A Vacation! A Facelift!

This past week, my church family has offered me an extraordinary gift: I've had an entire week away from any responsibilities -- kind of like a vacation, but our family spent the time at home. It's been wonderful! I've slept in almost every morning (I even made it to 8:00 AM once!), gone out to dinner with our family and with friends, caught a movie, napped in the hammock, and basically recharged my batteries. Margo and I spent a glorious spring afternoon touring Mount Vernon (what a cool place!), and I even read a couple of novels -- the 5th in Rosenberg's Last Jihad series as well as Grisham's latest, The Associate.

I've also had a chance to finally update this blog with a new facelift. The old design was so very black and dark, and I've wanted to play around with a different color scheme for a while now. Hope you like the new look.

Mark Brown once asked me why I blog. It's a really good question! I know a bunch of guys whose blogs are narrowly focused on a specific topic -- pastors writing about church leadership or theology, artists writing about technique and showing off their latest sketches, pop culture sites offering reviews and resources, tech gurus sharing news and tips, etc. For me, I started blogging as a way of "thinking out loud" and staying connected with folks when beginning our new life here in Virginia. I didn't really have an agenda, other than rambling a bit about whatever thoughts crossed my my mind.

During this past month's break from the blog, I thought a bit more about why I'm blogging and what I hope to accomplish. Do I want to come up with a "big idea" approach to blogging? Am I writing for a specific audience or just rambling for myself? In the end, I decided that I'm really happy with the "potpourri" approach of just sharing my thoughts, ideas, experiences, perspectives, etc. for whatever that's worth. I just needed a breather.

But I've caught my breath and am ready to dive back in to all the stuff life has waiting. Thanks for your patience, and I hope you'll feel free to join in the conversation...