LABOR DAY of LOVE

On September 3 (LABOR DAY),

Chris proposed and Suzy said "Yes"!

Wedding plans are underway for August 2008.

Congratulations,

Chris & Suzy!!!!!!!

He'll Be Moving On!

Many of you already know perhaps, but if not I just wanted to put it out there that Jason will be starting his new job next week!

He's in frantic mode working on finishing his thesis. He must turn in the full thesis 4 weeks before his defense which will be on October 12th. He's hoping to have it done by Monday so he can turn it in, take a deep breath and head on downtown to the new job.

Big congrats to him...time to turn a whole new page!

Belated HappySails Birthday

Hey, Scott, pardon us banana heads for missing your birthday last week! We were all disoriented with the house renovations going on here. This photo shows us trying to find our way out of cardboard boxes...no luck with that and therefore, no surprise that we didn't look at our calendar, send an email or make a phone call on July 12.

BELATED BUT HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Hope you had a good day and are sailing (by boat or motorcycle) into a very good year.

Love

The Henders

Do Cicadas Taste Like Chicken?

Ask Sarah!

At Camp Discover

(summertime 5 day bible/activity camp at Glen Ellyn Bible Church)

the CM Director

(Children's Ministries Director--that would be Sarah)

challenged the 140 kid-attendees to bring in groceries to help stock the local community food pantry. She told them that if they filled a designated space (about 5 foot diameter) with groceries from floor to ceiling, that she would eat a cicada :/

As you can imagine, lots of LARGE items came in and the kids did succeed in meeting the challenge. Here she is downing the crunchy tid-bit.

Admirable dedication, Sarah! and good results for the food pantry.

Let The Weddings Begin

Josh tuned up the singing voice to participate in the recent wedding ceremony of his high school friend, Eric (white tie). The music and voices sounded great!
One of the guys remarked about the wedding..."there goes the first one down!"...BUT...this is a tight group of friends and that the old song lyric ("wedding bells are breaking up that old gang of mine") will probably NOT apply.
Josh, enjoy your ride on the twenty something wedding train!

Summertime, and the livin' is easy...

Hello from Villa Graf!

My friend Brian recently learned that he has been re-classed from stage 4 to stage 3 cancer, which was awesome news. As you can see in the picture posted below, he sure doesn't look sick.





This is (L to R) Emily and Chloe Graf, their friend Sam, and their neighbor Emma.

This is Abby Graf, who is not-quite-10, but going on 20. This is her "shyster lawyer" look.

This is a rare picture of Barb Graf sitting still and relaxing. I do believe the Bloody Mary I made for her may have been to blame.

This is the next door neighbor, Jina. She reminds me of "Judy" from accross the street in Camelot.

And this is her husband Tom, who is a great guy, but also kinda reminds me of the Camelot neighbor.

Ok, that's all.

More Running!

This past weekend Jason and I were part of a team that was in the Great Midwest Relay. This race started in Madison, WI and ended in Chicago at Montrose Harbor.

We had a team of 12 people each person running 3/36 legs of the trip. The total time our team took was roughly 30 1/2 hours. Jason and I were in Van #1 which ran legs 1-6, 13-18, 25-30. Jason was runner 2 and I was runner 3. All went fine, I got lost at one point and had a minor...ok major freak out.

It was just about the most fun thing we have ever done and are looking foward to doing it again next year.

You can check out stories from the race at our blog : http://jasonleahrun.blogspot.com. and you can find pictures of the race here.