Conference

On Tuesday Stephen and I flew to Orlando, Florida for a pastor and spouse conference called The Gathering, which was for the entire Wesleyan denomination - there were over 2,000 of us there from all over the world!  

The weather kept changing, sometimes even multiple times per day, so I wasn't sure exactly what to pack, but I was pretty excited that it was going to be about 70 degrees.  We had wonderful flights to and from Orlando, and when we landed it was sunny and about 75...I was so excited to break out my flip flops!  

However, that was the last we saw the sun until we were back north again...and, I was cold almost the entire time I was down there.  But, it was wonderful to see green grass and palm trees, in spite of it being 50 and rainy our last day there.  

And of course, we didn't go to Florida for the weather ;)  It was amazing to connect with others we haven't seen in a long time, the general sessions were fantastic and we had great worship times, and Stephen and I both really enjoyed 3 out of the 4 seminars we attended on Wednesday and Thursday.  It was refreshing and relaxing, and Stephen and I had a great time together with amazing discussion and heart to heart conversations.

We left very encouraged!

Anyway, all that to say, here are some pictures from our trip...although I was soooooo disappointed to realize I left my camera at home :(  Thankfully my laptop has a camera, and it is small enough that I could carry it around with me, but it was super hard to take pictures because the camera only faces me, so it was hard to see what I was taking a picture of and to be able snap a picture at the same time.  

Absolutely no clouds for most of our trip from Grand Rapids to Florida...it made it fun to watch out the window!

Just because this was actually an easy picture to take ;)

It was so nice to see flowers and green everywhere!

I had to get a picture of Stephen because he loves palm trees :)

This was a HUGE chandelier in our friend's hotel - although just seeing this as a picture doesn't put it into perspective.  It was beautiful!

We went out to eat with our friends Brooks and Jill on Wednesday night!

Also on Wednesday night, comedian Michael Jr did a show after our general session.  He was fantastic, and has a great message, too!

If you haven't heard him, you need to check him out!

This one is all for Damaris...we had to get our picture taken with a Disney princess while at the Orlando airport :) :)

On our way home (earlier today)...another beautiful day for travel!