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Maple Leaf Duathlon Recap

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Man, what a great afternoon of helping with the Maple Leaf 5K and Duathlon!? We had a blast helping out racers from all over the area.? I am so proud of our church family who stepped up and volunteered their time and energy!? You guys ROCK!? I had a ton of the racers who were so thankful for the kind words and encouragement from our people.? Belinda Shores (#330 in the pic) is a triathlete and serves in our Kids City children’s ministry every Sunday? She did an amazing job in the Duathlon (5K run/15 mile bik/1 mile run). She is standing in-between Trisha Fisher and Jessica Ensz, two other Forest Park(ers)!? They decided to run the 5K together and did an awesome job too!

Check out an email that Jenny got this morning from Belinda…FP Carthage, you guys are awesome and it really shows!!!

Hey Stone Family and church family!

Just wanted to tell you how much your help was appreciated at the Maple Leaf Run and Duathlon.? What a great response from our church and what a unique way to reach out to our community!? You all did a wonderful job of protecting the racers from oncoming traffic and giving directions.? Thank you!? Those of you who were serving the water were a refreshment to the thirsty.? Thank you!

Matthew 10:42 “And if anyone gives even a cup of cold water to one of these little ones because he is my disciple, I tell you the truth, he will certainly not lose his reward.”

Joyfully,
The Shores Family

By the way, Taylor your a great runner!? I could tell you trained hard, because you ROCKED the run!? Also, Patricia and Jessica what a great run!? Your run times were spectacular!? Way to go girls!

Thanks again to all of our FP Carthage folks who really made a difference yesterday in our community!? AWESOME!

Here are some pics from my iPhone…random, I know…forgot the “real” camera in the truck!

Beach Disaster Part Deux

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We must be a real glutton for punishment as we ventured out to give the beach the old college try once more, but this time right across the street from the condo. Tucker didn’t get a good night’s rest, so he was teetering on the edge of meltdown. He was a little confused at where he was at last night and didn’t really get to sleep at all. Basically it was not going to happen . . . so Tucker had to go back to the condo and take a long nap. Taylor and I went to the pool later on.

Here is Taylor’s Travelogue . . .

The next day day we went back to the beach in front of our condo. We were only there like 20 minutes. Then we went to the pool by our room. My dad and me raced. I won every time!

No pictures of this crazy day

Beach Disaster–June 25

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We decided to give the beach another try and headed out to the St. Andrews State Park (which is really awesome, by the way) to get some beach time. The boys didn’t think the “our” beach was clean enough, especially after going to the Shell Island beach the other day, so we were going to try to go to a cleaner beach. I find it funny that Taylor says “that is the cleanest/dirtiest beach I have ever seen.” Oh yeah, how many beaches have you seen buddy?

We had made our lunch, packed the chairs (thanks Gary and Fran) and a canopy shelter (thanks mom and dad). I realize that the picture on the front of the canopy is a beach scene, but they definitely didn’t have the beach scene we have had the entire time here–pretty brisk wind. So basically our canopy deal didn’t work because it was too flimsy for the large winds on the beach.

Secondly, what is always at the beach and tends to multiply?? Everybody? SAND! When God promised Abram that he would make his children as many as the grains of sand on the seashore, he wasn’t messing around!! I think the boys like the idea of the beach and the sand, but they get sand on their hands, then head to their faces to scratch an itch or whatever and the get sand in their eyes. Then add an anger management issues and throwing sand at each other and you have a disaster on your hands. That is what we had on our anniversary morning and early afternoon–a full on beach disappointment.

We left the beach just in time to head to Happy Hour at Sonic (wish is was something else, quite frankly–just kidding). It is “anti-customer service week at the beac”h for us, so even something as simple as some drinks turns into an almost 45 minute ordeal. The first hint was that the girl came over the speaker and said there was a 15 minute wait, would we still want to order. Well, we had just gotten done with an absolute beating with a two year old, so we needed some self-medication for sure. We ordered our drinks and watched all of the cars on our side come and go. . . 25 minutes go by and Jenny walks up to the door. She is not alone. There is a pretty upset senior adult who wants names and telephone numbers of district managers. The beauty of the deal was that the manager and assistant manager are both sitting down eating while the short staff is drowning. They didn’t even come out to face the angered public, they sent this poor teenage boy out to try to calm down the masses. Forty-five minutes and free drinks later, we were off to take a nap at the condo.

We had some really good hamburgers and hot dogs for dinner and ventured out to get those awesome vacation pictures next to the sea oats and the sunsets. Did I mention that Tucker doesn’t really like the sand and waves? I think I did.

Overall, we had a really good time and we think we got some good pictures to capture the memories of this week. We had to go to the pool before bed and really had a good time at the pool.

Here is Taylor’s entry for the day . . .

We went to the ocean. It was a lot of fun. Then we went to the pool.

Here are a few of the pics from that photo shoot . . .

Anniversary in Florida

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We probably put WAY too many eggs into the Anniversary basket and hoped that the boys would even give a rip about the fact that 13 years ago, we started this family and they are a huge part if it!!

I took the boys to the pool so that mom could have some alone time on her anniversary and then we came back and had a nap, yeah right!

We got to go out for a “romantic” dinner with the boys at a place called “Calypso.” We sat out on the back deck where they put all of the loud families with crazy kids. There was live music from a guy that did a bunch of 80s covers. He was really pretty good. We met some nice folks from Georgia that had a boy in between Taylor and Tucker. We had some awesome fried pickles as well as what Jenny called “the best onion rings I have ever had.” Overall, it was a really good experience for us.

Here are some pics from the Anniversary dinner . . .

Vacation Pics-Day 4 (including boat cruise)

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Here are some pictures from our vacation that didn’t get sent last night as I forgot my camera . . . Enjoy!

Those dorsal fins are dolphins, not sharks. And yes, those folks are feeding the dolphins. Sorry all of these photos don’t go with the posts too well. . . but hey, we’re on vacation right?

Are you praying for our house to sell?? You need to be!!!

Sorry, there are a “boat load” of pictures in this post gallery . . . pretty punny, huh?

Vacation Pics–Day 3

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Here are some pictures from our vacation that didn’t get sent last night as I forgot my camera . . . Enjoy!

Taylor’s Travelogue–June 23

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We got a well needed night’s rest last night, but not near enough as the boys were up WAY TOO EARLY for vacation time!! But, who can blame them as they were so excited to go to the beach and “see the fish.” We slowly got ourselves around and ate breakfast in the condo and ventured out to see about a boat tour to Shell Island. We took the Capt. Anderson III to look at the dolphins and go to a beautiful beach on Shell Island. There was an alligator at the dock on Shell Island called “George.” He was right next to the dock when we pulled in and stayed right by the boat the whole time! Pretty amazing. The captain said that we needed to stay on the boardwalks to the other side of the island where the beach was because of the alligators and such. He said, “alligators can travel up to 35 MPH on land and the only way you can get away from him is to outrun your friend!” That’s probably in the Florida tour guide’s Jokebook, 3rd Edition! Absolutely beautiful beach there on shell island. We also saw several dolphins on the way to and from the island. We also saw some people feeding the dolphins from their boats. That is a $10K fine . . . obviously not enough to deter these folks!

Got back to the condo and the three boys went to the pool while mom got the dinner started. I switched off with her and grilled out steaks! We had a really good meal . . . and we didn’t have to fight the crowds at a restaurant and it only cost us a fraction of what it would somewhere around here. There was a guy on the boat tour that said, “I think everything here in Panama City Beach costs $40.” No doubt. Everything costs much more than normal . . . including eating out.

Here is Taylor’s Travelogue for today . . .

Today I went to a dock and rode a boat ride. It was fun! I found seashells. We found an alligator in the bay by the dock. His name was George and he was ten feet long. I saw a baby fish in the ocean. I was sea sick on the the trip to Shell Island. I also saw a jellyfish on the side of the boat.

After that, we went to the pool. It was fun!

Will try to get some pictures up soon . . . left the camera at the condo!!

Taylor’s Travelogue–Sunday Morning, June 22nd

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We made our second and final leg of our trip to Panama City Beach, FL on Saturday. It was a LONG day in the van riding across the country. We had to have a couple of “unplanned pit stops” for Taylor on the side of the road!! (Gary and Fran, do you remember those on our trip to Montreal??) Actually, the boys did really well for how long of a trip it was! We got in to Panama City Beach just after dark, so we didn’t get to see the ocean until this morning when we woke up!

Here is Taylor’s Travelogue entry from his journal . . .

We are in Florida!! It took 10 hours. It was no fun, but it was worth it! It is our first day in Florida! We are having fun already! We went to the ocean! It was fun!

Here are some pics of our trip down through Birmingham to Panama City.

We ate at a McDonald’s in Birmingham that was decorated for Miles Davis. Don’t know if he was from there or what, but there was a modern art deal at our table. Tucker called the trumpets, “TUBAS!” He wasn’t taking trumpet for an answer at ALL!! So to keep the peace, they are tubas buddy!

There is also an Ozark, Alabama. The kids thought that was really funny!

We got up to a wonderful view of the ocean from our condo (thanks to Katie’s parents!!) We ventured down to the ocean for a bit before heading to one of the largest Wal-Mart’s I have ever seen in my life. Talk about turning some merchandise over–wow! They were all OUT of vanilla ice cream!! All brands except Blue Bell (expensive) and fat free, sugar free (are you kidding me . . . this is vacation man!!) The beach road is like Hwy 76 in Branson, except much less “family friendly” in places. You’ve got to get good at changing the subjects when some places come by!!

We prayed for Finley Crossings today as one of my mentors, Dr. States Skipper spoke today at CFC about change. I am looking forward to the podcast on that for sure!!

Better go, the Panera Bread Co. people are wondering why Taylor and I haven’t ordered anything!!

Taylor’s Travelogue–Friday, June 20

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We left for our trip to Florida on Friday, June 20th after the routine old change before the trip, running to the bank, etc., etc., etc.

Here is Taylor’s journal entry for our first leg of the trip to Memphis, TN. . .

We saw Elvis’s and B.B. King’s statue. It was fun! We saw the front of the Peabody Hotel, where the ducks walk through the lobby. We didn’t get to see any ducks though, bummer!

I saw a crane. It was big!

We ate at Neely’s Bar-B-Que and a lady tripped and fell and probably sued them. The BBQ was really good because we had a long trip and were VERY tired and HUNGRY! We got back to the hotel and it was 11:00 p.m. and we went to sleep.

Here is a gallery of the photos from Day 1 of our journey to Florida ? including some B.B. King worship action and serious BBQ eating!!

Crazy week of Realtors and Tornado Warnings

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We had a really interesting week of lots of storms in Ozark. We met with our Realtor on Tuesday morning and therefore I had a LOT of work to do to get our house ready to be put on the market. We really like our realtor . . . she is a real go-getter and is going to do a good job for us!

I dodged the rainstorms and power-washed and stained our deck . . . tell me again why we make our houses look awesome BEFORE we sell them?? We are really bummed that we are having to sell our house! Getting it all shinned up really reminds us why we moved there in the first place! I’m sure someone is going to really love it just like we have over the years!

Back to the Realtors and Tornado Warnings. . .

We had a meeting to finalize the listing and papers on Thursday afternoon. While we were meeting with our realtor, the skies opened up and dumped a TON of rain and hail. Then it started blowing–REALLY HARD . . . and then in a “circular” manner! Needless to say, we turned off the Cardinals/Royals game on cable and turned in on to ol’ Ron “body bag” Hurst and the KY3 weather show. Basically, they said the tornado was right over our heads . . . and looking out the windows, I wouldn’t doubt that information. Needless to say, we were pretty freaked out by the whole situation. I guess we wouldn’t have had to finish this paperwork to SELL our house and begin some other paperwork with our insurance company after our house is hit by a TORNADO!!

Needless to say, we don’t have a storm shelter or basement . . . so David, Jenny, and our realtor are sitting in our bathroom waiting out the storm!! Man, what a sight . . . our realtor and Jenny sitting in the bathtub with big pillows all around!! Man, I wish we had our camera!!

All said and done, we got our house listed and we got all of the painting, scrubbing, and packing for vacation done and left on Friday for vacation! Yeah!

We will blog more this week as we have internet access! Actually, Taylor is going to be starting a new blog category on Stone’s Throw called “Taylor’s Travelogue.” He is keeping a journal of our journeys to Florida and our transition to Forest Park Carthage! We are really proud of our Taylor boy! He is really good at math,science and reading (much like his uncle Tad!!) but can work on his writing–this is a perfect way to do that!! We are going to be uploading some pictures of our journey as well! Enjoy!!