This week has been full.

Monday was spent travelling to the other coast of Ireland to see the Cliffs of Moher, the Burren, and Galway. We packed all 8 of us (our 6, and Andrea's parents) into our SpaceWagon (don't try to picture it, it's painful) and made the nearly 5 hours (yep, that's right, 5 hours) journey west to the Cliffs of Moher. It's only 175 miles from our place, but we had a few stops along the way to deal with a couple puke episodes from the kids as the roads were the curviest and the most narrow any of us had ever experienced (even more narrow and curvier than in Brazil Andrea's dad had said). So combining the puke episodes with the narrow, nearly one lane, roads you can see how the five hours came to be. All in all the kids were so good, but we learned a lot from the drive that it is not for the weak in tummy by any stretch. It was quite the journey and experience as we got to see a different side, literally, of Ireland. Nine hours of our 14 hour day away were spent in the car driving on Irish roads. Nearly five hours from our home in Dublin to the Cliffs, 90 minutes from the Cliffs to Galway (40 miles), then 2 1/2 hours from Galway (120 miles) to back home. It was a long journey, but one we were glad we took.

Tuesday was mainly a day of recovery and getting some well needed errands run, one of which was getting Kate's Irish Birth Certificate so we can apply her for a U.S passport and birth certificate. The day also consisted of the boys daily summer tennis session and a third driving lesson for me. Also, Aisling and Niamh dropped over in the early afternoon for several hours to see little Kate and to be with the family. Aisling stayed for dinner. After I dropped Aisling home our newest ABWE teammate arrival, Stephanie, came over for a few hours for a chat.

Wednesday Andrea's parents headed into Dublin's city centre on their own for a bit of touring. They had a good time seeing a few of the city's sites, and while they were viewing things it allowed us to just regather ourselves as a family for several hours which her parents intentionally wanted us to do. That's why they went just the two of them into town. After they had arrived back to our place a fellow school dad, Tom, and his daughter came over to see baby Kate. That evening I called over (went over) to our neighbor Dermot to see how he was doing as he had a recent surgery. I spent an hour with he and his family hoping to be an encouragement and keep building that Kingdom friendship

Early Thursday morning Russell (Andrea's dad) and I grabbed a cab (around 5 a.m.) and left for the Dublin airport. From there we flew for an hour into Scotland's capital, Edinburgh.  The day was jam packed with viewing Edinburgh Castle along with as many of the others sites in the city that we could catch our eyes on. For me one of the highlights was being able to see the church, St. Giles Cathedral, where Scottish Reformer John Knox preached and ministered back in the 1500's. Amazingly when we showed up to the church, the daily 15 minute service had just started, so we sat, and took in a service in the very place John Knox preached. From there we walked to John Knox's house, toured a museum of his life, and then left to find the Edinburgh School of Divinity. The Divinity School was an important find for me as a 19th century preacher named Robert Murray M'Cheyne studied there. I have become quite fond of Mr. M'Cheyne and his legacy of faith and his love for God's Word (M'Cheyne was a single man who grew up in Edinburgh and pastored a church in Dundee, Scotland. He died at the age of 29, yet in such a short amount of life left such an impression for His King - Jesus. I highly recommend becoming familiar with M'Cheyne and his writings as I am confident you will find them convicting, inspiring , and challenging).

While at the School we found the New College Library which allowed us access to read the original sermons and study notes written by M'Cheyne himself. Here we read personal Bible study notes penned nearly 200 years ago from a young M'Cheyne, a man passionate for His Saviour. His passion for the Word was obvious as we discovered in one of the books that he had constructed a Bible reading plan enabling him to read the entire Bible through in 2-3 months (that's 4-6x/year)! Reading these original writings was the absolute highlight.

After an hour of reading through M'Cheyne's sermons and notes we headed back for our final stops on the hop-on/hop-off tour bus. At our final stop I headed to find 14 Dublin St. in Edinburgh, the birthplace and home of M'Cheyne. After a few pictures of the house I walked back to the park where Russell was waiting and we headed off for a bite to eat. The next few hours were spent getting back to the airport, checking in, waiting for our flight home, and returning back to Dublin. It was an amazing day, and the roundtrip flight from Dublin to Edinburgh was just $65!

(For pictures of our day in Scotland copy and paste this link into your web browser: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=139859&l=dd2c6&id=877410050)

Yesterday was again another day of recovery, but later in the afternoon we headed north 17 miles to Ardgillan Castle, a beautiful place with an amazing playground on the castle grounds, all overlooking the Irish Sea. Beautiful.

Today the kids are heading two houses down for a birthday party for one of the neighborhood girls. It will also involve final study and and review for tomorrow's message that I will be preaching up in Balbriggan.

Tomorrow morning we will be ministering and worshiping with the Balbriggan church. In the evening Andrea and I are going out together as a couple (this is way overdue) for an early celebration of 14 years of marriage.

To be continued...

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