Wow. How do I even get my mind around this idea? I’m a dad. I have to sit down every time I think about it. This has got to be the most exciting thought I have ever dwelt on. A little boy is coming out of our love story…quite literally out of Ann! Only God […]
I wrote the song “Let’s go on an Adventure, Ann” as a Christmas present to Ann last year. We decided to bring the song to life by making it into a music video during a recent trip to British Columbia, Canada last August. Destroy Nate Allen sang and produced the song…and did a great job! […]
I grew up thinking that the words “I love you” were a statement of my endearment for someone. So whenever someone would say, “I love you” to me, I would sweetly say, “thank you” with a wink. And whenever I shared my endearment for another person using those special three words, I expected nothing more […]
One of the best parts about living in Colorado Springs is having the Garden of the Gods practically in our backyard. When we were living in our cabin, rent only cost us 400 bucks a month, but we felt like we were millionaires. When we walked out the front door, we could smell the mountain […]
Seeing a new extraordinary place for the first time is a wonderful experience. If it requires a bit of struggle to get there, it is almost always worth it. And if you have to struggle with someone that you love most, the experience will take your breath away. That’s why Ann and I work so hard […]
Ann’s crazy about organizing her stuff. She can literally spend hours doing nothing but moving things around. Everything she owns has a place…everything! If I set something down and leave the room, it’s usually gone when I get back. In fact, some of our biggest fights have been over me not putting things back in […]
I let out a loud grunt as I pulled on the jumars with all my weight. The haul bags hardly moved. The hardest part about wall climbing is hauling all your gear up, and even though I had set up a mechanical advantage (three feet of pulling equals one foot of lifting), it was still tough. Since we were planning […]
Last January Ann and I looked over our expenses for the previous year. This is easy since we buy absolutely everything on credit cards, accruing massive amounts of frequent flyer miles and points. After assessing our transactions from 2011, we saw that there were many areas for us to cut back on our spending. We […]
Joe had his first article published by Shout! Outdoor Lifestyle Magazine earlier this month. We hope you enjoy hearing about the beginning of our love story! “Joe, the rope is stuck!” I hear over the two-way radio clipped to my harness. My heart sinks. We chatter back and forth and I realize that someone is […]
Humility…I sure wish I had more of it. Whether you are trying to climb huge rock mountains or trying to overcome something in your marriage humility is a quality that you must posses. Pride kills many mountaineers and destroys a lot of love stories. My pride has already done quite a bit of damage […]
There is something deep, profound, and transcendental about packing up the house that I grew up in. I am flooded with emotions as I dig through my closet and discover different little objects that I have held onto. To anyone else these things look like junk or childhood toys but many of them represent different […]
“Watch me here!” I yelled. The moves were hard, and the desert sun left me soaked in sweat that kept bleeding sunscreen into my eyes. I was uncomfortably stemming across the two walls of the chimney. I tried to spit the dirt out of my mouth but I could still feel the grains of sand […]
There are a lot of things God did not make me. He did not design me to be a doctor or an engineer, nor did He design me to cut down big trees or run for president. It’s easy to list the things I’m not. It’s really hard to define who I am with a […]
Ann and I are back in Pennsylvania for the next month. My parents sold the house and needed some help moving everything out to Illinois to be closer to their grand kids. So we are busy packing boxes and preparing for our annual festival summer tour (we are still taking applicants for the tour, by […]
China is one of the most beautiful, unique, fun, friendly, and safe places to travel. Ann and I ate tasty food, saw brilliant sites, made friendships that we will forever cherish, and experienced each other in a completely new environment. I felt like our hearts grew and our love deepened. We both learned a lot […]
