A Great Weekend

This past weekend, Kristen and I got away for the Saturday and Sunday morning.  It had been quite a while since we'd gotten away together, and I'm so glad we did.  We had a great time ... the weather was great ... and the scenery was beautiful!  Earlier in the week, I wasn't quite sure what we'd end up doing, but Thursday night, we settled on the idea of taking the bikes down for the day and biking on the C & O Canal from Great Falls, MD down into DC and back.  

We had such a good time together and riding on the towpath of the canal and around the sights and monuments in DC.  The only part, I think Kristen could have done without was the part where we were riding on the streets of Georgetown.  

 At the end of the day, we had ridden 35 miles and we felt it :)  I got to say, it was such a joy to have this time together with my wife.  She's my favorite person in the world to be with and I'm so glad that she's up for putting in the miles on the bike :)  This has been quite the year for our family, and I'm looking forward to where the Lord leads us next.  Getting some quality time together with Kristen gave us so good time to talk and share with each other what the Lord's been teaching us. I love hearing how he's working in her heart.

On Sunday morning, we headed over to Covenant Life Church in Gaithersburg, MD for their morning meeting and found great encouragement in Lord.  It was a privilege to hear, Dr. Russell Moore, who was there guest speaker for the day, give a message entitled, "Christ in an Orphan Making Culture" - you can listen to it here.  Moore's book entitled, Adopted For Life:The Priority of Adoption for Christian Families and Churches, was one of the books that encouraged us during this past year as we were going through the adoption process and it was a pleasure to benefit from his teaching.  

After the service, we hurried home to see Rachel and Sarah start their fall soccer season.

Then it was clean up time to start Alpha with our Life Group at dinner. It was a great weekend, and I'm so grateful for my parents willingness to watch all the kiddos so that we could get away ... can't wait to figure out when and what the next getaway with Kristen will be!