Celebrating O'Fallon's New Sports Complex

The O'Fallon Township High School (OTHS) Sports Complex opened last Friday night and the Marshall family was there in full fashion.


Matthew is a lineman on the OTHS football team, and although he couldn't play on Friday night because he needs a couple of more practices he was on the sidelines. That's him as number 63.

Bethany was also there cheering her heart out with the kids that joined her OTHS cheerleading team at Cheer camp. That's her cheering in the center with her arms up.

Then, at half-time Matthew became the first student in years to both be on the football team and play in the marching band. He dwarfs the other band members as he plays his Mellophone below.

All in all, even though the football team lost 24-3 to a very good Cahokia team it was a lot of fun. The stadium is fantastic and the entertainment was great.

Bad Weather in the Lou

Since we arrived back home after a vacation in Chicago last week the "hot switch" has been flipped on with the local weather. This spring in St Louis has been cool and the wettest on record. This week the weather jumped from the 70s to the 90s with thunderstorms and tornadoes most every afternoon. Today looks to be the worst of the week. Today is about 95 degrees an tornadoes already on the ground and it is only 2pm. I hope they don't do any destruction today.

Family Vacation Post #2

The weather was horrible today, so we drove out to Wheaton College and explored the school. What a great looking college. Wheaton is where Billy Graham went to college, our Pastor Doug Munton went there, and one of the men I respected most in life, the late Dr Larry Ward of Food For the Hungry who I worked for in the late 1970s. I can see why they all liked it so much. I'd like for Matthew and Bethany to attend Wheaton if we can swing it. Then we took a much lighter detour and headed off to Ikea to look at furniture. You can't go in there without spending a paycheck or two. They have some great stuff. Sorry, but no Cubs game for us today. The thunderstorms were too off and on. Lots of tornadoes in central Illinois today. It was a good day to stay indoors. We will be heading home tomorrow morning.

A Much Needed Family Vacation

We are on a much needed family vacation to Chicago this week. So far we have visited the Field Museum, the Museum of Science and Industry (a really incredible museum and an awesome coal mining in Illinois exhibit), eaten at Giordano's (possibly the best pizza on the planet), spent lots of time walking and taking the train around Chicago (Union Station is wonderful) and tooling around Naperville where we are staying. Tomorrow we might take in a Cubs game if the weather stays nice. I also want to show Wheaton College to my son Matthew. I will post some pictures when I get home this weekend. It has been a long Blogging hiatus, but I am back.