The New Stevens Family Update

Thirteen days ago, Lindsay and I got married. It was a long day, but a very good day. We spent along time waiting for the day and we were very happy for it to come.

The day itself went very well. The only problems of the day were my nephew, who was supposed to be the ring bearer (or barrier as he said), got sick the morning of the wedding and the unity candle not wanting to light. Other than that the day went according to the plan. My dad even remembered to do the rings.

For our honeymoon we drove from West Salem, IL to Nashville, IN and stayed in a house just outside of town. We had a great week. We spent sunday relaxing, and we drove into Bloomington, IN to do some grocery shopping. Monday we went to the zoo and hung out with my family. Tuesday and Wednesday we went to Nashville and Edinburgh. Thursday we went to see Wicked in Indy and ate at the spaghetti factory afterward. Friday was another day in Nashville. We got reservations for dinner at a small cafe called Cafe Interlude, and apparently we were the only ones who made reservations for dinner that night. So we had this little cafe all to ourselves with personal service and a guy playing guitar serenading us. It was funny and romantic all at the same time. Saturday we took off for her home in Bone Game, IL.

Since then we have moved into our tiny apartment and are trying to make everything fit. Eventually it will all fit, but for not we are dodging boxes and Rubbermaid's that are in our way.

Done with school, time to start married life.

It's been an interesting few weeks. For starters, two weeks ago I graduated from college. Now I'm moving on to seminary. in the fall i'll be starting my masters in Christian Education. I'm excited about moving on in my education even though most are glad to be done with school. I will say that I am a little envious about all those people getting a job in the field they graduated in, I will still be a barista come this fall and I will also be a teaching assistant for the head of my department in seminary. I love working at the coffeeshop and it will be good to be a TA, but I also would like to find a full time ministry to work in at some point. My time will come, and till then I make coffee and be a TA.

Since graduation, I have been relaxing and getting stuff done for the wedding and for after the wedding. I've been working on getting groomsman gifts and trying to plan for the honeymoon and anything that I can do to help Lindsay while I'm in Indy. She's down in Southern, IL getting ready for the wedding, setting up for the reception, and going crazy doing as much as possible. Tomorrow I'll head down there so that we can get our marriage license. Tomorrow night is the rehearsal, and then Saturday at 2 we'll be getting married. That's crazy.

Besides getting ready for the wedding, I've had a chance to see most of my family in the last two weeks. My brother and his family flew to Indy this Sunday. I haven't seen him since Christmas of 07 and this is the first time that my nephew Alex has ever left Colorado. It was great to be able to see them and sit down and have dinner with them. Yesterday, my sister and her family drove in from New York. I haven't seen them since this Christmas, and it's been fun so far to have them hanging out at the house. My other sister and her family live here in Indy and I've had a chance over the last couple days to see them and hang out with my niece and nephew when they come over.

It's been a good couple of weeks and I've almost made it to my big day. After the wedding we're heading to Brown County, IN for a week and then coming back to Lincoln to start living in our tiny little apartment.

al...most...there...

Today I finished one of the last few papers that I have to write before graduating. I have three weeks left. It's pretty crazy to think, but I will be a college graduate in three weeks.

In five weeks I'm getting married. That's crazy.

That's all for this post, just a little update on my life.

Week of E: Part 2

Monday morning on week of e (the e, by the way, stands for evangelism) we were back at the church building painting. We were putting the finishing touches on the youth room upstairs at the same time part of the group was beginning work on the new coffeeshop downstairs in the main worship area. ECC was turning what was once a couch area where the youth met into a coffeeshop for Sunday mornings. Getting these two things done took the majority of the day. The evening we spent at home and we watched the NCAA championship game that night. Sadly, MSU lost.

Tuesday we put the finishing touches on the coffeeshop and moved all of the couches from downstairs to the new third floor youth room. Unfortunately, at least 3 of them were couch-bed combos. They were heavy, but we got them all up there. After lunch we split up into groups of 2 and 3 and went to pass out the door hangers for the Easter service on Sunday. Spencer and I walked two neighborhoods for 2.5 hours putting door hangers on doors. It was fun to walk and talk, but after a while our feet got tired. We did it though, and then came back and relaxed until wally-ball that night. We played at a local racquetball court with the small group that I met with while I was in Maine. When we got back we hung out at the church and ate food.

The next day was our day in Boston. This was another fun day just walking around and hanging out and seeing the sights. I've been to Boston several times before, and so it was a pretty typical day. The best part of the day was heading to Fenway Park. I've been to Fenway a bunch of times. I had, however, never been in the park. This time I made it in. Thanks to one of my friends on the trip, we got two standing room only tickets for Fenway and watched and inning of the game. It was fantastic. Next I go, though, I'm staying for a whole game.

Our last day was spent with the other New England trips celebrating what we had done. We flew back to Illinois that afternoon, after a 45ish minute delay. Thankfully, we got back to Lincoln before midnight.

That was my wonderful trip to Maine and Boston, and sometimes I wish I hadn't left.

Week of E: Part 1

Last week I went back to the place that I lived for 4 months. It's interesting how much being gone for another four months changes things. There were a lot of new faces to see and a lot of old ones that I didn't see. I also saw places and did things that I didn't see and do while I was there. It was quite an interesting to return to Maine.

We first went to the Root Cellar when we got to Maine. We spent a few hours there hanging out with teens and getting schooled in foosball (2 college students vs. 1 teen: we lost 4-10). It was a an interesting experience. The Root Cellar gets a lot of intercultural kids and when we got there we were outnumbered by teens who African. After about 10 minutes of awkwardness we started playing and hanging out and it was a great time.

The next morning we spent the day painting and getting the new youth room ready. It was a long day, but it was fun. We worked on the room with some of the youth group students and then that evening we got ready for the lesson the next night. Then we went home and spent some time with our host families and I got to stay and catch up with the family who kept me over my internship.

Sunday was mostly about Sunday morning Service and Fusion that night. In the morning we went to first service and the split during second service. Some of us talked to the high schoolers about bible college and others went to work with the children's ministry. In the afternoon we went to the Lobster Shack for lunch and saw some lighthouses, and then that night we went back for youth group. It was awesome to be back with the middle schoolers, they are great kids and really fun to hang out with. Afterwards, we sat and talked with the high school students about what it's like to be a Christian in a non-Christian world. This was very insightful. Then we went home.

That's all for now on Part 1 of week of E. Part 2 will come later. Part 2 will include walking for 2.5 hours, the Boston Red Sox, and an extra 45 minutes in Manchester's Airport.

For pictures of the trip see the albums down and to the right.

finally...

This weekend, exactly on year after we got engaged, I finally got my ring. I'm not going to go through the whole story, but basically it took longer than it should have.

Also for "finally", after a year and a day of being engaged we finally got our engagement pictures done this weekend as well.

That's all for now.

What I did on my Spring Break...

Last week was my spring break, and I took the chance to head home for a bit and hangout with my family. Here are the highlights.

After getting to my house, my first trip was to Half Priced Books. My dad and I spent a long time looking around and I finally found the set of the Lord of the Rings that I've always wanted. I

was very excited about finally finding this set and finding for half-off, so I purchased an early (very early) birthday present for myself. I already have the Hobbit book to match and now I just need the Silmarillion to match, too.

On my spring break I was able to accomplish something I have never achieved, I read two books over break. I was able to read Out of the Silent Planet and Till We Have Faces, both by C.S. Lewis. The first was for fun and the second was for my Lewis and Tolkien class at LCC. I was also able to get some research done for my research paper on the inklings from that class.

The best part of my spring break was spending time with my family. I spent time with my parents and my sister's family. One of the most fun times was helping my nephew Simon build a star wars lego set. We built Anakin Skywalker's fighter.

The week ended with a trip to my favorite eatery back in Indy. My wonderful mother took me to Skyline Chili for lunch, and then we spent the afternoon together doing some shopping.

That was my spring break, and now I'm back in to the flow of school. My next "break" comes in a few weeks when I take a trip up to Maine with a group from my school to serve Eastpointe Christian Church and the greater Portland area. I'm excited to go back and see the church and family that I lived with for 4 months.