What I did for my Easter vacation

Wow –Almost 5 months since I last ventured on to the keyboard for a blog entry –lot’s of reasons -- mostly due to teaching a full-time course load over the winter at Algoma University. In addition, my laptop had gone over the edge in performance—too much software – too little memory. Won’t bore you with the details but it is the equivalent of having along list of things to do and spending all your time going around in circles starting one thing and then thinking Oh – I need to do this other thing and ending up spending all your time going from one thing to another and not getting anything done!!! The end result was it just took too long to do the bare minimum of things like some email and Facebook which is a “hit & run” type of application anyhow.

Anyhow – I’ve finished the course (well almost – still need to do some marking) and I just added some memory to the laptop so its whizzing along now -- I got through the basics this morning in about 30 minutes whereas I’d been taking more like 2 hours to do the same thing (while playing a lot of Freecell while waiting for the larger applications to load).

So I’ve decided to do a post.

We went to visit Chris, Tammye, Hunter & Camdyn for the Easter weekend. We left Thursday morning and came home Wednesday.

The trip down was uneventful – sunny and clear – although I made a bad choice by going west of the lake and getting caught in construction traffic in Milwaukee and northern end of I-294 so it took us almost 11 hours.





Friday the kids were off school and C&T were working so we decided to do our annual birthday lunch with the 2 of them. For past 2 years we have taken them out separately – mostly “belated” for Hunter whose birthday is in February and “be-earlied” for Camdyn whose birthday comes in May. This year they said it would be OK if we did it to-gether.

So it was Shake & Steak – a concern for Linda who has been on a strict diet for past month (As an aside she has met her target weight loss and is pleased about that). So she stuck with a chicken salad and looked longingly at our steakburgers and shakes.


Saturday was cool but clear. In the morning we went to the park with the kids and played a game called “grounders” (No not with a ball – it is a form of tag and blindman’s buff). The person who is “it” has to keep their eyes closed and try to “tag” the other players who are moving around on the playground equipment. If you can catch someone and “tag” them or force them onto the ground and call “grounders” then they are it.

Later, Linda & I went out shopping looking for light fixtures and ceiling fan for the building addition. Saturday evening we went to the Easer service at Community Christian with Chris & family. Excellent message on the hope we have in the risen Christ and we had the privilege of observing several baptisms. More about the Easter story later.

Afterwards we had a great roast beef dinner and then later we played the “Mexican train” with Chris and Tammye.

Sunday was quite nice and Linda & I went for a long walk in the Springbrook Forest preserve. Chris came home at noon and the kids had to wait until then to do the Easter egg hunt. They had however scouted them all out so the actual hunt took about 5 minutes!!!
We went back to the park in the p.m. and I enjoyed tossing football with Chris & Hunter.
We had a second “feast” of ham that evening. (Linda was still sticking pretty well to her diet – just having the meat and salad with it) – although she did have some of the cherry rhubarb pie!!





Sunday afternoon we also went to Menard’s and picked up materials for the “project” which was to install a suspended ceiling in the downstairs bathroom. This is an ongoing project that I’ve described in a couple of earlier blogs. I had never done this before so it was a learning experience – however it worked out well –

Monday the kids were back at school and Chris was on his days off so we I spent most of Monday and Tuesday morning doing this project.

Wednesday we headed home in sunshine most of the way and 60 deg (17C) weather)
A good trip.





I mentioned that I wanted to say some more about Easter. I enjoy the special emphasis on remembering the hope we have from the Easter story and appreciate the focus that occurs at this time of year to tell the good news of God’s love. Having said that, I also need to say that, for me, Easter and Christmas are about affirming a relationship that exists and is important all of the time. It is similar in a way to birthday’s and anniversaries. Different people approach these special days in different ways. To me as a relationship grows and matures there is less need to make a really big deal out of one or 2 days a year and more need to seek ways to renew and strengthen relationship more or less “continually”. That is why I like the practice of a weekly remembrance of “Easter” through the taking of the Lord’s Table.

Well that’s my thoughts for now



God Bless

Charlie