Friends

Tom has lots of friends in his home-town of Ashland, OH.  Or better yet, Tom has lots of friends.  Most of them are guys (and now their families) that he discipled years ago.  They call him Sow (hence, why I'm "sowswife").

One of those friends is Dan Donatini, his wife Julie and their three girls, Mya, Sara, and Chloe.  Through FB we learned that they were heading out west to CA on their first stop while Dan is a traveling PT for 15 months (something that we're very interested in doing, and now, just a little bit jealous of the adventure God has for them).  Thanks to FB and e-mail we were able to get in touch with them and asked them to swing by Flagstaff on their way out. 

After driving a crazy amount of hours, they arrived in Flagstaff Sunday night.  Even though they were exhausted, we stayed up late talking until midnight at least (something we repeated the next night as well).  It was a sweet time of catching up and fellowshipping. 

Monday we all went to the Grand Canyon.  We hadn't been since 2004.  We had a very nice time seeing "the big hole in the ground" and riding the bus - the kids favorite thing to do.  Besides those moments of fear when a kid got too close to the edge, it was a very fun and relaxing time.

On Tuesday, Tom worked a half-day and we went down to Slide Rock in Sedona.  The men had to relive the glory days by jumping off of perfectly good rocks.  Again, besides fighting those fearful thoughts that some kid would slide off some ledge or a husband would land on rock instead of water, we had a great time soaking up the sun, splashing in the water and cheering on the husbands as they jumped, "Go Daddy!  Go!" 
Total rabbit trail - I've been writing a blog in my head for a year or so...someday I'll actually type it out.  Until the, all I can say is that I resist fear.  Look up "fear" in the Bible and you will find verse after verse that we are to "fear God", not men, not life, and certainly not death.  It's a lot easier said than done, I realize that.  I have fears that easily fly around my heart and head, but I try not to give them a place to land.  Anyway, there's so much more that I want to say on that subject, but I'm supposed to be blogging on something else.

Ah yes, the beautiful red rocks of Sedona.

Rock-throwing boys.

The hunky honey and pretending-to-be-camera-shy Livvy.

Mya and Sara.

Julie and Chloe.

Dan performing a 360 degree tuck.

Tom demonstrating a spiralling flip.

I'm sure the men would want me to say that the jumps pictured above was from a small cliff.  The other jump was a 40+ foot jump from under the bridge.  Now that's the real thing.

Check out Julie's blog for more pictures, read her side of the story, and follow them on their adventures.  She pays us an undeserved compliment, which all I can say is that we're trying and we're getting better.

Donatini's - It was great to hang out with you!  We're so excited for you! Let's do it again.