Well, if you follow my blog, today’s the day.  Shannon and I are off to adopt.  Very little sleep in the last few days and lots of mixed emotions, but we’re pumped and headed out so if you are they praying type, here’s a list of how you can pray for us.

MY KIDS HERE IN THE STATES: Please pray for safety and emotional and spiritual protection over my children as they stay with grandparents who are taking care of them in our home for the month we are gone half way around the world.

OUR LEGAL PROCEEDINGS IN UGANDA: Please pray for God’s Divine provision as we move through the court process in Uganda. We are told that it is methodical and chaotic and unpredictable and well, lots of things. We could certainly use prayer that one of those things is that it is smooth this time.

ATTACHMENT WITH OUR NEW KIDS: We are adopting twins: one boy and one girl. They are 5 1/2 years old. Please pray that they develop a healthy parent/child bond with us on a miraculous level. Pray that God connects them to us in ways we would only dream about. The experts say that this is the MOST critical component of a healthy adoption process. Please pray that we gain it quickly.

PROTECTION OF OUR FUNDS AND MY COMPUTER: As silly as this may sound, my computer and our money are both critical elements of our plans in Uganda and our communication with the states. Please pray that neither of them breaks or are stolen or anything like that. Pray for God’s supernatural protection of us and our temporary stuff.

THOSE WHO ARE COVERING FOR ME AT CHURCH WHILE I’M IN UGANDA: Please pray for the students, staff, and adult volunteers who are covering the many roles I have while I’m gone. Pray that God uses this time to advance his Kingdom in Encounter. Please specifically pray that God would strengthen and provide for my partner in crime, Sarah, so she does not bear the brunt of this weight. Pray that others stay healthy and remain faithful to the commitments they have made.

PEACE: please pray that God’s peace and provision would continue to flood this process as it has been doing thus far.

we’ll keep you posted as best we can from around the world.  Pictures to come 🙂

Ok, so the Wii has now been a part of the Berrytribe for 2 weeks and the honeymoon is over. It’s been fun, but now we are leaving for a month and the kids are here with the grandparents and we need a plan that is easily manageable for everyone. So, last night we talked with our boys and came up with a plan of attack for the school year. We’re calling it “wiibucks” and the trial run starts tomorrow.

Here’s how it works:

1. No Wii before school in the morning.
2. No Wii after school until homework is done and rest time is over.
3. To play the Wii after your homework is done, you must exchange a game controller for Wiibucks. (A laminated ticket like the ones I made below)
4. Each kid gets 6 total wiibucks per week on Monday- each wiibuck card is good for up to 20 minutes of play.

• Three of them are Wii active bucks, which are only good for a game you play while moving and standing up.

• 3 of them are Wii free play, good for any wii game we have, active or not. (like mariokart for example)

OK.. there ya have it. Might come home in a month and find out the idea needs a total revamp, but that’s our initial plan.

OTHER MINOR DETAILS:

• Weekends are up for discussion based on the weekend plans.
• Wii bucks can be removed for bad behavior and earned back for good behavior.
• Wii bucks cannot be saved and rolled over, once the week is up, they are up.

Hung Becky’s letters today. The guest room is now officially hers. Tomorrow I build shelves and finish her desk. Now we need to go get her. Time to have a daugher.

Well, we polished off 2008 with a night on the town for the second time in our post kids married life.

One set of Grandparents were still in town and they offered to take our kids for the night. They took them to jack in the box, then to ice skating in Alpine, and then home for a movie so they could stay up past midnight.

Shannon and I got all dressed up and went out to dinner with the Phillipsons at a super nice restaurant in La Jolla called “Georges”. The wine rack there is the largest I’ve ever seen. The grub was great. We all had the 4 course meal which let you pick a cold starter, a hot starter, a main dish, and a desert. Each of us chose different deserts to share and the waitress tolerated our ignorance on just about everything on the menu – proving that we all live on the other side of the tracks.

After we totally gorged ourselves, we rolled out of the restuarant and not wanting to beat our kids to bed, we found a movie that was starting at 10:40 and rolled into the theatre. We chose to see “Yes Man”. Yeah… “No Man” is what we should have said. We followed the nicest dinner in the world with the dumbest movie in the world. We are clowns and this movie was lame.

But, regardless, we had a great time. A fun final memory for all to cap of a life changing year for the Berrytribe.

I go to a place that cuts your hair for a measly $8- they inflated the price from $7 when I got here 4 years ago. I tip her, so it ends up costing me $10.

Myself and my boys go like 1x a month or 1x every 6 weeks. To save money, I bought a pair of clippers and tried having family cut my hair, but it turns out kinda ghetto each time and it’s all falling out, so I can’t even cover up ghetto anymore. I have cut my kids hair from time to time to save money, but again, I do it kinda ghetto too.

My brother-in-law cuts his kids hair and even his own hair. He’s the man. I can only do this if it’s gonna be buzzed which TJ and Tyler do from time to time. I think I can safely cut billy’s hair in the future.

Which leads me to the point of this post. While getting my hair cut, this guy was paying the barber to use trimmers on his head and make it bald. It was like 1/8 of an inch long before he sat down. I swear. Dude must be rich. He comes in like once a week or something. I almost offered to cut it for him for $7 a week. Even I can’t screw that hair cut up.

here’s one rich white kid keeping our economy going.