Category: family news

Introducing Greta Grace!

Shinnfans,

I’d like to formally introduce the newest member of Team Shinn, Greta Grace. She was born to Jonathan and Rachel Shinn June 28 at 1:09 a.m. Weighing in at a hefty 8 pounds and 1 ounce, she’s all cute and all girl!  You can find ongoing updates at teamshinn.blogspot.com.

Enjoy,

Andrew

Utah photos, part 5 and final

Friends and family,

Here are the last of the Utah photos. The rest of the team is staying until Saturday, but we’ll be driving back tomorrow. We need to be in Lodi for Ruth and Nate’s wedding on Saturday, so we had to leave earlier than the others. The rest of the team is headed to the mountains to work on building a Christian camp. They’re not quite sure what they’ll be doing yet, but it will be something in the realm of construction or trail-building. We’ll miss them, but we’ll also be glad to be back in the Golden State. We leave behind some great new friends in Michael and Rachel Trostrud.

Enjoy the last of the photos,

Andrew

Utah, part 3

Ok, so here’s the whole rundown on our trip to Utah so far:

Mountain View Community Church in Clovis sent three teams to the Salt Lake City area to support Mennonite Brethren church plants. One team was mostly youth, one team is ours, and I’m not sure who comprises the third team. Here’s our team:

  • Dave and Connie Thiessen – Dave is one of the pastors at Mountain View. Their kids are with family while they’re on this trip.
  • Milo – Single adult. Milo installs granite countertops and he’s a 4-year old Christian with a hearty laugh and a good heart. This is his second mission trip. His previous was a trip to Kenya last summer with Mountain View. Milo rode to Utah with us.
  • Rob and Sarah Jackson + Noah, Grace and Josh – These are our good friends. Their older daughter Gabrielle is on the youth team and their oldest daughter stayed home to work.
  • Andrew and Lisa Shinn + Liam – This is us! Liam is a lot of work, crawled during the trip for the first time, and is an absolute joy to have around.

Our team is working with the Daybreak campus of Shadow mountain church. The campus pastor is Michael Trostrud, who moved here from Reedley about two years ago. Lisa, Liam and I are staying with him, his wife Rachel, and their two lovely kids.

Yesterday, today and tomorrow our team is running carnivals in local parks. These are free to the kids and lots of fun. There’s no obligation, and the only church presence is a booth with a few flyers on it for the parents of the kids. We’ve been doing face painting, sack races, water gun games, bubble-blowing, and football-kicking. To let people know about these carnivals we’ve passed out flyers to the neighborhoods surrounding the parks. The irony of pairs of Christians going to the front doors of Mormon people was not lost on me.

Saturday, Sunday and Monday we’re going to be running family vacation bible school. It’s a new take on an old concept, and it should be pretty fun. The basic idea is this: in a church with so many new Christians, lots of parents don’t know how to teach their kids about the Bible because it’s often new material for the parents. So if we can study the Bible together as a family, hopefully the parents can take away some methods and means for teaching their kids about the bible in the future. This idea seems particularly relevant here in Utah, where family is everything and time spent together is golden.

That’s at least a thumbnail sketch of what’s going on. I’ll share more if you have questions. Leave them in the comments and enjoy the photos to follow!

Liam in the morning

Liam’s so cute when he wakes up! He’s usually all recharged, and he’s excited to see us when he emerges from his groggy state. The other day I was watching him smile so enthusiastically, and I thought, “What in my life gives me that kind of joy?” The only answer I could find was him. When he smiles like that, it’s a smile that I feel, too.

Artist Reception

Fresh Start Cafe in Reedley has invited me to display a few prints and offered to host an artist reception on Monday, June 25 at 7 p.m.  Y’all are invited and welcome to come!  Knowing Fresh Start, there will be some tasty morsels available for consumption, and a good time will be had by all.

See you there,

Andrew