Blessed and Thankful

Many events have happened over the last two weeks to make me realize how blessed Danny and I are and how much we can take that for granted. I'm truly in awe over why God has chosen to bless me in such amazing ways and I'm thankful for reminders to be thankful!


Last week both Danny's parents and mine celebrated their wedding anniversaries. My parents have been married for 33 years, Danny's for 40. I realize how rare that is for a young couple to have both sets of parents alive, healthy, and still examples of a loving marriage. The day my parents celebrated their anniversary, a dear friend of mine lost her mom. As I have grieved with her over the past week, I have been reminded of how much I take my parents, their health, and their love and support for granted. Not only are my parents loving and supportive, but I have amazing in-laws as well!

Lately I've been having strange dreams, often about running from terrorists. Either I watch too much violence on TV or the world news is getting to my subconscious. I wake up in the middle of the night, relieved to realize it's only a dream, and immediately am sorrowful for those who live that nightmare day in and day out. Again, I'm truly grateful for the life I've been given.

Last Sunday I spoke to the FCC high schoolers about my trip to Africa and how much it changed my life. Surrounded by poverty and homeless children made me realize how rich my family is, although we don't often feel like it. We're not rich by American standards, but we have a home, food, and clothes, and that is more than most of the world can claim.

For 15 years my dad drove a green minivan, a true family car. When he bought it, he didn't buy it for his own enjoyment. The van served us well on numerous trips to Texas and our annual Christmas tree cutting parties. My dad saw each of his daughters get a new car and still he served our family by driving his green van. It finally broke down one too many times and my father bought something for himself for the first time in 26 years: a new Mustang. I'm so thankful for the van that gave my family many great memories, for my dad who is so generous and selfless, and for the fact that he finally has a sweet new ride!

I hope none of this sounds trite, and I don't write any of this to brag, but I am really humbled by the blessings God has lavished on me, my family, and my new husband. We've had struggles at times, but what a shame it would be if we focused on the negative and took the blessings for granted.

In what ways has God blessed you? How do you remind yourself not to take blessings for granted?

I Married a Champ

I know blogs without pictures are boring, but you've seen our wedding pictures and we don't have a cute baby yet, so you'll just have to deal with words instead. Although I was talking to Anna Luce at church about our wedding and she asked "So do you have children now?" as if they came with the marriage license. Cracked me up. I love seeing the world through a kindergartner's eyes.

We had quite a busy weekend! On Saturday Danny and John Leestma teamed up to take on an amateur volleyball tournament. (They played "Bs" for those of you who actually know what that means. I'm not even sure I used that correctly in a sentence.) They played 7 games over about 9 hours. And they won the whole thing!! I, for one, am impressed that I'm married to a studly volleyball champion. I thought he would at least get a trophy to put on our mantel, but he just got a sweatshirt. Maybe we'll frame the sweatshirt.

Saturday night I was at a BBQ in San Jose with church buddies (after a productive day of getting my hair cut, chatting with my parents, and working on papers for grad school) and I get a text message that says "Can you bring me Gatorade? I can't move." I restrained myself from the wifely "I TOLD you to drink more today!" and rushed home to find my husband in a groaning pile on the couch and an ice pack on his head. And he had to preach the next day....

Sunday, despite sore legs and a short night of sleep, Danny delivered a great sermon (twice) on 1 Corinthians at FCC. My mom did double duty as she attended Campbell's early service to hear my dad preach, then drove an hour to FCC's second service to hear her son-in-law preach. It was great to have her there. I got to teach the high school class in Danny's absence and talked about my trip to Kenya and how it changed me. It was a little scary since it was my first time flying solo with my new youth group, but I think it helped that I had cool pictures of safari animals.

Monday night we decorated Danny's parents' house since this week marks their 40th wedding anniversary and they were out of town. Happy anniversary to both Danny's parents and my parents this week! We love you!

Feeling Cozy

Danny came down with a cold this week so he's been sleeping in a little to save his energy before taking the teens to Marine World tomorrow. I couldn't resist snapping this picture since he is under the down comforter AND has a pillow over his head, even though it was 75 degrees in our bedroom.

Time of Merriment and more

Since we've been married, Danny and I have enjoyed entertaining a few times thanks to all our fabulous wedding gifts!



Last week we had "A Time of Merriment" with 2 other couples. We were really looking forward to an evening with close friends, and I was excited to host a grown-up, sophisticated, triple-date dinner party. Dinner was a hit thanks to Janie Riddiough's artichoke dip recipe and Eve Medina's Pampered Chef inspiration. All was going smoothly until Danny brought out the after-dinner entertainment: sponge animals. Remember when you were little and you bought those capsules you put in hot water -- and soon the capsule dissolves and you have an animal shape? Yes, that was what my husband thought would make great entertainment at our dinner party. Actually, as much as I scoffed, even I enjoyed watching my capsule turn into a safari animal! Then, the boys started daring each other to swallow one of the capsules (I won't name who actually DID swallow one cough--Geoff--cough) and the sophistication of our party took another dive. There sure were a lot of laughs though!


Sunday night we had 5 First Covenant youths over who will be going away to college for the first time. It was another night of good food (thanks again, Janie and Eve!) and lots of laughs with good friends. It was so fun to hear about the mixture of fear and excitement they all feel about going to college for the first time. We are excited for them and the wide open road of possibilities they face!

We are having so much fun hosting people in our home, and maybe someday I'll get brave enough to make more than one specific meal when friends come over!

Best Bachelor Party Ever!

Although this event took place over a month and a half ago, it simply shall not and cannot be forgotten. Just two days before I was to stand before my bride and vow to love, cherish and honor her as long as we both shall live, Groomsmen Brent and Rob threw the best bachelor party a guy could ever imagine. They even let me wear this sweet Raggedy Andy costume! Make that, they made me wear it. For the entire night.


Around 4 pm on June 29, I was led blindfolded into a car and driven to an unknown location. When the blindfold was removed, I found myself in a place that I picture heaven being like. Within the Tillman's basement were 10 computers all networked together, 2 Xboxes projected on the wall with 8 slots for Halo, and 2 felt poker tables with real clay chips. I knew right then that this was going to be a late night.

Back when I was leading the college group at FCC, it was not uncommon for us to play Warcraft, Age of Empires, and other games until midnight... 2 am... sometimes 7 am the next day. With wedding and ministry busyness, I had not played a single game of Warcraft for over a year until the bachelor party! So it felt good to be able to just kick back and let my orc wolfriders and wyverns kick some elvin booty. Yes, I realize that I am a giant nerd.

One of the nicest surprises of the night was finding out that Groomsman Brent drove all the way to San Rafael and back during rush hour to pick up 20 Red Boy Pizzas for dinner. A lot of us including me, Brent, Rob, Kevin H, Lopez and Stew worked at the Red Boy Pizza in Montclair together before it became Jamba Juice. It was a little bit nostalgic and quite tasty to have Red Boy again.

The guys at one point took some time to encourage and pray for me which was pretty cool and lent an air of seriousness to an otherwise playful night. All in all, I do declare that this was the Best Bachelor Party Ever!

This picture accompanies Danny's blog below.

Shout Out

I can't resist giving a congratulatory shout out to Troy Aikman, my favorite Cowboy of all time, who was inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame this weekend. Congratulations also to Cowboy Rayfield Wright, and John Madden, my favorite NFL commentator.

CHIC 2006 No Ordinary Day

Exactly two weeks after our wedding, I boarded an airplane with 36 high schoolers and without my beloved new bride. Now what would drive me to such madness, such cruelty, and such utter buffoonery as a husband? The answer lies in 4 letters: CHIC.

No, it is not the French word meaning "fashionable". And no, it has nothing to do with "chicks", although some of the guys in our youth group may argue that point. CHIC is a week long conference that our denomination puts on every three years at the University of Tennessee. It stands for Covenant High In Christ, and while it may be one of the worst possible names imaginable... leading to an unending amount of confusion ("Can guys go to CHIC or is it only for girls?") wisecracks ("I hope I'll pick up a chick at CHIC!") and befuddlement ("Are the people who run CHIC aware of the connotations that the word 'high' can have?"), the camp itself really is a once-in-a-lifetime event. That is, unless you happen to be in youth ministry, in which case it could be a third-in-a-lifetime event, which it was for me. I attended once as a high schooler in 1991 when it was at Indiana University. We actually took Amtrak there and back that year and I almost got arrested in Denver for washing my hair in a fountain in the middle of a shopping mall. Good times. And then in 1997 I attended as a counselor, when it was at Colorado State just days after a massive flood devastated the campus. But it was during that week that I saw Five Iron Frenzy perform live for the first time. I am not much of a concert-goer, but they are the best live act EVER. Not just for their music and intensity, but for their jokes and crazy antics (I once saw the lead singer pick his nose and wipe it on the lead guitarist's arm during the middle of his guitar solo... the guy couldn't do anything to prevent it because he needed both hands to play his solo!) and for what they would do at the end of every show. After 1-2 hours of complete mayhem, involving a complete horn section a lot of skanking and quite often a cow suit, they would put down their instruments, and sing a worship song acapella with the audience before walking off the stage. They were also the most AVAILABLE band I have ever seen... always willing to sign autographs and hang out with fans after the show.

Anyways, this post is supposed to be about CHIC, not FIF (RIP). So this year's trip was pretty epic... around 7,000 youth and staff took over the UT campus for a week, staying in the dorms and eating the dorm food. The folks in charge of the whole event got a great lineup of bands to come including Hawk Nelson, Cross Movement, Salvador, GRITS, Family Force Five, Lost & Found and Bethany Dillon. The speakers were interesting in that instead of having one speaker go for like 45 minutes every night, they had 2 or 3 speakers talk on a subject, coming at it from different angles and adding new insights. This led to a little confusion at times, such as when Bart Campolo declared that "God is not in here, He is out there" while speaking on Matthew 25 and Jesus' call for us to serve the poor and needy around us. The problem was that we had just heard that "God was in this place" in reference to his Spirit being in there with us as we worshiped. I sort of liked the disparities, because it helped us hash things out with the students and talk about how different speakers might be wanting to emphasize different things, but I also agree with those who said, "Bart Campolo's statement was just plain false."

The students LOVED this trip. They had the freedom to choose what they wanted to do for free time every afternoon: river rafting, paintballing, going to the mall, hanging out by the pool, bowling, sports, you name it. Also, the times where all 7,000 of us were singing together at night were really powerful. Once in the middle of a worship song the band broken into "With or Without You" by U2 and everyone looked over at Nick Z and he had a look on his face that just said, "I'm in heaven right now." For me, heaven is probably more along the lines of a quiet night with my wife rather than a jam-packed concert but I must say that CHIC really was a once, I mean, thrice-in-a-lifetime event.