The great Minnesota get-together! (continued)

Jenna and I were able to get to the State Fair on Monday along with my bro and his wife Karna, and Ben and Jen Lindwall. It was a great experience as usual. The weather was cool, which was very nice because most years I go it is really hot. The crowds were lower than usual which was also very nice. We didn’t;t have to wait for any of our favorite fair foods. We definitely had a nice variety of food. Here’s what we had:
Bratwurst (me)
Root Beer (Jenna and I shared)
Pronto Pup (Jenna)
Fresh French fries (group shared)
Coke (group shared)
Pork chop on a stick (group shared)
Sweet Martha’s cookies (group shared)
Milk – all you can drink (group shared)
Deep fried pickle (group shared)
Cheese curds (group shared)
Roasted Corn on the cob (Jenna and I shared)
Mini donuts (group shared)
Gelato (group shared)
Apple Cider freeze (Jenna and I shared)

I think that’s it. Other highlights of the fair included watching a Cow give birth to a baby calf. It was pretty gross, but somewhat fascinating. Also, we checked out the biggest boar that weighed in a 1040 lbs, which is a disappointment compared to past years. One of the biggest highlights for me was the new eco center. It was dedicated to many ways to reduce the consumption of our natural resources. In this building was a Jetta TDI (which is what I own) that was retrofitted with a kit to make it run on used fryer oil. So, you can literally go get used fryer oil from a local restaurant, filter it and put it in a tank. Then you start your car using diesel and then when it gets up to proper temp, you can flip a switch and have it run on the oil (grease). So, in otherwords, you can drive for free! Sure there is some up front cost to get the kit, and a little work involved picking up the used oil and filtering it, but shoot, it’s worth it. Thus, Jenna and I are going to start saving and hope to get my car running on grease in a year or so. Not only will is save us money, but I won’t be using up as much of our nations diesel supply, plus the fryer oil is recycled and used twice instead of just once! Check out www.greasecar.com for more info on it!

Sanctuary Website

The sanctuary website is now up! It feels good to have it up there for people to check out a read about who we are. Go check it out and tell me what you think.

www.sanctuaryhudson.com

also, I am still trying to figure out how to have a calendar on there that stays up to date, so if you have any ideas or know of anything, let me know.

The great Minnesota get-together!

Well, today is the first day of the MN state fair! It is the 2nd largest state fair next to TX. I feel bad for everyone there right now though because it is raining like crazy! I for one am a big fan of the fair and go at least once a year! I don’t know what the appeal is about it- Is it the food? the entertainment? the animals? the people watching? I think for me, it is a combo of people watching and food. I know it’s pretty much all bad for me, but I love the food! Here is a list of food on a stick:

All of this will be served ON A STICK!

macaroni and cheese
Deep-fried chocolate chip cookies
cajun alligator sausage
chicken
Caramel apples
Cheese
Pork chops
oriental lemon chicken
candy apples
cotton candy
chocolate covered bananas
pancake wrapped around sausage
Fried Swiss cheese
fried jalapeno pepper cheese
maple smoked pork tenders
salmon
Belgium waffle
cheeseburger calzones
taffy pop
key lime pie dipped in chocolate
lamb burgers, gyros, wraps, leg of lamb, marinated
Egg roll
lemon chicken
shrimp toast
pizza
reuben
Tater tot hot dish
spaghetti & meat balls
dill pickle
Poncho Dog
pork chops
deep fried Spudsters
blackened cajun steak
Puff Daddy
Thai sausage
Scotch Eggs
Scotch Meatball
Batter dipped, deep fried hot dogs
fresh dipped in chocolate marshmallows
chocolate covered cheesecake
cherries
walleye
Political pop (stick with party designation on wrapper)

New music

Hey, I am in the process of searching for new worship songs/cd’s to use in my worship leading. If you know any good ones, let me know.

Speaking of music, I put a few new selections in my “current listening” section. I highly recommend these cd’s so check them out!

that’s all for today.

The Unfortunate Cookie

So, last night, Jenna and I got some chinese food from a wonderful local establishment here in Hudson by the name of “Dragon Pearl”. She got chicken lo mein, and I got sesame chicken. The food was good as usual, and there was lot’s of it. Once again this is pretty typical for the dragon. In fact I have observed that this is quite typical for many chinese restaurants. Anyways, upon finishing our meal, we sat down to enjoy a film (V for Vendetta), and it was at this point that we would partake of our fortune cookies. This is one of my favorite parts of eating chinese food. I don’t know why, but I really love these things. Now, I am not one to put a lot of weight into what the fortune says inside the cookie, but what was inside my cookie last night could not have been good. Do you want to know what it was?…..NOTHING! I got nothing! Not a blank peice of paper, not a bad fortune…nothing! I don’t know what this means, but it can’t be good!

wakeboarding

I don’t have much to say other than, I can’t get enough wakeboarding! It is so fun! For those of you who haven’t seen the little video I made of Mark Fisk, Uncle Rich, and myself riding, take a look:

Oh, also, my ipod has been working for 4 days now with no interruptions (knock on wood). Also, I am close to being done with the Sanctuary website. Here’s a preview of what’s to come with that:

it’s a good day!

Death

Last night at our worship gathering we prayed the “peace prayer” of St. Francis of Assisi. It was a perfect prayer for me last night. In particular the last part.

here it is:

Lord, make me an instrument of your peace,
Where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy;

O Divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console;
to be understood as to understand;
to be loved as to love.

For it is in giving that we receive;
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned;
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.

This whole church plant thing has been a very rewarding, but extremely difficult at times. More than ever before, I have had to continually put to death my expectations and ways of thinking in order to allow God to work in His way and His time. It reminds me of a song I like:

Nothing Left of Me
W&M by Joel Engle and Jeffrey B. Scott

Your sacrifice is brokenness A heart that’s full of tenderness,
Come and break me, Lord.
To see You in Your righteousness, To find You in Your holiness,
Come and take me, Lord.

Your Spirit is the only one That can conform me to Your Son,
Let Him move in me.
Your grace is written deep in me, You sign my heart so pure as He,With Your holy blood.

That I can learn to trust You,
And every way to love You

Strip away all that remains, For Your glory and Your name,
‘Til there’s nothing left of me.
Burn the kingdoms I have made, You will shine and I will fade
‘Til there’s nothing left of me,
‘Til there’s nothing left of me.

I am so blessed to be here in Hudson and partnering with Wes in order to see God’s kingdom come in Hudson as it is in Heaven. I feel like I am continually being stripped away.

iPod issues

ARRRRGH – My iPod seems to be dying on me. I don’t know how to resolve the problem and I don’t want to just up and buy another one because they are expensive. Plus I figure I might as well wait till the next generation is out. I don’t know what the issue is exactly, but it will just freeze up from time to time. Sometimes, simply plugging it in resolves the problem, but on 3 occasions I have and to do a complete restore back to the original settings. This wipes out all the music and everything, and the resets it, and then you have to re-load all the music back on, which takes a while when you have over 35 GB of music. If anyone has any insight into what to do to prevent this, I am all ears. I actually heard from one person that you should give it a little hit on the right side (not too hard, but hard enough) when it happens, and so when it froze up on me last time, I tried it and it started playing again. I don’t know how reliable this method is, nor how much damage could be done in the process, so I would rather find an alternate solution. So, if any one wants to lend me some advice or some $ (hehe), I am open to either!