Family get away - Spring Break 2009

Spring break has come again and we are at a water park again as a family. You can see what we did the last two years by click on 2007 or 2008. This year we decided to go to the Grand Harbor resort and waterpark in Dubuque, Ia. It has been a fun time and everyone has a had a wonderful time making memories together. If you would like to see a short slide show of our time here please click on the pic.

NCBC staff & Geocaching

I've shared about some fun stuff we have done as a staff here at NCBC on this blog. I've also shared about the different geocaching fun that I've had (click here and here to read about that). Today I got a chance to put it all together and we did some geocaching as a staff together. You can click on the picture to see some of the adventures we had. I really really enjoy doing ministry with these guys - it is a prayer answered over and over again.

fun video

Here is a little video Mark F and I made to invite all of our sponsors to an appreciation banquet we are having for them. Fun stuff.

Ok so I don’t know how to spell “Groovy” but I do now.

When the cats away...

Our "sr staff" wasn't around today so for our 5th Tuesday Staff fun day we had some fun (we have fun like this eve if the "sr staff" is around). A number of the ladies put together a great meal from BBQ This and Mark Forstrom our sr hi Pastor (and my good friend) put the games together. You can see we did a fun game of tug of war (click the picture to see a slide show), graduated rock-paper-scissors, and a fun getting to know you clock game. Thanks to all for putting this together what fun the mice will have when the cats are away (or even if the cats are here we still have fun).

Spring Break 2008 - more fun with the family

Another awesome spring break has come and gone. It was simply a wonderful time with the family as we got to do some of the things we love to do together. We went geocaching again, enjoyed time with Becca our friend from across the street, and went to Wasserbahn Waterpark resort. We went there last year (click here to see that post) and it was even more fun this year since Daniel was able to enjoy the big water slides, Lisa tried and enjoyed the fastest waterslide, and we had Becca with us. We took some pictures and if you click on the picture you can see a short slide show of our time together.

online - bubble wrap popping - YES!

My friend Mark Forstrom sent this to me. For those days that you just need to do a little stress relief but can't get away from the computer. Online bubble wrap popping - check it out here. Have fun!

Better Late then Never

Well the leap day of the leap year is over and we have finally got our 2007 Eades family Newsbrochure done. Don't think of this Newsbrochure as a long newsletter or short newspaper (because it is 16 pages long) but as a short brochure of what has happen in the Eades lives this past year. There are a lot of pictures and a few captions throughout the brochure. It's a very easy, short, but fun read. Enjoy. (note - click on the picture to go to the brochure).

Forgive or be in a strait jacket

I usually don’t talk about the lessons I teach to the kids on this blog but tonight’s lessons was unique and wonderful. I’m using Kurt Johnston's lesson series “Value Pak” and taught on Forgiveness tonight.

What made the night unique was the fact that a correctional officer friend of mine brought in an old straight jacket and put me in it as I was teaching (click on the picture to see a slide show of it).

What was wonderful was the kids got pieces of cloth and tied themselves to another person. I taught that if we don’t forgive others we become in bondage just like we were tied together with another person. And it gets worse as time goes by if we don’t forgive and we become completely consumed by it (like I was in the strait jacket). I asked them pray and seek God for help with forgiving. As a symbol of seeking God they took the pieces of cloth and stapled them to a wood cross. It was a very “remember when..” moment.

Snow Day at the Eades home

With the big storm that came through central America yesterday all schools were closed and over a foot of snow hit Cedar Rapids. My wife called me about 3 pm and said the kids were outside playing in the snow. I wanted to sneak up on them and start a snow ball fight. After getting home (I only live 90 steps from NCBC where I'm the middle school pastor) I was able to start the fight, but found out that my boys were still inside. Well, that had to change and so a 1/2 hour later I had them outside and we went at it. Even our neighbors dog came out and played. It was a great time with the family. If you would enjoy a short slide show of our snow day please click on the picture.

The Ice Storm of 2007 - again

Back in Feb of this year we were hit with the first ice storm (I blogged about it here). Now we are digging out of another one. The picture is the same lap post that I've been taking pictures of (you can see other shots here and here). The last ice storm we didn't lose power (we were one of only a few areas that didn't lose power) but this time we were w/out power for almost 12 hours (temp in the house got down to 54 degrees - cold).

You can click on the picture to see a few more pics from around New Covenant Bible Church. Also, check out my friends blogs (Tye and Jill) for more pics and thoughts from the ice storm.

I've been Elfed

My wonderful Admin found this fun web site. Check it out.

I've been ELFED:

http://www.elfyourself.com/?id=1209272390

I'm recognized as a High School read

I made it as a High School level reading blog. Of course if I post much more on here it might change. Here is the link if you would like to know what level reading your blog is.



ht - Marko

Time away is a good thing

My wife (Lisa) and I got a chance this last week Thu, Fri, & Sat. It was a wonderful time. We had a chance to find 10 geocaches, enjoy some local food (click on picture to see a very short slide show), and got a lesson from God.

The geocaching was just fun and we were pretty tired after a full day of hunting around.

The food was nice and it was the place that God taught me a lesson.

The lesson was this - sometimes my righteous “spiritualness” isn't God's direction for me. We were eating and enjoy ourselves. We had a wonderful waitress and she took good care of us. Two gentlemen came after we were there and they ordered and started to talk with the waitress. In less than 2 minutes he had her "praying a pray" of acceptance of Jesus. I was not happy - "What was he thinking? does he care of this girl? does he know her? is this just another nonce in his spiritual belt?" I made the decision to talk with this young lady and find out a little more about her. I wanted to see if she has any connections to help her with this decision she just made. We got a chance to talk (she took a picture in the slide show for us) and I asked her about the decision she just made and if she had any "spiritual mentors" in her life? She said no and we were able to exchange email addresses. I walked out of there thinking - "There! Now that is how you share Christ with someone." But later as I was out geocahing with Lisa God gave me a quick smack in the face. "Would you have talked with her about her spiritual life if that gentlemen didn't have her pray that prayer?" Ouch! Lesson learned.

MESS FEST 2007

Mess Fest 2007 was a big hit. We had so much fun. This is a great chance for middle school kids to get messy. We had the pleasure of having eggs, oatmeal, pancake syrup, chocolate & lemon pudding, ketchup, mustard, hershey's syrup, strawberry syrup, icecream, whip cream, mud all mushed, plastered, slathered on us!

It is a perfect illustration of how sin is in our lives, and how sin makes us feel, Then when we give our lives over to Christ, and ask Him to forgive our sings, we are washed clean through his blood on the cross, that saves us. Then, we are free from the sin that so easily entangles us.

Click on the picture for a slide show of the event.

7&8 summer trip 2007

We are finishing our 2007-08 year on a great note with our 7&8 grade summer trip to Kansas City; (we did a trip with our 6th grade at the beginning of July to Des Monies). We got a chance to do a lot of wonderful things together to make lasting memories (please click below on the days to see each days pics). We went to Shoal Creek Living History Museum where we got to clean up all of the old homes there. We also worshiped and stayed at River of Life church (where they were so gracious and let us stay there for free). We got to see my favorite baseball team win a game – The Kansas City Royals. Of course no trip to KC is really fun without a day at Worlds of Fun and Oceans of Fun. The last big thing we did together was enjoy a couple of hours and a meal at Union Station down town KC.

My favorite part (as always) is the bus rides there and back and to all the different places as I get a chance to spend some awesome personal time with most of the kids. What a great trip and what a great group of 7th and 8th graders. I can’t wait to see what else God will do in their lives in the future.

Day 1
Day 2

Day 3
Day 4

6th summer trip 2007

Yet another exciting year of summer trips have started and what a trip we had. It was horribly hot but the service and fun that we did together was incredible. The sponsors are incredible and they really knew how to make this trip memorable. Thanks to Kris, Mark, Jim, and Peggy for a job well done - God was glorified this weekend. If you would like to see a little slide show of the trip please click on the picture.

15 years ago - OH MY!!

May 24th, 1992 will always be one of the most important days of my life. I meet Lisa for the first time and I've never looked back. My wife and I got a chance yesterday to spend some time together (with our kids) remembering when we first meet and what we did together.

We took the boys out to the movie (Lisa & I saw two movies our first day together) Shrek 3. It was ok - but not that great. Then I took the boys to a wonderful youth sponsors home to be watched and Lisa went and got the girls (we babysit a girl (Becka)). We meet an Pei's mandarin (Lisa & I went to a Chinese restaurant our first time together) and enjoyed a simple snack there. Then it was off to a httsoftball game that Lindsey and I were in (we lost 11 to 12). Then we took Becka home, got the boys, and went to bed. It was a simple but wonderful time together remembering.

Small group - Caching together

Last night we had a free night for our small group as we finish the good sense finical series last week. We decided it was time to have some fun together and my family has been wanting to introduce everyone to geocaching. So we went out and cached together last night and it was a blast. We did four caches together (3 of them my family and I have done before) and introduced them to the world of geocaching. Here is some things I heard from the group, "It was fun; I haven't done anything like this before; challenging but fun; really enjoyed doing this with the whole group." It was a great time with friends & family. Sure hope we can do it again someday soon.

Daniel is 4

Today my family and many friends celebrated my youngest child’s fourth birthday. My wife went all out as this was the first official B-day party we did for Daniel. He had friends from everywhere, neighbor kids, church kids, and kids I didn't know how he knew but he knew them. I put a fun slide show of the pictures together for you to watch (just click on the picture). Thanks to all the families who brought their kids to the party.

Hill Billy Thank You! video

Some of you were asking for the video from the appreciation banquet. So here it is - enjoy?