Knocking on Our Own Front Door

As we walked out of the house yesterday, I turned to the girls and said "Well, its official, next time we come here, we'll have to knock."

We have handed the house over to the renters -Todd and Jennifer Nagel and their four kids. On Saturday, they were moving in as we were finishing up. We would walk one of our suitcases out to our car, grab a box from their car and walk back in.

We are staying next door at Julie's folks until our plane departs. As I type this Annika and Elise in the back yard playing with the Nagel kids. After living without neighbor kids for 13 years, the girls are enjoying having playmates next door -for four days.

-Jack

Delayed but not Defeated

Well, July 24 has come and gone, so why are the VanNoords still State-side? Well, we've been delayed by a slight medical set back.

On Tuesday morning, July 7, Jack was injured while burning brush in the back yard. He spent 13 days at the burn center at Loyola Medical Center in Chicago -the first three days in the i.c.u. He had first and second degree burns covering 15% of his body namely his right arm and leg.

After a couple of arduous weeks, he is on the road to a full recovery. The doctors believe that he should have no long-term side effects including scarring.

We managed to get our airline tickets changed and we will be flying out around noon on Wednesday, August 5th.