My apology for the lack of posts lately , and my typical excuse would be ”I’ve been busy“. However the truth is rather I’m been lazy.  Also somehow I couldn’t stay up late like I used to anymore. Usually after my evening devotion time, I would grab my laptop and browse, or write blog,  or find something to watch on the TV until 1AM before I hit the bed. Now, I could hardly open my eyes after I finish my evening prayer.  Sign of old age, I know!

Anyway, here is a long updates with what’s going on last few weeks.

Kids

Grace is doing fine in 1st grade and has fun at school. We get the hang of managing homework thing every night now.  Grace is also reading everyday, and I’m very impressed with her developing skill in phonetically pronouncing unknown words by breaking out letters and sounding them.  It’s amazing! I don’t know why this skill was never taught when I learned English back in the day in Vietnam.

Benjamin is into cars, or anything with wheels. Anywhere he goes, he brings a car toy with him. He’s still learning to talk, slowly. Ben goes to sleep by himself without mom or dad laying next to him. Though many occasions, he quietly sneaked out of bed, laying down on the carpet on top of the stair, observing us while we were cleaning in the kitchen.  When he heard me calling him out , “Benjamin! Go to bed, now!” he quickly ran back in the room,  climbed onto bed, closed his eyes and pretend he was sleeping. It’s kinda cute!!

Work

God has been great to us. We are still blessed for having our daily job.  Our company’s client cuts back, our company has to follow as well. It’s sad to see co-worker being laid off, or cut back in working hours.  It’s the ugly sight of this downturn slow economy. Though our hope is still in the Lord, who knows our future, and carries us in the palm of His hand.

Church

Our family’s been attending New Life Church morning service for about a month now. I’ve been going with friends before, but now Thao and the kids are joining me, which make me extremely happy. The messages past several months were on Proverbs, and they were so good. I certainly learn a lot, and these series of messages are meaningful, lifechanging to me.  God’s Words brings conviction, yet refreshing, and certainly makes my life, my family, my marriage happier.  I challenge you to listen or watch these sermons online at the New Life Church website, http://newlifechurch.org. Your time won’t be wasted.

After morning service at New Life Church, we usually go out for lunch. Then we rush home to get ready to attend our main church service, the Vietnamese Baptist Church in the afternoon. Thao is still teaching Vietnamese to the kids prior service time. I am still playing guitar for worship. It’s a long busy Sunday for us, but we are in it for the Lord, to worship Him. Last week message was great, too. That also reminds me to continually praying for my dad for great insight and teaching to bring transformation, revival for the congregation. Dad is also a guest speaker for the convention for the northern states and Canada this Labor’s Day weekend.

Guitar

Talking about guitar earlier reminds me that I want to tell you I have changed to a different guitar teacher for 5 weeks now. Yeah, I kept saying I will write all about this but that laziness got to me,  you see….  I really like this new tearcher, and absolutely learn a whole lot from him. He not only taught me guitar skills, but gave lots of insights in praising and worship.  It’s pretty awesome. I’ll talk more about that in another post.

Concerts

Two weeks ago, I went to the Chapel Service at Forcus on the Family with Rush of Fools lead the worship, and John Morgan was the guest speaker.  I wasn’t planned to go, but I heard of it on the radio on the way to work, and decided to take 2 hours off from work to come. My sisters and two other friends also went.  Without prior information, we probably would be fooled thinking the President George Bush was there. John Morgan not only impersonated the president well, he looked just like the president.  At first I was troubled by the idea of impersonating the president and sharing Gospel message, like how do you make fun of someone and talk about God at the same time. But it actually wasn’t a comedian showto make fun of the president.  With all the jokes aside, he presented the characteristic of the president that people don’t see. John’s message and the testimony were actually quite entertaining, funny yet inspirational.  You should check out his website: http://www.georgebushimpersonator.com .

Last week we also went to the Lincoln Brewster concert event hosted by our local Christian Radio. It was pretty awesome as well. I knew about Lincoln and his music, but did not know about his background.  It wasn’t like typical concert with music after music. He took breaks, joked around, played secular song requests. He introduced his family, talked about his kids, his wife. He gave the testimony about his life, his step-father…. There was calling and there were people accepting Christ on that night.  It was great. Lincoln is such a talented guitarist, and the praise and worship session was splendid.

Youth

Several youths go to New Life Church with us in the morning. It’s always fun going with the whole group, and hang out more. Lately, we are hooked on Sequence board game and played that a lot. We still play volleyball after our afternoon church service ends. Last Saturday, we went to Youth Fellowship event in Denver to hang around with other youths. It was been a long time since we last had such event.

Photo

I haven’t taken any pictures with my camera lately, or I might have and forgot to off load them onto computer. Last week at the Youth Fellowship event, I left my camera at the church and forgot to bring it home, so a friend is holding it for me. There won’t be any pictures anytime soon until I get my camera back.

But while waiting, enjoy some pictures I took with my phone at the Famous Dave BBQ restaurant last Sunday. I like my new phone, did I tell you that?!

Moose head	BBQ
Grace	Benjamin

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