July Update

Hey everyone,

Here’s a short update on what’s been happening in our personal lives in the last couple of months.

Camping! We’ve taken several camping trips as a family this summer. Most of them have been for just one night. It’s easy to get an hour or two away from Denver and into the mountains and the kids just love it. We did take a longer trip a few weeks ago that was really fun. We usually try to take a summer vacation each year and rather than go somewhere far away this year, we camped for three nights up in the Steamboat Spring area and then stayed one night at a guest ranch in southern Wyoming (see picture of the girls in front of the Snowy Mountain range in Wyoming). Norton did a lot of fly-fishing and the kids always got excited when he reeled one in! We also took our bikes (we put Marin in a seat on the back of Janis’ bike and Norton pulled Townsend and Ellory in a trailer) and had fun riding around the campgrounds with them.

Family. Janis’ parents came to visit for about a week this July. They drove up from Texas and made it here in time to celebrate Townsend’s fourth birthday. Even though it’s been fairly warm here in Denver, it’s still nothing compared to the heat and humidity they experience in Texas, so they’ve loved just sitting on the back porch and playing with the grandkids.

Guatemala. We’re going back to Guatemala in August with a small team from the church. We’ve always wanted to take the kids back there on a regular basis and now that our church is considering doing missions down there, it’s a great fit for us. Townsend will be traveling with us (Norton’s parents are coming to Denver to watch the girls while we’re gone). He couldn’t be more excited. It’s all he keeps talking about. I don’t think he has any idea what to expect but every few days, he starts setting out all the clothes and toys he wants to take with him on the trip. He’s even packed toys for Michael, Amanda, and Quinn who will be traveling with us.

Church. Summer is usually slower in church world in Denver since everyone is outdoors and having fun, but we’ve stayed pretty busy. Norton is helping to teach a class we’re doing on Wednesday nights and he just started a new sermon series on the thorny issue of creation and evolution. As far as growth goes, we continue to be encouraged. We’ve had a couple of conversations with people who have decided to leave the church because they don’t think it’s a good fit for them. On the flip side, we’ve had many more people from all places in their journeys of faith who have connected well and gotten involved. Our attendance is growing and we continue to see our local giving grow. We knew it would take some time to build a core group of local people who would invest financially and we’re not fully self-sustainable yet. But the trend is moving upward and all indications are that we’re on the right track!

School. This fall, Norton has decided to go back to school part-time to pursue a Ph.D. at the University of Denver/Iliff School of Theology. He’ll be studying contemporary American religious history and just taking one or two classes at a time (he’ll still devote the majority of his time to the church.) It will be a long road and probably take 5-7 years to complete since he’s just be doing this “on the side,” but it doesn’t hurt to go ahead and start chipping away at it now. And it’s great that we only live a mile or so from the campus.

That’s it for now. Stay in touch and take care.

~Norton, Janis, Townsend, Ellory and Marin

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