Reflections of Christ

If you have a chance to see the exhibit in your area, I highly recommend it. It was truly awesome. Hope you enjoy the little slide show.

Week in Review

America had a chance this week to once again flex its muscles for democracy and choose a new president to lead our country. Now, I am not going to say who I voted for,...but I will say that we got a chance to go to the John McCain "celebration" party and we went. :)

We parked off site from where it was being held and waited in a line for a very long time for our turn to be shuttled over to the "party". As we waited and shuttled we kept checking for updates on Mike's phone as the results were coming in to see who was taking which states.

As we entered the ballroom, we were greeted with reporters and bright lights on risers around the perimeter. It was quite an organized circus. The highlight of our time there was that Mike got to hear Hank Williams Jr. perform on stage. The pictures is a little blurry, but you get the idea. We were quite close. However, it wasn't enough to keep us there. Once we saw that Ohio went to Obama, it was decided that we were going to leave before everyone else decided that the party was also over and the shuttle line was crazy going back. But not before we got a picture of Mike in front of the last viewing of the "Straight Talk Express". Our rally pom-pom went to Katie.

We went out to dinner and had front row seats to the concession speech by the television that we sat by in comfort and quiet. Yes, we could have been 20-40 feet away from history, but we saw it just the same. I have no grand illusions about political parties anymore. Maybe I have been to a few too many Boy Scout functions. Unless you are with the ones you love, it is just not much of a party. But it was fun to have a chance to go and see and be a part of it for a moment.

Most of the rest of the week was busy with school, school, Mike's work, and me keeping busy. Two cute pictures of the week, though...

Here is Christian when he came out of his room one night and sat in the chair across from Mike and I. Before we could get a question out to him, he was asleep in the chair. How cute.

The other picture is from tonight. We met Mike after a long day of doing interviews for prospective employees and after we had just gotten Katie's hair cut. Look at these good buddies...especially when they have had good sleep. Hopefully that will be accomplished tonight.

What kind of Ice Cream???

Mike and I have been married now for over nine years. In those nine years, Mike has never been able to quite put his thumb on what kind of ice cream I really like. Tonight we went out for dinner with the kids. There was some miscommunication about the desserts and so we ended up sharing quite a bit of the mom and dad dessert with the kids. Mike knew I was a bit frustrated, so on his way home from getting shoes tonight, he was sweet and surprised me with some ice cream to cheer me up.

Out of the bag came the pint of Ben and Jerry's and I elatedly asked, "What kind?"

"Chunky Monkey," came the reply.

Now, you have to know, that I have never picked out Chunky Monkey ONCE in our marriage. Never said, I wonder what that tastes like...or anything of the sort. Why? Because I don't know that banana is usually a good thing in ice cream. Nor walnuts. I love just about any nut. But not walnuts. I think they are bitter and I can only count on one hand the number of times that I can say I have really enjoyed something with walnuts as an ingredient.

So, even though Mike doesn't usually pick up my favorite at the store, it is usually something that I can enjoy. Not this time, so I am twice frustrated on a dessert tonight. Not that I need it.

If tonight, you read this and you are craving some Chunky Monkey...come on over. You have a pint, minus a bite, all to yourself.

A thought...

'A government big enough to give you everything you want,

is big enough to take away everything you have.'

- Thomas Jefferson

Saturday Madness

This weekend, we started off at a run and just didn't stop. Of course, it started with Halloween and the next morning we got up and I sent the kids off with their dad to the Scout-o-Rama. Our friend Debbie from Oregon came and stayed with us this weekend so that she could attend her sons graduation from his motorcycle mechanics program. It was nice to get to visit with her so much while she was here. She works for the Boy Scouts in Oregon and since her son was still sleeping that morning she went with the kids and Mike to see the HUGE Scout-o-Rama until he woke up. The kids loved having our "guest" as Christian called her for awhile and both wanted to ride in her car to the event. They had a blast.

There are a ton of things to do there. Here are just a few. Shooting rubber band guns. Look at the concentration on those faces.

Another taste, launching watered sponges...to hit the...

....cows. What cute cows.

Launched rockets. (paper rocket he made there)

There was a ton more things. I mean, they probably only saw 1/3 of what was there in 3 1/2 hours that they were there. They loved it. We should have just stayed there all day. After I came and joined them the kids and I left to go support the Fall Festival at our school, so off we went...

The beauty of the Fall Festival this year was that the kids are old enough to take off on their own and I just stayed in a central location in the shade (I already had a sunburn from the hour I was at the Scout-o-Rama) that they could come and check in with me. I got to watch them run all over the place playing games, bouncing, and trying to dunk the teachers.

Now, the day after Halloween, we just hadn't had enough sugar, so we had to get cotton candy.

Christian is addicted to anything bounce house-ish. He burned off a lot of energy.

Katie went and got her face painted at one point. Amazingly the line wasn't too horrendous this year, because I wasn't sure where she was for a little while and then all the sudden she showed up painted.

She really misses the rock wall at the gym, so she was lucky and was one of the very last kids on. We had a lot of fun and after another 3 hours of fun were ready to go home and relax for a little while.

Halloween

This year we once again abandoned our neighborhood to go somewhere else. We have yet to do the same neighborhood twice since we have moved to Arizona. The night started off with pizza at our friends and girl scout leaders home, the MacArthur's, and most of the rest of the girl scout troop and their families too. Luckily, Christian is friends with Kristin so, he didn't mind the set up. It was somewhat difficult to get the kids to come away from playing in the backyard and get moving onto Trick-or-Treating. Strange kids. Here is the obligatory group picture. Christian finally decided it was time to eat Pizza, so is stuffing it in his mouth.

We went trick-or-treating and then came back to play with fire. But not to worry, we had a fireman on hand that started and overlooked the fire. The kids, as you can see, had a blast. They helped keep it going by finding the old leaves and sticks in the yard.

Here we decided to toss a pizza box on the fire. The reaction of the kids is great here in this picture.

We had a blast. Thanks Cindy and Scott for letting us come Halloweening with you!