New House

We just bought a new house! Cool, huh? There's a beautiful area in the city a little closer to where I work with really good schools and a really nice church congregation that we're excited about. House prices have typically been crazy there, but the recent slump has made it more affordable. We're still paying more than we would like, but we feel like it's worth it and we're excited to be in that community. I'm also excited for my kids to get into some really high quality schools.

Here's a picture of the house from the front. It's really beautiful inside and out.

Here's my favorite part, though. It has a bidet in the master bathroom. Who doesn't want one of those? We'll be living like aristocrats now.

Last weekend, I installed a hot water heater and that was a fun experience! I had never done that before, but thanks to whoever invented Sharkbite connectors, I felt like I could do it. If you ever have to do a plumbing job with high-pressure pipes and you don't want to sweat pipes (like me), check them out. They are AWESOME for the amateur. I wouldn't have attempted the install without those. And thanks to my brother-in-law who pointed them out to me and gave me confidence that I could do it. Our new house now has hot water. And we're going to be really busy moving in this weekend. Maybe once we get settled, I'll have some more time to post random thoughts to this blog. Thanks for reading!

Family Reunion

We had a family reunion recently and my brother got married. It was really nice! Keystone is a great place to vacation and we really enjoyed it. Here are a few photos of the trip.

England

I had a business trip to England recently and I got some great photos. My favorite parts were standing in line at customs for over an hour, waiting almost an hour to get a rental car (yes, I had a reservation), and driving two hours while feeling a little groggy and trying to focus my mind to get used to driving on the left side of the road. Thankfully, I got pretty good sleep on the plane because for some reason, the guy at the gate gave me a business class boarding pass when he took my boarding pass as I was getting on the plane. I don't know why, but I didn't complain. Those seats are fantastic! It's hard to sleep on the plane no matter what, but those seats make it a LOT easier!

The English countryside is absolutely beautiful! The rolling hills, the green meadows, the stone fences, the lovely (yes, I said lovely) architecture ... it's just beautiful. Bangers and mash was great. Swordfish and prawn curry was good, though a little less English. I didn't have much time to tour, but I enjoyed what I saw. I've been there a couple times before and I would love to go back and spend some time seeing the countryside.

I love Europe. I have a goal to take my wife to Italy, but I don't know when that will happen. I'd love to visit Greece, Switzerland, France, Spain, ... lots of places. I speak German and Emily speaks Spanish, so we look pretty good for a lot of countries there, but I think I'd better learn some French.