Crafting For The Holidays

Well, Thanksgiving may be over, but the crafts are just starting! Crafts for Christmas started today at the house, where we all made clove oranges. Boxes of lights were brought out from storage, and ornaments were sorted. Christmas music played on the TV and PC. Hannah sang her own words to Joy To The World throughout the house. It was a wonderfully lazy day. Hannah themed her oranges, the most noticeable; the golf club cloves in honor of my dad, Rick. Faces adorned oranges, some even with mullets. Finally, 3 oranges were completely covered, and a mullet-headed one stood aside, awaiting more cloves from the grocer. Ah, the sweet smell of the season!

Thanksgiving

Now, we all have our Thanksgiving traditions...for that last few years, mine has been working, and then showing up at the folks after everyone had eaten. It's the life of a waiter I guess. But I'm still a newlywed (3 months 4 days) so I wanted to actually spend it with my family. I still had to work, but we had a later dinner (after 7pm!) just for little old me! My brother showed up with his family as an added bonus, as he had dinner with the inlaws. My new nephew, Cole, was in a real smiley mood, so that was great! Dinner was traditional, and as another tradition in my family, my mother handed out personal Christmas ornaments to all of us. So I suppose I should take down the giant Halloween Shrek in the front yard now...and replace it with a giant Grinch in a santa hat! I love decorating!

Happy Thanksgiving.

The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe

It's been loads of fun. I get to practice all of my bad British and Irish accents, for male and female. And she loves it. I've been reading The Lion, The Witch, And The Wardrobe to Hannah one chapter a night. From the set that I had as a kid. It's great. And she made the connection to Christ when Aslan was killed and was then alive again. (I hope that I didn't give anything away to those of you who haven't read it...read it anyways) I've really enjoyed it. And we got to do it before the movie comes out. Now, I hear that they did a superb job on the movie, you can even still see the parallels that were meant to be seen in the book. But a child's imagination is far superior to what they can do at the cinema. Countless times I've been disappointed at the casting or the imagery of movies where I've read the book first. And then when you go to read a book that you saw the movie first, the characters and scenes are predisposed in your head. But Hannah wanted to have me read her the story before seeing it. We finished last night. She slept through the last page, but I think she'll stay awake for the reread tonight. And then...Prince Caspian.

Oh, and I'm sorry, you have to read them in the original order that they were written in, not the order that they were re-released in. The family of Lewis may have okayed it, but it doesn't make since to read a prequel before the first one. Too much is mentioned back to in the prequels (The Magician's Nephew and The Horse And His Boy). So start off with The Lion. Move on to Prince Caspian, The Voyage Of The Dawn Treader, and The Silver Chair. Then read The Horse and Magician's Nephew. Finish with The Last Battle. It reads better that way. And the folks making the movie knew it. Let's go and watch the results next month, shall we?

Crash, Grandma, & Me

This post was actually written for MySpace since it was more personal rather than reflective of my entire family, but I feel that it is reflective of what we should all be about-thus the picture.

I watched the movie Crash last night. It was really well done; made me feel emotion, and was well acted. Not the happiest movie ever, but it rekindled some memories, and something that I heard this morning connected them. Near the end of the movie…
A man says to his grieving mother, "Mom…I promise you, I promise, I’m gonna find out who did this, momma.” She replies, “Oh, I already know.” He looks at her in confusion. “You did.” She accuses. “I asked you to find your brother, but you were busy. We weren’t much good to you anymore, were we?” He sits back, speechless. “You got things to do, you go ahead.”
Now, this may not be a fair accusation, but it haunts the man. His heart breaks. Imagine the questions he is asking himself.

My grandmother was divorced and in the later years of her life. She had smoked for most of her life, and her health was deteriorating noticeably. She had to move to a convalescent living center for health and monetary reasons. When she first moved there, I would visit about once a week. But then life was moving for me. With a new job, a wife, and my “busy” schedule I found it “too hard” to find the time to visit her. Once, after she had lived there for quite some time, I bought her a picture frame meant to hold about 24 little pictures. She was excited by this, and I said that I would come and help size the pictures and put them in for her (at this time she was little more than skin and bones). It had been the first time that I had visited for months. It was probably her birthday…some special occasion. I forget. My busy life kept me from going back. I never even collected pictures for her. It sat empty near her chair. One day I received a call from my father, informing me that she had passed on. I hadn’t seen her in months. Some weeks later my father stopped by to give me something. It was the frame. It was empty. And my heart screamed. The frame haunts me to this day. It sits empty still.

What was it that kept me so busy? Why did I feel that sitting at home watching a movie was more important that spending time with someone that I loved that was alone? She was alone, in a cold, disinfected, ambulatory place where she would die. And I knew it. If I am meant to be the Hands of the Almighty here on earth, and I can’t even find the compassion or time to reach out to my family, who I know and love, what chance is there that I will do it to those who are alone that I don’t know. This morning I wept. I wept and cried out to God, in hope that she was with Him. I asked Him to hold her for me…to give her the compassion that I was “too busy” to give. And my heart breaks again.

Am I blind? Am I deaf? Am I mute? Am I truly His Hands? I pray to God, on my knees, that I may see. That I may hear. That I may reach out and touch someone who is alone. That I may speak words of comfort to someone in pain. That I may turn from this selfish, ignorant, petty shell and become alive in His love.

As I heard the words “we are His hands” this morning, I am reminded of two songs. The first is Casting Crowns’ If We Are The Body. In this song, they ask,
“But if we are the Body
Why aren’t His arms reaching?
Why aren’t His hands healing?
Why aren’t His words teaching?
If we are the Body
Why aren’t His feet going?
Why is His love not showing them there is a way?”
These words pierce my heart to the core. The other song is an old 70’s song by the band LoveSong. It’s called Two Hands, and it calls us again as Christians, in the spirit of the Great Commission,
"Accept Him with your whole heart
And use your own two hands
With one reach out to Jesus
And with the other, bring a friend”
Paul writes that he has been all things to all people…and we are to mimic these actions. But remember, that we are to be IN the world, but not OF it. I find myself caught by the cool things that make us a modern nation. I love my computer, my movies, my car, my guitars, et cetera. But they are all EMPTY! Only through His life do we have meaning. And that what I wanted to share with you. Reach out. See. Hear. Love. Act.

Revenge Of The Ankle Part 5: A New Beginning

Monday night we ventured over to my folks' house, where I put together my mom's new computer. It was fun. She's happy. yay! But then I attempted to walk out the fron door. And fell. Those of you who have known me for more than a year realize that I fall down...and break things...usually my right ankle. But this was new. My right ankle escaped unharmed. My left ankle rolled, swelled, and caused me to inflict the shrubbery with new and exciting curses. We stayed at mom's a while longer. Borrowing a cane, I finally went home (luckily I have an automatic transmission). Having stairs sucks when you can't walk on one leg. It really sucks when you can't put all your weight on the other ankle, because it wants to roll as well!!! A wheel chair in a house with stairs would really, really suck. So I sit. Alone. The cat's don't follow instruction well, and my requested glass of water was replaced by a catnip mouse. It was actually quite refreshing. You should try one.

Friday Fun Night

Friday night Lake Grove Elementary had their Mardi Gras Fun Night. Yeah, so Mardi Gras is actually several months away...it was just a theme. Lots of fun to be had, games to be played, cakes to be one, and balloon swords and bats to wack each other with. Hannah spent most of the time in the Obstacle Course, a huge inflatable structure with bouncing floors, and a faux rock wall to climb and fall down. Lots of fun. Kevin? He watched. And paid.
I was amazed at Hannah's patience about the "facepainting" room. The line was approximately 45 minutes long, but she held it out. In the end, she and her friends got matching rose tatoos...which is fitting for her, as that's her middle name. 8 o'clock came, and went, and still fun was being had, until the shutdown started (late) and we had to leave at 8:30pm. There are more tattoos to be applied, a pink sword that I get wacked with frequently, and tons of baubles and jewelry that was won due to Hannah's dexterity in playing Operation on a 6 foot board.

Halloween

Halloween has come and gone, and with it, a surge of hyperactivity not to be equaled until Christmas. From the 8' Shrek in the front yard, to the 4 jack-o-lanterns, to pumpkin pencils by the door (no candy for kids here it seems), we were ready...except for the rain. Both girls were in high heels, and slid down several driveways together. It's pretty dark around our house, and there are no sidewalks, so we drove over to the Westlake area, where we were surrounded by hundreds of other pint-sized Darth Vaders and Disney Princess'. The haul won, we stopped at my parents house at last, where Hannah quickly fell asleep on her mother's lap. So cute!! She was a little Fairy-Princess, complete with wings and wand, and Michaela was a "female cop" complete with 2" blue heels, Dragnet hat, and water gun (my back was soaked by the end of the night!). And the next day, all of my pumpkins are still in one peice. Thanksgiving, here we come!