, but it is really, really huge. It has its own traffic system (lights, etc..), a huge 3 storey parking garage, multiple buildings, beautiful landscape with fountains, little streams, an awesome outdoor baptismal, it really gave me that 'WOW' factor that I was expecting, and the crazy thing is when you are expecting a WOW it usually doesn't happen, but this did. It was awesome to see how God has been blessing people through the church, and to imagine that this was a little church plant of only a few was great. God is good, and we were encouraged by being there, not only through the experience, but also through the teaching and worship.

this is the only good pic we have of the church

After church on Sunday we did the Christian thing and went our for lunch and then shopping. Nothing too special.

The next day we were all a little baked so we stuck around Campland and I did some reading, the kids helped mom with laundry, and then the boys and I went for a little swim in the pool. After the pool we came home, had some dinner and had a campfire and went to bed.

he did alot of looking not alot of swimming

this guy loves the water, as long as he can touch the bottom

check out those biceps
Yesterday was sort of the big day in terms of the reason we came this way. We went to the San Diego Zoo for the day. It was really fun, tonnes of walking, but the kids had a blast! It was your typical zoo, animals caged up, and people telling us how they love being in their recreated 'natural habitats'. You should have seen the polar bears, there was nothing natural about that...(just for the record I am not an animal activist, I love eating dead animals, I just think they should be a bit more honest about the whole thing). But we saw EVERYTHING and did the bus tour to boot. The kids thought the bus ride was cool and Tyler's favorite animal was the giraffe's, ironically they didn't actually have giraffe's. Here are some pics from our day

self explanatory

JJ filling the tank before another round of walking, sno-cones yummy me and Kel
the boys playing over the lion cage...just kidding, they were ducks or something (why have ducks at a zoo???)the fam on the busmy girls suckin' facedad and JJ eatin' some chipstoken animal picture (random elephant fact: did you know that elephants have thousands of tiny, ultra sensitive nerve endings on the bottom of their feet and they can feel vibrations in the ground that most animals cannot feel. during the recent tsunami just hours before the water hit the land the elephants were all running for the mountains, elephants were breaking chains to free themselves and running wild, because they could feel the earth quake in their feet...crazy huh?)

Today the girls are going shopping and the boys are hanging around the trailer, reading, playing, and stuff like that. Tonight is our last night here and we think we are going to a place called Carlsbad Beach for a couple of nights (dry camping, right on the beach again) and then no idea after that...any suggestions????

A Day Behind

2007-12-02T07:29:00.000-08:00

Hey everyone just wanted to throw up a quick blog about our Friday night. It was by far the best night we have had here...we driving down the #1 hwy on our way to San Diego area and saw this neat camp site right on the beach. I said, 'dudes we totally need to sleep here tonight!' Kellee was okay with it...it was dry camping (no hook ups) which scares her a bit. But we have enough battery to get us through a night with heat, hot water and lights. But it was an awesome night...the beach was literally right outside our door, about 200 feet from the ocean. Here are some pics...

the view from our trailer, not bad for 15 bucks!

thats our sweet ride, you should see the looks driving through Malibu and LAthe fam checkin' out the oceancooking dinner on the beachme and emileethis dude we found in the morning passed out on the beachthe bong we found next to the dude passed out on the beach...wonder if there is a connection there???the boys exploring the coast in the morningmom and her girlthe ocean attacks!

We are now officially in San Diego. This morning we are going to go to Saddleback Church (about an hour drive) then spend the day in LA checking out cool stuff. Bye!

Happy Birthday JJ

2007-12-01T20:25:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday to our littlest boy! We celebrated JJ's birthday a day early because we knew that we were going to be on the road on his b-day, so we just pretended. We had a great day. He woke up super early (I guess that has been a bit of a routine), and jumped in bed with us and said, "IT'S WAKE UP TIME!" We had a cinnamon roll breakfast, and went to a cool train restaurant for lunch. We had a "party" for dinner in the trailer and did cake and presents there. It was a fun day, and I think that JJ had a great day. It was our goal to make it extra special for him, and I think we accomplished that! Daddy helping JJ hold up only 3 fingers...it's real challenging just getting 3 to stay up!

Yum, yum, yummy!
This is the cool diner that we ate in
JJ and Daddy
The restaurant had a weird sense of decorating with wall to wall business cards.
After lunch we went to Monarch Butterfly Grove. One of the largest places that the monarchs migrate to in North America. It was really cool, there were tons!

Our Birthday Party in the Trailer
Our special three year old boy (in his birthday suit, he really didn't want to get dressed for the occasion).

Technical Difficulties

2007-11-29T21:25:00.000-08:00

Hey Everyone, not too worry, we didn't crash our van off the side of a mountain, or drive into the ocean...no the computer died. The sad thing is is that seems just as tragic! But 80 bucks later we are back online.

So we left Oregon and hit sunny California. We spent our first night in California in Lodi (no idea where that is, and wasn't nearly as glamorous as I thought it would be). We froze our butts off because we ran out of propane in the middle of the night! Kinda ironic huh?

Then we woke up, jumped in the van and hit the road. We decided the prospect of driving to the Grand Canyon wasn't looking like such a good idea, because it meant 3 more days of driving and our kids were getting squirrely (Emilee still freaks out whenever we put her in her seat).

So we took a detour to towards the coast and stopped at this place called Pismo Beach. There isn't much here except a fairly nice RV park where we have been for the last 3 nights.

We have been enjoying hanging out on the beach (not swimming, its too cold still), going to walmart to shop for JJ's birthday party, cooking meals and marshmellows on the campfire, reading, and making friends with all the other young families at the playground.

Tomorrow we are leaving. We aren't entirely sure where we are going, we are heading towards LA/San Diego (we think!?) but aren't sure where we will land.

Here are some pics from the trip...

We made it to the sunshine state!

I figure we need one picture of me doing something manlyThe boys enjoying a morning stroll on the beach in their pj'sEmilee being cute!Mom and the boys feeding the ducks (or the chickens depend on who you ask)Tyler concentrating hard on making sure he doesn't burn his wiener (that sounds funny?!)JJ polishing off some more marshmellowsUs enjoying a late night campfire after the kids are gone to bed (another manly thing I did)

Couple of quick PS's...

1) we just found out yesterday (Wed) morning that we got the job in Victoria.

2) we immediately phoned our real estate agent and he put our place on the market. And we just found out tonight (Thurs) that we have an offer. Assuming the subject get removed it is sold!

We are very excited.

One more thing in case we don't get to blog tomorrow. Happy Birthday to my grand mother who just turned 80. And a huge congrats to Spencer and Kelsey who are getting married on Friday. Wish we could be there guys!!!!!!

We will blog about JJ's day early birthday festivities ASAP.

Grants Pass, Oregon

2007-11-24T20:03:00.000-08:00

So we left Olympia with every intention of making it to Northern California, however...

Not much happened. Lots of driving. We stopped at a Christian outlet bookstore because I forgot to pack my books for reading. We stopped in Eugene to have some lunch in our trailer and let the kids run around a bit, and then we rode through the mountains until we hit Grants Pass. It was around 5 and seemed like sane people would stop rather then push the limits of the kids and our tiredness we stopped. We will definitely be in California tomorrow!!! Here are some pics....

the boys chowing down breakfast in the trailer

dad driving the vanWe made it to Oregon (a day late but who cares we have 27 more to kill)mom making dinner in Oregontylers prize boat! this was our ploy to have him put it away rather than save it!

Olympia

2007-11-23T21:51:00.000-08:00

Hey for those of you scoring at home we are spending our first night in Olympia, Washington. Not too far from Seattle. We didnt really hit the road until about 1pm, so not too bad. For the most part it was uneventful. Lots of laughing and singing. We are hoping to hit California tomorrow. We will be making a pit stop in Portland!

We havent taken any pictures yet, sorry!

See Ya Later Aligators!

2007-11-21T15:38:00.000-08:00

Just a heads up, we are leaving either late Thursday or early Friday for a month long camping trip to California/Mexico. We really aren't sure where will be or when we will be there and we will try to blog on occasion to keep y'all in the loop. We will be back before Christmas sometime.

Whoo-Ah

2007-11-19T20:20:00.000-08:00

The past couple of weeks of unemployment have been crazy. There have definitely been some moments of relaxing and enjoyment, but overall we have been very busy. However, the kind of busy has been nice.

Last week some friends of mine from Salmon Arm (up North) invited us to come and hang out with them for a few days. So we loaded up the van and took off for Sunnybrae Bible Camp. We had the privilege of having the whole camp to ourselves. It was a blast. During the day we went swimming at the pool, hung out at Jungle Mania (Go Banana's), walked the beach, went to the library, pretty much whatever we wanted. In the evening we hung out with Ben and Kirsten Hall, Mel and Sherry Reimer, and Joel and Katie Neustater. It was a great time of relaxing for our family. Here are some pics:

Our family at the Sunnybrae tunnel

Tyler and JJ skipping rocks into the Shushwap LakeTyler enjoying the beachTyler going down the slide at the pool.JJ showing off his 'mad skills' as he jumps in!

Tyler and JJ passed out on the couch while they watch a movie.

Also, since we have been back from Victoria (from a 5 day job interview) Emilee has started eating rice cereal. Here are the pics from that fun time:

It all looks so fun at the beginning.

Happy baby for now.The rice enters into the mouth.Its in the mouth.Its out of the mouth.

Blur

2007-11-12T05:20:00.000-08:00

Does life ever feel liked it barfed all over you and you feel like you are playing catchup all the time? This has been our lives since October 31st. We finished at Newton and went immediately into 'home reno' mode. I was painting like a mad man, while Kellee was packing like crazy. We spent 6 days prepping our house for sale in anticipation that we will be moving to the Island (perhaps a little presumptuous, but necessary nonetheless).

Then on Sunday afternoon we all piled in the van and drove to Salmon Arm to hang out at Sunnybrae Bible Camp and visit some friends. This was an awesome trip. The Reimers and Halls (pastors in Salmon Arm, and friends of mine) were so generous to us. We essentially had nothing to do for 5 days and it was wonderful. However there was the looming unfinished projects at home still hanging over our heads.

We arrived home late Friday night after a visit with some friends from our 'old church'. And Saturday morning got right back at 'er. So now we have a storage locker almost completely full of stuff, baseboards almost completely up, a house almost completely painted, and carpet guys coming on Tuesday to replace our carpet. So we have a lot of 'almosts' to do between now and Wednesday morning.

Because...on Wednesday morning we leave to go to Victoria for 5 days to interview at a church for the job of Youth and Young Adult Pastor. We are very excited about this opportunity and believe that God has been leading us down this path for some time now and we were just not aware of it until recently. But it gets better still...

Once we get back from Victoria, we are piling in a trailer and driving to Mexico! We are taking 7 days to camp our way to Mexico where we have a free place to stay for as long as we would like (thanks Mel). Then taking a couple weeks to camp back up to Surrey. So we are hoping that in the 4 weeks we are away that our house will sell, we will discover that we got hired by the church in Victoria and that we are moving....how is that for crazy!

But somehow in the midst of it we are relaxed and calm.

Pray for us.

Happy Halloween

2007-11-03T08:35:00.000-07:00

This Halloween was our kids first time ever 'trick-or-treating'. In the past we have had to be at Newton's Harvest Party as part of my job, but since I am a jobless bum....we didn't. So we gathered at Ladner Baptist Church with the Oldhams, Frews, Vanderkuips, and Unruhs for some food, a bouncy castle, and some trick-or treating. It took our boys about 5 seconds to catch on, and at one point JJ suggested we do this every day...good idea. Here are some pics:

Mommy, Emilee, JJ, and Tyler

Our whole clan of kiddies
Mom and Emilee

My cow and Lion

End of an Era

2007-10-29T09:08:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, sorry for the length of time between posts but it has been a crazy week for us as we wrap up our ministry at Newton.

Last Tuesday was our last youth group night with our students. It was a very special time for us. Our youth leaders turned the night into a celebration of our time at Newton. It started with a slideshow of pictures over the past 5 years. Then they brought us up to the front and had an open mic time. Student after student came up and shared a funny memory (there were lots) or a story of how God used us in their life. One of the girls in the youth group got everyone in the youth group to write us a note or a special letter. We will always treasure those. Thanks for the Rosemary.

Then after they shared their stories they had a special gift for us. Among the youth group they took up a private offering for us that totalled almost $700. We were floored! We have developed a little tradition in our youth group that whenever someone leaves our youth group we gather around them as a group, lay hands on them, and pray for them, commissioning them as our missionaries. So they group gathered around us and prayed for us. Asking that God would use us to bless others the way they have been blessed by God through us.

Then we finished off the night crying more, hugging more, taking pictures and eating food. Kellee and I stayed up until 1:30 that night reading notes and letters, remembering great times, and just being so thankful that God brought us to Newton. What an unbelievable time it has been!

Here are some pictures of that night...

Me and Kellee cutting our cake.

Me rubbing cake in Kellee's face. She got me back though, that is why I look like a retard in the rest of the pictures. It's because I got a whole piece of chocolate cake mashed my way

Kellee, Emilee, Kerri, and Kathleen Kellee, Bethany (she is our babysitter), and Emilee

Kellee, Emilee, Tammy, Katie, Rosie, Vanessa, and Amy
Me and my neice Kathleen

Me and Troy

Me and Joe

Me, Emilee, Kathryn, Clarke, and Matt

Me and Tammy

Me, Jessica, and Andrea

Me, Amy, Emily (she babysits for us sometimes too), and Kianna

Me, Rosemary, and Gareth

Me and Amy (i have a chocolate cake moustache thanks to Kellee)

Me, Cameron, and TJ

Me and Jessica Wiebe

Me and Matt

Me and Bethany

Me and Katie

Our Group

I remember we started as a group of 12 disjointed students 5 years ago. Now they are loving, caring, Christ-centred community. Gonna Miss these Guys!

These were unbelievable times, and every students in this picture has a story about God, and we have had the privilege of being a part in those stories. They will not be forgotten, and my prayer for them is that they would always love Jesus, always love others, and always dream of how they can change the world. See you guys!

Soon I will be posting about our farewell Sunday and the retreat we just got back from.

The Pumpkin Patch

2007-10-16T10:41:00.000-07:00

Our pumpkin patch adventure. It was a perfect day. A little mud and no rain. The kids had a blast.

I Love Autumn

2007-10-11T21:18:00.000-07:00

I love autumn. Especially in Ontario! The boys are really enjoying preschool, and mommy is too. It is a wonderful break that get to spend with Emilee for a couple hours every week. The boys had picture day today at preschool, so they were all dressed up. I thought I would talk advantage of it. Emilee is a drooling machine!
Thanksgiving at the Samson's
This is Tyler and JJ's idea of a good time (wrestling...all the time).

Our little Pilgrim

Re-sigh

2007-10-09T09:26:00.000-07:00

Hey everyone, it has been a bit since our last update. Things have been pretty wild around our house lately. This past weekend was a real tough one for us. On Thursday night I announced to our deacons board that we would be resigning. Saturday I told our youth leaders. Sunday morning I told our youth before church. And then at the end of the service we told the congregation. It was pretty much brutal. Lots of tears and emotions that are really hard to even express but we know that God has been leading us down this path. Our ministry at Newton ends on October 31st.

What is next for us? We don't know. As of October 31st are jobless. We have been talking with a church about the possibility of us being their youth pastor and we are hoping that will work out. However if they decided they would like to go in another direction we have nothing else lined up, which would probably mean me having to get a 'regular' job for a bit while we look at other options.

Either way it is our hope that we will be able to take a significant break between whatever we end up doing. We have been advised to take 3 months off. We have no idea how to make that happen but we feel it is necessary.

As you can see there are several ???'s in our life right now, but that is part of faith in Jesus. We know that he was releasing us from Newton and we listened, so we will continue to do that in the steps ahead. Your prayers are welcomed!

Better Late than Never.

2007-09-25T11:01:00.000-07:00

Here are some pics from the kids first day of preschool. This is Tyler's second year and JJ's first year. We told Tyler that he needed to look out for his brother. His reply to me was, "If someone bugs JJ I can hit them right dad?" I said not exactley. But Tyler did show his brother the ropes. It was VERY cute. Here are some pics...

They're Here....

2007-09-25T10:51:00.000-07:00

It took only 5 short years but family has officially started migrating out west. It started with the Smith's, Russ (Kellee's dad) has been living out here for a month, working in the excavating business. Once their home in Brantford sells then Lisa and Brennen will be coming out this way to join him. We see Russ about 4 or 5 times a week. Usually just short 'pop-in' visits. He drops off doughnuts for the boys, lets them jump on him, eats dinner and then leaves. Just last

Wednesday Shawn (my brother) made his way out here. Love is in the air in beautiful BC, he has found a girl who will actually spend time alone with him. I think he would move anywhere to cash in that offer, it just so happens to be near us. He has been staying with us for almost a week, but he will be moving into his own place on Oct 1. He also just started a job today! He is laying brick with a friend of mine from our church.

So it is a bit of a shift for our family. We are used to being out here all by ourselves...we love having family close, but we are still adjusting.

Camp Awesome!

2007-09-15T12:46:00.000-07:00

This is beyond late, but we spent the better part of the long weekend in Point Roberts (USA) at a camp that a friend of mine owns. He let us and 4 other families use the camp for a few days of awesome fun. It is pretty much 3 days of eating lots of food, letting our kids run wild, not showering, staying up way to late, and waking up ridiculously early. But yet it truly is Camp Awesome! Next year we have decided that we will make up shirts and the whole bit (right Andy!). But in all seriousness, it is a lot of fun just hanging out, not really doing a whole lot and enjoying the friendship we have with some truly 'awesome' people. Here are some pic highlights...

my boy working his mojo on the frew girl...way to go buddy!

the kiddies learning to shuck corn with auntie nadia

jj actually got one done!

Cool Guy. Amazing Message.

2007-09-10T22:39:00.000-07:00

the man in the video is mark driscoll he is a pastor at a church here in seattle. he explains the Good News that God has for all of us in a very simple way.

not sure what the first few minutes are, ignore those guys, they are idiots. but skip ahead to 3:30 to hear from mark.

Photo update

2007-08-30T00:18:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from my dad and brenda and co's visit.

me and my sweetheart at red robins

tyler hamming it up for grandma and grandpa

jj with some sweet hair on the sky train

capilano bridge
the family on the tree top bridge

my dad on the way home from whistler (without us!)
the boys at go banana's
the boys at the zoo.

do it!

uncle shawn sleeping.

Good-bye

2007-08-27T22:03:00.000-07:00

Reality has set in yet again. We just got back from the airport after dropping off my dad, Brenda, and brother Skylar off for their red-eye flight back to London. Friday night we also said good-bye to my brother Shawn (but that wasn't so sad, because he seems to fancy Amy, so he'll be back). We had an amazing visit (I'll blog about that later), which makes seeing them leave so much harder. It is really hard to watch my dad say good-bye to my kids. A little bit of guilt actually seeps in. And without fail every time we are saying good-bye to our family there is a small piece of me that really wants to move back to Ontario. We are content to be where God wants to use us. We trusting that God has called us here, and we want our lives to be used for the maximum Kingdom impact that they can. Sometimes following Jesus sucks. Tonight is one of those times.

us at Red Robins for dinner before hitting the airport (oh yeah I wear glasses now!)

Is this Parksville or Hell?

2007-08-23T10:53:00.000-07:00

Okay the title may be a bit over the top, but in all honesty the trip got off to a rocky start. We left off with our family getting pictures taken by a friend, and we booked the photo time around a ferry, giving us lots of time to make it from pictures to ferry. When we got back from the beach the night before we had an automated message from BC Ferries letting us know that the ferry that we had a reservation on was cancelled due to a ferry breakdown. So we scrambled to make another reservation, and we booked a 12:00pm ferry.

We get the pictures done, hit the road and fly to the terminal. In order for your reservation to be valid you have to be there at least 30 minutes before your sail time. We were 1 minute late. They would not let us on the boat. After I yelled at a bunch of people the best they could do was get us on the 2:00pm ferry to Shwartz Bay, meaning we still had a 2 hour drive once we got to the Island. so we did all of that and pulled up to our 'Resort' at about 6:30pm, tired, hungry, and whiny, and that was just me.

Our room was super expensive and a complete dive (never rent a room without seeing pictures first...mental note, there is a reason they don't put pictures on the website). So we told the boys not to touch anything and started phoning around for alternative sleeping arrangements ( I would have been happy in the van), but the best we could was find something for the next night. So we ate, slept, all woke up with ear aches and runny noses, and got outta dodge ASAP.

We went to the town park (very nice), had lunch, and attempted to check into our SWEET (and I mean sweet, probably the nicest place I have ever stayed) Resort (Tigh-Na-Mara) as early as possible. Our room was available, we unloaded our stuff and hit the beach!

before we hit the park we played a round of mini golf

my daredevil Tyler on the climbing equipment (I was quite nervous for this one) JJ trying to be like his big brother, I was so proud of him!We beached from about 1 - 5, hit the playground which included a bouncy castle, then went back to our room, put both the boys in our 2 person soaker tub, added some sunlight and turned on the jets...they loved it. Then we ordered pizza to the room, had a great family night, and rented an inroom movie (Meet the Robinsons, very good, I highly recommend it!). The boys passed out in the murphy and Kellee and I went and enjoyed the soaker tub. The rest of this story is very X rated, and I mean very!

my two princesses on the beach

Tyler and dad 'way out' deep in the water

the boys on the bouncy castle

the boys passed out in the murphy bed

The next morning we went back to the beach and the tide was out. It was ridiculously far, it took about 30 minutes to get to where the water was. We saw tonnes of cool stuff, shells, sand dollars, crabs, eagles, geese, jelly fish. When we got back to our room we packed up, hit some retarded little shopping village and then drove to Victoria to enjoy some ice cream, government buildings and the 9pm ferry.

us with the tide out. the houses you can see is how far we have to walk

the jelly fish we found

Kellee and JJ on a horse in Coombs Village

Tyler and Kellee on the same horse

It was the best holiday I have ever had.

Emilee being a princess

Does anyone read this?

2007-08-20T17:28:00.000-07:00

I am just curious if anyone actually reads our blog and if it is worth continuing...i realize that the posts have been infrequent as of late, and frankly we just dont have many friends, but if you read this could you throw down a post and let me know. thanks.

Holidays!

2007-08-16T22:14:00.000-07:00

Okay, so it has been a ridiculous amount of time since the last post. That is because facebook is actually the devil. My wife has gotten hooked on it and she reminds me to a 1 year old watching baby Einstein when she is on it. Blank stare for hours, drooling uncontrollably, it is really weird. We are getting help. Nonetheless, I have taken it upon myself to post on our behalf, so this may be different then you have experienced in the past. What have we been up too...

We got back from Rough Acres and had a week to kill at the church. Then was the holiday Monday. Kellee's dad arrived from Ontario (they are moving here and Russ is here ahead the family to work, while Lisa ties up loose ends in Ontario), and he brought his Seadoo with him. So we went to Cultus and had fun at the beach.

JJ and his mommy

My brave boy Tyler (check out his face)

The next day we woke up and got our family pictures taken by Traci Hewitson, Alicia's mom (a girl in our youth group, you can check her out at http://traceyhewitsonphotography.ca/). She wanted to give us something to say thank you for all that we have done for her daughter. It was a privilege to allow her to give us a wonderful gift. We had alot of fun. Check out our proofs.

From there we went on to Parksville. But I am a guy and this has been way to long and stressful so I am going to stop now. I will blog about Parksville later. Peace.

Rough Acres

2007-07-30T16:50:00.001-07:00

Hey guys, a rare post from Chris. For those who have been wondering what we have been up to the past 2 weeks we were in houston, bc (16 hours north of us) working at a camp with our youth group. here is a short video which we showed in church. i am positive that kellee will blog about our trip in the near future. until then....enjoy

Baby Brycen

2007-07-17T08:23:00.000-07:00

Congratulations Jacquee and Jay to baby number 4!

Happy 4th Birthday Tyler

2007-07-14T21:29:00.000-07:00

Wow...I can't believe that Tyler is already 4 years old. How time has flown by, and now we have three beautiful children. I can't believe it. Tyler sure is a big boy. He is a wonderful young man. And yes I mean man. He can't wait to grow up and be just like his dad. He wants to have more arm hair and leg hair. He was so excited the other day when he noticed that he has a small amount, one step closer to being like dad. He stepped on the scale this morning and wanted the weight indicator to move all the way to the other side. He asked me "when I get big like daddy will it move all the way to the other side?" I laughed and said, "yes when you get big like daddy you will weigh a lot too!" It's really neat to see him be so in love with his dad. Tyler is such a caring boy, he is always helping me with JJ and Emilee. He's so tender and sweet. But he's a boy boy as well. Playing basketball and rough-housing non stop, getting dirty and eating his boogers (which we're trying to stop). It's really neat to stop sit back and observe the changes that have taken place in his life. It's so neat to see how his mind work and that he understands so much, and can comprehend as well. Tyler, we love you so much and are so proud of you. We have had so much fun being your mom and dad, and are excited to continue to watch you grow and see where God takes you. Our prayer for you and your bother and sister is that you would grow to be passionate about God, and your life would be one that oozes with love for Him. Love you sweetheart!We had a little BBQ with some friends, and Tyler got a couple of things. We celebrated his birthday back when my family was here with Brennen. Chris and I gave him and JJ a new really cool basketball net. He also got a really cool Mack from Grammy and Papa and Uncle B.

The other day at the splash parkEmilee's first time in her very cute (thanks Kerri and Nathan) bathing suit

Video Of Emilee

2007-07-13T08:46:00.000-07:00

We're back

2007-07-09T20:49:00.000-07:00

So...so...so sorry for the lack of blogging. We have been slacking, and super busy. Our dear friends Nathan and Kerri were married on June 30th...(Brennen's 13th b-day...Happy birthday buddy). Chris performed the ceremony and was the MC as well. I had the pleasure of making the cake, which turned out great. And tasted great as well. After the business of the wedding we packed and headed to Keats Camp where Chris was speaking for the week. We had a fabulous week. We are tired and ready to be home, but had a great time.

Uncle Brennen and Tyler

Nathan and Kerri's ceremony
wedding cake
mom and emilee setting up the cake at the reception hall...thanks mom for all your help!

Here we are all dolled up
Here's Ty and I aboard the Brittania on the way to camp
Chris and Ty on the Brittania
Here are our boys...they had so much fun on the boat ride to Keats Island
This is the dining hall at Keats
Here are the boys, we were trying to entice JJ into peeing (not in his diaper) off the porch of the cabin we were staying in.

We are a really cool ski boat for a ride
Here is one of bald eagles that we saw on a number of occations.
JJ and Tyler had fun playing in a kiddy pool. They had more fun dumping dirt into the pool than slashing and getting wet.
This tyler's bed in the cabin, each night we read a bible story and the boys love to cuddle their little sweetheart before bed.
This is Tyler and Chris moments before jumping off a 25 feet dock into the ocean. Chris jumped a couple of times, and Tyler was all set to go but the life guards wouldn't let him, because his life jacket could choke him. He was so brave and jumped at a lower level.

This is the wall that free willy jumped, they filmed a lot of the movie across from the camp at Gibsons
My boys talked me into rock climbing...so I did.
Here is Chris speaking at church on the Island...the whole island comes to the camp for church outside on Sundays during the summer. Chris did a great job.
We meant to get a family picture outside our cabin, but this is as close as we got.
On the way home. It was a very rough ride. The boys were so tired, and the waves were causing the boat to rock, I almost lost it.
"Where's my sucky?"

Family Fun

2007-06-25T22:22:00.000-07:00

It's been a while since I have blogged...sorry. Time seems to keep getting away from me. We are doing well here. There is one more week until my family leaves. I sure am going to miss them. It has been so nice having them here. They have been a huge help to me and I so appriciate it, and the boys have loved having them here as well. Tonight at dinner Tyler asked Brennen if he would stay here and be his big brother. It was so cute. Here are a few pictures from the past couple of weeks.

Tyler at the Smiths for a BBQ
Emilee at the Smiths for a BBQ
Our first attempt for a family picture. It's that much harder getting everyone to look!Emilee has been smiling for quite some time now, but I can't seem to get her to smile for the camera. So this is the closest that I can get to a smile.

Tyler being cute Tyler
We celebrated Tyler and Brennen's birthday on Saturday
Emilee is 5 weeks

Brennen and Emilee

Fun at Kaleb's Birthday Party

2007-06-13T15:47:00.000-07:00

On Monday we went to Bear Creek Park for Tyler and JJ's good friend, Kaleb's, 4th birthday. The boys had so much fun. It was a nice, but windy day. Here are some pictures of the boys and one of Emilee all bundled up. Emilee is doing good. I took her to the doctor's this morning because she has had a really stuffed up nose. The stuffiness comes and goes, but it's uncomfortable for her, and she is choking a bit because of it. So I thought I would go and get her checked out. Well, he said that she's fine...no sign of a cold. Sometimes babies can get stuffy noses due to the dry air. So that's good, I'm glad it's not sickness related. Other than that she is doing great.

Emilee's 3 Weeks

2007-06-09T15:50:00.000-07:00

Sleeping on Papa
I was trying to get her to smile

Our Stubborn Little Eater

2007-06-08T08:37:00.000-07:00

This is JJ. Let me tell you how stubborn he is. He is not such a good eater. The last couple of weeks he has been especially challenging getting him to eat dinner. Chris and I have this rule that what they don't eat at dinner they will eat it the next time they are hungry. Even if that means the next day for breakfast. So this seems to be the routine. JJ eats his dinner for breakfast of lunch the next day. But on this particular day JJ went 24hours without eating. It was so hard on all of us. But close to 7pm the next day he finally finished, and was very proud of it. We all celebrated that the punishment was finished!

Emilee asleep on Grammy
Tyler and his little sister

Uncle Brennen and his littlest niece

More wonderful pictures

2007-06-03T14:40:00.000-07:00

Emilee loves her swing, especially when she has her beautiful pink blanket!
Tyler and JJ have loved playing outside, it has been gorgeous here!
JJ and Ty love playing with play dough Brennen is so COOL!
This is Emilee, being held by Judy Hunter at our Ann. party
Emilee at a party, wearing party clothes, isn't she beautiful!

Happy 5th Anniversary to Us and Jay and Jacquee!

2007-06-02T22:36:00.001-07:00

Yesterday was our fifth anniversary. We didn't really do anything because a lady in our church...Nancy Garner...ordered quite a large cake from me. So Chris and I decided that we wouldn't go out on Friday, but Saturday instead after the stress of making the cake was over. I almost didn't take the cake job, but she offered to pay double, so I couldn't turn down the money. So yesterday I baked and iced the cakes, and decorated them today. After the work was all finished, I got all cleaned up and go ready for our date out to White Rock to the Boathouse. Well, Nancy came to pick up her cake at 5:30 and she and my parents were in the kitchen, and she was writing the cheque...come to find out that the cake that I had slaved over was for our SURPRISE ANNIVERSARY PARTY. My parents had planned a great party for us. So we didn't get to go out, but we will make that up another night. We really enjoyed the party with some of our closest friends. Thanks for everyone that came to celebrate with us, and thanks to mom and dad who love us and encourage us and blessed us with a great party! A special Happy Anniversary to Jason and Jacquee who are also celebrating their fifth! I love you so much!

Emilee's Baby Shower

2007-05-29T14:44:00.000-07:00

Thank you so much to the ladies in my church who blessed Emilee and myself with a baby shower. Everybody gave such wonderful gifts. Emilee will look beautiful! The shower was on Sunday afternoon at Jody Leite's house. Emilee was wonderful. She didn't mind being passed around from her many admirers. We had a lovely afternoon of socializing, thrilling games (!) and yummy chocolate fondue, oh plus a little gift opening.

Emilee in her first party dress, bought by Daddy and the boys

Emilee's first bathing suite, how cute!

The boys and Basketball

2007-05-25T17:54:00.001-07:00

It has been beautiful here in bc, and the boys have been outside playing with uncle brennen and papa any chance they can. they have so been loving basketball. chris and i have been looking for a net to buy the boys for ty's birthday. in one of the pictures tyler is reading emilee a book. what a great big brother.

1 week old

2007-05-25T17:17:00.000-07:00

Emilee is one week old today. At one week she is doing great. She will smile, but only at mom. She is doing really well holding her neck up. She, like her big brother is doing baby crunches. Emilee is doing good at night. She had one bad night, and couple okay nights, and several good nights. She likes to sleep on my tummy. She has been waking only to eat. She had her first bath at home today, and she wasn't a big fan. She screamed. I'm not sure if it was because of the bath or because of the fact that I attempted to cut her nails, and ended up cutting her finger, and drawing blood. I felt so bad. I hate cutting baby's nails. So I won't anymore. I'm learning that she loves to be held and snuggled. She has really smelly poops, like the rest of the family (except mom, she always smells good!) She doesn't mind the company, because we have been blessed with many visit from our friends. Which we have loved having. Chris and I have noticed how blessed we are to have such great friends and family. Thank you to everyone who has taken and interest in our family at this time. Plus all the gifts! Thank you, thank you, thank you. I went from having one sleeper to a whole lot more. So thanks again!

We are loving having a baby girl. She is a blessing to our family. Tyler and JJ love her, especially JJ. He has surprised us with his interest in her. He always wants to know where she is, wants to give her love, and lots of toys. He likes to give her presents. Daddy, is falling in love, and it's so cute to see. Every morning he tells me how special and beautiful she is. Emilee is the addition to our family that God knew we needed. Thank you God for our family! And thank you again!

the boys thoughts on their new sister

2007-05-21T09:34:00.000-07:00

Some More Of Our Princess

2007-05-20T12:15:00.000-07:00

THE BOYS THOUGHT THEIR SISTER WOULD LIKE THEIR NEW DINOSAURS

THIS IS WHERE THEY POKED HER, BUT SHE DIDN'T EVEN CRY...SHE'S A TOUGHIE!
WHAT A BEAUTIFUL PRINCESS
I LOVE MY MOMMY!

We had a really good first night home. The boys were so excited and hyper most the night, and were excited to see her again in the morning. Tyler asked last night if Emilee could sleep with him. He's so cute! We actually did some sleeping. We bought a soother, which helped a bit. After a whole day of sleeping we thought she would be up all night, but she did really well. Today daddy and the boys went to church, and left us "girls" home to rest. Chris has been such an amazing help and great dad. I can't express with words how he has been making me feel. I'm so thankful to have husband like you honey...thank you for all you have done and do for our family!

Emilee Renee Synesael

2007-05-19T22:07:00.000-07:00

Hello everyone. It is late. We are tired. So this will be a quick post and some pictures, followed by more details, more pictures and some video in the next day or two.

On Wednesday, Kellee went to the doctor at 10:30am. The doctor said she was in labor and was 3cms dialated and when her contractions are more painful and more regular she should go to the hospital. She tracked me down at the Newton Starbucks and we went shopping go figure. Then we went home, had lunch and everyone took a little nap. Kellee packed the essentials, the boys were picked up by Jody Leite and we were off to the hospital. Not before a quick stop at Quiznos.

We got to the hospital at 3pm, Kellee was in pain, they checked her out and she was 4cms. They put her in a room, did a whole bunch of paper work and useless stuff, checked her again and she was 9cms, but her water hadnt broke yet. They couldn't get ahold of a doctor, her water broke, she was fully dialated and after about 5 minutes of intense pushing we had a baby. I am sure our lives will never be the same.

Emilee Renee Synesael
7lbs 9ozs
born at 4:58pm on Friday, May 18th

kellee gettin' high

first picture of Emilee

mom and baby

dad and baby

boys and baby

one more of just baby

Happy Mother's Day

2007-05-13T15:30:00.000-07:00

Happy Mother's Day!
As some of you may already know Chris has been quite sick and in bed almost all week. He has really needed the time to get better and I'm actually thankful for the time he has taken to get well. So Chris said to me earlier this week, if it's okay with you can we do mother's day next weekend? I was certainly okay with that. So today was a pretty low key day for us. We went out for Starbucks this morning, church then to Boston Pizza, where mom eat for free on Mother's Day. It was nice. Now my family is resting. Later we will be watching the season finale of Survivor. I have been feeling kind of yucky today. Definitely a good yucky, kind of crampy, and a few contractions. Who knows maybe the baby will be coming soon. It would be nice if my mom was here in time though, and she is planning on arriving on May 21st, so hopefully the baby will not come before then.

A special thank you to our mothers. Mom, you are such an intrical part of my life and I'm so appreciative for the love (sacrificial) that you have given me over the years. I am so thankful for the blessing you have been in my life and now in my kids lives. You are one of my main supporters, and cheerleaders. You have given me so much encouragement, and confidence as I have been maturing, and learning in the new phases of my life as a mother and wife. I love you so much, and am looking so forward to seeing you next week. It has been way too long, and I can't wait for our reunion. Oh, and I guess I'm excited to see Bren and Dad too. Just joking, I'm very excited.
Thank you Brigitte for the mother you have been to Chris. I have been so blessed to be married to a man, a true man, respectful and loving. You have done such a great job raising him. You have been part of making a man that so many others are blessed to know and have in their lives. Thank you also for being such a great grandma. Our kids are so lucky to have grandparents that truly love them, and desire to build into them. Thank you. Thank you!
Thank you Brenda for the love and the care that you have given our family. Thank you for all your support over the years, and the love that you have given your grandsons. We are lucky to have you be part of our lives.

On Thursday at Preschool, Tyler had a special Mother's Day Tea. I was his special date for the morning, and it was the most wonderful morning. He was so cute and so proud of the gifts he made for me. Here is a video highlighting some of the morning.

17 More Days

2007-05-09T22:01:00.000-07:00

Avoiding the sickness!

2007-05-09T21:44:00.000-07:00

My family is sick. Chris has something, he doesn't know what, but he thinks he's dying (he's joking). He does feel horrible. I took JJ to the doctor on Sunday, and he has an ear infection, and some sort of eye infection. Then today Tyler was not himself. So I'm thinking that he's coming down with something too. So I'm in the midst of a battle zone here. I have just over two weeks to go, and I really don't want to get sick. (Oh, the little girl I babysit is sick too). So if you think to pray for our family, please pray that my precious boys feel better, and that I'm able to boycott it. Bye!

Our Biggest Bike Rider

2007-04-30T13:21:00.000-07:00

Cakes By Kellee

2007-04-24T10:22:00.000-07:00

I have started a blog for my little cake making and decorating business. Please go and check it out. I have listed the site on my Blog Roll. Or you can visit http://www.cakesbykellee.blogspot.com/.

Baby Poll

2007-04-21T22:33:00.000-07:00

As you may already know...it is getting close to baby time! I made a fun poll, so go ahead and vote...but please don't make Chris happy and vote for the boy's name - Sh1. He suggested that if that name gets the most votes that we would name the baby that. Yeah Right!

Anyways we have 5 weeks left until the due date, and everything is going great. I'm definitely getting bigger. And ready to pop!

A New Doo

2007-04-19T08:16:00.000-07:00

We had an interesting day yesterday. Tyler and I went grocery shopping, and Chris and JJ stayed home. JJ decided that while dad was in the shower he needed a new doo. So he caked his hair with Desitin Diaper Cream. He called it ice cream. What a mess.

BEFOREAFTER

IN BETWEEN
It was kind of a stressful day, but it's over, and now he has really cute short hair with permanent gel/wax, (at least until the cream is totally gone)!

Our Birthday Celebrations!

2007-04-13T22:58:00.000-07:00

Chris and I celebrated our 27th and 28th birthdays yesterday. Yes we have the same birthday. We really enjoy sharing our birthdays, it's always really special. April 12th, as we have been learning, is quite a popular date. There are many others who share this day, including two our of our friends children. Yesterday we were able to enjoy an evening together. Thank you so much to Andy and Niki for watching our boys, so we could have a night out. It was truly one of the best dates we have ever had. Thanks again.

Here are a couple of pictures from the restaurant we went to.

Today we got a babysitter, whom the boys love, and had another evening out. We are spoiled, I know. We went to one of our favorite restaurants, East Side Mario's. We were joined by some great friends. It was a lot of fun. Thanks guys for sharing this special evening with us. It means a lot to us!

Thank you to my sweetheart for marrying me, and sharing this special day with me every year. I love you so much!

What a Great Easter Holiday!

2007-04-09T22:13:00.000-07:00

Happy Easter! We had a really great weekend. For the most part we had really nice weather. We went to our Good Friday morning breakfast and service (which Chris put together, and did quite a good job). We had a very relaxing afternoon, playing outside all day and evening. Saturday we did some more relaxing, and enjoying our family. Sunday was a busy day, but a great day. We stuffed ourselves at the Samsons, with our family away from family. It was a lot of fun. Then on Monday we spend the evening our in Ladner with our youth pastor friends. We had an egg hunt, which the boys ate all of their candy. Then we played in the gym. JJ spent a lot of time trying to make a basket that he was never going to make, but that didn't stop him. He is determined! We had a great evening. And are ready for the week ahead...our birthdays!

Fun with our new camera

2007-04-07T18:13:00.000-07:00

Chris and I have bought ourselves a new camera...due to the fact that we are having a baby in 6 short weeks. We don't want to miss any precious moments. Since our birthdays are in a few days we splurged and bought a new camera, that we are both excited about. I have been having fun taking lots of pictures.

We have been doing pretty good here. Since the last snow fall, it has actually been really nice. We have been outside all the time. Tyler, JJ and I went to the doctor early this morning to get Ty's cough checked out, and it turns out he has a bad ear infection and braunchitus. I asked the doctor about the potential of Asama, and he thinks that he very well could have it, so were are going to watch more carefully and look into it after this round of antibiotics are finished.

Chris has started baseball for the year, and he's really enjoying it. The boys love watching him, and are quite enthused at any sport their dad plays. I know this goes without being said, but Chris loves basketball and the boys are really loving the sport as well. Both the boys come running when Chris is watching it. So I am currently looking for a secondhand outdoor plastic net, that they can play with.

I am only 6 weeks away from my due date. I'm getting so excited. My tummy is growing nicely. I have been getting more and more painful contractions along with the braxton hicks contractions. Well have a happy Easter!

April Foolishness

2007-04-02T11:00:00.000-07:00

April fools day came a day late this year. This is crazy! We may as well live in Ontario. It had been raining for the last 3 years, okay, maybe not 3 years, but for sure it had been 6 weeks. Then we got a couple of nice days, I was thinking the sun was coming to stay, and blam-o! I woke up on April 2nd looked out my window and this is what I saw. SNOW. Laugh it up Ontarioans, while you can. Soon balance of the universe will be restored and we will be enjoying our picturesque weather. Until then....

Feeling Sad

2007-03-23T09:42:00.000-07:00

My sister left yesterday. We had such a great week. I miss her so much. Sometimes it's so hard being miles away from the people you love, and I'm feeling that today. This last week wasn't event filled. We mostly rested, and relaxed. Since Jacquee was away from her normal business of three kids, it was nice to do a lot of relaxing. (Thank you Jay for letting me have your wife for a week, it means so much.) Yesterday, the boys and I went to Seattle to drop her off at the airport, then back home again. We spent the rest of the day moping around, and sleeping. Chris and I were both wasted, and couldn't do much. Chris preach a real zinger in his homiletics class yesterday, and had some great reviews. I'm so proud of him.

Above is Jacquee and I out for dinner one evening, and below is JJ, Madison, and Emmalea wearing my belts.

Below is the boys getting into all of mom's personal hygene products, they thought the tampons were pretty cool!

Below is a huge goose egg madison got from falling on the corner of the wall. Ooch!
My sister is quite the photographer, so her and I had some fun taking pregnancy pictures. Here are a couple. Thanks Jacq for the great belly pictures. I will never forget the fun.

Is It May Yet?

2007-03-09T19:48:00.000-08:00

The Boys LOVE pretending to make donuts, Chris and I are eating donuts all day long. They need their special Krispy Kream hats in order to make the donuts.

After we are finished making donuts. We like to fix things. And since I finally put new batteries in the drill, it's extra fun. And after a long day of playing, we get all clean, and help mom clean the bathroom walls.
Now we are ready for bed and are watching Over the Hedge in mom and dad's big bed. Mom is so happy that we are settled, and calm...
For some reason it has been a long day for me. And I'm so ready for bed time. Sorry that I haven't been so good at updating the blog lately. I have been feeling pregnant!
Today I went to the hospital to get tested for gestational diabetes. I had to chug that orange drink. I actually don't mind it. It's like orange pop. So I think that I'm fine. I didn't feel any of the symptoms that I was supposed to be looking for. What I don't like is the needle part. You would think after having two babies, that I would get used to the needle thing. But I still hate it. Especially when the technician is rough and careless (like today). Anyways. The fun part of my hospital visit was registering. I went to the maternity ward, and filled out all the paper work. It was so exciting being there. All these fond memories came rolling back. And we are all excited for May to come.

Tyler has been learning his months in preschool, and we go over the date all the time. He keeps asking me if it is May yet. He is excited for the baby. When I told him this morning that I was going to the doctor, he asked me if I was going to have the baby. Quite often he tells me, as he's rubbing my tummy, that my baby is growing. He is knows that the time is coming soon.

Guess what...my sister is coming to visit.

I'm so excited. It was a last minute trip idea. Jacquee and Madison are flying here on Tuesday. JJ and myself are driving down to Seattle to get her. (Isn't Seattle such a beautiful city!)So I'm sure I will put some more pictures of us on later. I have no idea what we are going to do, but I'm sure it will be fun. We always have fun together!

We've been having a tough time with potty training Tyler through the night. Both Chris and I are unsure if we are making the right decisions. We have been pretty persevering. We haven't wanted to give up...or retreat. So he has been going without diapers since Christmas, and has done pretty good, as long as he has no liquids in his belly. But now that he is on the top bunk it makes it challenging for him to want to get down and go in the middle of the night. We think that maybe he just isn't ready, so we put him in pull-ups and will continue to encourage and reward the dry nights. I have found potty training to be one of the hardest hurdles to overcome...so far...(I'm sure there are many to come). I am thankful for rest I have had the last couple on days in not washing sheets!

Some Cute boys

2007-03-02T20:54:00.000-08:00

Here are our boys getting some sweet hairdo's after bathtime.

What Boo-tiful Day!

2007-02-28T14:33:00.000-08:00

Jesus makes cute babies. Probably enjoying this blogging thing too much.

How Exciting!

2007-02-27T00:28:00.000-08:00

Our New Beds!

2007-02-26T21:19:00.000-08:00

Our family had a very busy day off. Chris installed some lights in our kitchen, I went shopping AND...we got new bunk beds. We were all very excited, especially Ty and JJ. Check out the video we captured of their excitement. We spent an hour and half getting them to stay in bed and sleep. At the end of it all, Tyler is in JJ's room and JJ is in the bottom bunk, and hopefully we are good for the night. We'll try again tomorrow. Good Night

A sick boy!

2007-02-25T20:19:00.000-08:00

Our big Tyler was sick last night and today. He seemed fine throughout the day, then when bedtime hit, the coughing hit also. We were up until 2am trying to calm the coughing, gaging, and vomiting. He has had a cold for the last couple of days, and I wonder if the cold (and coughing) is caused by cows milk. I have for a while now given my kids goats milk as a good alternative to cows milk, and haven't necessarily noticed any differences. But when I took them off the goat milk they both got colds following the change. Any ideas, like to hear feedback. Also, the cough, not sure what I can do to help it. It's not a bark, and it's not chesty at all, he just can't stop coughing...to the point where he's vomiting. So I'm going back to the goats milk, until I can figure something out. Hopefully we will have a more restful night. I sure need all the rest I can get! Thank you to Chris for all your help today!

Kellee's Belly

2007-02-24T15:49:00.000-08:00

Here is a shot of our little baby to be still inside of his hot mom. This picture was taken at about 21 weeks. We are now at about 28 weeks. (Thanks Chris)! We are all getting very excited, especially me about having our third baby. I'm getting ready to have it. The poor little baby knows what kind of house he/she is being born into because it is constantly getting kicked, needless to say it leaves mom in pain. Chris and I were commenting today that we are going to have to be way more protective of our new little one with two wild boys.

I have been a little uncomfortable as of late. I need to slow down a bit, relax a little more, and stop the routine I have so become accustomed to (never sitting). So in my attempt to sitting more, I started a very old knitting project. I'm knitting an afghan. I'm actually enjoying it. I do love knitting. My mom bought me wool years and years ago to make this afghan (thanks mom), and it has been sitting, very unfinished, in my closet. I'm grateful for the project to work on.

As I enter into the last trimester of the pregnancy, I'm so grateful to God for giving me this precious gift. There is something very comforting about making it to 28 weeks, and I praise God every day for the blessing!

in the beginning

2007-02-22T20:43:00.000-08:00

hello to everyone who is reading our blog for the first time. Chris and I have started this blog to allow others (friends and family) to take a closer look into our family. We are excited to share with you our kids. We will have have updated pictures, provided that I stay on top of changing it. I'm not so sure I will be as good as Niki, but I will get better. We also hope to provide live action videos of us. We are excited, primarily to be able to share us with our family who we don't ever get to see, and who we miss very much!