Check out our wedding website! Only 66 more days!

http://www.mywedding.com/nikiandmikelynch/

Invisible Children Mascarade Party

Lindsay Marsolais and Kirstie Perry are throwing an amazing party on October 26th (Friday) at 7:00pm that would like to invite every one of you to come!

It is a MASQUERADE party, masks required, will be food and music and raffles and fun, it will be sponsored by JUBILANT EVENTS and will be for the benefit of Invisible Children.

They hope to provide an INCREDIBLE party for all who attend while also benefiting the organization Invisible Children. Spread the word and save the date!

They are only charging $10 at the entrance but will also be holding a raffle throughout the night. ..And of course donations to Invisible Children will be accepted if your feeling led to do so. Otherwise, it will just be a FUN night with food and music and much more!!!

It is not a closed-invite, so bring whomever and invite whomever you wish!
The invitation has details and directions in the above links, but if you have a problem openning it, just ask me any questions and I'll be glad to answer!

The party colors are deep red, royal purple, gold, and black… no need to coordinate, just wanted to let you know.
Don't forget- MASK AND COSTUME REQUIRED (especially mask…). A simple dress and mask, suit and mask, tux and mask, pant suit and mask, or full on costume and mask, anything you can come up with as long as you've got the mask hence "MASQUERADE". :)

Ask to Me, Lindsay or Kirstie for directions!!!


All ladies and gentlemen are cordially invited to attend a
Masquerade Ball


Friday, October 26th at 7pm

For the benefit of
Invisible Children

Cover Charge of $10
Costume Required
(Dress is semi-formal with masks)
Raffles, Food and Much More!

Let's go fly a kite!

Check out an adorable picture of my neice flying a kite all by herself! I haven't flown a kite in so long and am now inspired to buy a cheap one thanks to this little two year old. She makes it look so fun and relaxing, which is actually what I might need in the midst of all my wedding planning. What a great down-time activity! Isn't she cute???

We're ENGAGED!!!!!!!!

GUESS WHAT!!!!!!!!?????????I'm engaged!!!!
I've been blessed by the Lord with the most incredible man who I can't wait to spend the rest of my life with-Mike Lynch!!!!!!!!!!


This past Monday he asked me to be his wife and of course I said YES! I am so blessed to have him in my life....He is my BEST FRIEND, my biggest support and my soulmate :) Here are some pictures of the engagement night that our friend Eric Jepson took.






Mikey planned an incredible evening: He first took me to Poehe's in Coronado, then we walked around the hotel del coronado (where he asked me to be in wife near the central gazebo area) and then ended the night taking me to my favorite place Extraordinary desserts in Little Italy.


We are having a short engagement and plan to get married January 19th, 2007. Wahoo!

My Europe trip with friends-London, Rome, Paris and Amsterdam

A few weeks ago, I had the privilege of traveling to Europe with my friends Christy Owen and Melissa Linthicum. I met the two in London where our adventure began. Prior to seeing Melissa at the London Heathrow airport, I sat next to the British musician Craig David’s bodyguard and was introduced to him right after we arrived. I had a great time talking to Craig on our long stroll through the Heathrow airport to the luggage center. Right after finding my bags, I spotted Melissa waiting to greet me at the beginning of the arrival meeting area. Despite my jet lag and hunger, I was thrilled to see her and couldn’t wait for our adventure to begin. Here we are shortly after at the playhouse watching Billy Elliot.

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Here are some fun pictures of us in Rome. We had a fun time ROAMING the beautiful streets of such a historical place. Here’s us at the coliseum.



When we were about ready to leave the Coliseum, Christy mentioned she wanted to get one last look on or way out. The second we all agreed and headed to get our view, she ran into some old friends from her college Azusa Pacific. It was such perfect timing seeing they were on their way out too. It was then that they invited us to the 5:00 mass at St. Peter’s church at the Vatican.

Here they are singing. It was such a coincidental treat for Christy to see her old colleges and her choir teacher…




I think the Mamertime prison was my favorite part of the trip. Just knowing that both Paul and Peter sat in this jail cell made the Bible seem more real to me.





Us at the Spanish steps after we enjoyed a wonderful pizza and calzone dinner.






Michelangelo’s beautiful Sistine Chapel.





A wonderful view of Rome from the Vatican Dome…We had to walk 323 steps up a long claustrophobic hallway to get this view...but it was worth it. The guy with us was named "Vee"-a Serbian boy who wanted to come along with us on our tour of Vatican City.






Us at the Trevy Fountain throwing a coin in with hopes of returning to Rome...





After Rome, we stayed with a very distant cousin of mine whom I never met. Luckily we found him at the airport after a half hour of searching. He (Mark), his wife and 6 month old baby were very very kind to open their humble abode to a bunch of strange American girls. Not only were they hospitable, but they were also very generous and trustworthy to lend their car and cell phone to us during the 3 days and nights we were there. Christy did a great job driving us into downtown Paris despite the one night of getting lost for 2 hours. Luckily the cars in Paris drive on the right side of the road and not the left. It was way better than taking the metro.





Here’s us at the Eiffel Tower and the beautiful rainbow that encompassed both sides of it.





After Paris, we stayed at the house of another distant cousin of mine. This time it was on my Dads side. Her name was Debbie. She cooked a delicious Indonesian dish for us which was a favorite highlight of mine!

Biking in Amsterdam was scary, but I somehow managed to only crash one time.

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Here’s me at the Anne Frank House.


Here's My wonderful Dutch-Indonesian famiy...My cousin Debbie and her daughter Chantel and granddaughter Secress. We stayed at Debbie's house in the city of Hoorne and she was very very very hospitable. We have a lovely stay with her and so much fun!!!!!!!!




Overall, the Lord has blessed us with such an incredible European adventure that was safe and fun!!! I had such a great time!!! Thank you Lord!
Holland 2 005 Holland 2 033 Holland 2 051

Online Devotional

He Said, She Said
Amanda Mejia

“Did you hear that Jenny told Caty that Carla and Kathleen were mean and selfish? Yeah, can you believe that? I mean Jenny is best friends with Carla and Kathleen, at least she says she is. And then, Caty told Carla and Kathleen what Jenny had said about them, and now they are having a huge fight and Carla told Jenny they would never be friends again. Wow I’d hate to be in Jenny’s shoes right now, if my best friend said that about me, I’d never want to speak to her again.”

Does this sound familiar to anyone? This kind of gossip is probably very similar to things that go on in most kids’ lives. At least I know it is in my life. I can’t even begin to tell you the countless times I have sat around with a group of my friends and talked about the lives of other people I know. And why do we do it? No one really benefits from it, people only get hurt by it. I suppose a completely honest reason would be that it’s fun to discuss other people’s mistakes and know that they aren’t yours. We are able to feel better about ourselves by putting other people down, even though we know we have done things just as bad or worse. And let’s face it, I think most people hate being talked about, I know I do. Gossip can be so vicious, it becomes a scary thing.




When I was a freshman in high school I started hanging out with a group of older girls. I looked up to them and they were truly awesome to me and made me feel less like a stupid freshman than anyone else could. At the time I began hanging out with those girls, their friendships were falling apart, and fast. Gossip was a major part of it. They were telling lies and secrets and rumors about each other, behind their backs. It caused such a rift in the friendships that those who knew these girls were forced to take sides, including me. I would have some of them tell me certain things and then 20 minutes later the others would come and ask me what I had heard and then refute said rumors with their own. I know, it sounds like some television show about some kids living in California on a beach somewhere, but its not. It was my freshman year of high school. In the end of it all, I lost wonderful friends because I had to choose sides. The rumors and gossiping played a major part of the rift between my friends. So many people get hurt by gossip, and personally, I think it can be more hurtful than punching someone in the face. A rumor can make you see people totally differently, whether it is true or not.

I have been a Christian since, well, since I was born. I have gone to a Lutheran school my whole life, and have been around Christian people my whole life. And all the while, people have told me to; “be a good Christian, live for Christ, show His love in everything you do.” And I do love God and hope to do His works, as do my friends and the people I am around all the time. When you think about it, gossiping really isn’t so bad; I mean there are far worse things you could do, right? But God has other things to say on this matter. Gossip can destroy friendships, jobs, families, and other people’s lives. Many times in the Bible the tongue is referred to as one of the most deadly weapons. In Exodus 20 it very plainly states, “Thou shall not bear false witness against your neighbor.” And in Romans 1:29b-32 Paul says, "They are gossips, slanderers, God-haters, insolent, arrogant and boastful; they invent ways of doing evil; they disobey their parents; they are senseless, faithless, heartless, ruthless. Although they know God's righteous decree that those who do such things deserve death, they not only continue to do these very things but also approve of those who practice them.” Well it sounds to me as if God doesn’t really want us to be gossiping. As harmless as it may seem at the time, gossip is harmful and even deadly in some respects. If we are supposed to love our neighbors then we shouldn’t be sitting around talking about them behind their backs. That doesn’t exactly sound like love to me.

You know what does sound like love? “This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins.” 1 John 4:9-10 reminds us that like all sins, Christ paid for the sin of gossiping on the cross. His love covers our sins and in response to His love, we want to love one another.

It’s probably something all of us need to watch, believe me, I know how easy it is to let a few little things slip and how simple it can be to get sucked into gossip. It can be very entertaining at the time, but what can happen after the fact can cause pain for others. I have seen it happen and I’m sure you have too. I know it’s not so easy to avoid. We see it happening all around us, but with God all things are possible, right? Seek His forgiveness for the times when you mess up and seek His guidance for help to avoid the temptation. He is a constant friend who will never desert you and in whom you can trust.

Check out Brooke Fraser!

This weekend I am visiting my sister in San Fransisco and it's so relaxing! Today she introduced me to her new favorite artist- Brooke Fraser, a New Zealander from Sydney Australia. After hearing her songs online, I couldn't help but fall in love with her voice! So today as we went into the city to shop we also searched high and low for her CD, only to find it's not yet available in the US.

I guess for now we'll just have to listen to her online (which is fine for us)!

She's got an incredible talent, great voice and writes all her own stuff! Check it out!!!

Check out the North County Times article about the Weekend of Service

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Loving their neighbors: Thousands from North Coast Church plan weekend of community service

By: GARY WARTH - Staff Writer

The seats at North Coast Church in Vista will be empty the weekend of April 29, but members won't exactly have the day off.

The church, which attracts about 6,500 people on weekends, is planning the largest community-service event in its history, with participants painting, landscaping, washing and rolling up their sleeves for various jobs at 54 sites throughout North County on April 28 and 29.

In all, congregants will tackle 92 major projects, including painting and landscaping Washington Middle School in Vista and Claire Burgener Academy in Oceanside, with up to 200 people working at each site.


"Jesus said the Commandments can be summed up in two things," said senior pastor Larry Osborne. That message: Love God, and love your neighbor.

The Weekend of Service will put that love of neighbors into action, said Osborne, senior pastor at the mega-church since 1980.

"We've always felt spirituality isn't something that's just in church, but it's going out and doing it, day to day," he said.

Community service is nothing new for churches, including North Coast. For years, the small study groups that about 80 percent of the members attend have been quietly performing a variety of services throughout North County.

That work became more focused about three years ago, when the church hired Casey Yorman as its first community service pastor. About a year and a half ago, Yorman said the idea of a churchwide project was planted after he attended a meeting with Leadership Network, a national group focused on church strategies for pastors.

Yorman said discussion at the meeting was on what it means to be an externally focused church, or a church that cares about its community rather than just its own congregation.

"Most people think of a church as a secret club, but we want to be externally focused," Yorman said, "a church that cares for its community and wants to show it."

The previous community-service work paid off for the church when it came time to select projects for the Weekend of Service.

"When we went out, a lot of people already knew who we were or said, 'Oh yeah, you've worked with us before,'" Yorman said.

The church's reputation for doing quality work comes in part from a number of professionals who are on the volunteer crews. Yorman said a couple of hundred contractors are leaders on the volunteer teams.

The Weekend of Service doesn't mean the church will spend less time on its smaller projects throughout the year. Rather, each individual study group is being asked to do at least one project every season. Osborne said he is not sure whether the Weekend of Service will become an annual event.

About 80 percent of the thousands of people who attend Sunday services also meet in groups of about a dozen during the week at a home for a more personal Bible study, Yorman said.

North Coast itself began in 1977 as a home Bible study in Carlsbad. It has grown to be the country's largest member of the Evangelical Free Church of America, an association of 1,400 autonomous churches. Osborne describes the church as conservative Christian, although its method for delivering that message is far from traditional.

In 1998, North Coast spearheaded the multisite church movement. Besides its main campus on North Melrose Drive, North Coast also has services at Madison Middle School in Oceanside and Fallbrook High School. It has broken ground near Guajome Park in Vista for a structure that will replace the main campus in fall 2008.

On weekends, people attending services at the main campus experience a multimedia, a la carte approach to church. The bustling foot traffic outside the buildings resembles a street fair, while worship services inside are a smorgasbord of styles.

Churchgoers have a selection of venues to attend Saturday night and Sunday morning. In North Coast Live, a room that holds about 500, Osborne or pastor Chris Brown delivers a sermon from a stage shared with a band. From the overhead stage lighting to the technician in the control booth, the production is smooth and polished, although Osborne, who has an affinity for Hawaiian shirts, likes to keep things casual.

At another venue called Traditions, an older crowd enters the room through a facade that resembles an white, wooden church. Inside, choirs sing traditional music from a stage bracketed by deep-purple banners that read "King of Kings" and "Lord of Lords." The service breaks for the broadcast of Osborne's or Brown's sermon in the North Coast Live venue.

Likewise at two other venues on campus, worshippers hear the same sermons projected on a large screen onstage. In the Video Cafe, the feel is more of a coffee shop and the music is played on acoustic instruments. In the rock 'n' roll venue called The Edge, gospel music is a bit louder, the subwoofers are bigger and the artwork is more urban.

Worshippers at the Fallbrook and Oceanside campuses hear the same sermons as their fellow congregants in Vista, although the message is recorded and brought to the sites.

All those rooms will be quiet in about a week, however, as the culmination of more than two months of planning is put into play with service projects throughout North County. The church will calculate the estimated value of the work in man hours and material later, but Yorman said a conservative estimate will be more than $400,000.

But the real value of the projects is more intangible.

"One of the things we talked about is changing how people think," Yorman said about planning the event. "They may think Christianity is just something in church on Sunday. This is the ultimate object lesson. When you close down church services on Sunday and go out and love your neighbor, it shows how serious you are."

-- Contact staff writer Gary Warth at (760) 740-5410 or gwarth@nctimes.com.

Weekend of Serivce projects:

This is a partial list of projects North Coast Church will be working on during its Weekend of Service on April 28 and 29.

San Diego Blood Bank: Donations.

Boys & Girls Club, La Costa: Maintenance repair and cleaning.

Boys & Girls Club, Oceanside: Painting, carpet-cleaning and mural painting.

Boys & Girls Club, Vista: Painting the gym and other work.

Brother Benno's: Maintenance, repairs and upgrading.

Buena Vista Elementary School: Campus beautification.

Camp Fire USA: Painting, maintenance and repairs.

Casita Center Magnet School: Carpentry, fencing, repairs.

Clair Burgener Academy: Exterior improvements, landscaping, painting.

Crown Heights Community Resource Center: Painting, building brick wall, bookshelves.

Downstown Inc.: Landscaping, painting, fence repairs.

Rancho Buena Vista Creek: Cleanup.

Green Oak Ranch: Maintenance, repairs.

California Avenue Preschool and Mary Loud Clark Center: Construction, repairs and maintenance.

Joe Chavez Resource Center: Painting, upgrade flooring.

Leo Carrillo Ranch: Landscaping, clean-up, maintenance.

Libby Lake Community Center: Outdoor refurbishment, clean-up, maintenance.

North Santa Fe Avenue lots and malls: Clean-ups.

Project OZ: Painting, electrical work, irrigation decorating, gardening.

Salvation Army: Painting, repair basketball court.

San Luis Rey Valley Community Resource Center: Painting, carpet-cleaning.

San Marcos Historical Society: Fence-building.

Washington Middle School: Multi-purpose room irrigation and landscaping, creating signs and murals, upgrades, clean-up,

Laughter is the BEST medicine!

Can you imagine delivering a 150 pound baby?

Hey guys!
Check out these cute pictures of a baby elephant born earlier this week. At birth, he weighed 150 pounds.




The Birding America website reads " On November 25, 2001, a baby Asian elephant was born at the National Zoo in Washington, DC. The baby was given the regal name Kandula, after the most famous elephant in Sri Lankan history who assisted a prince in uniting the island of Sri Lanka under one King some 2,000 years ago. This baby is just the 5th elephant born as a result of artificial insemination. Mother Shanthi must be wondering what happened, but she carried the baby for 22 months, so by now she's probably used to the idea. She gained about 1000 pounds in the pregnancy, and the little guy weighed 325 pounds at birth". http://www.birdingamerica.com/DC/elephant.htmOn