Thanksgiving 2013

 

This year, we …

… planned to eat between 12:00 and 1:00 … and we actually did!  When we were getting our food, it was 12:30.

 

…  played two marathon games of HeadBandz.

 

   

… laughed at how silly we all looked wearing the head bands.

 

… ate a lot of dessert. Oh wait – we do that every year.

…marveled at how big the kids are getting (we do that every year, too. ;-).

…enjoyed feeling vigorous kicks and rolls from the newest Mozingo baby, due late January/early February.

…thoroughly enjoyed all our little pilgrims.

 

… and the annual Thanksgiving play, although next year, we’ll try to do it before 10:00 at night. They were wild! :-)

I’m already thinking about next year and have made myself a vow. I will do my best to come up with some sort of costume for these 2 guys. Thanksgiving prep has always meant making sure I had all the parts for the pilgrim dresses gathered up and ready. I really didn’t even think about costumes for Grant and Trent until the morning of Thanksgiving! :-)  I guess in some ways, I’m still adjusting to a life with BOYS!  :-)

Quotable cuties

 

Me: Grant, you can come out of Quiet Time now.
Grant: OK. Are you going to come up and clean up the glass?

Thankfully and miraculously, there was no blood. I think he was trying to see if one of the Little People could fly. It made it all the way up to the ceiling fan! I’m thinking of installing a hidden camera in his room during Quiet Time...

Grant, 3yo

I really don’t post these cute little quotes often enough. I’m afraid I’m going to forget them! I read something I’d posted on FB a few years ago about Claire, who was 3 at the time. It was this:

This morning Claire (3) sitting on my lap, hugging me, kissing my cheek, giggling ... looks at me and says "Wouldn't this make a cute picture?!"

I had completely forgotten that she said that. When I read it, I had a vague recollection of it. So glad I wrote it down then, but I need to be better about doing that here! Who knows, Facebook may be a distant memory by the time our kids are grown, kind of like 8-track tapes or home doctor visits. Although they promise us that whatever we put on there will be saved forever … {cue scary music}.  We’ll see.  :-)

Here’s a picture taken of Claire right around then.

Trent is at that age where he has a quotable quote a couple of times a day. I just need a personal secretary to follow me around and help me out with things like this. :-)

An Unforgettable Night at the Theater

Last weekend, Rachel’s piano teacher, Jeeyoon Kim, was guest soloist for a concert with the New World Youth Orchestra at Hilbert Circle Theater. Rachel and I had talked about going, but the ticket prices were a little beyond what I wanted to spend. On Friday, Miss Kim contacted Rachel and asked if she’d like to help out by selling her CDs and DVDs during intermission and after the performance. As a thanks, she offered to give us 3 complimentary tickets! So, Rachel, Mick and I made plans to go.

As Sunday drew near, the weather reports were sounding ominous. First a moderate risk for severe weather, then a high risk. The worst was predicted to hit between 3 and 4 o’clock, before it all moved out by 5:00. The concert was scheduled to start at 5:00. This called for a change of plans. We decided Mick would stay home and Rachel and I would leave early enough to beat the bad weather. I knew the Central Library’s underground parking garage is a tornado shelter, so we decided to park down there and wait it out, if it became necessary.

We ended up spending a little over an hour in the parking garage. Things got very dark and blustery at one point and there was a very strong downpour. Rain was blowing at an angle and running down the ramp into the parking garage. I called Mick to check in and let him know we were safe. They were all in the basement, just in case. He said it was very quiet down there, in spite of the blowing going on outside, and the kids were fine. One strong storm had blown through and he was watching one more thin line of storms on the radar which looked to be headed in their direction. A little while later, I got texts from Heather asking how we were doing. She said a tornado had been spotted going through our town. By then, things had cleared up enough for us to make our way over to the theater. It was a bit of a hike and more storm clouds were bearing down.

We parked several blocks from the theater and made a dash for it, getting inside right before the skies opened up again. Things went very smoothly after that. Our tickets were waiting at the Will Call booth and we had box seats! We got there 15-20 minutes early and the concert ended up being delayed by about 15 minutes due to the weather. Once we were settled, I checked my phone and noticed Mick had tried to call 3 times (the phone was on vibrate). When I got a hold of him, he was walking around the yard surveying the damage. They had watched the tornado as it moved from west to east about 3 miles south of us!

A neighbor got this picture from a farmer a couple miles south of us.

 

Thankfully, the damage was minor: we lost some trim from one of the peaks on the back of the house and one of the old barn doors was barely hanging on (Mick fixed it the next day, thankfully).

  

While we were talking, I could hear the wind whistling in the background and the kids laughing and running around the yard. After we hung up, Rachel and I were able to just relax and enjoy the view and concert, which started a little while later. Miss Kim played beautifully and we added a new song to our list of favorites: Schumann’s “Piano Concerto No. 3 in A Minor.”  

Sitting in box seats is such a novelty to us that I got several pictures of Rachel in her seat.  :-)

After all that excitement, it sure was good to get back home and see our house still standing and everybody happy.

The Gift of Faith

I took this last spring when the surrounding fields were covered with beautiful golden carpets of Wild Mustard.

Doug Wilson is a pastor and writer whose insights often inspire, challenge and sometimes, well, I’ll be honest: sometimes they just just confuse me. :-)  Today, his words really resonated with me.

“Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me” (John 5:39).

God has given us many gifts — indeed, there is nothing we have that is not a gift. But there is only one gift from Him that enables us to see through things.

When we see through a gift, with a gift, we are enabled to see the Giver on the other side of the gift. When we cannot see through a gift, we are stuck with looking at it. With the gift of faith, everything is a window. Without the gift of faith everything is a mural.

We can look at the Scriptures, like a mural, or through the Scriptures, like a window. The same thing is true of everything else God gives us — sacraments, sermons, families, stories, food, air, and sunshine. We can stare at it, thinking that the mere existence of the thing justifies its existence, or we can allow the great gift of faith to pose the question why for us, and then graciously answer the question for us with the who.

Look through. See through. Peer beyond. This too is the gift of God.

Vacation 2013: Days 4-10. The Beach.

This is my fourth and final post on our 2013 vacation. (Click to read Day 1, Day 2 or Day 3). When looking back over the pictures to write this post, one thing is certain: we spent a lot of time just enjoying the beach. The majority of the time, definitely. The days just run together in my mind, except for a few specifics.

The highlights of Saturday were the traditional run from the van down to the water as soon as we got to the house (yes, I videotaped that!), getting settled in to the house and having a pizza dinner. The older girls and Heather and I went to the grocery late that night for the mega-shopping trip. This is always exhausting, but fun. We usually top it off with some special treat. The girls had chocolate milk, I had a Frosty, and Heather had roasted red peppers. You read that right. :-)

As we were settling in, we noticed a handwritten note on the refrigerator from the previous renters. They had lost an onyx ring in the house the week before we were there and were offering a $500 reward. Yes, we did spend some time searching for the ring … only because we wanted to do a good deed, of course. ;-) At one point, somebody heard something rattling around in one of the couches, so the guys actually did a thorough check underneath but found nothing.

On Sunday, we went to church with our Virginia Beach family, which we enjoyed very much. We made it in just before the service began and trickled into the sanctuary, causing several people to keep sliding over to make room.  A little bit more. Then a little bit more, etc. It was a little embarrassing, but all was met with smiles from the congregation.

On Monday, our first full day, our beloved, trusty camera broke. As in, this was the result I’d get:

Unfortunately, I had to make do with Mick’s iPhone camera for the rest of vacation. It actually did a pretty decent job as long as I didn’t zoom in for a shot. I learned that the hard way.

The weather was absolutely phenomenal – mid 80s and sunny almost every day, very summerlike. We were told by several locals that we lucked out. We’ve definitely had our share of chilly, rainy Virginia Beach days in late September/early October. We always managed to get generally nice weather, but there is usually one or two days of rain. This time we had mostly clear skies. The first day or two we got there it was windy and cooler, but it was sunny. Trust me – we took full advantage of it.

Kate and her assistants made some pretty amazing sand sculptures.

Caleb is so flexible!

I don’t even think I got pictures of all of them, but this is a good sample.

Evenings were fun, too. Sometimes the kids watched Gilligan’s Island or Adam-12, sometimes we gathered in the living room and told funny stories. One night, we took turns telling a story, making it up as we went along.

Mick and Ron did a lot of fishing. Dad did some, too. A couple of the girls tried their hand at it. Between the huge lunker Ron caught and several smaller ones, we had a very tasty fish fry one night.

Pretty nice view at breakfast.

 

The guys often started and ended their days on the deck.

On our last night, we had our Virginia Beach family over for another visit. While we were sitting around the table, Trent came walking in carrying his milk in a very special glass.  It seems he asked Uncle Ron for a drink and this is what he gave him!  :-)

I was so worried he’d drop it and spill the milk or break the cup – or both! But thankfully, he safely drank it. :-)  I don’t suppose I look too worried here, but I guess this is my vacation worried look.

This was also the year poor Brooke got some kind of a bug and spent 2 days sick. Mercifully, it did not hit anybody else. I still can’t believe that!  In spite of that, even Brooke would agree it was a wonderful vacation and although we were glad to get back home, we’re so glad we have more sweet memories of time spent with our family at the beach.

 

(Thanks to the Bruces for sharing their camera and some of their pictures that were taken while we were in the Dark Ages of our vacation photo-journaling.)

1 week

For 51 weeks of the year, we enjoy this Red Maple tree: the overall shape – even without leaves, its shade, the swing underneath it. And then for one glorious week each year, it completely outdoes itself.

This is its peak week. I can see it clearly from our schoolroom window when I’m standing at the board and it’s really hard to stay focused on explaining polynomials, dividing fractions, or dividing a circle into eighths, with those brilliant red leaves on display right at the window. I stop and look at it when I’m running out to the pole barn to get something out of the freezer. We watch it when we’re pulling out of the driveway and when we’re coming back home. On sunny days, it’s almost too bright to look at directly. On cloudy days, it practically illuminates our yard.

I blogged about this tree last year, about my mission to get a good picture of it. I’m still trying.

The FedEx guy made a delivery a couple of days ago and after I took the package from him, he started back down our path, glanced over at it, and then just stopped and stared. “That is a stunner,” he said.

You really should drive by just to see it; this picture doesn’t do it justice.

A million thanks to whoever planted this tree decades ago.