Kristen Tucker & Adam McLane, Fall 1996

I’m performing a wedding this weekend for long-time friend Dave Luke and his fiancee` Justine. Thinking about their engagement and wedding brought back this lovely memory.

I’m not sure Kristen has changed a bit. But I’m glad that zit finally healed up and I got over the Friends look.

I’m a youth pastor, you don’t think I never rocked a goatee at some point, did you?

Click to see full-size

This week we taught our kids about lent. So now that lent has begun, we wanted to make sure that we kept the long 40 days in front of us.

With that in mind I made some sweet signs to hang up around the house. That way, if we see someone cheating we can kindly remind them of their commitment to fast from the thing we have chosen as we prepare, as a family, for Easter.

If you’d like to download your own sign, I’ve added both a generic pdf and the original Photoshop files to my free downloads page. (Click the image below)

For the record, here is what our family is giving up:

• Megan – Reading in bed
• Paul – Creamy peanut butter
• Jackson – Everything but milk
• Dad – Carbonated beverages
• Mom – Twitter
• Stoney (dog) – Chasing Lovely
• Lovely (cat) – Bringing rodents in the house
• Radicate (hamster) – Hiding treats

I have thousands of pictures from 2010. Work events, family life, our garden, and two mission trips. But both of my favorite pictures of the year came from the same day in the same location. The Sons of God Orphanage in Carrefour, Haiti.

The first picture is of Kristen. She’s with a little boy who latched himself to her and promptly fell asleep. He sensed her mom-ness and found rest. And she carried him around in the 100+ degree heat with this smile on her face for more than an hour. She and I were thinking the same thing, knowing it was impossible.

The second picture is of me. Walking around the small courtyard snapping pictures of the 60 or so children playing and interacting with our team I decided to let a boy take some pictures of his own. Placing the strap around his neck he grabbed the camera like a pro. He started fiddling through my Nikon settings and changing things to his liking. About that time another boy snagged Mandy’s sunglasses and told his friend to start shooting. I was shocked by the quality of shots this young man took, including this one. I love the composition and the juxtaposition of my smile against the backdrop of a the orphanage. Likewise, the subjects serious face mixed with the silliness of his sudden discovery of style captures the fullness of the moment. Despite the hardship these were kids having fun.

More pictures from Haiti

Give $10 to the Sons of God orphanage. (They run the entire thing on $30,000 per year.)

Man, I was smoking hot back in the day. (circa 1991-1992) Just as humble as today just twice as young.

Backstory to the picture above:

Over the last few months I’ve gotten reconnected with Joanne via Facebook. (pictured above) We went to First Pres in Mishawaka together back in elementary, middle, and some of high school. And we also shared a common bond of the same church camp each summer.

As these things are prone to happen… we lost track of one another. And, as Facebook is so good at doing, we have gotten to catch up. At one point it even looked like we were even going to be able to meet-up in Port-au-Prince this summer. We were both looking forward to reliving some old silliness from a mission trip we did to Tennessee. (I remember little else of that trip than yelling “he haw!” at people passing in cars and the drive to/from Appalachia.)

Last week Joanne sent me this picture. It cracked me up. First, it cracked me up because I had no idea why we were in this picture together. (Apparently, we went to a dance together in 10th grade. I don’t think we ever “went out” so we must have gone as friends.) Second, it cracked me up because I was so self-conscious in high school, looking back at my former self, I had nothing to be self-conscious about. Third, it cracked me because of how stinking young we were!

Do you have an old picture from a high school dance? If so, post it and share the link.

A few weeks ago we hung this little hummingbird feeder. We were amazed to discover that the hummingbirds (who nest in a tree in our backyard) discovered it within hours.

Maybe it makes me sound old or stupid? But I don’t care. I love watching these amazing creatures in my backyard. And I love watching them up close when they are at the feeder.

So every few days we take it down and clean out the little bottle of sugar water, then mix up some more for them. It’s really fun! We can’t believe how tame they are. (You can get like 6 inches from them.) And it’s really cool when they come close or “buzz the tower.”

This morning, I thought it would be fun to set up my camera to take time lapse pictures while we went to the farmers market. All told, we captured about 2 hours of pictures… one every 10 seconds. 665 frames.

The video above is the result.

The song, as you may recognize, is from Jars of Clay. It’s called The Long Fall. (click here to buy it on iTunes)

You might need to click on the image so you can take in the awesomeness of this moment. This couple was completely oblivious.

1. This was Sunday, early evening, at La Jolla Shores. (The most kid-friendly beach in San Diego, one of the best beaches in California.)
2. There were families and young children everywhere.
3. Lisa (former youth group student of mine and retired RA from Grace College) couldn’t resist the cameo. She tried, it was too awesome.
4. My favorite part of this picture is the kids playground in the background. We’re not talking about a secluded beach spot for a private make-out session… this literally is in the middle of family-friendly central.
5. They cleaned it up by the time we took this picture. There was a time when she was on top of him. And also a time when when hands were in all sorts of places.
6. Yeah, it’s weird we took a picture. You never stop being a youth pastor and this is always funny. It’s like a middle school girl farting in the church van. You just find it funny!

Last night our community group went to Ocean Beach to enjoy a bonfire.

Fire, stories, sunset, hotdogs, and s’mores. Dang. Such a cool time.

It’s nights like that when you have to pinch yourself and laugh a little as you fall asleep.

I’m thankful for where I live. And I’m thankful for the friends I’ve made.

Time to write a cheesy Christian song, isn’t it?

Stoney rules!, originally uploaded by mclanea.

Today we took the whole family on an outing to dog beach. We all had a great time, but I think Stoney had the most fun of all.

Here’s a link to the rest of our pictures from the beach.