For those of you that don’t know, I started working on my masters degree a few months ago through the Resurgence Training Center (Re:Train).  Due to the heavy work load, I haven’t had much of a chance to update you on my progress (except through Twitter).  I thought I would give you a short update, and then start sharing with you more about what I’ve been learning through some blog posts (I’m writing a lot for school, so it doesn’t hurt to share it with you here).  I hope that it will be helpful to you as much as it has been to me.

The easiest way I’ve been able to explain my experience at Re:Train is like going from Pre-Algebra to Algebra II.  While the basic concepts are the same (Jesus is God, Jesus is human, humans suck, worship God only, etc.), I have to think about them in ways that I didn’t even know existed before this class.  I feel like I have grown more in the last two months in my knowledge of Jesus and how I interact with Him than I have in the past three years.  It has been amazing.

The classes have been (and are going to be) taught by the best of the best in their fields.  You know you’re dealing with someone really smart when the text book for the class is written by them and they have more degrees than a small Mormon family has children.  I have consistently been in awe these men…but more importantly I have been in awe of Jesus’ work in their lives.  I’m truly blest to sit under their teaching.

Like I said, I hope to share with you what I have learned over the next few weeks what I have been learning in my classes.  My first class I took was Spiritual Formations by Bill Clem.  As part of the homework we had to write a discipleship curriculum for a new believer.  I’ll share this with you through several posts over the next few weeks.  I hope you enjoy them.

Lastly, I want to thank you for your prayers as I’ve been going through Re:Train.  I have had many late nights, drank several gallons of coffee, and typed and read more words than I would like to admit.  It is through your prayers that I have been sustained by the Holy Spirt, and I thank you.

I ran my first triathlon today…this is a video recapping the event. As soon as they post the results, I put up the results for me and all my friends from church that ran with me.

UPDATE:
The results from the tri have been poster. You can go here to see everyone’s results.

Here are the results for me and my friends:
Men:
49th Nathan Schmidt 1:34:09.15
64th David Williams 1:40:27.80
71st Ryan Wallace 1:44:25.10
74th Greg Qualls 1:49:20.55

Women:
21st Misty Davis 1:42:18.00
33rd Tracey Odonnell 1:48:36.85
67th April Barreiro 2:22:52.05

I thought I would give a short update on how things are going for the triathlon before I go to bed.  Tonight we ran a simulated triathlon.  I actually was able to finish.  It took me about two hours to do the whole thing.

I feel pretty good at the moment, but tomorrow will be the real answer for how I feel.  I’m going to take some ibuprofen and go to bed.  Hopefully I’ll be able to walk tomorrow.  If not…..well….um…I guess I’ll have to borrow a wheel chair or something.

I thought I would include the video update from Tuesday for those of you that didn’t see it.  I hope you’re getting some enjoyment out of my pain….at least someone is.

photo by: laffy4k

So I realized today that I haven’t given a baby update in awhile.  So here is your update.  We are currently four weeks from our due date of June 1st.  I have to say that there are elivated levels of excitement and fear.

It’s kind of crazy to think that we are about to be parents.  In no time at all, I’m going to be losing sleep and changing diapers.  But I’m also going to get to use all the cool stuff that we’ve gotten for the kid.

We have the nursery pretty much ready to go (we still have to get a few minor items) thanks to two baby showers that were thrown for us.  I’ve been having fun the last few weeks/days setting things up.  I even have the car seat base already in the car. I know…I’m a nerd.

It’s also been fun getting to feel Asa move.  He is already in posistion (head down) and has been really active.  It’s crazy to watch Shannon’s stomach rise and fall.  And from what we’ve noticed of his activity, we are going to have a night baby (he takes after his daddy).  So, it looks like I’ve got a lot of late nights in the near future.

Speaking of the near future.  Don’t forget to put in your guess for when our bundle of joy is going to enter this world.

Well that is pretty much it in baby world.  We’re just getting ready here on the home front.  Preparing the nursery and taking birthing classes.

Here is one question for all the parents out there.  What was one thing that you think every new parent should have that they don’t typically get beforehand?

photo by: Bethany L King

So here is how it is going to go. This is pretty much you typical baby pool. You’re going to leave a comment below with your prediction for the baby’s due date, due time, and weight. There will be one prize for the person that gets the closest in each category (with the other categories being the tie breakers). The person that is the closest to all three will win a grand prize. I’ll give out a grand and runner-up prize for the people that are closest to the delivery time (weight will be used in the case of ties).  The person who is the farthest off from all three will win the grand un-prize (my kids first dirty diaper).

Do you want to know what the prizes are? Well tell them Bob….

Ok so I don’t have that figured out yet, but I’ll get together with Shannon and I’ll update you in the future.

Grand Prize: $10 Starbuck Gift Card
Runner-Up: $5 Starbuck Gift Card

(Sorry it’s all I have)

To answer a few questions in advance:

The due date is June 1st.
No this isn’t an April Fools joke (I just happened to come up with the idea today).
No you can’t exchange you’re prize for something else.
This isn’t The Price is Right…you can guess over.
You must predict all three, or you will be disqualified.
If you don’t put am/pm, it will be assumed you meant am.
Any other questions can be sent to me via my contact form.

Alright…get to guessing.

This is just a quick post to give you and update on the baby.

Shannon had her regular appointment yesterday with our Midwife.  Things are looking good with the kid.  We got the results back from our last ultrasound and everything looks normal.  He is growing at a normal rate and Shannon is doing fine. Shannon is starting to get a little bit of a tummy, and she is able to feel the baby moving (he’s not big enough for me to feel him move yet).

We are also interviewing a couple of doula’s on Friday (tomorrow).  If you don’t know what a doula is, you can read about it here.  They are awesome!  Thanks for everyone’s prayers and thoughts during this time in our lives.  YOU ROCK!!!

Sorry it has taken so much time to post an update on the state of the baby. Shannon and the baby are doing fine. We had a couple of scares with some bleeding, but everything is fine. We’ve had several ultrasounds and we’ve heard the baby’s heart beat. The doctors have said that everything should be clear sailing from here on out.

Shannon is currently at 16 weeks. Her nausea has gone away and she is feeling better than ever. We will have her next appointment in January and should find out the babies sex shortly thereafter.