Hey everyone. In honor of our 1st anniversary, Sarah and I now have a joint family blog. I will no longer be keeping this individual blog (not that I was all that good at updating it). So, if you subscribe to my blog feed, please move it over to our new family blog. We’ll hopefully be doing a better job keeping it up-to-date since we’ll both be working on it. We’ll see you there!
www.hamricks.wordpress.com
My good friend Cameron and his beautiful wife Lydia now have a son. Ian Robert Byers. Sarah and I are both so happy for them. All along they thought they would be having a girl. So, no doubt, it was a big surprise to them when Ian arrived. God bless you guys!
Dave, Aiden, Patrick and the Fish
Josh and Margo invited our CG out to their farm on Tuesday. We had a great time fishing, eating and playing Catch Phrase. It was a fun time! We even had a surprise appearance from the Hodskins Family. I caught this little fish. Later, Aiden caught a big one, lost it, but later Luke managed to “re-catch” it (we think).
I recently built Sarah and I a new bookcase. This was my first venture into woodworking as a husband. I am very proud of how it turned out. To start, I simply searched for instructions on how to build one off of the internet. I found a good one that looked simple enough so I wrote down what I would need to purchase at the lumber yard, went there and picked up everything. I bought enough for 2 bookcases. Hopefully I will get around to building the 2nd one eventually.
A problem that I ran into was just having the equipment to cut/sand everything. In the end, my dad’s garage came in very helpful. I wouldn’t have been able to do this without the stuff that he has collected over the years. And he was kind of enough to give me some suggestions when I ran into snags. So, anyway, i built it, puttied it, sanded it and then painted it. I took pictures of the progression of the project so I thought I would post them here. Check out my new bookcase!
Oh my gosh, it has been too long since I last wrote on my blog. It’s been 4 months since Sarah and I were married and what can I say… I’ve been busy. Instead of a long post, let me just give you a list of ten things that I have learned over the last 4 months. It’s not exhaustive by any means. I’ve learned lots more. But, maybe this will give you an idea of what life has been like for me recently. (Be sure to check out the slideshow at the bottom of this post with pictures from our honeymoon)
During Sarah’s personal shower this past Saturday, my man-friends from Community Group organized a little get-together at Lafe’s house. It was lots of fun. Lafe made some great food for us. I kicked everyone’s butt in Wii boxing. I was undefeated! I still can figure out if they let that happen or not. But, regardless we all had a great time. Thanks Lafe, Evan, Justin, Nathan, Ryan and Stu!
So, Sarah and I have been engaged for three and a half months now. We’re just now getting used to that and now it’s time for us to get married!! And, honestly, that’s alright with us. We’re very excited. All the hard work that Sarah has been putting into this is really paying off. We’re pretty much finished with most of the planning. And I have to say that I haven’t done much at all. Sarah has worked so hard! I told her last night that she isn’t going to know what to do with her free time after we get back from the honeymoon. She, of course, is more than okay with this!
[a photo of us from our recent Grove shower. yes, we match but didn't really try to and yes, I am kicking my leg out]
So, for those of you that haven’t heard, the church is indeed going to be finished by the wedding day. I got a call day before yesterday and was informed that things are finishing up nicely. This is a great relief because seriously, the thing was looking like it might not be done. Thank you Stu (and many others) for your encouragement. Please continue praying for us as you remember us. There is definitely still a lot on our minds during this time.
We had a family pumpkin carving night this weekend (mine is the one on the far right). It was a great time. The weekend was eventful actually. Sarah had her 10 year class reunion on Saturday and I joined her. It was super fun. There was a BBQ and Saturday evening was a formal dinner (great food and dancing) at the Springdale Country Club. I really enjoyed myself.
We’re getting married at my parent’s church in Prairie Grove: First Baptist. I’m getting a little concerned about the completion of the church actually. They have been building this church for over a year now. It looks complete on the outside mostly except for the parking lot. But, there are still a few things that are incomplete on the inside. Why am I writing about this? I am asking you to pray about it with me! People at the church are telling me that it will be ready by our wedding day. That’s 27 days away!
Other than that things are coming together very nicely. We’re excited! Sarah is doing a great job with coordinating and planning. She has a gift at this! We’ve got some great spreadsheets that we are frequently reviewing and it is really keeping us on task to have a wedding on November 17th. RSVPs are flowing in, music ideas have started coming to both of us. We’re busy a lot of the time but are really enjoying the time.
We have a new Movie Theater now!! Sarah and I and some friends went last weekend. It’s very nice!!
