Change in ETA

We've just recently changed our plans for moving back to Chicago! We had originally planned on moving our stuff up to Chicago around July 18th, and coming back down to Richmond until mid August, at which time Christy would move up to Chicago for good. Instead, we will be moving to Chicago the following week (July 26th) and will stay up there permanently. I plan to take the remaining part of my vacation during the first week of August - then fly down to Richmond August 15th to finish out my last two weeks of work, and finally drive our other car up to Wheaton. This change will prevent us from having to stay in an extended stay hotel for three weeks and also keep the kids from traveling back and fourth twice. So I guess everyone has one more week to rest up their back before they move all of our stuff :)

The family is doing well this week. Sammy has gone from taking a step or two, to walking everywhere. It is amazing how quickly young children take a totally new concept and make it business as usual. Certainly something for *old folks* like me to be envious of. Elizabeth continues to evolve as well. She entered a stage in life where she can not obey me, but be clever about it. I dropped a big glass milk jug in the kitchen which shattered. I told her to get in the living room so she would not get cut or track milk everywhere as I cleaned it up. I look over to see her with one toe in the family room, but the rest of her stretched out as far as she could into the kitchen. When I told her again to go into the family room, she said, 'I'm already in the family room daddy....what do you mean?' I think we'll need an extra dose of patience as we enter this stage of toddler-dom.

Well browsing the news this morning, I saw this article about Venezuela. When people started rioting in Venezuela after Chavez took over the airwaves a couple weeks ago, I remember thinking that perhaps his people had finally reached breaking point with the dictator. After dwindling oil profits on poorly thought through & managed social welfare programs (and on himself), and now taking away their freedom of information through airwaves - people were ready for a change. However, reading the above article reminds me that taking away power from a dictator is not always easy. Not only does buying more military give Chavez a chance to rally his population against the US (I'm bad-but looking how bad THEY are....) but it gives him greater control over his people. The article pitches Chavez as a threat against the US, but honestly, what will 53 helicopters, 24 fighters and 100,000 guns do against the US? That would be like a mosquito going after a tank. However, his small military can help him suppress people in or near his country that have differing view points. All this said, it is a constant reminder that in Latin America, things are not always stable. Thankfully Costa Rica has a neutral and fairly stable government; however, the entire region generally dislikes the US (and sometimes rightfully so given our self focused policies) and can change in a hurry.

Anyway....investing tip for this week is Apple. Four years ago my brother-in-law told me that Apple was 'money'. I laughed at him and told him the washed up computer company was nothing. Looking back at my stock returns, maybe (just maybe) I would have been a little better off having a little fruit in my portfolio. This week they are releasing the new i-phone which folks are excited about. I find myself again thinking 'this will never catch on, and who would want to pay 400 dollars for this..' However, I know they will. Don't pay any attention to the analysts who are worried about the bugs that need to be worked out. People will buy this phone, and buy it again if they have to get an updated version. And if I'm smart this time, maybe I'll buy a little Apple.

Until next time...

Happy Monday!

I must admit, now that I am part time at work, early in the week is not really all that bad anymore. The long three day weekends combined with less stressful items on my to do list at work have taken alot of pressure off me. This is probably good as I'm sure the move to Wheaton as well as living out of a hotel for three or more weeks in Richmond could increase the tension quotient at our house....



We have some new pictures to share. This is outside of Christy's Nana and Papa's place in Baltimore. The kids were outside playing, and quite happy. I'm sure that is because one minute after this picture was snapped, I drove up after being away in Detroit for 5 days (not because nana bought them new balls to play with).


Here is another picture that was drawn by Elizabeth last weekend while at my office. It is a puppy, apparently with a necklace or a bow tie. Also, the little red things that look like flames are not the tail; rather, they are the back legs (more than two? I don't know...) All kidding aside, it is the best picture she has drawn to date, and certainly worth sharing with the world.


My one investing tip for the day.... If you've been dying to know, which HD format is going to win in DVDs, it may have been decided yesterday (see: http://www.spokesmanreview.com/breaking/story.asp?ID=10363) The video rental business was a big driver in sorting out the Beta Max versus VHS tape format back in the 80s...so we will see if this has similiar implications. Untill next time...

Less than 3 months

It is hard to believe that we have less than three months before we move back to Chicago! We have continued to make tactical progress towards moving, including having our house officially sold (to close late July after we fix one or two items), reserving the moving truck, starting to pack up our belonging in boxes, looking into a one month rental to cover from July to August, etc. If you just LOVE moving furniture, let me know and I'll recruit you for the moving truck load in July. I've joked with my friends at work that I can probably get 20 something guys from Cap One over to the house easy enough - but a) They would probably demolish my furniture while carrying it and b) none of us young whipper snappers would know how to pack the moving truck. It is common knowledge that you don't attain packing greatness until you get past 45 (my two packing mentors are currently my father and John Scott). Christy will be heading back around August 20th to prepare to teach her class at Wheaton College and I will follow sometime in early September (my last day at Capital One is September 1st and I will probably need a day or two to close things out here).

God has continued to show provision and love to our family as we have met with others about our trip including folks coming to our home, meeting people at Church, and general conversations at work and beyond. We have had so many encouraging conversations with folks in the Richmond area and have started making some progress towards financial support, and more importantly, a prayer team. I was especially encouraged by West End Presbyterian Church's missions team commitment to consistently pray for our family and the ministry in Costa Rica. I know that we will have hiccups along the way and it will be so important to have that support. We have more information sessions at our house scheduled and will be speaking in a couple weeks during the service at WEPC, so if you would like more information, just shoot me a note and I can provide more details on times.

Now...onto some important details. My question of the day is, if I have 26' moving truck I'm driving from Richmond to Chicago, do I have to stop at truck moving stations? The consensus among friends is about 80% no and 20% yes. I'm thinking I can just stop at the first weigh station and ask someone there...this will satisfy two things for me: 1) I'll know if I need to stop the rest of trip and 2) I can tell everyone that I've been to a weigh station before (how many people can say that?!?!).

Elizabeth and Sammy continue to get big so fast. Sammy can stand on his own now and has started taking a step or two on his own. However, he much prefers to crawl as quickly as possible towards Lizzy and bite her feet. Thats right, he's is a biter. Luckily he only has a few teeth AND Elizabeth has kept a reasonably cool head and hasn't clubbed him too hard yet (although I've joked with Christy that if she is going to do it now is the time, because in a couple years he will probably be bigger than her). This new development of the kids going after each other makes things more *interesting* (aka - tiring and frustrating) at home for Christy, so if you see her dragging, give her a hug and tell the kids to obey mama.

Anyway...thats the update for now. I'll try to be better about posting a little more often. Also, I'll commit to getting a few more pictures up on the site of the kids. Until next time...