September 2017

In September we enjoyed some unseasonably warm weather, and we tried to make the most of it.  We enjoyed spending lots of time outdoors with family and friends.

We went up to my sister's cottage and enjoyed some wading, since the water is so shallow.  R enjoyed playing in the water, and had some fun floating in an inner-tube until a big wave came and splashed her in the face.  

On Labor Day we went to the beach for the annual Jasperse family pancake cookout.  It was another perfect kite flying day.  I taught Sam how to fly my new parafoil kite, it is a real blast to fly.  I also was able to fly my new kite train, I took 6 cheap kites and made the strings to tie them together so they can fly in a train.  The wind was pretty strong so they pulled a lot.  Later I took them apart so that each of our friend's kids could fly one.  It was a lot of fun!

I traveled to North Carolina again for the graduation of my year long course that I have been taking there.  A big group from our church took this course to learn how to minister healing and deliverance in Jesus' name.  We enjoyed seeing all of the other people from around the country that also took the course, and we got to present our projects to the whole group.  This is an exciting ministry and we are thankful that we have been able to pray with people often and see them experience freedom.

I always have loved the mountains!  We stayed in a mountain chalet with this view!

R continued to grow and thrive, her personality continued to come out more and more.  She enjoyed playing with other children whenever she had the chance.

She loved going on walks to the park during the day with Rebecca and seeing the geese that were there.  She also enjoyed picking apples off of our tree and biting them.

At the end if the month we decided to take an impromptu trip to Beaver Island for our 14th anniversary.  We left early Friday morning and took the ferry over.  It was really windy and rough and I think that R was the only one of us that wasn't feeling a little queasy.  

This was our first time to Beaver Island and we enjoyed it very much.  It is a very beautiful place and because we went so late in the season it was very quiet too.

We stayed at an apartment we found on AirBNB, it was very close to the ferry, right in the main town.

The owner was great, he let us borrow his car so that we could drive around and see some sights that we wouldn't have been able to on foot.  We saw lots of deer everywhere we went.

We got to explore this old lighthouse...

We saw lots of beautiful scenery...

And R was very fascinated by the deer head on the wall at the restaurant we ate dinner at.

We were able to catch a beautiful sunset...

Visit the other lighthouse on the island...

And take a nice walk along the beach, spotting some parts of an old shipwreck along the way.

All of this was in one day!  While we were there we decided we would like to stay a little longer than we would have been able to if we had taken the ferry back, so we booked a flight on a small plane in the afternoon.

This was our first time flying in such a small airplane, it was a 6 seater!  It was really fun, definitely one of the highlights of the trip.  Plus it kept our streak alive of flying at least once a year for the past 10 years.

R really enjoyed it too, she wasn't afraid at all, it figures with how adventurous she is.  She is such a great fit in our family!

At church it was a busy month too as we launched Children's Worship for our older children after being off for the summer.  Our youth group met for most of the summer so there wasn't much of a launch there but we started doing lessons again that focused on teaching some basic ways to pray.  It was a great month as we saw lots of fruit from the ministry that happened over the summer months.  

September was a nice and memorable month, we are thankful to God for the many ways he blessed us and took care of us.  We are thankful too for all of you that prayed for us and encouraged us as we continued to navigate through the uncertainties of the foster care process.  We saw God bringing fruit there as his plan seemed to be coming together, something we saw even more of in October.  That post will be coming soon!