Date night and piles of shoes

Last weekend Andy's mom called us and told us she was sending us on a date. So we got a babysitter for Jeffrey and went up to Ashland. We stayed the night at a cute little old motel that was redone into a beautiful garden. We had a kitchen in our room and everything. Then we went out to dinner at a really nice Italian restaurant (I had cheese tortellini with gorgonzola, cream sauce, and peas - it was delicious). Then we went to a play at SOU that was very funny, and a guy from Andy's old youth group was one of the lead characters (big surprise to both him and Andy). Then in the morning we went home. It was a really really good time. I think it's the nicest thing someone's done for us.

When we got home on Saturday we drove out to church and met about 20 people for a shoe sorting day. Our church has collected shoes (more than 1000 pairs) to send to Africa. The project is called Shoe Africa, and the name came from Andy and I on our honeymoon. We were walking around in Animal Kingdom at Disneyworld and I saw a guy with a t-shirt that said "shoe africa." Immediately the idea popped into my head to do a shoe drive to send over. The summer of 2006 Andy and I and 10 other people went to Uganda to work at a few schools and encourage people. Tons of the kids have to walk to school with no shoes up to 12 miles. We've been really passionate about this project and are working at getting them over there for the kids. It's very exciting for us.