Saturday, June 1st, was Isaiah’s 7th birthday! After celebrating his birthday early at Elijah’s Harbor, he had another party the eve of his birthday. Isaiah designed his own cake. A highlight of his party was getting to light his own candles. This boy misses building fires in Cambodia. One highlight on his actually birthday was having Uncle JD, Aunt Kim, and Nat show up as a surprise!

This year Isaiah lost 4 teeth (most recently the top two). In the past year he learned to read chapter books. He has grown in showing leadership with his sisters and he now has a little brother.

Thankful for Isaiah and the gift he is to our family!

May 27-20 we went to Elijah’s Harbor with Josh’s side of the family (minus the Erkens in China and David who had to work).

One highlight was exploring the creek. Everyone got in on the fun!

We enjoyed two afternoons in the pool. We had it all to ourselves.

We celebrated Isaiah’s birthday and had a great time hanging out together and playing games throughout the week.

The last night we were there we did s’mores. That turned into a fascinating time of watching marshmallows burn in the fire.

We had a great time getting away and being with family. So thankful for the family members God has blessed us with!

After we had our family vacation we settled into the Hampton Park missionary house for our time in SC until the end of June. We had a lovely meal with the Casillas family (May 21). The following Sunday we were at their church. Cleveland Park Bible Church is always a highlight for our family.

We enjoyed a lovely lunch Thursday, May 23, with Dr. and Mrs. Bell. It was wonderful to have dinner with our Hebrew professor and friends. For me it was a great honor to be with our entire family in the home of a highly respected professor. It goes down as a furlough highlight.

Friday night we had a lovely meal with Donna and Amy. So good to catch up with them both.

Saturday we got together with my brother Jon’s family. We had a great time at a park and then eating at our house.

May 13-18 our family took a vacation, just the 7 of us. While we’ve enjoyed visiting with people, we were all looking forward to being together as a family without anyone else around. We rented a four bedroom house with a large yard and creek in the back. Very peaceful. It was great to just be together without any extra demands.

The kids loved the break from having to be places or with others doing things. Becca especially loved having her own room and being able to tuck herself away to read. The kids loved exploring the creek.

When we arrived I had a bad head cold. Even though I was bummed out about being sick on our vacation, I was glad to have the extra time to rest. By the last two days I was feeling much better. Josh and I enjoyed the days without a set schedule and enjoyed the extra time we had to talk with each other. It was really refreshing and we both needed it.

On Thursday Josh took Becca horseback riding. Below is an article Becca wrote about the experience.

Becca Nearly Scraped off a Wild Mustang!

In Tennessee, Becca went horseback riding and rode a wild mustang. But it was very lazy. It kept trying to eat grass on the trail for there was no one leading the horse. The horse, Nugget, suddenly ran the wrong way and under a low branch. The branch scraped Becca’s neck. Reporters rushed in from Ratanakiri, Siem Reap, and Phnom Penh.

Note – Publishers admit that the reporters are fictional.