BIG NEWS!!!

Hey, ya'll! Many of you guys already know this, but for those of you who don't...Kerrie and I are adopting!

We are going to be adopting a little boy who will be born in early April. We even get to bring him home from the hospital! We've been praying about it and talking it over since late October, but we decided not to tell anyone until recently, just because we santed to be sure. This has been a really big decision, but it's been a huge blessing to see God's hand in it every step of the way.

The past few weeks have been spent filling out adoption forms. For anyone who hasn't ever done this, it involves a ton of paperwork. Almost a bigger workload than I had when I was an outdoor recreation major. We also spent a few days registering for baby stuff. We had no idea what we were doing, but thankfully Abel and Sarah Schafer and Hollie Voth went with us to help. We're registered at Target, Toys R' Us, and The Baby's Room in Rogers. Kerrie already has a couple of showers coming up, and we're planning on having some "meet the baby" showers in April, too.

Which brings me to my question...what do you think we should call him? I've been calling him Pedro for the last few months, but Kerrie's not really voting for that. We have some thoughts, and I think we've got one that we've pretty much decided on, but we're welcoming any new suggestions. Thanks for sharing in this with us!

You can stop holding your breath...we're back!

Break time's over!

OK, I know it's been awhile...but I have to tell you--Kauai is awesome! Kerrie and I had a great time. Here's an ultra-abbreviated summary of our 2-week trip

We got there at 6 in the morning after a horrendous 5 hour flight delay in Los Angeles. Definitely, the worst part about Hawaii is the trip to get there. We stayed at the Radisson and it was pretty nice. Kind of a moderately up-scale hotel. We didn't really get bored with it, so that's nice. Most of our days consisted of sleeping in for a bit and the lounging around the pool or the beach. The hardest thing to decide all day was where to eat. We saw a TON of humpback whales, seals, and dolphin. I got to go deep sea fishing for yellowfin tuna, which rocked. I tried surfing, which didn't rock. And, we got to go on a really fun tubing ride up with a company called Kauai Backcountry in these irrigation ditches that were dug in the mountains in the 1800's. That was really cool, because most of it was underground in these crazy tunnels. (By the way, that is the first hyperlink that I have ever done...I'm really proud.)

It's crazy that Hawaii is part of the U.S. Think about it--you're in a total tropical paradise that's almost equal distance from California, Alaska, Japan, and Australia. So, it's literally in the middle of nowhere. Every native Hawaiian looks exotic, but then they come up and say, "How's it going, bro?" But, I think the most wild thing about Hawaii is that everyday we could jump in our sweet Chevy Cavalier and within 10 minutes be at the nearest McDonald's, Starbucks, or Pizza Hut.

donde esta mi hermano

mateo???????? remember when you used to write as a kid a lot? at least i think you did, i always thought of you as a very literary person. always reading something or rather. from calvin and hobbes to choose your own adventure. readers make great writers too. escribe por favor. :)

remember knocking on the wall between our bedrooms as we read? i am happy that our parents made us readers. i can't go to sleep without reading, how about you, mi hermano?

long day

I spoke today in FSM, which always means that I don't get much sleep the night before. I think I probably slept like 3 hours last night, but I was able to sleep straight through my alarm this morning and wake up an hour late. Fortunately, I was able to get to the church on time...it was just a bit stressful.

After speaking for 2 services, we went to Ron and Pam Sweeney's wedding in Bella Vista at 2. Needless to say, it was a little unorganized. Kerrie was basically a spur-of-the-moment wedding coordinator for them. (She found out last night!) It was a little crazy, but they left the chapel married. That's the most important thing, I guess.

This is unprecedented...I think we're going to bed at 9 p.m. This may be the earliest ever. Well, goodnight.

deep thoughts

alright, so i started checking around other people's blogs and i found that pretty much everybody else blogs about really deep stuff like the meaning of life, the doctrine of the Trinity, the overcommercialization of christmas, etc. i felt bad. so i'll try and talk about deeper stuff from now on. so here goes...

...


...


...


i got nothin'.

ok, i have this game called bejeweled on my palm that i play about any spare moment i have during the day (meeting a lunch appointment, waiting in the doctor's office, going to the bathroom, too much information). i'm pretty addicted to it, and i hear that lots of people play it, but i have no idea if i'm any good at it or not, because i don't have anyone else to compare it too. my high score is like 110,000. is that good, bad, laughable? who knows?

that's my deep thought for the day. my last blog of 2004.

sabattical is upon us...

i just realized a few things today...

1. we have the week off between christmas and new years, so we really don't have to be back at work until next monday, january 3rd.

2. our sabattical starts thursday, january 6th. so our last day of work is the 5th.

3. we leave for hawaii on sunday the 10th.

4. from december 23rd to january 27th, we will only be working 3 days.

5. we have a TON of stuff to do in those 3 days.

well, i gotta go get to work. stressful.

we made it back

hey. we're back from oklahoma and we had a great time hanging out with the family and just chillin together.

i'm up to speak sunday, so i'm working on that right now.

kerrie's last present finally came in today. she got a new big flash for her digital camera. it works great and she's excited to use it. (her other present came in, too. but i can't tell you about itbecause i haven't given it to her yet. i'm really excited about it, though!)

well, i'm going to go play my new video game--the sith lords. i started it last night, and it's pretty fun. i might be getting addicted.

yesterday

the dossetts and some other friends came over last night. we played "scene it," which is a pretty fun dvd game. kerrie's friend haley came to town for the night, too. it was fun.

we finished the first lord of the rings and watched about a half-hour of the second one before mom had to go to bed. hopefully we'll finish the rest soon.

big gulps, huh? well, see ya later.

update

riley finished part of his candycane bone. some family friends are coming over tonight to hang out. we might play scattergories. i'm trying to get better at this.

this is where you lose me

there you go. we are going to start blogging again. we just had christmas. and we got lots of presents. kerrie really likes her new dyson vacuum cleaner. it's the first vacuum that doesn't lose suction. i got lots of fun stuff. including some movies and xbox games, a ladder, an air compressor, a camping stove & much much more. sadly, two of kerrie's gifts did not make it in the mail in time. hence, we will christmas a second time around new years.

riley's having a great time and enjoying his new dog toy & candycane bone. we're going to watch a movie now.

may the joy of the birth of the christ child bring peace and happiness in your life today.

sincerely,
matt & kerrie archer
jaime miller typing (to show how easy this is)

Life in general

welll, sorry for not posting for so long. Life has been busy with work and all. I really enjoy the new Halo 2 game for the Xbox. Very fun. I went out and played with my dog Riley today. And we also have two cats at the moment, Isabella and Sancho. Isabella is up for adoption as we already have too many animals. I like the Beastie Boys too. Ummm... Jason is probably the coolest brother-in-law that anyone ever could have and is the greatest Halo player of all time. Thats about it. See everyone around.

come on and blog

hey guys, everyone really wants to know what is going on in your lives. Get that blog going. Matt has been fly fishing for too long now.

Jason

i think i know my brother too well

hi this is jaime. i just wanted to say hi. um, yes, i hacked into matt's blog. i think i know him too well.

Fly fishing

Sam Hannon, Chase Davis, and I went out yesterday morning at 5:30.  Fishing is about the only thing I'll get up at 5:30 to do.  We headed to the White river below Beaver Dam.  I've never had much luck there, but now we have secret weapons...PJ's Finesse Baits.  Our friends Jim and Pam Hall make them, and they have these microjigs that are phenomenal.  I know they're not true flies, but they are hand tied and they only weight 1/180 of an ounce, there were all sorts of guys fishing around us, and they kept getting closer and closer the more fish we caught.  By the end, everybody on the river was within 50 yards of us.  We pulled out over 100 fish, and there were periods of time when we were catching fish every cast.  We pulled out at noon when the dam started generating.
 
I wish every day of fishing was like that!  You can check out Jim and Pam's jigs at www.ejigs.com
 

Sorry!

Alright, I have to apologize.  I've been a bad blogger.  I just have a hard time thinking of very exciting stuff to write about, and Kerrie and I have been gone so much lately, and I guess that's about all the excuses I can think of. 
 
Anyways, we spent June 26th-July 10th in Colorado at Ravencrest.  For those of you who have never been to Colorado during the summer, there's about no better place to be!  There are so many outdoor things to do, the weather is perfect, and you're in the middle of one of the prettiest place on earth.  That about sums it up.  The camp was awesome and it's always great hanging the Ravencrest staff.  After seven years of going there, they've really become some of Kerrie's and mine's close friends. 
 
If you're interested in seeing any of the hundreds of pictures of our weeks, you can check them out at www.ravencrest.org/glimpse04/week4/html
 
It's been tough to get back into the swing of things around here.  We've been trying to catch up on everything around here--sleep, work, friends, blog, etc.  I promise to write more and post some pictures!
 

what to type when you don't know anything...

OK, so I have something really personal to admit...I'm actually excited about the Vin Diesel movie coming out this weekend--The Chronicles of Riddick. Sad isn't it? I know. Pray for me.

Oh please, oh please, oh please, oh please, let the Pistons beat the Lakers...let ANYBODY beat the Lakers.

Kerrie's new camera rocks.

Derek and I are headed to Colorado on the 16th for a five-day whitewater rafting trip on the Arkansas river. That's going to be amazing! Basically, it'll be me, Derek, and a guide on the river for five days--either the guide is going to get saved or kill us...or both. I'll definitely keep you guys updated.

This is our dog, Riley. He's pretty much the coolest furry guy in the world. 

First try

Hey, Kerrie and I decided to jump on the information superhighway. I'm not really sure what we're doing, but Jason and Jaime will be here Wednesday, and they can help us out more after that.

Kerrie and I just celebrated our 5 year anniversary yesterday! It's amazing, cuz it doesn't seem like that long at all. I gave Kerrie a Canon Digital Rebel, and she gave me this cool weather gauge (Oh, and a five day white water rafting trip in Colorado).

All in all, it was a pretty laid back day. Kerrie's brother and sister-in-law (and kids) are here from Florida, so we've been spending a lot of time with the family and playing a lot of video games with the kids lately.

Well, that's our lives summed up in three paragraphs. I'll figure this out someday, and we'll post some stuff from the camera.