Happy Birthday to Hubby!

Today is the 36th birthday of the man I love, and I do love him for so many reasons.

Happy birthday, babe. I love you so much more than I can say. Te amo con todo mi corazon.

Christmas Eve

Can't embed this video, but this is one of the most powerful songs about Christmas Eve I have ever heard, and I just heard it yesterday!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LqqlaTRBxas

True friends will nurture your obsessions

....and get you things like this for Christmas.

Who throws a shoe?

After all this brouhaha over Bush and the shoe-throwing incident in Iraq, all I can think of is this:


Call me hopeless.

Last-minute Christmas gift

If you are still looking for a good Christmas gift to give someone and are just out of ideas, you might want to check out this site. It is very cool - you donate money to the site, and the person in whose honor you are giving it to gets to choose how it will be spent. A friend of mine did this for me and I got to use it to help buy new desks for a school in a high-poverty school district. Very neat, and very needed.

Oops.

Today while we were having computer problems:
"Mommy, don't say dammit. You have to say, 'Oh no.'"
He's probably right.

Christmas is here!!!

Finally, a tree!


My personal favorite non-made-by-Daniel ornament:

A letter from Santa!!!

Thank you, Aunt Kirsi & Aunt Maiju for reminding Santa to send a letter to Daniel!!! :)

Kirsi and Maiju were the ones who clued me in that Santa really lives in Finland.

Here's a link to his post office: http://www.posti.fi/postimerkkikeskus/jpp/en_index.html

Christmas cheer

...or don't let your 4 year old get bored with the dry erase markers in hand.

Playing possum, and trying not to laugh.



At the pumpkin farm a few weeks ago...so now he can milk a cow. Cause you know, we have so many cows wandering around our neighborhood needing milking...

Marine Corps answering machine

For those of you with ties to the Army, Navy, or Air Force, this is (of course) just a joke. :)

This is why....

....Daddy is the preferred playmate. My traintracks are nowhere near as cool.

Me: "Daniel, you and Daddy are silly boys."
Daniel: "Yeah, and we're crazy and gross too."

More stuff that entertains me when I'm sick.

I surprised myself here. Apparently I am a socialist. Who knew? I fall in between Mikhail Gorbachev (turns out he's been a Christian all these years!) and Barack Obama.

Now, that doesn't say much about how I feel personally about certain things. It just says what I think government's role should or shouldn't be in a given situation.

This is what I do when I can't sleep

NameThatDisease.com - Identify The Disease

Thank you, viral illness!!

Thankful Thursday

Happy Turkey Day!
We have much to be thankful for. We have a house, our bills are paid, we are all healthy, we are warm and fed, and we know the love of a good God.

Watching these videos sung by Aussies make me wonder if we have learned anything in the last century about sending boys off to war.

Overheard just now...

..."but Daddy, if you cut my hair, then all my strength will be gone!"

Springsteen does gospel

Confessions of a 4-year-old

"Mommy, me and Daddy don't wash our hands after we go stinky. I just only wash my hands with you."

Might be time to have a talk with my husband.

Thankful Thursday

Things I'm thankful for this week:
1) Roasted marshmallows
2) A church to call home
3) My husband's honesty
4) Toothbrushing without a battle
5) My 92 yo stepfather who plays Hungry Hungry Hippos with my son.

Wordless Wednesday

Going to a weenie roast at the pastor's house tonight!!

Thankful Thursday

Stealing ideas from others' blogs....:)

Today, I am thankful for:
1) A healthy child.
2) My husband, who is the best father ever.
3) Takeout on a night when I don't feel like cooking.
4) Sleeping well at night.
5) Hot baths.

That's what I get...

....for trying to be cute with my son.

He refuses to call them marshmallows. They are, to him, 'snowman stinkies.'

The morning after

A friend of mine shared this quote with me, and I love it:
"Crispus Attucks fell so that Rosa Parks could sit,
Rosa Parks sat so that Dr. Martin Luther King could march,
Dr. Martin Luther King marched so that Barack Obama could run,
and Barack Obama is running so that our children and grandchildren can fly."

Yes, We Did

President Obama. I bet bells are ringing the world over. I am prouder now of my country than I have been in a very long time.

Yes We Can

Please go vote if ya haven't already....no matter which way ya lean.

We're official

Darn back spasms

Instead of spending yesterday afternoon seeing Michelle Obama, I was in the chiropractor's office getting my back popped. After an adjustment yesterday and another today (that I felt clear down to my toenails!!) I am feeling much better though still in some pain. But it's more at like a 4-5 out of 10, versus yesterday when it was an 8/10. Way worse than back labor w/ Daniel.

Please y'all keep Jesus in your prayers because this time of year is always difficult for him. Cold weather means not much work for him. He gets stir-crazy as well as a tad depressed when he's not working like he feels he could/should be.

Daniel, on the other hand, is doing just great. He is so excited about wearing his Spidey costume to school tomorrow.

Michelle Obama is coming to Rocky Mount tomorrow. I'm going to see her. :)

Wazzup 2008

Warning: pro-Obama video ahead.

Making it count

Post-debate commentary

1) McCain did better here than he did in the first two debates, I thought. And I thought Obama stayed cool, no ruffled feathers.

2) If I were Joe the Plumber I would be ready to crawl in a hole and never come out right about now. It drove me crazy how they both got so much mileage over that.

Truly humbled by this man's heart

From the aftermath of the Postville immigration raids, a Catholic priest caring for the families affected.

I read through all the comments, and while some of them disgust me, I am heartened by responses of those who understand what people like Jesus and I deal with on a daily basis.

I have so many pregnant friends right now. Two friends from work (that I know of) and three college friends are expecting babies. I think God must have a sense of humor.

But not til that pesky green card is OURS. And God knows when that is going to happen.

Bathtime conversation

Me: Are you guys [Daniel & Daddy] using the man soap in your shower?
Daniel: Of course. We're men.

Now I remember....

...why I hated giving shots to 4-year-olds when I worked at HFHC (my previous job, where I still take Daniel for his checkups etc). It wasn't fun for either one of us. He got the flu, DTaP, IPV, and MMR. The MMR she saved for last - which is the golden rule of vaccinating kids. If you give the MMR anything but last, the kid won't let you anywhere near him for the rest of the shots. It hurts like a mofo.

I much prefer to give them to the newborns, although I really think vaxing newborns is over the top in most cases.

All else is well, according to his PNP. 50-75th percentile for height, 75th percentile for weight, and 50-75th percentile for BMI. Eyes good, but he didn't really cooperate for the hearing screen.

Also, falling under the category of 'Crap!' news, the lab tech that works there is a good friend of mine although we have pretty sporadic contact. Anyway, her son is in Afghanistan w/ the Army. He spent his summers between years at college working at the clinic interpreting and helping hold unruly kids for shots. Super-good kid. Well, not really a kid - I think he's 24 or so. Anyway, if you could remember Carlos in your prayers, we would all appreciate it. He says guys there are stretched way too thin and all want to come home.

You know it's time for elections to be OVER when you're watching the news where Barack Obama is mentioned and your 4-year-old pipes up, "I'm Barack Obama and I approved this message."

Good friends

Daniel with Halleigh, the precious little girl of friends Miles and Brooklynne, who hosted us for dinner Saturday night. We were joined by Kristy Kent, also a dear friend from college. We watched the Heels beat Notre Dame, ate yummy burgers/fries/asparagus, and watched Halleigh shamelessly flirt with Daniel. (The horsie pic was posed, though.)

Reminded me just how lucky I am to have such awesome friends. We talked, laughed, and enjoyed ourselves. At least, I did. :) The whole way home, this was the conversation between Daniel and I:
D: Mr. Miles was mad at the Tar Heels. He said "Shoot!"
Me: Yes, he did.
D: But when he's happy, he doesn't say that.

D: Mommy, Mr. Miles made us hamburgers, right?
Me: Yes, honey, he made hamburgers.
D: They were yummy. My tummy liked them.
Me: Mine too.

D: Mommy, Kona is a big scary dog, right?
Me: No, Kona's
not scary. But she is big just like Miss Pansy.
D: But she was showing me her teeth!
Me: She was just smiling.
D: She chased me and licked me, but I was faster than her.

D: Mommy, my acorns are my friends. See? I have them with me to keep them safe.

And, perhaps the best of all, we sang the fight song together:
I'm a Tar Heel born, I'm a Tar Heel bred
And when I die, I'm a Tar Heel dead....

I didn't teach him the ending I learned at Carolina. When he's 18 he can learn it for himself.

Thanks to Miles, Brooke, and Kristy for a fun fun evening!

Happy Birthday!!!

Can't believe he's 4 years old. So this was this morning - replete with birthday pancakes, a big all-terrain remote control truck ("A Chevy just like your Chevy, Daddy!"), and more fun to come....

I am so blessed to have the world's greatest child. Every day, I can't believe he's mine. A great gift, indeed.

Welcome the immigrant

I found this great website by accident and have signed the statement of agreement. It is for people of all faiths (or no particular faith at all) who believe that we as people of faith, and we as human beings, need to stand with immigrants.

Click here for the link. I thought it was awesome.

What my husband better never do

My dad called this afternoon and, as usual, the converstaion switched to politics. He can't believe I'm actually voting for Obama and sometimes wonders where his daughter is and what we have done with her....

...anyway, he told me something that I'd never realized. Their next-door neighbors (have lived there for about 30 years now) are rather um, unique, to begin with. But to top it all off, her husband tells her how to vote.

That is just wrong. There is a reason why those booths are private!!!!

Annoyed

I so wish I could be a SAHM right now. Ok, so I've planned to take this weekend off for months now. One of the supervisors calls me tonight and tells me I have to have at least 36 hours of vacation time in order to be able to take this weekend. I have 34.58 or something like that. I had it calculated differently, but whatever. So, in order to make up for the difference, I'm working 7pm til 3am tomorrow night. (Because I'm weekend option each 12 hour shift counts as 20 hours because they pay us as though we're fulltime.) Working the full night wouldn't have been an option as Jesus has yards to cut Wed and Daniel has school from 0830 til 1200 that day.

So, I probably should just put on my big-girl panties and deal with it. And I will. But right now I just want to gripe and moan. So I am.

1) I am disappointed - but not surprised - at the Cubbies' loss Saturday night.

2) I am so glad to be off work this coming weekend.

3) I cannot believe Daniel is going to be 4 on Friday.

Again...

....good grief. We cannot even score a run. Miles! Have you been keeping a pet goat at your house just for good measure?!

Alright, Miles....

....what spell did you cast on the Cubbies tonight?!

Fight over the TV

Yes, on Thursday night there will be a massive fight over the telly. The one telly in our house, no TiVo or DVR. And no, I am not talking about a fight between Jesus and I. I am talking about a massive internal fight - between me and myself.

Do I watch the Biden-Palin debate (yes!) or do I watch Dodgers vs Cubs at Wrigley (yes!)?

There are many more important crises around the world, yes. I know.

I Dream of Baseball

I dreamed that they were going to tear down Wrigley, and that I was at the last game. I was in the left field bleachers (always been a dream of mine to be a Bleacher Bum) and got Alfonso Soriano to sign my glove between innings. At the end of the game, they opened the field and I ran around the bases.

I had just gone into the clubhouse to meet some more players when I was interrupted...

...by a preschooler at tthe edge of the bed: "Mommy, we need to go to Wal-Mart. I need some big-boy scissors."

Ah well, at least Wrigley's still standing. :)

Being a boy mom

Being a boy mom means that I can burp loudly and it's hilarious, to both the boys in my house. :) Yesterday, Jesus told Daniel, "Come here, I gotta tell you something." Daniel goes up to him and Jesus burped in his ear. Daniel thinks this is AWESOME and says, "That's gross!" (it was) and at the same time (not on purpose) I belched out loud too. "Eww, Mommy you're gross. Everybody's gross in here!"

Being a boy mom also means that someone farting at the table is headline news.

Being a boy mom also means that all books at the library have to have something to do with bugs, sharks, snakes, or lizards.

Also means that I will invariably, at least once daily, trip over a train, or a fire truck, or a stinky shoe.

Or that I will be chased by a boy holding a booger on the tip of his index finger.

And I would not trade it for all the money in the world!!!

Our diagonal neighbors (great neighbors, good people) have put up a McCain/Palin sign on one side of their front yard, and a Pat McCrory sign on the other.

Our across-the-street neighbor (next door to the aforementioned people) is a senior citzen and a lifelong Democrat. She offered to pay me $5 to put an Obama sign front and center in our yard.

This is the same neighbor that gave Daniel the Beanie baby donkey named Lefty.

Ah, election years. Thank God they're only every 4.

Me: "You're a silly boy!"
Daniel: "Yeah. I'm a wild and crazy guy."

Helping

Those things in Daniel's hands are the eggbeaters. One is 'Larry Boy' and the other is 'Alfred.'

March of the Penguins

I had heard this movie was really good...and it was.

But why had I never heard how freaking sad it was?! For about the last half I had to hold a crying 3 year old and explain to him how the mommy penguin is in heaven! Guess that's what I get for not prescreening even a G-rated flick! He is fine now.

Israel for Obama

Found this and thought it was cool. I hope it airs around here.

Daniel funnies

1) Friday nights are not usually our best nights because Daniel is now aware that Mommy works every Friday night. So this past Friday night, I'm getting ready and Daniel is his usual whiny, pleading self. "Mommy, no. You can't go to work!" etc.

Me: "Well, I have to, or we won't be able to pay for our things."

Him: "Just stay here and let them be mad at you."

2) Daddy got a new cellphone w/ camera so Daniel now has Daddy's old phone that is just like it except no camera. So now they are 'two the same,' in Daniel's words. Saturday afternoon Daniel was playing around with his, punching buttons and what have you when the battery started to die. I watched this play out....Daniel punching buttons furiously to get the thing to work and when it died, an angry look on his face and an exclamation of "Stupid computer!"

Glad I don't swear (much).

Handsome

Follow up to last post

Jenny's comment got me thinking that maybe I should add on some here. That is the only time that someone in our church has ever made a comment like that.

Our senior pastor (not the guy who made the comment last Wed. night) is very adamant that our partisanship is not of this world and our party doesn't really matter. Not that we shouldn't consider our earthly votes important but that ultimately our affiliation is not with any earthly powers.

I find politics funny sometimes because my personal moral beliefs are (I think, anyway) pretty conservative. It's just that my feelings about what government's role should or shouldn't be lean more toward the left.

On an unrelated note, while I was sleeping today after working last night I dreamed that I was working 3-11 and it was 8pm before I realized that there were two patients I had not gone to check on. That is one of my biggest fears related to work!!!

Church story

So last night at church, the speaker was talking about how our only true hope is in Christ, and so to illustrate his point, says, "Our hope does not lie with the GOP; our hope lies with G-O-D." I giggled a bit and it must've been a bit too loud, because at that point he turns right to me and makes eye contact and is about three feet away from my face and says, "As excited as we may be about this GOP ticket, this is not our true hope." Now, I agree with the point he was trying to make. But I just thought it funny that he directed all that right at me - probably the least-excited about this ticket in the whole building. I tried to keep my poker face.

Happy Birthday Mexico!

Yesterday to celebrate Mexico's 198th birthday, we went to a Mexican restaurant:

And would you believe Daniel took the second pic???

Today Daniel told me: "Scuppernong is my favorite word."
We ate scuppernongs for our afternoon snack.

Something Fun!

I found this over at my good friend Miles' blog regarding the National Endowment for the Arts' The Big Read initiative. They've made a list of of the greatest books ever written, with their estimation that the average adult has read 6 of the listed books. So, the game is as follows:

From the list below of books you have to:
Look at the list and bold those you have read at least part of.
Italicise those you hope to read.
Underline the books you LOVE.
(Blogger ain't lettin' me underline today, so I had to use an exclamation point for these!!)
Put a # beside the ones you hate.
Put a * beside the ones you did not finish.
If you've read it more than once, put the number in ().
Add 5 of your own favorites to the end.

So here's my list: (and thanks Miles!!!)

1 Pride and Prejudice - Jane Austen
2 The Lord of the Rings - JRR Tolkien !(3)
3 Jane Eyre - Charlotte Bronte*
4 Harry Potter series - JK Rowling
5 To Kill a Mockingbird - Harper Lee !(2)
6 The Bible ! (don't know)
7 Wuthering Heights - Emily Bronte
8 Nineteen Eighty Four - George Orwell
9 His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
10 Great Expectations - Charles Dickens
11 Little Women - Louisa M Alcott #*
12 Tess of the D'Urbervilles - Thomas Hardy
13 Catch 22 - Joseph Heller
14 Complete Works of Shakespeare
15 Rebecca - Daphne Du Maurier
16 The Hobbit - JRR Tolkien !
17 Birdsong - Sebastian Faulks
18 Catcher in the Rye - JD Salinger *
19 The Time Traveller's Wife - Audrey Niffenegger
20 Middlemarch - George Eliot
21 Gone With The Wind - Margaret Mitchell #*
22 The Great Gatsby - F Scott Fitzgerald
23 Bleak House - Charles Dickens
24 War and Peace - Leo Tolstoy
25 The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy - Douglas Adams
26 Brideshead Revisited - Evelyn Waugh
27 Crime and Punishment - Fyodor Dostoyevsky
28 Grapes of Wrath - John Steinbeck *
29 Alice in Wonderland - Lewis Carroll *
30 The Wind in the Willows - Kenneth Grahame
31 Anna Karenina - Leo Tolstoy
32 David Copperfield - Charles Dickens *
33 Chronicles of Narnia - CS Lewis *
34 Emma - Jane Austen
35 Persuasion - Jane Austen
36 The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe - C.S. Lewis !
37 The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini
38 Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Louis De Bernieres
39 Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden
40 Winnie the Pooh - AA Milne
41 Animal Farm - George Orwell (2)
42 The Da Vinci Code - Dan Brown
43 One Hundred Years of Solitude - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
44 A Prayer for Owen Meaney - John Irving
45 The Woman in White - Wilkie Collins
46 Anne of Green Gables - LM Montgomery
47 Far From The Madding Crowd - Thomas Hardy
48 The Handmaid's Tale - Margaret Atwood
49 Lord of the Flies - William Golding
50 Atonement - Ian McEwan
51 Life of Pi - Yann Martel
52 Dune - Frank Herbert
53 Cold Comfort Farm - Stella Gibbons
54 Sense and Sensibility - Jane Austen #*
55 A Suitable Boy - Vikram Seth
56 The Shadow of the Wind - Carlos Ruiz Zafon
57 A Tale Of Two Cities - Charles Dickens *
58 Brave New World - Aldous Huxley
59 The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time - Mark Haddon
60 Love In The Time Of Cholera - Gabriel Garcia Marquez
61 Of Mice and Men - John Steinbeck !
62 Lolita - Vladimir Nabokov
63 The Secret History - Donna Tartt
64 The Lovely Bones - Alice Sebold
65 Count of Monte Cristo - Alexandre Dumas
66 On The Road - Jack Kerouac
67 Jude the Obscure - Thomas Hardy
68 Bridget Jones' Diary - Helen Fielding
69 Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie
70 Moby Dick - Herman Melville
71 Oliver Twist - Charles Dickens
72 Dracula - Bram Stoker
73 The Secret Garden - Frances Hodgson Burnett
74 Notes From A Small Island - Bill Bryson (although I loved 'A Walk in the Woods' more)
75 Ulysses - James Joyce
76 The Bell Jar - Sylvia Plath
77 Swallows and Amazons - Arthur Ransome
78 Germinal - Emile Zola
79 Vanity Fair - William Makepeace Thackeray
80 Possession - AS Byatt
81 A Christmas Carol - Charles Dickens !(2)
82 Cloud Atlas - David Mitchell
83 The Color Purple - Alice Walker
84 The Remains of the Day - Kazuo Ishiguro
85 Madame Bovary - Gustave Flaubert
86 A Fine Balance - Rohinton Mistry !(2)
87 Charlotte's Web - EB White !(3)
88 The Five People You Meet In Heaven - Mitch Albom
89 Adventures of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle*
90 The Faraway Tree Collection -Enid Blyton
91 Heart of Darkness - Joseph Conrad
92 The Little Prince - Antoine De Saint-Exupery*
93 The Wasp Factory - Iain Banks
94 Watership Down - Richard Adams
95 A Confederacy of Dunces - John Kennedy Toole
96 A Town Like Alice - Nevil Shute
97 The Three Musketeers - Alexandre Dumas
98 Hamlet - William Shakespeare
99 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Roald Dahl
100 Les Miserables - Victor Hugo
(the unlucky few books that found themselves with a #*, well, I hated them so much I couldn't finish reading them!)

Now for my five:
The Silmarillion by JRR Tolkien
With These Hands by Daniel Rothenberg
The Screwtape Letters by CS Lewis
Silence by Shusaku Endo
The Complete Works of O. Henry

Just finished watching a documentary from Netflix on the computer called "Born into Brothels". Very disturbing and sad, and if you ever get the chance to watch it you should.

Politics

Soo.....since all my friends in blogworld are posting about politics and I'm posting about music, I guess I better get with the program. :)

I watched the DNC, and got the highlights of the RNC (not feeling well last week). And I have to say, I'm not enthused with Sarah Palin. We would probably get along in real life but I'm not sure she's the best candidate for the job. Being a Christian doesn't make you a good veep candidate, any more than it makes you a good surgeon. And if I'm going to have surgery, I'm not going to ask my surgeon if he's a Christian...I'm going to ask if he knows what he's doing. And I don't think Sarah Palin does.

Not only that, I'm less than enthused with her record. Much ado is made over her 'fighting the Bridge to Nowhere,' when in reality she was originally for it, as it earmarked millions of dollars in funds for her region. I don't agree with her stance on same-sex couple issues. While I have my personal beliefs about it, I don't think the government should be the arbiter of those things, and she wants it to be. Ditto for abortion, which is why I think 1st trimester abortion should be legal. Not because I agree with it but because outlawing it is not going to improve things a bit, and it's not government's place to say so.

She stated herself that she did not think much about the war in Iraq...not until her son got deployed, and all of a sudden she's 'just like the rest of us' because she's got a son going to war? Why didn't it matter to her before?

Her family is really a non-issue for me. It's not really any of my business how many kids she has, or what their personal issues are, esp not Bristol. That kind of thing happens in the best of families. The only other thing I'm going to say is how much it annoys me that pro-life groups have praised her for not aborting the youngest baby 'even though she knew he was going to have Down syndrome.' Since when was that EVER a good reason to abort? I know of no pro-choice person that would abort because they knew the baby they were carrying had Down syndrome - and in my field, I know a lot of pro-choice people. It really gets under my skin.

Add to that that she has about zero foreign policy experience....I just don't think she's cut out to be a heartbeat away from the presidency. I don't think McCain would have picked her had a 'minority' not been running on the other ticket.

I don't care whether she was in FCA in highschool, I don't care what her nickname was on the basketball team, I don't care whether she hunts/fishes or not, and I don't care what her husband does. Let me rephrase that - none of those things affect my vote.

Where Sarah Palin stands on the issues

Which do you like better?

This is not a life-or-death issue, I'm just curious. I've long since been having this internal debate over which version of this song is better. I like both, but one is a cover of the original. Am looking for objective opinions (since mine is obviously not). Which one do you think is better?
One:


or
Two:

These guys are funny!

Just make sure the kids are asleep or you have headphones on...some PG (at least) language.

Jesus for President

Has anyone read this book? I am currently reading it & would like to have a discussion group. So far haven't found anyone. It is extremely interesting and very challenging.

The author has also written "The Irresistible Revolution" which is also worth reading. And, he's traveling the country stumping for Jesus in an old school bus that runs on used veggie oil.

CNN did a story about him not too long ago:
http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/06/29/evangelical.campaign/index.html

In case you were wondering...

Daniel informed me tonight that "My boobies don't move. Maybe when I get bigger they will." Nice.

Tribute

Since I'll be working on the 16th, gonna go ahead now and post my tribute to Elvis, who died 31 years ago Saturday. Silly to miss someone you never knew but I can't help it.

I got this message from a cyber-friend of mine who has just started his first nursing job at a local VA. Apparently that particular VA is a great place to work but he also has this to say:

"I am reminded every day of the senseless costs of our involvement in Iraq. MPLS [Minneapolis] VA is one of the 4 acute polytrauma treatment centers for the US. I see kids every day who are just learning to walk and navigate around the hospital within a month or so of their injury. It was so sad today to see a kid being escorted by either sister or girlfriend being supported with his pants being used like a transfer belt. I just want to weep over their changed lives. They are the ones who have born any burden for ????. We have kids every week on our unit with PTSD/depression/schizophrenia all attributable to war service."

Every time I hear something like this I'm reminded of what my stepfather says about war: It's stupid, and the worst part is it destroys young lives.

Biology lesson outside

Mama Mockingbird built a nest & laid some eggs in the maple tree in our backyard, and they've hatched. Those baby birds are so very cute, and Daniel has thoroughly enjoyed watching them. One of his favorite books is "Are You My Mother?" so it has been like that book coming alive for him.

Say It's So!!!

It is is August and - dare I say it - the Cubs are STILL leading the NL Central. Here is a little music to honor that:

We watched "Flags of Our Fathers" last night. If you haven't seen it you need to; it's about the flag-raisers of Iwo Jima. War is such bull****, such a waste.

We plan on watching "Letters from Iwo Jima", told from the Japanese perspective. I think we will probably reach the same conclusion about war.

New Baby

I'm writing this post from our new baby - a Toshiba laptop with wireless!!
Now maybe Jesus and I can be in the same room while he watches TV.

New link on my sidebar

I'm posting a link to this website - Corazon Fair Trade - for a couple reasons.
1) There is some really really neat stuff there, made in co-ops and small businesses in Latin America. Organic coffee, hand-carved nativity sets, jewelry, plaques, all sorts of things.

2) I'm a big supporter of fair trade. I really think free trade has hurt our neighbors to the south, even if it has benefited the US.

Something y'all might not have known:
Daniel was really supposed to be named Cuauhtémoc. That's right, people. Cuauhtémoc.
That was the name I wanted. Unique, strong, proud, and distinctly Mexican.

My husband only half-jokingly threatened to leave me if I named our son that.
So....we named him Jesús, like his father and about 40% of the rest of Latin America (ok, maybe an exaggeration, but only a slight one.)
And Daniel, which is the same in about a dozen languages.
Aren't you all glad?

Daniel has a twisted mother

Ok, so tonight as Daniel was going to bed, he insisted on sleeping with his 'new' stick pony. It's not really new, more like rediscovered, as he's had it since he was about 10 months old (thanks Marilyn!). Anyway, so just today he rediscovered the thing and has dragged it all over the house today including into the bed.

As I'm getting up from the bed after I tucked him in, all I could think of was that scene from The Godfather. My mind is a scary place.

The stick pony's name, by the way, is Eunice.
Whiskey Tango Hotel??

Sweet guitar

This song is by Maná, my favorite Latin American band. They have been around for something like 30 years but I have just discovered them recently. I think the lead singer Fher (think that is his 'artistic' rendition of Fernando, his real name) is beautiful. And, they sing a lot of of songs that actually mean something. I can't stand most of the drivel put out by most bands. This song is about Chico Mendes, an environmentalist in Brazil who was murdered whilst doing his work trying to protect the Amazon rainforest. Anyway, enjoy the song, but I really like the guitar & flute. And Fher.

Song is titled When the Angels Cry/Cuando los Angeles Lloran

Just a quick question

Does anyone actually read this blog?

Some more evidence...

....that the fence along the US-Mexico border is not the best idea.

Not only is it not going to stop people from coming here, it is messing up wildlife and private property. I am glad some folks down there are protesting it, because up here most of what we hear about here is how it needs to be built.

Full story

Future Tolkien

Bono & Luciano Pavarotti

I can't remember if I've already posted this or not, and frankly I don't feel like scrolling back through three years of posts to look! But I found this on YouTube a while back and thought it was so cool. Not your conventional duo but very pretty all the same.

Daniel funny

Whilst picking up his toys, Daniel informed me just now that "I need an assistant. I have too many toys to pick up all by myself."

Luau

Zoo Pics

On the chimp statue....
And we learned what an ostrich looks like.
The rhino statue...unfortunately the real rhinos were too far away for us to see.
The zebra - "Mom, he looks kinda like a horse."
So happy we got good pics of the elephants... (see the story at the end of the pictures)

And "When I was a baby, I looked like the baby elephant." Right.
Also think the giraffes are really cool. I just cannot imagine giving birth standing straight up.
The grizzly!!
"Look Mommy, we're two guys the same sitting on the lion!"
"Mommy, is the alligator a stinky guy?"

In the polar bear cave
With Daddy & the bison statue
Watching the alligators
The highlight of our day was the elephants. Why, you ask? Because they are enormous, beautiful, intelligent creatures that happened to be pretty close to where we were standing? Because we got to see them spray themselves with water and with sand? Nope.

Because we got to see the elephant pooping. A three-year-old boy lives at this house, and to him, the elephant pooping was way more exciting than anything else imaginable. You can imagine that all the other parents with small kids there breathed a huge sigh of relief when it was my child and not theirs that yelled "LOOK MOMMY! THAT ELEPHANT IS STINKYING! AND HIS STINKIES ARE REALLY REALLY BIG!"

Too bad we didn't catch THAT on camera.

I went to Haiti in the middle of a bad drought there. One day we finally got some rain (the first in like a month and a half or something...) and little Charissa (who is now big Charissa) ran around yelling, "Mési Jezu pou la plis!" (Thank you Jesus for the rain!!) I kind of feel like doing the same thing right now. It has been raining here for about 6 hours now, and we so desperately need it.

Sometimes I think God gives us droughts to remind us humans down here who's really in control.

We went to the zoo Wednesday....as soon as I get pics dumped onto the 'puter, I shall upload them.

Last night I went to Bible study at church and the Scripture was just for us (funny how God works that way, isn't it??). James 1:3 "Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance."

We are going to meet with our pastor & his wife sometime this week to try and straighten some things out. (And no, our marriage is not falling apart, either. That's two things you can rule out!)

As Mother Teresa once famously said, "I know God won't give me any more than I can handle. I just sometimes wish He didn't trust me quite so much."

Pray, please

I really don't even feel like discussing details here but please keep Jesus and I in your prayers. We really, really, REALLY need them.
(Nothing to do with immigration, by the way.)
Thanks.

You know your kid watches Veggie Tales when....

....you are told, "We don't live in Rocky Mount, Mommy. We live in Bumblyburg."
....every water tower spotted whilst driving in the car results in an ear-splintering cry of "The monster is headed for the Bumblyburg water tower!!!!!!"
....your 3 year old does a pretty dang good English butler accent when pretending he is Alfred addressing "Mastah Leddy".
....same 3 year old insists on wearing earplugs to Vacation Bible School as he is Larry Boy and said earplugs are his "super suction ears." This results in numerous people coming up to you and asking if something is medically wrong with your child.
....when calling your child by his given name, he corrects you by stating, "I'm Larry Boy and I'm a fighting cucumber."
....your car ceases to be your car and is now the Larrymobile.

I'm Voting Democrat

It's not a video, but it's what I found.
In the spirit of fairness, here it is: http://phelps.donotremove.net/?p=1252
I thought this was funny too.

Love My New Room!

Daddy painted room while Mom was in Michigan at Grandpa Swindle's funeral and I was with Yaya for her 'gradulation'. As you can now see, I love the new color and the new rearrangements. I am a cool dude. And yes, that is a jean jacket, no shirt, and pajama shorts taht I'm wearing. I dress myself. I am a man of fashion.

I'm Voting Republican

And for those of you know me, before you have a thrombo, please check out this link:

http://www.imvotingrepublican.com/

Because I didn't actually take it seriously, I laughed so hard I almost peed myself.
I couldn't find an 'I'm voting Democrat' to balance it out, but you, gentle readers, will be the first to know if/when I do.

Beats the alternatives....

This nice new wallpaper that I might consider for the 'puter.

Today in Daniel's World

He is Nemo, I am Dory, and Daddy is 'the turtle.'

I miss you, Nana.
6-7-38 - 5/31/08

You know your kid is half-Mexican when.....

He has recently taken to being 'el Chapulín Colorado' - the Red Grasshopper.
Classic Mexican sitcom, very funny, and very family friendly.
So he asks me to come watch it with him, so I go sit on the couch and ask if he can come sit up there with me. "No, because Chapulín doesn't hug his mommy."

Now I know.

(btw - the Wiki link is not entirely accurate. The guy who created the character is NOT Chespirito. The guy's name is Roberto Gomez Bolaños. He created the character Chespirito and El Chavo del 8 as well. Just had to clarify.)

Now for some YouTube so you can see some Chapulín:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=harjdP4sBWk

Daniel dresses in his cowboy boots, red pjs and a makeshift cape (read: his blanket + a clothespin) to be the superhero.

Enough already!

Just got back from the immigration attorney's office.
$340 for transferring our case from the greencard dept. to the visa dept. That went to the esteemed Dept. of Homeland Security. (don't even get me started on that.) And then $150 went to pay the lawyer for 25 minutes of his time.

I'm less upset about paying the lawyer - I know that's cheap for an immigration lawyer - than I am about paying DHS. They raise the prices because they know they have people like us by the balls and we have to pay whatever they charge.

On top of that, my grandma is dying. So today has kind of SUCKED.

What to do....

....when your kid asks you a question you have no idea to answer???

For instance:
"Is Jesus a boy?" (Ok, that one's probably pretty straightforward.)
"Where is heaven?"
"Did Coocoo go be with her family?" (yes.) "Why can't we go live with Coocoo's family?"
"Where is Jesus' daddy?" (which way to go with that???)

Sheesh, the questions this child asks!! I thought I was sort of intelligent until about two weeks ago!

And, the sweetest thing ever:
"Mommy, I love you, and I want to live with you until I go to Heaven."

We'll see if he's still singing that tune in about ten years.

Memorial Day

Thanks to:
My brother

My dad

My stepdad

My grandpa, whom we recently buried

My uncle

And all those great folks who never came home.

Thank you.