We're sitting in the airport waiting for our flight. Our next post will be from Africa.

Ready or not...

...mostly I feel like "not."

An AirFrance A340 is leaving at 5:15 this afternoon.  It won't take much notice if I'm not on it, so the fact that I don't feel ready is of no consequence.  It's time to go.  

I don't think I actually realize that I'm going.  I don't feel prepared to go, much less lead, so most of my prayers of late have circled around that theme.  Thanks for your prayers and encouragement!  We love you and we'll keep you posted.

Tick Tock...

8 months of procrastination and a couple weeks of frenzied planning/packing have all led up to this.  We leave tonight for Chicago.  Do I feel ready?  Nope!  The plane's leaving anyway.

Last Sunday...

It's our last Sunday in OP for a while.  It started out with church, like normal.  We joined Junior Church to tell them about our upcoming trip to Cameroon.  A couple of the kids in the group are from Cameroon, so that thought that was pretty cool.

Most of the day was spent packing, with a couple breaks here and there for photography and a haircut (head over to facebook for the before and after mugshots).  We are so far from being packed it's a little scary.  We'll see how it goes.

This evening we packed a picnic and headed downtown for a performance by the Kansas City Symphony.  They were playing in front of Union Station.  It's a really fun venue for a concert, and they put on a great show.  My favorite part is always the Armed Forces salute, which was even more meaningful this year with Sarah's brother in the middle of a year long tour in Iraq.  I'm so thankful for the men and women who protect not only our freedom, but are working to ensure the freedom of others.

The concert ended with the customary 1812 Overture  (I think it's funny that a piece about Russia's defeat of Napolean's forces has become a staple of patriotic concerts, I'm pretty sure it has something to do with the cannons) followed by an encore of Stars and Stripes forever.

That kicked off the 15-20 minute fireworks show.  It was up the hill behind the Liberty Memorial (pics of that are on facebook as well, the wind took the smoke the other way, so the pictures turned out pretty well).

We're down to two days left to prepare for the summer before we head to Chicago where we'll spend a few days with my brother's family.  The word is that my niece (also Sarah Springer) has been looking forward to our visit for weeks and has a long list of activities for us, no doubt Polly Pocket will be involved.

Wow, I just realized my last post came from Big Break. That wa almost two months ago. Lame.