Elevation part tre

Ok, so Annalise got upset at me for not posting more pictures of Elevation, our high school winter retreat that happened in November. It's actually quite funny because she is the one who took all these pictures and I got them off of her camera . . . but alas . . . here they are.

We were at UCYC in Prescott, AZ for three days. It was an awesome weekend for our students as we talked about what it meant to be a real man/woman of God. Some really powerful messages from our speakers and some incredible worship moments where our students were able to meet God in a real way.

2009

Again, I apologize for the gap in the updates . . . I guess you'll just have to get used to it :)

Karyss and I have decided that our New Years Resolution every year is going to be a prayer. We did this two years ago and our prayer for 2007 was to be generous. In 2008 we somehow forgot to make the resolution . . . quite an interesting year for us anyways :) But now, in 2009, we have decided to once again make our resolution.

This year, our prayer is simple: GROWTH

In all aspects of our life, we are praying that we would grow. 2009 promises to be a year full of new experiences for us as individuals as well as a pair (and soon to be trio) of a family!!

- - -Just a quick update that everything is going really well with the pregnancy. We have decided to name our baby boy on the way Oliver Alexander Bollen. We'll call him Ollie!!

Elevation part deuce

Quick little update on Elevation . . . sitting around waiting for the buses to arrive and Annalise had some time to take pictures of the set-up. I'll post some more pictures of the sessions later this weekend.

This is the main session room:


And this is me yelling at Annalise in the back of the room all by herself:

Elevation

I'm gonna be gone this weekend at our Fall retreat.

Excited, but it's a TON of prep work. Pray that God does some big things in our student's lives. The theme is "Battle of the Sexes" and it's about becoming a real man or woman of God.

A lot of Teleos ideas . . . becoming all that we are created to be.

Training

Today I finally did a run.

I've been "training" for a half marathon the past few weeks . . . although I'm not doing too well. I've done a few runs, but for the most part I seem to find excuses not to run. I do have a date to run a half marathon and I WILL be running in it (especially now that it's on my blog).

If you workout in any way, what's your normal routine and training schedule? I'm finding it hard to pick a consistent time to run.

More of my Peoples

Over the past two weeks the visits to my blog has jumped in huge numbers! It's about 50/50 old readers vs. new readers. I would love to get to know some of you who are newer to reading my blog! Leave a comment, ask a question, and I would love to follow your blog if you have one!

No Shave November

I hate to disappoint, but No Shave November is a No-Go for me :(

There are two important reasons i decided against participating in this fantastic tradition among America's youth:

1. I really can't grow a beard, so it would be more like "ugly, dirty, I'm scared to let my children around that guy" November

2. My wife said no . . .and to all who are married, you know the first reason does't really even matter at this point.