It was my birthday yesterday! I got to go to church, have lunch at IHOP (my favorite!), hang out with some of my favorite people at staff meeting, and I even squeezed in a movie last night.

It was the wettest July 17th on record for our area yesterday…I can’t remember a rainy birthday in my whole life, so that was new.

Church was great! Josiah Thalhofer preached. He is a memorization master! His notes would make your head spin because you can’t follow them, but I’ve come to realize they are just a map around his brain and it’s all in order in there somewhere. He doesn’t look at notes and yet it was the same message both services…YIKES! Wonderful message on pain. You’ll be able to catch that online by tomorrow.

I am praying for a video production wizard to come into our church. We do pretty well faking excellence in that department, but I know what a well-trained, creative video editor can do. Especially college-age males who have too much time on their hands!!!!! We need one that is pre-trained, since none of us have any real business training anybody!

We are revamping the kids check in…Phase 1 complete. Now on to some tweaking! If you aren’t checking in or checking out kids, please stay out of that area. It will help make everything much smoother and a much more secure environment!

I’m running out of positive adjectives to describe our worship team. Next week will will have Matt Garner’s CD available for purchase at the coffee bar. Tiffany Wisecarver’s will be coming soon. I look forward to the day when we produce our own worship CD with our team, but we’re not quite to that point, yet…

This week we are moving the sound booth to accomodate more chairs, so the good news that you can come to church and have a seat…for a couple of months anyway. 🙂 We are also getting some new chairs this week from another church which will help a lot!

I’m feeling the need to do a creative project. That usually involves lots of work and pain from a lot of people. Good thing that Josiah just spoke on the value of pain, huh?

Mark went to a community meeting last week and when he was introduced a lady said, “North Creek? As in the Coffee Church? I LOVE what you are doing and I follow you all the time online! I just wished I lived closer!” Shucks…

Maybe this is the week that God will answer some of our prayers for www.19centsoffaith.com. So excited to get going on the next phase of what God is doing at North Creek!

We got the opportunity to go to Disneyland as a family last week and it was INCREDIBLE! I wanted to share some of my favorite insights with you from our getaway:

1. The creativity was awe-inspiring! I’m a creativity junkie. I could care less about Mickey Mouse, but the details sucked me in from the moment I got there. I love what God poured into the minds of people and Disneyland is the ultimate use of creativity. I LOVED every step and was mesmorized by the logistics of how they staffed all of the positions. Truly amazing!

2. My two girls could not be more different. Kennedy found the most joy in the danger of it all. She loved the roller coasters, speed, and drops! She thought space mountain was awesome as it sped through the darkness of the stars and sent your stomach on a journey all of it’s own. She laughed hysterically when the River Ride soaked her from top to bottom. She was fearless…until she saw a princess. And then she ran away and cowered behind my legs. OK. Delaney on the other hand lit up like a firework on “Princess Day”. We got to meet and greet all of her favorites and watch them dance. You can literally see her jumping out of her own skin in the pictures because she was so excited. Bottom line: God made us all light up at different things. Find your passion and do it!

3. We rented a Ford Focus, but when we got there all they had was a shiny red sports car. Sometimes God upgrades you for no reason. And so does Alamo.

4. Delaney mastered swimming at the hotel pool. She’s had all of the mechanics for years, but refused to just commit and put her face in the water and go for it. Once she was “all in”, she had no problem propelling herself through the water. People spend a lot of their life with their heads out of the water and wonder why they aren’t successful. You’ve got to give it all you have to succeed.

5. We spent a day at Huntington Beach. It was Kennedy’s first experience with the ocean, which was fun to watch! Kennedy looked down the beach and asked, “How far does the ocean go?” I think that’s how we think of God. Surely He “stops” somewhere. It’s hard to grasp the enormity of the ocean and even harder to grasp the enormity of God.

6. Delaney walked by a princess wedding dress everyday. I watched as her head would turn, lock into the dress, and she was instantly transported to another world. One day she simply said, “Mommy, will you buy me that dress?” I looked at my seven year old and thought, “Yes, if you promise to marry a prince.” I want my girls to dream of their wedding day (and the marriage that follows) for their whole lives. I want them to know how special marriage is and how important it is to keep it valuable in their hearts. Sometimes I think in our feministic world we have done too good of a job of helping our girls know that they won’t be living in a fairytale. The world will do a good job of beating that out of our children, but in the meantime, I want my little girl to live in her perfect dream.

7. Below is my favorite picture from the trip. Our raft got stuck for a bit on the River Run and while we were sitting around doing nothing the other lady in the raft snapped this shot. Just seconds later we plummeted down the rapid and were completely drenched. We went from frustration to exhilaration in moments. This means a lot to me right now because I feel like I’m sitting around waiting for my raft to get going. I know the excitement is imminent, but I’m not entirely thrilled about the waiting part.

Thank you to all of you who helped make our trip possible! People have been giving us gifts for years in order to bless us with a great vacation and we diligently set all of that aside. It was SO incredible and a dream come true! We took advantage of every moment and let the weight of ministry go for six wonderful days. We’re back and ready for the ride to get going again!

Apparently we have had 20,000 or so “guests” living on the right side of our church building for the last couple of months! These honey bees made their home with us, but due to the danger of them, they needed to find a new home. A local bee keeper came on Monday and opened up their nest, cut out several layers of honeycomb, scooped up, vacuumed up, and boxed up all of our little bees. They will live out the rest of their lives happily making honey in their new place! I thought I would share some of the pictures because the process was FASCINATING!

We landed from our Los Angeles to Portland flight at 9:00 pm on Saturday and we were in the church building at 7:30 am on Sunday. Pretty sure our family was FRIED! Luckily we had planned easy mornings for ourselves with just greeting and a baby dedication, so we skated through and enjoyed telling everyone about our Disneyland adventures.

Congrats to the Torres family as we dedicated Grayson! This family has been with us since nearly the beginning and they are WONDERFUL! We love doing life with them and have enjoyed dedicating three of their kids in the last several years.

Chris Harold preached, which is always a treat! He spoke on serving and I loved it! If you feel prompted to get your hands dirty at North Creek, fill out a form at www.coffeechurch.com under the resources link. We’ll get you situated quickly!

We had one of our highest attendances yesterday…yes, that’s how we do July. We usually have strong attendance all summer. Strange, but true.

Matter of fact, we are moving the sound booth this week (and next) in order to get an additional dozen chairs in the 11:00 service. That will alleviate some of the rows that we have to add in the far back. If you are free on Wednesday to help get this process started, get ahold of us!

Rachael is also working on streamlining the kids check in. Our system is feeling the weight of growth, so we will adjust and keep going forward! A couple of ways you can help: If you don’t have kids, please avoid hanging out in that area. If you do have kids, clear out quickly from that back corner so that we can keep the line as smooth as possible. We also need more volunteers to help get kids in and out. It’s the shortest and easiest commitment on our list!

Does anyone have a couple of million dollars? We’re cramped and could really use a new location… www.19centsoffaith.com…Such a good problem!

I love the stories of life change! Still reeling from the 13 baptisms last week and knowing that those kids, teens, and adults are DIFFERENT because of Jesus!

Mark and I both got to work in the kids class today. Seriously…you’ve got to go and hang with your kids every once in a while. My daughters light up when we are in there dancing to their worship songs and learning their lessons. We have a parent pass at the check in, which allows you to visit any Sunday!

It was Lee Malone’s birthday yesterday! He’s a great part of our team!!!!

I’m glad that coming back from vacation is just fine because I love our life here. And I’ll love it more after a few days rest!

In honor of Disneyland…May you have a magical week!

10 Lessons I Have Learned
by Lindsey Nobles

Read this blog HERE.

The countdown is on. I only have two more days of work at Thomas Nelson. {I know. I know. I am a little in shock about the whole thing too.} I thought it would be fitting to write about some of the things I have learned the last four years, so here you go:

1. I don’t know as much as I think I do. BUT I am capable of more than I can possibly imagine. Michael Hyatt shared this awhile back. I have never believed it more than I do right now.

2. People would much rather follow a person than a brand. Customers are skeptical. They want to know the who and why much more than they want to know the what.

3. Change is inevitable. It’s a lot easier to embrace it than fight it. And don’t get too settled in your new reality, more change is coming. It’s the one thing you can count on.

4. Relationship before opportunity. I learned this one from my friends at Catalyst. They live it out well. Invest in people first. Pour into them without giving a second thought to what they can do for you.

5. Books and events change people. They really do. When I look back on my own life and see the catalyst for change and transformation, I usually find a book I’ve read or an event I’ve attended. And I am thankful to have heard hundreds of stories of how people have been inspired by Thomas Nelson books and live events.

6. Surround yourself with people you would want to emulate. It’s truer than we admit. We are shaped by those we surround ourselves with. So I surround myself with great people.

7. Social media brings people together. If I had never worked at Thomas Nelson, for Michael Hyatt, I am pretty sure I would be a social media skeptic. But instead I have witnessed first-hand how it brings people from around the world with common interests together. It has revolutionized my thinking, and my relationships.

8. Set a goal. Share it with others. Live with intention. You don’t drift into real accomplishment.

9. Control is the greatest of all illusions. Pete Wilson shared this awhile back. And this is probably the single greatest thing I’ve learned in the last six months. The good news is once this truth is realized, a huge weight is lifted off our backs.

10. Security and comfort are over-rated. I am in a place in life where I want to be, scratch that, where I NEED to be, stretched. I am ready to live a life that’s a little uncomfortable.