Fishing and tornadoe relief

Last week was another typical non-stop week. Monday and Tuesday were work and house cleaning days :). On Wednesday I drove up to Haverhill Ohio for meetings Wednesday and Thursday. On Friday we did a little more house work and then went fishing with our neighbors the Herrings. Cade caught his first two fish ever (ok, Brooks caught the first one and then gave Cade the pole :), but he caught the second one all by himself).






Kaitlyn caught her first four fish ever and she had a blast doing it!


Sadie was a non-stop stress machine. She was running back and forth on the dock and I can't believe she never fell into the water.


She did decide that she wanted to fish also, she laid down and stuck Kaitlyns pole in the water and then dropped it :) Kaitlyn threw a fit and sobbed for a couple minutes and then she got over it.




We had soooooo much fun. I've never really liked fishing but that's primarily because I never caught anything :). It was so great to see Kaitlyn and Cade actually catch fish.

After fishing we all went out to Meksico for dinner and then I headed to Chattanooga to help with the cleanup after the tornadoes a couple weeks ago. We camped out on the stake center softball field and then woke up and drove to Cleveland TN where we used chain saws, bobcats, and good old fashioned labor to remove trees and debris from peoples yards. It's really amazing how much devastation mother nature can inflict. I've never really been around tornadoes before but they are absolutely devastating.






We worked all day Saturday and Sunday and finally got home about 6:30 p.m. on Sunday (Mothers Day). Luckily I'd sent Cindy a couple of nice Mothers day letters on Facebook and e-mail. Also, I called and asked Kaitlyn to get a package out of the downstairs closet and give it to her. It was a great week!

Chigago update and a great day

Well we made the decision a few weeks ago but we're going to move to Chicago. We went up to Chicago a couple weeks ago and found a place to live. Our new house is going to be in Naperville. We are pretty bumbed about leaving Knoxville. We've made so many great friends and absolutely fallen in love with the beauty and the culture of the South. We live in a great community and have awesome neighbors. We were trying hard to talk ourselves into being excited to move to Chicago the whole way up but I just wasn't really feeling it. I know that we'll be happy wherever we are and that we'll make friends and be happy but the thought of leaving Knoxville just really stinks right now.

However, when we went to our new ward we were greeted by a young couple that we'd met at the Chicago temple on our way home from Grandma Stoehrs funeral last year. They remembered us and were pretty excited that we were moving into the same ward. Then Cindy noticed a girl that looked like a girl she went to high school with. Sure enough it was her. We had a great day at church and it seemed like everyone in the ward came up to introduce themselves and tell us how excited they were for us to move in. Then after church we were invited to Sunday dinner by Cindys high school friend (I should remember her name but I don't right now :) I'll be reminded in a couple weeks) and they have kids the same ages as ours, it was so nice. It really helped us to reaffirm that the Lord loves us, knows us, and that his church is the perfect organization. It's amazing that anywhere you go you can feel Christs love and feel like you are home.

Yesterday I was planning on going to Chattanooga to help clean-up after the tornadoes. We got to the church and we were told that the service project had been postponed. The damage was so great that they were still searching for people and doing needs assessments. They weren't allowing people in yet. Matt Pulver and I decided to drive out to Loudon and help the branch president with some yard work since he'd injured his back a few weeks ago.

After we finished with the yard work we called around to line up a baby sitter and a canoe and we took our wives canoeing down the Tennessee river for a couple hours. If only we'd have thought to get them umbrellas to spin around as we rowed them down the river it would have been perfect :) But really, it was a great date in a GORGEOUS place on a beautiful day. After canoeing we went to Tommy Watsons birthday party. They had a ton of little kid games and also and arranged for ponies to give the kids rides. Then we got another baby sitter and went out the Archies BBQ, then went back home and had dessert and played 3-13 with the Sinks and Pulvers. It was such a fun day. I've been SO blessed with a fantastic family, wonderful friends, the gospel of Jesus Christ in my life, and so many friends and family members that love, pray for, and support me. God truely is great and life is good.

China, India, St. Louis, Virginia, and the storm!!!

I've been typing up my missionary journal and I really appreciate being able to go back and read from when I wrote more regularly in my journal :) So much has happened the past few weeks. I've been to China (walked on the great wall and through the emperors tomb, been to Tianjin, Beijing, Hungzou, Shanghai, and Hong Kong), India again, and we're planning trips to Europe and Brazil in the very near future.

Last week I got to work Monday morning and I had a couple of voice messages and e-mails asking me to come to St. Louis for meetings. I packed up my laptop, drove home to get some clothes, and by 8:30 a.m. I was on the road. I got to the plant (Granite City) in time to work for a couple hours and call it a day. On Tuesday morning we took the company plane to Virginia for meetings. The wind was blowing pretty hard and I was working for most of the flight (a mistake in retrospect as I typically get motion sick). As we were getting ready to land the plane was getting blown around pretty hard and I actually thought the left wing was going to hit the runway before the wheels. At the last second the pilot pulled it around and we then pretty much locked up the brakes at the end of the runway. Then as we were driving to the plant I got really sick and was pretty pathetic during the whole meeting. At dinner I couldn't even sit still in the restaurant. I went out and laid down on the side walk. After about 45 minutes I finally thew up about three days worth of meals and finally felt better.

We flew back the St. Louis on Wednesday morning and flew over a HUGE green and red blotch on the radar. I didn't think that much of it at the time and we ended up working until after 8 p.m. As we were leaving I checked facebook and noticed that there were tornado warnings in Knoxville. I became glued to the news and it ended up that the worst tornadoes in over 50 years passed through the South and killed over 320 people. Cindy and the kids were safe but it was a pretty scary experience, especially with me gone. Now we're getting ready to spend time in Chattanooga starting the cleanup effort next week.

Happy Easter

As we drove home from church I was asking Kaitlyn what she had learned today. She talked about Jesus being resurrected which led me to ask her if Jesus was still alive. She responded that he was and he appeared to Marry. I told her that was so awesome and asked what he said to her to which Kaitlyn replied, "behold, it is me, Jesus". I smiled and we talked about how great that would have felt. Then we talked about how when we are out looking for our eggs and Easter gifts that we can remember Marry who went to look for Jesus and how good she must have felt when she found him.

Then I asked Cade what he's learned at church. He got all choked up and said, "I can't remember all those things sister said." :) It was so funny. Cindy and I laughed most of the way home. As we were nearing the house we were talking to Cade and he said, "hey, I got this sticker at church today. It says to be quiet and listen but I just want to take it off and throw it in the garbage. Can I?" Yeah, we laughed the whole way home.

We just got home and sent the kids on their traditional scavenger hunt for their Easter baskets. I hid charades clues around the house and they went from clue to clue until they found their baskets. It was great! Even Sadie found her clues. She got a little distracted however by the clues. The clue on her bike made her want to ride her bike. The clue by the bananas made her want to eat bananas. But when she finally found her basket she was extremely happy. It's been a great day already.

I'm so grateful for the Savior and for the knowledge that I have that he died for us and rose the third day. He wants all of us to repent, give our burdens to him, follow his example in all that we do. He has promised that if we will follow him with all our hearts that through him we may also be resurrected and return to live with him and those we love for all eternity. I'm grateful for the peace that I feel in knowing that I have a father in heaven that knows me, cares for me, and is willing to walk with me giving comfort and guidance whenever I am humble enough to ask. I wish I was better at sharing what I know with others. The gospel of Jesus Christ is so rewarding and there truly are no questions that can't be answered here and now. Happy Easter everyone!!!

Job update

Last week my boss came to me with a revised offer to go to Chicago. While it still isn't what I think it should be it was significantly better than it started out. Originally the offer was a 7% cost of living increase + relocation + a one time 40% bonus. The latest (and I've been told it's the final offer, but I still believe there's a little more wiggle room :)) offer is the same except for the cost of living increase is 25% (the one time 40% bonus is based on the base salary so it went up 18% too). He asked me to have my response by Friday (I've been dragging this whole negotiation thing out since early November :) and everyone else has either said yes, no, or already taken new jobs).

I went to talk with him and told him that I had some serious concerns about moving to Chicago. I talked to him about going to work at our plant in Granite City (East St. Louis), Bob Huffman (a project manager for plant capital projects) asked me to come work for him as an assistant construction manager. If I did that the cost of living in St. Louis is ~5-6% cheaper than Knoxville, plus I'd be on per diem which is ~$35K per year so even if I didn't get a raise (which I should if they made me an ACM), I'd be getting a $40-45K per year raise. I figure that would be a pretty dang good raise :). Also, I've been wanting to get into management and also get some more field experience (this would take care of both).

He told me that he'd prefer that I went to Chicago but he was glad that I had come up with another option to stay with the company and told me that he'd support me in whatever decision that I made.

Since I still didn't know the details of moving to St. Louis (salary, duration, job description, etc.) I sent an e-mail asking him if I could have the weekend to think about it. He responded that that would be fine and also told me that Jacobs Engineering was coming in to interview people. They have worked out an arrangement to hire some people that won't relocate to Chicago and make them available to work on SunCoke work for a period of time and then they would transition to Jacobs project work. He told me that he knew I had concerns with moving to Chicago and if I wanted to pursue this option I had his permission. He said he'd prefer to keep me with the company but that if we want to stay in Knoxville this may be a good option for me.

On Tuesday some Jacobs people came by and gave us the recruiting speech followed by a tour of their offices in Oak Ridge. A few of us have interviews set up in Greenville SC on Tuesday and then the expectation is that offers will be made by the end of the week. They want our responses by 3/18 and then we would start with Jacobs the beginning of April.

In the middle of all this I'm going to China and India from 3/13 until 4/1, so basically if I take the job with Jacobs this next week will be my last week working with SunCoke, or at least in the SunCoke office.

It's nice to have a few options. Each of the options has its pros & cons but some options are better than no options.

One thing about working for Jacobs that might be good is that they told me that they have a huge project coming up in Idaho in the next year or two. If I was working with them I could probably just transfer out there and then we'd be moving closer to family with a job waiting. I'm not exactly sure about the timing of that whole thing but it could end up being great for us.

Saturday in the Smokies

This was such a great Saturday! We started out letting the kids play for a little while in the neighborhood. Cade is obsessed with fishing right now (guess I'd better get into it and figure out how to catch a fish). He grabbed a stick and probably spent a half hour pulling a leaf out of our neighbors pond and had a blast doing it :)


Then we packed a lunch, through the kids bikes in the van and headed towards the Smokies. We found a park with a bike trail loop and Cade went around and around and around.


We had a great picnic.


I love the Smokies. I dream of having a small farm someday so that my kids can experience a few of the things I did growing up. Everywhere I drive back here it's like one big gorgeous ideal farm after another.


We found a cool swing bridge over by Townsend that the kids thought was pretty cool and Cindy reminded me that she wouldn't enjoy the big tree top tours :)


What a great weekend!

Luke 22:44

Yesterday we had a youth temple trip to do baptisms for the dead. We had 41 youth from our ward. During the introduction a member of the temple presidency talked about Luke 22:44. He said that we are all familiar with Luke chapter 2, we read it every Christmas, but without Luke chapter 22, Luke 2 wouldn’t have mattered. It would have just been another story about a regular man born in very unfortunate circumstances.

In Luke 22:44 it says that Christ was “in an agony”. It sounds strange “an agony” he said. We would probably say that he was in agony. But being in “an agony” is something totally different than being in agony. He said that “an agony” is what they called the battles that the gladiators were in when they were forced to fight to the death. He asked who he was in a battle with and talked about the war in heaven and how Satan had waged a war with Christ. Then he asked us if he was in a fierce battle, was there ever really a chance that Christ would lose? He went on to explain that in verse 43 the battle was so fierce that an angel needed to come to strengthen him. Then in John 19:30 when he declared “it is finished” he was declaring victory to Satan. He was stating that the “agony” or the battle was over.
He had won, he was ready to return to the presence of his Father.

I love receiving new insights into the scriptures. This was another wonderful reminder that Christ is my Savior and that he did overcome all. He atoned for my sins and I too can return to live with him again if I will just believe and be faithful.