4 Generations

We recently went to the Navs National Military Ministry Conference in Denver. It was a great time seeing lots of friends. The best part was getting to see my grandparents and parents. They of course, loved getting to see Georgia. It's rare to have all FOUR generations together, so we made sure to take some snapshots.

Johnena, Joe, big Papou, Papou, Grandma, Big Yiayia and Georgia

Georgia Drake enjoying time with her great-granddaughter and namesake

We also got to spend lots of time with friends

Josh Peterson (left) - who is going to be living with us for a while in Colorado

Sarah and Brandon Bernardoni (right) - who are close friends from FL, but now live in Ohio

Johnena and Sarah Bernardoni

First Day of Beach Season

Joe had the day off today and so we headed to the beach for the first time of the season. :) It was Georgia's first time at the beach. She really liked it.

Yum? Sand...

The water is still quite cold so we just walked down to look at it. In a few weeks we'll take Georgia into the water.

We had an umbrella, but it was cheap and broke, so Joe make a make-shift one with a beach towel we tried to keep her under.

Georgia and Daddy enjoying the beach toys

Check out my crazy suntan lotion hair!

Trip to KY

Joe, Georgia and I all went up to KY for about 12 days to be with his family as his mom, Jenny was in the hospital with complications from having a stroke. The time was a bit emotionally draining, but a good time with family despite the circumstances. Jenny left the hospital today for rehab and we are praising the Lord!

Below are a few of the pictures taken while we were there.

Popie enjoying time with his granddaughter

Joe has fond memories of going to Big Bone Lick State Park as a little boy. The park is really close to his parents house and we hadn't had a chance to go. This time we took advantage of one of the beautiful days and made the trip with the Bernardoni's.

Georgia has started working her way towards crawling. She gets up on all fours, but has only figured out how to scoot herself backwards. She loved the wood floors, but kept running into things!

Playing in the basement with all of the great toys Nana has.

God is an Amazing Creator

This was the sunrise from our back porch the other morning. Beautiful, amazing, God is so creative. I'm not at all a morning person, but this is worth being up early. We have been so blessed to live on the water for these past 3 1/2 years. I'm sure the sunrise over the mountains is beautiful, but I'm going to miss this view.

Georgia Playing & Rolling

Below is a video of Georgia playing with toys. She can occupy herself for a times 30 minutes or more, which is great for mom. :)

The 2nd video is her showing off her rolling skills.

Lovin' Our Little Girl

Georgia is at such a fun age. She is exploring everything and is quite social and interactive. We've both enjoyed getting to play with her and watch her discover things.

Her newest thing is to take out all of the toys one by one from the basket and then go through and chew on all of the parts to the 'Mrs. Potato Head'.

She's enjoying all of the new foods. Here she's just eaten prunes.

She's also discovered her feet and likes to put them in her mouth, especially when I'm changing her diaper.

USAFA here we come!

As many of you know, we began praying this past spring that God would take us to the Air Force Academy (USAFA) for our next assignment. Some of our best friends, Sarah and Brandon Bernardoni and Corban and Katrina Bryant have gotten orders there. We wanted to be able to continue to minister and share life with them. It has also been a desire of Joe's for some time to be able to go back to USAFA to teach.

Teaching at USAFA is considered a special assignment because it is outside of whatever career field one is in. This summer when Joe began the process of applying, he had been told people weren't being released from Intel to go do non-intel assignments and that the chance of him being released to even apply were slim to none. He told his coordinator, 'well, I won't get accepted if I don't apply and I serve a big God.' This summer he found out he was released to apply to USAFA. God 1, AF 0. Then as he applied we found out in January the political science department requested him by name to come and teach. God 2, AF 0. Yesterday we found out Joe has officially been given the assignment to teach! God 3, AF 0. God is good!

We are SO excited for this next adventure!