Introducing River Elijah Buckner!!

Welcome River!

River's B-day began with an Underwear Party celebrating that Bella can now wear underwear to bed - totally done with Pull-ups!  We had chocolate chip pancakes to celebrate and sang the Underwear Party song.  (Little did I know that less than 24 hours later I would already be changing another diaper in our family!!)

Epidural is in...Waiting for River to arrive!

Janelle did an amazing job!  So peaceful and joyful and kind, even in labor. 

Esther and Bella's first meeting of "Baby Brother."  They were SO excited, Esther especially!

Esther is really good at holding River and even feeding him.  She is going to be an awesome big sister!

Gigi (Forrest's mom) flew in as soon as we went to the hospital so she could help for the week.  We are so thankful that she is here!

That was hard work!!

Thanks be to God for his amazing gift of life!  Everything went as well as it could have, and we are now home and beginning to learn what it looks like to be a family of 5, remembering what it's like to have an infant, and trying to keep up with school.

I'll post more later.  Thanks for all your prayers and excitement for us.  God is good.

Happy Easter! Still Waiting for Baby Brother...

Dadda has been promising Esther and Bella that we are going to go camping this summer, so we finally made it to an REI garage sale (with some friends out here who are pros at REI garage sales) to get a tent - and we got a winner!!  After we got our massive 6 person tent with two rooms, we had to set it up in our living room and play "family camping!"

Janelle and our girls...so pretty!  One of Janelle's spiritual gifts is getting bargains on really pretty dresses and making little girls' hair amazing. 

Janelle is 9 months pregnant and still going strong with the girlies. Life doesn't stop just because a baby is about ready to arrive! (watching this process makes me appreciate moms more than ever before)

Easter Egg Hunt 1 of 5 - Preschool!  The girls keep loving preschool.  Bella has recently started talking more about her "friends" at preschool!

Esther helping Bella find eggs - Esther is really thoughtful and kind toward Bella in many ways.  Often when they wake up in the morning we'll hear Esther explaining things to Bella and helping her get dressed.  Bella is still working on consistently returning the favor.

Easter Egg Hunt 2 of 5 - Fuller Seminary.  Fuller does an amazing job thinking about families.  The quote of the day the night before this egg hunt from Esther, "Dadda, Please, Please, 100 pleases, do you think Bella and I could each eat 2 candies at the egg hunt tomorrow?  "Yeah, I think that's a good idea."  "OK.  Dadda, please repeat 'two, two, two, two' to yourself all night"  "Why?" "So you don't forget!!"

In case you've gotten nervous that seminary might have knocked the competiveness out of me, I still got butterflies in my stomach before this sack race.  I was behind at the half way mark but you can see me here taking it home for the victory! Esther and Bella promptly ran up and congratulated me...it was a good moment.  :-)

 

Easter Sunday at our wonderful, little church - Knox Presbyterian.  We continue to be thankful for  this wonderful, vibrant, living community of Jesus-followers that has welcomed our family in.  We had breakfast, service, and a great egg hunt together. 

Post-egg hunt loot.  We were happy for some non-sugar prizes.  Check out the projectile noise maker!

Egg Hunt 5 of 5 (my favorite).  After Bella, Esther and I dyed eggs on Saturday, I followed in my dad's footsteps and hid them all over the apartment (high and low).  The girls (and I) loved it, and we didn't forget where any eggs were!

Waiting for their Easter presents...

Fun baby-doll carriers!  We have been getting a bit more interested in our dolls as we prepare for baby brother.

To finish out a really great Easter, we had a potluck dinner with some of our close friends out here - it was such a joy.  They love our girls really well.  We sang and the girls danced; we go to know each other more; we lived in the reality of Jesus' life.

We had a great Holy Week and Easter Weekend remembering Jesus' death for us and celebrating his resurrection-
 Esther quote at bedtime on Friday, "Dadda, I think it should be called Sad Friday and Good Friday because it was sad that Jesus died but it was good for us that he died so we can live."

Every time we hang out with our friends out here who don't have kids, they comment on the fact that Esther and Bella are always having fun.  I take for granted sometimes all the laughter and smiles and silliness that comes with being 2 and 4 years old.  I am really thankful for those.

Whenever baby brother decides to make his grand entrance (due date is actually 4/11), my mom is going to hop on a plane to help out with the girls for a week.  Janelle's parents are planning on coming out for bit when Sandy leaves.  We are grateful for the help.  For some reason, the seminary doesn't offer the same 2 weeks of paternity leave that First Pres Boulder so graciously offers its staff!!  So whenever baby brother arrives, I'm going to have to be managing schoolwork at the same time.  I think it is going to be good practice in hard work and in not getting overly concerned about grades (the latter is going to be harder for me!).

I have some great classes this quarter -

• OT Writings (Psalms, Proverbs, Esther, Ruth, Chronicles, etc) with one of the legendary profs here - an older English man who tells it like it is.
• Isaiah 1-39 in Hebrew - this is going to be my toughest class.  It applies my previous two quarters of Hebrew learning in an in depth study of Isaiah.  I'm sure I'll learn a lot.
• Grief, Loss, Death, and Dying - what an important class for many reasons, especially for being a pastor.  Last week we had to write our own obituary, epitaph, and eulogy; sounds morbid, but it was a really beneficial exercise.
• Perspectives on Christ and Culture - taught by the president of Fuller, another legend, Dr. Richard Mouw.  It is a total privilege learning from Dr. Mouw because he is so well read and brilliant and faithful to Christ and theologically deep while also bringing an amazingly broad appreciation for the whole world.  The question of the class is, "how do Christians engage with human culture?"  
• Preaching practicum - a chance to keep growing as a preacher.  I know I need that!

We will be back in Boulder for the summer, from mid-June to mid-August, hoping to find any kind of job to save some money for Scotland (any tips are welcomed).  I hope I get to see many of you then!  

Jesus is risen...Happy Easter!

Forrest

2 Quarters Down, 1 To Go...and Scotland in the Fall

A final tea party with Ruthie Stratman.  The Stratmans finished up the quarter here and headed back to Colorado Springs.  We were all very sad to see them go, but also very thankful to have discovered such wonderful new friends for our whole family!

Aunt Crystal came to visit for a week - so much fun!  (This is In N Out Burger at our favorite park)

A St. Patrick's Day celebration and Irish dancing at our wonderful little church - Knox Pres.

Esther and Bella love dancing!  This is Irish dancing, but if you'd like to see Bella dance in the aisles at church, just stop by any Sunday at Knox to see some spinning and arm waving!

Just turned in my last final...what are you going to do?  I'm going to Disneyland!  

Go Orediggers!

Waiting for the World of Color light on water show (it is really amazing)

We had the privilege of getting to spend some time with Daniel Webb while he was out for Spring Break.  The girls are actually getting pretty tall but 6'5" makes just about anyone look short!

We made it!  The last few weeks were intense but not insane, and we have finished quarter #2 of 3.  The quarter went very well.  I will try to get you a 2 sentence summary of what I learned in each class soon.  For now, I want to share a bit of my Colossians final.  With one of the best profs at Fuller, I had the privilege of studying Paul's letter to the church in Colossae (book in the Bible) from the Greek.  Our final exam was to write a paraphrase of the whole book of Colossians from the Greek.  It was a fun, challenging, time-consuming assignment.  I'll include one of my favorite parts from Colossians 3:8-11 (after some amazing talk about how our lives are included in the Rescuer [Christ])-

    Picture yourselves taking off an old, worn-out jacket. The jacket is held together with the threads of an impure heart expressed in shallow anger, self-serving wrath, mean-spiritedness, abusive speech, filthy talk, and lies. All of those horrible, hurtful words that used to come out of your mouths are part of the old person that y’all have taken off. Throw that jacket into the rushing waters of baptism that washed away your old way of living.
    Now, imagine yourselves putting on a beautiful new jacket, the new person, that is made of living threads. The living threads of this jacket are constantly being made anew so that the wearers of the jacket look more and more like the Rescuer every day. In this new life, the old divisions between people are gone! No longer is there Catholic or Protestant, Jew or non-Jew, American or Immigrant, African, Muslim, slave or free, but the Rescuer unites them all and invites all peoples to be united to him.

We are on Spring Break now - one week off.  The girls are super-excited, "Dadda, you don't have to study this week!"  We have gotten off to a great start, and we are looking forward to a trip to Sea World later in the week.

Janelle and "baby brother" are doing great-36+ weeks pregnant now. As always, Janelle's attitude is amazing even as the little guy gets bigger and bigger and pushes her insides around.  He is very active in there - I think he already knows how important it is to get his workouts in!  :-)

In the other big news in the Buckner family, we heard back from the PhD programs we applied to, and we have decided to go to St. Andrews University in Scotland this Fall!  I will be doing a one-year Masters (M. Litt) in Systematic and Historical Theology and then a 3 year PhD.  If you are interested, my probable area of study for the PhD is Trinitarian theology - particularly the role of the person of the Holy Spirit in our corporate and individual union with Christ.  In other words, I will be studying what it means for us to be in real relationship with God in Christ by the Spirit.  Although I had hoped I could maybe skip the one year masters for time and financial reasons, I am really excited about the privilege of learning under some amazing professors for a year (including NT Wright, Alan Torrance, and Trevor Hart). 

Even though we are going down the PhD route, we are still planning on heading into pastoral ministry when it is done.  I'll be ready for ordination this summer, so maybe God will even open up a door to get ordained in Scotland...we'll see!

You may ask, If I'm not planning on being a professor, why do a PhD? Great question!  Mostly because I'm really excited about studying who God is as the Father, Son, and Spirit and because as much as we know how to discern, we feel God is leading us this direction.  The community in our lives has confirmed this desire.  As far as I know, getting a PhD is a way for me to faithfully be myself as who God has made me.  I trust that God will use the learning to make me a better dad, pastor, follower of Jesus.

You know you live in Southern California when you are driving home from Disneyland at 9:30pm and you get stuck in a traffic jam, moving about a mile in an hour and fifteen minutes!  Even with 8-10 lane highways everywhere, there is always traffic!!

Blessings on you in the Rescuer Christ today.

Winter in Pasadena - "cold" weather, new friends, family fun

God's gift to our family for the quarter - Ruthie Stratman (along with her mom (Kim), dad (Nate), and sister (Ellie) moved out to Pasadena from Colorado Springs.  Our girls love playing with Ruthie and Ellie.  Kim has been a gift to Janelle. Nate has been a blessing to me.  Wow!

At the Huntington Gardens - Funny faces!!

Minnie Mouse with Snow White while Dadda and Esther ride the roller coasters.  Esther loves all the roller coasters and took me on Space Mountain for the first time a couple weeks ago.  We both loved it!

We are so thankful for the gift of going to Disneyland!

Our "backyard"

A visit to the Getty - an amazing art museum.  Esther is sketching from a 20 foot painting of a beetle...focused!

Our girls in front of a Van Gogh.  Our baby boy is 7.5 months old now!  Janelle is doing great.

Pretending to be statues outside at the Getty.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Our "front yard"- you can see one of our two hummingbird feeders and you can see by Esther's feet our pumpkins that we planted last fall - they haven't grown much yet, but we are hoping the warm weather will bring us some pumpkins!

I'm so thankful for fun family time.  (Special shout out for the Dawson Basketball team!)

I'm so sorry that I have not posted for so long.  I will try to get a post up at least every couple weeks from here on out. 

The pictures tell most of the story of January and February for us except you don't see me sitting at a table in the Library where I spend much of my time studying away.  I am enjoying my classes this quarter very much - Colossians (from the Greek text with one of the legendary teachers of Fuller), Homiletics (preaching - I have learned SO much and see how much more I have to learn to be a good preacher), Hebrew quarter 2 (with a really excellent, young prof), and Missional Churches & Leadership (challenging me to rethink many assumptions I have had about "doing church").  We only have 2 more weeks of classes and a finals week.  Before we know it we will already be starting my last quarter out here!

Janelle and baby brother are doing great.  Due date is April 10.  His "room" is all set up in our closet in our bedroom.  It feels a little crazy having a baby out here away from all our family and in a 2 bedroom apartment, but we know that God is going to take care of us and we are thankful for the community out here that continues to form.

Last thought - you know you have become acclimated to Southern California when you look at the weather, see it is going to be a high of 59 in February, tell your kids that it is going to be cold today, and put on your wool socks.  Sheepishly I admit that all of those things happened today!  I am a Coloradan still but my inner thermometer has been reset!

I do hope you are well and know God's grace and love in Christ this day.

Forrest