Comment Change

Because of complaints from my wife about the recent comments being from both this site and the Experience site that I put in the side bar of the experience, I created a brand new comment account for this site. What that means though is that the comments that had been posted on here are now gone. I didn't really know that it would do that. I'm sorry. I will repost the comments in one large comment. The only one that I did this on was the "Life Can Be So Disappointing" post.

Cousin Exchange

Hey Cousins.

Sarah and Rachel, you normally handle the cousin exchange, right? Will you still do it even though Sarah left us all for NC? I'd be happy to help in anyway.

Also, Cheryl is going to visit her dad in MI for Christmas, so she will not be in the exchange, as originally planned.

I'm so looking forward to this year and still bummed I was sick last year.

Kristy, will you be back? And would you like underwear for Christmas?

(p.s. McElroys - this is the exchange on Christmas Day at the Statons. You won't be here but we'll celebrate with you on Christmas Eve Eve - which I'm also really excited about.)

Life can be so Dissapointing

Mom and I had a crappy experience yesterday. The Millers did too. We bought a ticket to MN to visit the Millers back in August during a sale for this weekend trying to schedule our visit after Isaac was born, which turned out just perfect. Well we waited and waited and waited at the airport until they cancelled our flight b/c of the weather. So, no airplane, no MN, no Cal, no Isaac, no Leah, no Eric, no Alyssa, no thai food, no wordly market, no fun and only dissapointment.

AA would not reschedule our flight and couldn't fly us out until 8pm Sat. night or refund our money. With our return flight being Sunday evening, we are getting a refund.

Meanwhile... Mom's luggage is MIA and we're hoping AA comes through and its delivered today.

How dissapointing.

New Family Links

Hey, I just noticed through the comments at Lives of Cal and Issac that Brian and Sarah have a new blog. I updated the link to the left. Check it out!

UPDATE: I also noticed through Brian and Sarah's that the Staton/Whittington/Ciz clan also have a new blog. It's also in the links at the left under Makin momma happy!

Newness

Welcome To The World Isaac!

Weekend Edition

I had a great weekend and am wondering how everyone elses went. Friday night Tom and I went to Scott's show "The Music Man" and had a great time watching Scott as well as a pretty good production of that musical. The fun time ended though when we got stuck in the crazy roadwork on 94/41 and didn't step in the door until after 1:00. Ugh, I hate 2 1/2 hr drives that should only take about 50 mins! Sat Tom worked all day and I cleaned, did laundry, found Yoda puke on the guest bed and did MORE laundry, napped!, and read 9 days worth of my read the Bible in a year program. Yes, I was a little behind and yes it took me a couple of hours but once again I am caught up. :) Also I spent sometime knitting. Then Tom came home and we watched "The Lost City" which we both liked. Sunday I went to church in Kenosha with Jas and Stef (Tom worked all day again), went out for hot wings afterward (which were yummy), went to the Staton's to see Jason's decorative plaster work he's started (he's such a talented guy), picked up Tom and came home for a couple of hours to relax before bed. And I knitted. Whew, it was busy but really fun. Oh yeah, I talked w/Becky on the phone and she gave me some costly tips for making more room in our condo so when the 4 Miller's visit we won't be so packed. I didn't talk w/Leah because I didn't want to keep calling and asking "Is anything going on?!" and driving her crazier than she needs to be. Didn't speak w/Richard or Kari either. So what did everyone else do???

Bally's For The Mind

“CHRIST WILL DO ALL FOR YOU, OR NOTHING FOR YOU.”
–J. GRESHAM MACHEN (GAL. 2:21)

Bally's For The Mind

"All men must die; but as men’s lives are very different, so their account in death also. To an ungodly man death is a loss, the greatest loss: but to a believer it is gain, the greatest gain." (Thomas Boston)

"There is a great deal of difference between the desires of heaven in a sanctified man and an unsanctified. The believer prizeth it above earth, and had rather be with God than here (though death that stands in the way, may possibly have harder thoughts from him). But to the ungodly, there is nothing seemeth more desirable than this world; and therefore he only chooseth heaven before hell, but not before earth; and therefore shall not have it upon such a choice." (Richard Baxter)

Absolutly Mortified

The crappy Red Eye has been including some hilarious articles lately.

Here's today's about a new show called "Mortified" that gets regular people on stage to read their own diary entries, letters and other writings from the preteen to teenage years, showcasing a period of life when are at our most tortured and dramatic. It started in LA and has had shows in NY, Boston and San Francisco with 2 shows here in Chicago in Oct. and Dec.

This is an expert from a letter that inspired the show. It was written at the age of 16 by the creator of the show trying to get a girl to go out with him.

"He cited, amoung other things, his love for "sunsets across the water, beach volleyball, 'Calvin and Hobbes', the outdoors, classic lines and beautiful eyes."

A few more:

"Am I the only one in the world how understands Pink Floyd?"

"Words cannot describe my love affair with marijuana."

"Mom said I ate all the cookie dough when I didn't! Mom is a dork, a moron and a geek, and I hate her so much!"

Anyway, this got me laughing pretty early in the morning. Maybe its b/c if I wasn't so smart to throw all of my writings away I could join the cast - but I'd be too Mortified.

I Pity the Fool

Why write to Mr. T instead of, say, Santa Claus?

See, everybody knows Mr. T is real. Santa Claus ain’t. So you never know what you’re gettin’ in that Santa Claus outfit. You could have a pervert dressed up like Santa Claus. You could have a child molester. Also, Santa Claus can’t make them visits. Only god is omnipotent and omnipresent – being there at the same time everywhere. So parents are lyin’ about Santa Claus.

I tell people the reason why I never believed in Santa Claus is No. 1, I lived in the projects [Chicago’s South Side Robert Taylor Homes]. There was no chimney. No. 2, if we catch a white man in red suit in a black neighborhood, he’s in trouble!


~ Interview with Mr. T today in the Red Eye

By request of Richard

By request of Becky

36 weeks tomorrow.

For your entertainment!

Street wise vender: "One dollar is all it takes to keep me out of your house and the big house."

- Wacker and Madison

-- Submitted by Willy

More Chicago quotes can be found here.

Leah's Cervical Update

I'm dialated to 1 cm! I don't think that really means anything except that if I start having contractions again, I better get myself to the hospital. Pretty crazy, right?

Woohoo.

PS My back hurts.

Quote of the Week!

Run, my dear, from anything that may not strengthen your precious budding wings."

~Hafiz, translated by Daniel Ladinsky

Bally's For The Mind

Idolator Or His Handiwork, Which Are You?
.
It’s much harder to submit to God shaping His image in me than it is to shape my image into Him. Maybe this is why God calls us to accept or reject him as the artist. It isn’t easy. God’s holiness sheds light on all our fear, anger, loneliness and lies. We begin to stand out and become different and unique, recognized by the scars of our past and birthmarks we can’t scrub off. And He prefers doing this in the context of community? That’s scary! I imagine all the Church might look like Jackson Pollock’s studio. Paint and passion spilled all over the rooms. And hope for beauty.
.
In community, we learn a frightening but empowering truth—that the great tragedy of rejecting God as your sculptor isn’t just what you lose, but what we miss out on seeing through you. In his poem W.H. Auden wrote:
.
God may reduce you to tears
On Judgment Day
As He recites by heart
The poems you would have written
Had your life been good.

Calvin's Christmas List

Mommy, can I have one pleeeeeeease.......?

.
.

A boy posing with a pure-gold rocking horse
© AFP Yoshikazu Tsuno

TOKYO (AFP) - Japanese jewelry designer Ginza Tanaka has unveiled a rocking horse made of 24-karat gold in commemoration of the September 6 birth of Prince Hisahito, who is line to become Japan's emperor.

The price is as hefty as the 30-kilogram (80-pound) golden toy -- 150 million yen (1.28 million dollars).

Ginza Tanaka has made one golden horse but is ready to produce more if it gets orders, a spokeswoman said.

"Due to the costliness of this pony, we haven't received an order yet, although we have received inquiries," she said.

Despite the heavy gold, it is easy to rock on the horse, the company said.

"Made after a normal wooden rocking horse, its seat is very smooth and easy to sit on. The child can sit on it for long hours without getting tired," the company said in a statement.

Minnesota Memories-n-More

BugMan And His Apple.

You Ain't Seen Nuthin' Yet Scott!
Gimme The Keys Daddy, I'm Ready To Roll!

The New, The Improved: Baby Issac Baby Carriage!

Tired Of Thinking About All Those Diapers For Two Leah? Here's An Option For Ya - The Chinese Way: The Opening Of Convenience.

John Piper is bad.

http://www.foolishblog.com/extras/piperisbad.mp3

TV

I just watched Studio 60 last night and it was interesting. Matthew Perry plays an hilarious character. 9:00 on NBC (right? Same channel as the Office. ).
I really hated it that since I turned on the TV a little too early, I had to watch the last five minutes of Deal or No Deal. That show is so dumb. Even when a deal is made, they still have to play out all of the choices the person "would have" made.
What do you think?