The Rock I've Been Under

I've been thinking about crawling out from under the rock I've been hiding under and making another post on this blog. My final year of School is getting ready to start back up and for some reason that makes me want to blog. I don't seem to have the desire to blog during the summer months as the same thing happened last summer. Maybe it's because while summer is a break from school for me, it's not really a break in other aspects.

This summer I have worked many 70+ hour weeks at work, have been involved in a teaching ministry at a boys detention center, and have become a treasurer at our church. Robin and Crysta and Kayla have been super busy doing CEF 5-day Bible clubs which have resulted in more then 40 decisions to accept Christ.

I took Serena camping by the Niangua river while Robin and the other two girls were away at the CEF training camp. Robin and I also got to spend a few days in Branson, MO for our anniversary and had so much fun we decided to bring the girls back down for a day to ride the DUKS. We did that while Crysta went to St. Louis to do inner-city missions work. What are the DUKS? I'll post pictures on the picasaweb album for you to go look at and you'll figure it out.

I've tried to spend some time being creative with my camera. Don't know if I've been successful or not. Maybe I'll post some pictures On here and let you decide that for me. We'll see.

I've used the pronoun "I" way too much in this post, but I am too lazy to be any more creative than that.

So, that's the skinny on what's been going on in the Porter family.

Oh yea, I also discovered facebook and have been having fun catching up with old friends and keeping up with new friends. If you don't have a facebook you should just get one. Look me up when you do. I'll be sure to approve you as my friend.

See you sooner or later.

Ken

No New Posts?

Yea, I know. I've been very busy finishing up classes. Let me get through finals week next week and I'll start posting again.

All is well here, by the way.

He is coming!

If a picture is worth a thousand words, how many words is a short video clip worth?

She's home!

Thank you, Jesus.

It's Friday

She will be home this evening. Yay!

I'm getting butterflies in my stomach.

One

The early 70's band Three Dog Night sang this popular song that I can now identify with heartily.

One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
Two can be as bad as one
It's the loneliest number since the number one

No is the saddest experience you'll ever know
Yes, it's the saddest experience you'll ever know
`Cause one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
One is the loneliest number, worse than two

It's just no good anymore since she went away
Now I spend my time just making rhymes of yesterday

One is the loneliest, number one is the loneliest
Number one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
One is the loneliest, one is the loneliest
One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
It's just no good anymore since she went away
(Number) One is the loneliest
(Number) One is the loneliest
(Number) One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do
(Number) One is the loneliest
(Number) One is the loneliest
(Number) One is the loneliest number that you'll ever do

You see, for some crazy reason I agreed with my wife that she should go away for two weeks to attend a Child Evangelism Fellowship training course.

I must have been delirious at the time.

I knew that things around the house would run smoothly because Robin has done a superb job of training our three girls in homemaking skills and we have worked hard to teach them proper behavior. No, they are not perfect, but the are well behaved so with a little bit of encouragement from daddy I don't worry too much about that kind of stuff.

I also knew I would miss my wife, but this is just too much. I almost took off Tuesday to go see her but I was able to get a hold of myself and meet my obligations at home. Fortunate for me, she will be home Friday evening. That's only two days from now.

I can't wait.

Nikon D40

As you have probably figured out by now if you have been reading this blog, I got a new camera recently. It is a Nikon D40. It came with an 18-55 kit lens. I also bought the superb 18-200 f3.5-5.6 VR lens. VR stands for Vibration Reduction. This lens is revolutionary in that it pretty much replaces all other lenses for practical uses. Of course, there will always be other lenses that you COULD use or may I dare say NEED for one reason or another, but this one could be the only lens the average family photographer like me ever really needs.



Here is the excellent 18-200 f3.5-5.6 VR lens.

Live, in concert....

We had the privilege to go see Mark Lowery and Lordsong in concert at High Street Baptist Church Friday evening. It was a good concert and we had a great time. Mark's facial expressions and gestures are ripe for anyone with a camera. We didn't have great seats for photographing but I did manage to get some good shots. You can view the other photo's here.

I'm starting to feel old

My oldest child turned 15 today. It's difficult to believe that I have a 15 year old child. She's really not a child anymore. In fact, this whole week and next she is the acting lady of the house. Robin is away at a CEF training school until the 15th. Crysta has done an excellent job being in charge of the house and all that that entails. I'm very proud of my 15 year old. Here she is last summer playing with water jets at the zoo. You can see more zoo photos at my Google Picasa Web Album here.

Fun In The Snow

Yep, it snowed this morning. The girls and I had fun playing in the snow. Crysta and Kayla threw snow all over the place but generally toward each other. They even hit their target occasionally. We had lots of fun. I took over 500 pictures of them throwing snow and building a snowman. You can see all the pictures by clicking here. Enjoy.

I just love the white fluffy stuff

It snowed last night. It snowed a lot last night. It snowed enough for them to close campus and cancel classes. That was glorious. I needed the time off. This is a picture of our house at 2:30 in the morning while it was snowing. If you look closely you can see the porch light and front door in the upper center of the photo.

This is a picture of our house from the same vantage point after the snow decided to stop falling later that day.


It doesn't look like it snowed all that much from this photo but it was also very windy and much of the snow drifted. That means we had areas of light snow and also areas of 8 to 10 inch deep snow. Anyway, snow is fun and we had fun in the snow that day.

Books, Part Two

All those books down there that you have been looking at since January are what I have to read by the beginning of May. I was going to add up all the pages and whine a little about how many pages I had to read this semester but I am afraid if I count them all it would be to discouraging. So, no page total.

I should get busy. I have a lot to read.

Books

Alright, just consider this image for a while. I'll be back later.

What?

I just heard on Fox & Friends that Tony Blair, former British Prime minister, became a Roman Catholic yesterday.

That's interesting.

Sweet Relief

Ok, the semester's over, I survived finals and am now in a recuperate mode.

About midway through the semester I was diagnosed with pneomia. I eventually got over it, sorta. I did start to feel better but have had cold symptoms almost constantly since. I would feel better for a day or two but then go back to feeling bad again. Well, I think my body was just doing what it had to to survive the hectic schedule I was keeping. Since finals were over last Thursday I think my body said, "ok, now I CAN be sick!"

I have been terribly sick since finals. I am starting to feel better though, for now. So anyway, send me your accolades for surviving the semester (yes that's unabashed self-promotion) and please pray that I would get all better by Christmas. I'd like to be well Christmas morning.

Oh yeah, wait till I tell you about Christmas. Our God is good. That's all I can say for now.

Remember, He (Jesus) knows when you've been good or bad, so be good for His sake.

'Till next time...