Well, we had a very busy end to our quarter and an equally busy break. My sister-in-law graduated with her M.A., and we were pleased to see her walk. Plus, we got to spend time with our Godson, little Oscar. He has grown, as all these little ones tend to, and is quite the handsome dark-haired young man. We had a wonderful time holding and feeding and playing with him.

After graduation, we headed down to Florida with Mom and Dad for break. We had a wonderful time except for missing Mom. While we were still in St. Louis, her dad went into the hospital and was eventually diagnosed with heart failure. She was up in Michigan attending to him for all but one day of our vacation. We missed her terribly! But we still got to have a good break. We went back to the beach we stayed at on our honeymoon to celebrate our one year anniversary and ate at the little deli we found then. We had several days all to ourselves while Dad was at work to just relax and do absolutely nothing! We also went tubing (the just-drifting-with-the-current kind not the really-fast-behind-a-speedboat kind) and visited friends and went fishing with Dad in our canoe out in the Gulf. The weather was perfect, and we had a wonderfully relaxing week.

The day we returned home to St. Louis, we received the news that my grandfather was taken off the ventilator and died shortly thereafter. We headed up to St. Louis the next day to be with Mom and help her with details. She did an amazing job taking care of her dad and getting all the funeral and burial arrangements done. We were very blessed to have my brother (Pastor) Matt and Tessa with Oscar also make the trip. The funeral was led by my grandfather's pastor at the home where he had been staying. The internment at the cemetery was led by Matt and JJ assisted, followed by military honors by the local VFW post. Both were the highlight and tear-jerkers of the weekend. Grandpa died Thursday, June 3 and was laid to rest on Sunday, June 6. He was 84. He is baptized, and we await with hope the Resurrection of the Dead, when all will be made right and the sadness of what never was will be replaced with the joy of what always should have been.

Now, it's back to the daily grind. JJ is taking one class this summer quarter, The Parables of Our Lord. We have one more weekend trip before being able to settle down and start packing. We leave for South Dakota on July 7th! We are anxiously awaiting it. JJ's ready to get started and excited for the year ahead. Thanks for all the prayers and support we receive from all of you! May God bless you as richly as he has us!