Say cheese

Isaiah and I had a major incident over dinner tonight. Lately, if Isaiah thinks food doesn't look good, he just won't eat it. He won't even try it. I'm tired of his crying and ruining entire meals for the whole family. So the second he didn't want to eat the chili my mom made (and I had only given him a tiny spoonful anyway, anticipating that he might not really want it even though it is most certainly delicious) I gave him a warning that if he didn't try it he was going straight to bed. He refused to try it, so I carried him kicking and screaming (he was kicking, I was screaming) up to his bedroom. I told him that he could come down when he was ready to eat his chili.

He came down almost immediately, apologized to my mom for not eating it, and ate his chili without too many problems, just a few bad faces. But he ate it, all but three kidney beans. So that was pretty good.

Tonight, when I was putting him in bed, we were talking about what happened at dinner. I said I was sorry for yelling at him at dinner, and he said he was sorry for not eating his dinner. And I could tell he really was sorry. The rest of the conversation went like this:

Isaiah: I have an idea. Next time maybe we should have mac 'n cheese, complain cheese, lasagna and chili all mixed together. That sounds good!

Me: (kind of laughing) Do you mean complain cheese or plain cheese?

Isaiah: Complain cheese (giggling)

Me: Plain cheese?

Isaiah: No, complain cheese! (laughing)

You just never know... From the mouth of a three-year-old...

Happy Baritone Day

Ok, so I don't usually blog during a Steeler game, but those weird uniforms are buggin me out.

So for the last week or so, I've been trying to get in touch with a woman who lends instruments to students and schools. A music teacher at another school gave me her name and information. I contacted her because I have a new ninth grade student who plays the bartione horn but doesn't have his own instrument. (He played the school's instrument at his previous school.) As a music teacher with a small band, I will do just about anything to get more low brass!

So I played phone tag with this woman for most of last week. Apparently I was calling her husband's business line and she wasn't getting the full messages.

Eventually we connected and made an appointment for 1:00 today. So this afternoon I found my way down to Canonsburg, and her house was about 3 miles off I-79. It wasn't really to hard to find, although I was winding down country roads for those 3 miles. I saw a sign that said "Dangerous Intersection," so I slowed down. I came to what might be considered an intersection... two country roads intersecting. But dangerous? Hardly. It made me laugh.

When I got there, she was working on several baritones out of the back of her minivan. She was quite an eccentric older woman who apologized for not having a chance to clean the baritones because she was too busy putting shoe polish on the outside of the one baritone case... what? Through the course of our half hour together she told me the story of how she ended up lending instruments. Apparently this woman's husband is a millionaire. She has a passion for music, kids and education, and shopping in second hand stores and on ebay. Somehow these passions came together, and now she has a storage unit full of instruments that she will lend to just about any committed student or band program for absolutely free. Amazing!

The music teacher that gave this woman's name to me said she has witnessed to this instrument-lending woman, and that she's not a Christian and doesn't intend to become one. But I couldn't help but think how God blessed me, my student, and Eden Christian Academy today... all through someone who doesn't believe in Him.

As a little aside, when I got home, I got to clean the baritones out and grease up the slides, lube the valves, etc. Of course I had to play them a little (the veggie tales song is pretty fun...) and see if Isaiah could make decent sound. And he did! It was the funniest thing I've seen in a long time, just to see this little person making such a big sound on a big instrument! Dan did take a video and, if my laptop's memory wasn't completely full, I could download it and post it here. If Sam had been awake, I would have had him try it too. All you really have to do is make rasberries into the mouthpiece and some sound will come out. Sam would probably be an expert!

On my mind...

I know I haven't blogged much lately. I haven't forgotten about all of you. There has been a lot going on, some things I can't really discuss on my blog.
Here's a quick summary:

• Dan has accepted the position of director of the Lighthouse. This means a lot of major changes for our family. The biggest change to me is that we are leaving our church.
• I'm realizing a complicated aspect of being in a pastor's family: You don't get to choose which church you attend. This kind of stinks because I really like Bakerstown. If I was in a different situation, living here, I would go to Bakerstown. I've never been comfortable at a megachurch. I want to be at a growing church where people know each other, yet quickly integrate newcomers. I have a deep respect for the Christian and Missionary Alliance. While other denominations are debating whether homosexuals should be a part of church leadership, whether scripture is without error, whether Jesus is the only way to receive salvation, etc, the Alliance is debating whether family church camp attendance should be "expected" or "required" for ministers. I don't say that to ridicule the C&MA. I say that to emphasize that the C&MA knows, without question, where it stands on the major issues. I'm not saying that I would never attend a church of another denomination. I'm saying that, given the choice, knowing what I know about the C&MA, I would prefer to attend a C&MA church. It's not that the people at other churches aren't nice or don't love Jesus. It's the church leadership that I might question, and the district and national leadership that I might question. And non-denominational churches? It just doesn't seem like there's much accountability there. This whole discussion became a whole lot churchier than I would have liked. I'm not a terribly churchy person. I believe in Jesus. That's all.
• I turned 30 yesterday. In my head, I know it's just a number. But it's pretty hard to say the words, "I am 30." Is this what I thought 30 would be like? Definitely not. I feel so much younger than 30-year-olds always seemed to me. I think I'm in the best shape of my adult life. I'm getting more confident, caring less what people think about me. I still think too much about how people see me. But I'm getting better about it.
• I had dinner with a new friend, Andrea, tonight. We both had our 30th birthdays this week, so we decided to go out to celebrate/lament. There was more celebrating than lamenting! Anyway, we had a great time at Atria's just talking and getting to know each other more.

Craziness...

We have really had a crazy couple of days. Dan's marathon was great! The boys and Lorrie and I arrived in Erie when Dan was just over half-way through the course. So we got to cheer him on all the way to the finish line! I still can't believe he ran 26.2 miles. It blows my mind. I don't think I could even run .26 miles! =)

Sunday afternoon we got home and collapsed. Dan's clothes from the weekend needed washed, the boys' beach toys needed cleaned and put away among other things that we let slide for the weekend. But we just relaxed happily waiting for the Steeler game to start. We were playing in Cleveland, and they were predicting 50 mph winds from hurricane Ike, so we were waiting to see how the game would go.


We were having strong winds at our house too, and around 8:15 (right at kickoff!) the power went out for about five minutes, giving us a little scare. We heard a tree fall in the woods, but it didn't hit the house. Then at half time the power went out for good. We just went to bed, hoping it would be back on in the morning. When it didn't come back on, we went to my in-laws' house, which is right around the corner. We really couldn't stay at home because, with our well and electric water pump, we didn't have any water either.


Several days and many calls to the electric company later, we are finally home. Phew! Now I have to clean up everything from last weekend's adventures!

From an undecided voter in a swing state

I have been really into this election process. For the first time in my life, I feel like I have some understanding of the issues, where the candidates stand on the issues, and how the election process really works.

Also, although I am a registered Republican, I don't fully align myself with the party's beliefs. According to a survey I took yesterday, my beliefs fall on the Right side of Libertarian. Interesting.

All that aside, I had a thought yesterday. Romans 13:1-2 says, "Everyone must submit himself to the governing authorities, for there is no authority except that which God has established. The authorities that exist have been established by God. Consequently, he who rebels against the authority is rebelling against what God has instituted, and those who do so will bring judgment on themselves." Therefore, I have total peace about our next president. God will place in authority whomever he needs to, in order to fulfill his purposes. Who I see as the best candidate may not be the one God places over me. And I'm ok with that.

Book List

I'm compliling a list of books I'd like to read and re-read. Here is the list so far. If anyone has a favorite book, I'd love to add it to my list, so let me know!

1. 1984 by George Orwell
2. To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
3. The Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis
4. For Whom the Bell Tolls by Ernest Hemingway
5. War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy
6. The Rights of Man by Thomas Paine
7. The Social Contract by Jean-Jacques Rousseau
8. The Wisdom of the Desert by Thomas Merton
9. The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Graham
10. The Lord of the Rings by JR Tolkien
11. David Copperfield by Charles Dickens
12. Catch-22 by Joseph Heller
13. The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
14. Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky
15. The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
16. Walden by Henry David Thoreau
17. The Republic by Plato
18. Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov
19. Getting Things Done by David Allen
20. How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie
21. Lord of the Flies by William Golding
22. The Grapes of Wrath by John Steinbeck
23. The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
24. Honeymoon with my Brother by Franz Wisner
25. I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou
26. Black Like Me by John Howard Griffin
27. The Outsiders by S. E. Hinton
28. The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain
29. The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain
30. A Patch of Blue by Elizabeth Kata
31. To Sir with Love by E.R. Braithwaite
32. A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Betty Smith
33. Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo (maybe)
34. Native Son by Richard Wright
35. Deliverance by James Dickey
36. The Color Purple by Alice Walker
37. Shogun by James Clavell
38. Of Mice and Men by John Steinbeck
39. Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe
40. The Heart of a Woman by Maya Angelou
41. Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail by Malika Oufkir
42. Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert
43. The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky
44. Common Sense by Thomas Paine
45. Remembrance of Things past by Marcel Proust
46. Vindication of the Rights of Women by Mary Wollstonecraft’s
48. The Constitution of the United States
49. The Perks of Being a Wildflower by Stephen Chbosky
50. Harry Potter Series by JK Rowling
51. The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
52. One Flew over the Cuckoos Nest by Ken Kesey
53. The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne
54. Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury
55. My Antonia by Cather
56. Heart of Darkness by Conrad
57. The Great Earth by Buck
58. House on Mango Street by Cisneros
59. Peace Child by Richardson
60. Shadow of the Almighty by Eliot
61. Bruchko by Olson
62. Heavenly Man by Yun
63. Age of Innocence by Wharton
64. In His Steps by Sheldon
65. Pilgrim’s Progress by Bunyan
66. Middlemarch by Eliot
67. Silas Marner by Eliot
68. Wuthering Heights by Bronte
69. Hind’s Feet on High Places by Hurnard
70. The Absolutely True Diary of a part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie
71. Lindberg by A. Scott Berg
72. A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier by Ishmael Beah
73. Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer
74. Gone with the Wind by Herb Bridges and Boodman
75. Great Expectations by Charles Dickens
76. Tess of the D’urbervilles by Thomas Hardy
77. The Time Traveler’s Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
78. The Hitch Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams
79. Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
80. The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown
81. Anne of Green Gables by LM Montgomery
82. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood
83. Life of Pi by Yann Martel
84. A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens
85. The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
86. The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom
87. Emma by Jane Austen
88. Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen
89. Jan Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
90. The Brethren by John Grisham
91. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
92. Snowflower and the Secret Fan by Lisa See (Chinese foot binding)
93. The Road by Cormac McCarthy
94. The Other Boleyn Girl by Philippa Gregory

Quiet...

Isaiah was walking well this morning, still not running or jumping, but even going up and down stairs just fine. So we decided to let him go camping with my mom. They left this morning and are coming back Sunday night or Monday morning, depending on how things are going.

Since he left it's been awfully quiet around here. During Sam's morning nap I felt lost and didn't know what to do with myself. So I sat down at watch tv before 8:30 at night! There's a concept! And it wasn't even Sprout or the Disney Channel!

When Sam woke up from his morning nap, he played for a little, somewhat discontentedly. I'm not sure if it was the teething that was bothering him or the fact that Isaiah wasn't around. I decided to take him on a walk to the mailbox to mail our latest Netflix video. It was Raising Helen, but unfortunately it stopped playing in the middle of the disc. So we didn't get to see the second half.

Anyway, Sam was riding in his stroller so nicely that we just kept walking. He had his little hand stretched out as far as it possibly go, so he could reach the flowers and weeds growing by the side of the road. He was trying to grab them, but his reflexes just aren't fast enough yet. So they just tickled his hands and he giggled. So cute! It was nice to have some me and Sam time.

Isaiah's first x-ray

Isaiah fell at the gym nursery today. When I went in to get him and Sam, he was crying and couldn't put any weight on his right leg. Sam was crying because Isaiah was crying, so it was an interesting scene. After a few minutes of hoping Isaiah could shake it off, I realized that he really couldn't walk. So one of the nursery workers carried Sam, and I carried Isaiah out to the car. After we were home for about an hour, Isaiah still couldn't put any weight on his leg. I called the pediatrician and made an appointment for this afternoon.

An interesting twist in the story is that Isaiah and my mom were supposed to leave to go camping before lunch today. So that kind of got sidelined. The good thing is that my mom was off work, so she stayed home and watched Sam while Dan took Isaiah to his appointment because I had to go to school. I ended up cancelling the babysitter, which added somewhat to the confusion of the day.

At the appointment, the doctor saw enough of a problem that she sent them to get an x-ray. (No, this isn't a picture of the actual x-ray. I think they were sending that over to the dr's office.) Luckily he has no fractures and is supposed to take it easy for the weekend.

He's already walking better. I can tell that he's thinking about it, being careful how he stands up and moves around. Hopefully by tomorrow he'll be back to normal!

Oh. And Sam cried and fussed from 3:30 until 7:00 when I decided to put him into bed. (He did have a 45 minute nap during that time). I'm not sure what his problem is! Teething? I didn't see anything... so we'll see how that plays out.

Boys' moments

Last night Isaiah had just finished his before bed snack of pretzels. He asked for a drink, so I asked him if he would like juice or milk. His exact response was, "You know what I'd really like? (A phrase he learned from his dad!) Do we have any leftover cake or something?" I busted out laughing. We didn't have any leftover cake. My mom had made brownies two days before, but we had finished them. Just to see him sitting there, watching tv, with one leg slung over the arm of the recliner made me feel like I was seeing a thirteen-year-old Isaiah instead of a three-year-old one.

Speaking of kids getting older... On the morning of his first day of preschool, Isaiah was excited for school and feeling like a big boy. He was still in his airplane jammies when he caught sight of himself in our full-length mirror. He stopped, looked at himself, and said somewhat sadly, "Mommy, I don't really look that big." Tear*

Dan has been trying to teach Sam to do the Home Alone hands on the side of your face scream thing. Sam loves imitating people, so Dan will do it, then put Sam's hands on his cheeks. Usually Sam will let out a little scream, about five octaves too high. Hilarious!

Thinking about it...

In the book Wild Goose Chase Mark Batterson discusses a study a few years ago suggested that people "stop thinking about the lyrics of a song after singing it thirty times." It got me thinking about choosing songs for church. I do consciously try to balance the new songs with the old ones. It's not that I deliberately choose one hymn and three choruses or whatever. But I include the older, more familiar songs in the songs that I choose from. I choose based on Dan's message theme and God's leading. Mark's comment made me wonder if people really do think more about the words to newer songs, and thus worship God with their hearts and minds and not just their lips. Interesting. Just got me thinking.

End of summer update

I haven't blogged lately, not because there's nothing to blog about, but I've just been so busy. Here's what we've been up to:

Saturday: Spent the day at the Strip District. My mom had never been there before and it has been years since Dan and I had been down there. So we loaded the kids into the car and headed down. The streets were pretty crowded because it was Labor Day weekend. We browsed a farmers' market, asian food stores, whole foods market, Wholey's, Penzey's spices (oh the smells!! - and did you know there are at least four types of paprika??), and many others. Afterwards we had lunch at the Spaghetti Warehouse and even got to sit in the caboose! It was a fun time.

Sunday was a fairly nice and relaxing day, from what I remember.

On Monday Dan had to run and attempt to mow the grass (during which the mower broke again...) so my mom and I took the boys up to meet my aunt and grandma at the outlets at Grove City. My aunt had a toy box, which my grandfather had made, that she wanted Isaiah and Sam to have until my cousin has kids. So we decided to meet there as it is about half way. It was an absolutely gorgeous day! We meandered around the stores with no agenda just enjoying the sun. Isaiah played on the playground while the rest of us talked. Then we all had lunch and headed home for naps. After naptime we went to my mom's for a Labor Day picnic and swim.

On Tuesday Isaiah's preschool started it's phase-in, so I went with him and it was only an hour long. He played with toys, did two projects, and had circle time. I can tell that he is definitely on the younger side for his class. Some of the boys in his class are much bigger and more aggressive. We'll see how that works out... This is kind of a test year for us. This year will decide if Isaiah will be the youngest in his grade, or if we'll hold him back a year and he'll be the oldest in his grade.

So that's what we've been doing!