Some BFF time at Red Robin

Sheryl and I have been best friends since the 3rd grade. It is always fun to hang out together, and this trip we met for dinner at Red Robin. Love Tay like family and the kids all have so much fun playing and being silly together. Here are several attempts at taking a picture of the three of them.

Schoen Family Reunion

The first weekend in August, we were in Colorado for a family reunion on my dad’s side. My grandma is one of two of the siblings left from that generation. She was not able to attend the reunion, but I think most everyone trickled in for a visit with her in the nursing home during their visit to Colorado. My parents hosted the gathering at their house on Friday night, and the next day we all met at Castlewood Canyon State Park for a BBQ, hang out and/or exploration time. I am still obtaining some pictures from this trip, and don’t have one of just my grandma’s family. Going to the canyon is one of my boys’ traditions when we go visit grandparents in the summer. Highlights include walking in the creek and trying to catch crawdads - which my sister, Alicia is great at! Aunt Alicia and Sam searching the water for crawdads.Sam and Mom. Dad (Russ) took the picture from the trail up above. He has tender feet and doesn’t especially enjoy all the rock scrambling. We need to invest in some great hiking sandals. Water shoes don’t really work, as they fill up with sand.Precious Bella. Everyone had such a great time, and voted for my parents to host it again next time. I think the idea of a summer break to Colorado rather than Kansas or Texas helped in the matter also.

US Conference in Omaha – July

Our family attended the US Conference of Mennonite Brethren churches this summer in Omaha, NE. Every other year, the US Conference meets, and in between those years, the Southern District (KS, OK, CO, AR). The boys and I have been able to go to several if they are somewhere around the middle of the US. Russ has also enjoyed Canada and North Carolina.

These conferences are usually a highlight to my year. I love being challenged and encouraged in my faith and the life of ministry we are in. And as the years pass, I am really enjoying being part of something bigger than our local church and seeing other brothers and sisters in Christ that we share so much in common with in ministry. Of course, each year looks different considering the stage of parenting we are in. Last year the kids stayed with Papa and Mema while Russ and I were in Norman, OK, for the conference. However, we had a wonderful time together as a family this year. That definitely changes how much we are able to connect with others, but we embrace the individual moment.

One morning, the children had their faces painted in their childcare session. One of our speakers was Jim Nicodem, pastor of Christ Community Church in the Chicago area, and author of Prayer Coach.  We had several sessions and enjoyed his challenge on prayer. The closing evening, Alex Kendrick, from the movie Courageous, spoke to us. He was funny and I really enjoyed hearing how God used Alex way outside of his box. We also enjoyed beautiful jazz worship from one of the church plant pastoral couples in Omaha and their band.

Close friends of ours, the Humbers, are church planters with this musical couple and their family in Omaha now. We’ve known them from our time at Denver Seminary. When Russ and Stephen graduated, we went to Corn, and the Humbers went to Hillsboro. They moved to Omaha the summer after we moved to Newton. It was wonderful to see them and spend time together with them again. And let me just say most enthusiastically what a fantastic town Omaha is! It has so many fun things to do. We tried to do some exploring in the afternoons during our free time (that is when we weren’t swimming at the hotel). Neat shopping districts, and cultural elements abound through the city. And the Omaha Zoo is currently ranked the number one zoo in the US. We found that our Wichita Zoo membership partnered with the Omaha Zoo, and decided to go take in a few hours. We were also relieved that the afternoon high was only 88 degrees vs. 105 from the day before and so chose to venture outdoors a little more then. We couldn’t even begin to cover the entire zoo, but hit the jungle and aquarium areas for starters. An absolutely amazing aquarium! On our final day, before driving home, we explored downtown a little. We had heard that there was a super cool slide to go down while sitting on wax paper. The trashcans were just stuffed with wax paper, and while gross for me to think about now, we all grabbed a few pieces and went for it! On our way there, we discovered a beautiful little river walk. I wish the grass wasn’t all dried up and crusty, but a las, that is the result of the current drought. This slide was fun and amazingly dangerous! And also very hot. (This day was back to the 100s). There is a pedestrian bridge crossing over the Missouri river between Omaha and Council Bluffs, IA. We walked most of the way across, mainly far enough to stand in two states at one time. You could see how much the river was down then, and that was a month ago already.

Fun times! Omaha is definitely worth returning to. I wish I felt this enthusiastic about Wichita. Perhaps its time to do a little more exploring there.