With the familiar chirp of a nextel phone, our ride was waiting for us at the ‘pickup-zone’. It was really an uneventful trip, though our first flight with the kids. The only issue was I had packed one of our ‘Action Packer’ 5 pounds over and another 5 under. So with a short delay we got that worked out.

    We got to Detroit early and called my (Jim’s) parents who where at the airport to pick us up. We where all really hunger as we had gotten on the plane at 8:30 am and landed at 4 pm from a 4 hour flight. (Gotta love time zones, although this trip has nothing on our trip to Indonesia!). SInce being home we have gotten quite a bit done as we are getting ready to send our last Newletter from the US for a while It should be done today and out maybe tomorrow! (thats a record for us.. Other than that we are just recouping a bit from the last 5 weeks and preparing for the next 4 years.

    Thanks for all your prayers as we traveled. God truly had His hands on us as we almost lost a tire, had many ‘close calls’ on the freeways in the LA area, Almost over heated a few times (only saved by ‘just happening’ to look at the gauges.). Our God is so good!

    This weekend we are planning on just ‘hanging out’ at the lake (Jim’s parents house) and enjoying some time with the family! You can tell Arika is loving it! She has to have Papa, Nana, or Grandma Kibbey by her side all the time. While coloring a picture last night we had this dialogue:

Arika: ‘Come here papa i want you to see this.’
Papa: ‘Ok Arika, Just a second while papa finishes the dishes’
Arika: ‘Hurry I want you to see it before Jesus comes!’

Hope you have a wonderful Fourth too!

Jim and Joy