Connerisms

I had a couple of good Connerisms to post today.

Last night, Conner ended up on the floor next to our bed, which is kind of common lately. Well, this morning, when I woke up, Anita was in the other room with Zach because he had already been awake for a little while. I woke up because I heard Conner wimpering on the floor. He was sort of half-crying/half-mumbling and finally he got to where he could say something and I asked him what was wrong. Then he said, "My hand's doing something it's not supposed to.....it's tickling me!" I asked him if his hand fell asleep and he said, "NO, my hand's not ASLEEP, it's tickling me!" So, I just had him get up in bed with me and told him that it would go away. It really kind of freaked him out though. I had never really thought about that. It just happens throughout your life and you get used to it. However, it isn't comfortable and I'm sure the first time it happens, it would be rather scary.



The other thing that happened was as Anita, Conner, and Zach were leaving to go to speech this morning, they stepped outside and it was quite a bit cooler today than it has been the past few days. It's really sunny, but it's in the upper 60s instead of 80s like last week. When they stepped out, Anita remarked, "It's really cool out here." Conner then replied, "I know. It's going to turn into WINTER this SUMMER!"

Eating Cookies

Tonight, after dinner, Anita made a batch of cookies and when they came out we all just stood around and were eating them straight off the cookie sheet once they had cooled enough to do so.

Well, Conner and I were standing there eating them and Zach came over and Conner asked him, "You want a cookie Zach?" Zach had been grazing already. Anita gave him a bite, I gave him a bite or two, etc. So, Zach nods his head yes and Conner walks over and pulls the paci out of Zach's mouth and lays it on the counter. Then he walks over, breaks off a piece of cookie from one on the cookie sheet and feeds it to Zach. When he finishes, Zach walks away and Conner laughs and says, "Zach eats like a doggy."

Kiss My Brain

As Conner and I were walking back to the car yesterday after soccer practice he suddenly kissed his hand and smacked himself in the forehead and said, "I kissed my brain!"

It sure caught me off guard and gave me a good laugh. Then, when I tell Anita about it and expect to get a good laugh out of her she just say, "Oh yah, they do that at the library." .....huh... yah, well... at least I thought it was funny. Thanks for ruining it for me.

Being Lazy

Okay, so I've been lazy ..and busy. I have several picture posts I need to do as well as I should try to remember and come up with some good blog posts. There were several good ones last week that I wanted Anita to do because she was the one around when they happened.. but I'll have to try and even remember what they were now.

We were gone all weekend to Atlanta to visit Anita's parents and brother. We all met at a hotel there and had a nice day together on Saturday and then everyone left on Sunday to go back to their respective places they call home currently. We had all planned to go to Stone Mountain together on Saturday and spend the whole day there. We had tickets already purchased as a package deal through our hotel, but then it rained really hard Friday night and rained some more Saturday morning, so we opted not to do that. Instead we went to the Natural History Museum and had a great day anyway.

Sunday, after everyone left, the four of us were headed back home and Anita and I decided to turn back around and go back to Stone Mountain anyway with just the four of us. It was a beautiful day and it was early, and we already had tickets anyway, so what the heck. It turned out really nice. It was really warm (about 88 degrees) and super sunny and the sky was nice and clear. We walked around the attractions, and we were there so early, most of them weren't open yet, and all of the shows started later in the day. We really did get there right at opening time I think.. maybe within 30 minutes of when they open. Anyway, we took the skyride/tram/cable car thing up the mountain to the top and then we walked around up on top. It was really beautiful and very nice. The only issue was Mr. Squirmy-Fussy-Pants --- Zach. He was tired, probably hungry, frustrated, and all around not in a good mood. He eventually calmed down and nearly fell asleep on my shoulder and then again on Anita.

After the ride back down the mountain we ate some lunch and it was a really nice and pleasant lunch. I think both boys were just really hungry and thirsty and that was probably adding to the agitation level. We had burgers, fries, and shakes and finished JUST in time. As soon as we were gathering up our trash, the train whistle sounded as they were pulling into the station. We walked right over, got in line, and got on the train. We took the [loud] [rough] train ride around the park and when we got back, it was just right at the time we needed to be getting on the road.

Both boys were pretty tired, and Zach cashed out immediately. He slept for the first movie, then he woke up and we put in another one. This time, he stayed awake, and Conner was out 10 minutes into that movie and slept through all of it.

I've got pictures of course of some of the Stone Mountain stuff and I'll post them, but I'm really tired and I wanted to post something since it had been nearly a week with no update. Plus, I wanted to say at least a few things about the weekend before I forgot them. I know they aren't anecdotal or anything, and more of an event recapping, but oh well. At least it is something.

I will say that Conner did just fantastic at the park. For as much as Zach fussed at the beginning when we got there, and then while we started walking, and then when we went up the mountain, and then on top of the mountain, and then coming down the mountain...... well, Conner did just awesome. He was very active and wanted to do tons of stuff, and be very much the little independent explorer. From the moment we walked in, he took off and went to investigate stuff, and would come back and stay in front of us and say, "No, you have to stay behind me, I'm the leader!" and then he would act like a tour guide and show us the stuff he had just gone to see and say, "You have to see this, it is so COOL!" Then, we'd mention, "Let's go in this building and check out _______" and he'd say, "No, we don't need to see that" and he'd just march right on past it. If there was a rock to climb on, he did it. He was climbing stuff right and left. At one point, there was this rock wall bordering the sidewalk and I told him to "go up there and get on that rock so I can take a picture of you." The next thing I know he has scaled the whole wall and walked up it's entirety until he is about 15-20 feet off the ground at the top of it - at it's highest point - standing up high and mighty saying, "Look!" with a big grin on his face. Other than a few times where we had to tell him to stop doing something more than once or twice, he did exceptionally well though. As we were walking to the car, I was looking back on the whole day and had to stop and tell him how proud of him I was at how well he had acted and behaved all day. During only one small part did he get the slightest bit fussy (for maybe 10 minutes) and I honestly think that was the tired thing kicking in.

There's bound to be tons of funny stuff that happened during the day. Great one liners and funny little things that happened, but of course, I can't think of any of them for the life of me right now. One thing I can think of is that while we were riding the train there was an older man in the seat in front of us who had a bushy head of white hair and a really bushy white beard. A little ways into the train ride, the woman sitting with him (his daughter I think), turned to Conner and said, "Hey, you see that guy? You know who he is don't you?" and Conner got really shy and unsure of what she was trying to ask him and she said, "It's Santa Claus, he's on vacation." and Conner just gave her the sternest look and then he cut his eyes and eyed the old guy really hard and then he slid back in the corner of his seat and against the wall and turned around and looked back out the side of the train. She tried to ask him if he'd been a good boy so far this year, but wasn't having any more of it. He just kept his back to her (and Santa) and kept looking out the train. Then, today, he came in as I was downloading the pictures and he saw the picture of the carving of the mountain and he said, "I love that mountain". I let him sit here and go through the pictures with me and when we got to one of the ones in the train there was a picture of that guy in the background of one of the shots and he made sure to point out to me, "There's Santa Claus."

...okay, now I'm sequeing..... saying Santa Claus reminds me of an incident that happened a week or two after Christmas. I was tucking Conner in to bed one night and we had just finished praying. He sat there all pensive for a minute and then said, "You know. I bet God is helping Santa make toys for next year." I found it exceedingly cute, innocent, charming, and funny all at once and yet I still held it in long enough to say, "Well, he just might be." and then kissed him goodnight and went out to have a good chuckle in sharing it with Anita.


Alright, NOW I'm going to bed. Goodnight!

Fun Pic

This is another picture I pulled out for a wallpaper, but it wasn't as cute. I thought it was a really neat picture and cute, but not as cute as the other one. So, I still thought I'd pass it along though because I thought it was funny.


Yup, there's no doubting they're mine

Wallpaper

My sister (Jennifer, aka Aunt Jenny Pooh) emailed me today to request a new wallpaper for her computer at work. I will often make these on request from pictures I can find of the boys. I try to do something artsy, or just find a good picture or couple of pictures and put them together to make a good wallpaper.

Well, I whipped one up today and it's too good not to put it out for everyone to enjoy. I combined a picture of Zach from the "Planting Flowers" series, and then one from Conner from some of his famous faces to make something altogether better.


Click on the picture for a 1024x768 version.

Cutie Pie

It's caterpillar season apparently. We have those little green caterpillars ALL OVER our deck. They are everywhere. And Conner LOVES it! He has really gotten into the whole bug thing recently and he's been picking up caterpillars and making homes for them and naming them. Apparently, his favorite name for any given caterpillar is Cutie Pie. Then, the next one will have some strange name. Still though, he seems to name at least one a day Cutie Pie, and he'll pick them up and go put them all in one special spot for the day and pretend it is their home. I'm sure on top of the basketball goal is exactly what they'd think is a good home too!

Anyway, it's hilarious to watch him with them and I had to share this latest new infatuation. Zach, on the other hand really likes the plastic Easter eggs that are left over from this weekend's egg hunt. Most notably, he enjoys dumping them all over the floor. He also likes transferring them from one bucket to the other. All so he can just dump them out again, of course.

Making Me Laugh

Saturday we had a great day, and I've got lots of other stuff to post about what happened on Saturday, but I had to share this one thing before I forgot it.

That night, we had a nice spaghetti dinner with rolls and afterward Anita had fixed up some strawberries for dessert. We had strawberries with whipped topping which Conner just loves.

Well, Anita was up from the table cleaning up dishes and it was just Conner, Zach and I around the table. I've got my head down eating my strawberries and suddenly Conner says, "Look at me, I'm ICING guy!" and I look up to see him lift his face and he has whipped topping in a complete circle around his mouth. He looks up at me with this face and I literally let out a full out guffaw/snort/wheeze. I nearly spit strawberries all over the table. I'm just happy I wasn't drinking. I mean, I laugh at him all the time.. even big hearty laughs. For some reason though, this was different. This was like one of those laughs you do with your best buds when they do something that totally catches you off guard and you nearly spew your water/coke/beer all over the table. All I could do was say, "Good one Conner." and gave him a high-five.

Clean Shaven

The beard comes off!

Friday night, I got home around 10pm from our last performance of our Last Supper drama. I came in and talked to Anita for about 20-30 minutes and then I said, "Okay, that's it.. I'm going to shave." I went and got the clippers and got started right away. I decided to shave it down to just the goatee first to see what it looked like. It looked like I still had too much hair, is what it looked like!

The variation between the shaved part and the bearded part was so remarkable to me. It was hard to believe how much hair was there.

After I got it down to just the goat, I took a few pics for the heck of it, and then off it came as well. I then got in the shower and took a nice soothing 20 minute shower shaving very slowly and methodically. I had a new razor and brand new can of shaving cream out for it and everything. It took me so long to shave one side of my face that I had to rinse off the lather and reapply when I got to the other side because it had dried up too much.

When it was finished though, it was VERY smooth. It felt very odd and yet refreshing all at the same time. I definitely enjoyed sleeping on my pillow with a shaven face that night.

Saturday I went and got my haircut. Conner got his cut too for the first time (successfully) at a barber shop as well. I'm using the phrase barber shop loosely.. it was a Supercuts. Anyway, Conner did great and his haircut looks really good. It's basically the same haircut he's always had but we let her feather it some so that it would have a softer line around the edges and not be quite so thick. I'll post pictures of the haircut later.

Anyway, here are some pics of me without the beard and with a haircut now. I feel so much lighter and cooler :)

First Time Flying a Kite

We finally got a chance to go out and fly a kite yesterday for the first time with Conner. First time for Zach too, for that matter. Conner and Anita picked the kite up weekend and he's been asking every day since to go fly it.

When we got to the park there didn't appear to be any wind at all. As we parked, Anita and I took the time to explain to Conner about how it takes wind to make the kite fly. Then, making the connection to the fact that it wasn't a very windy day, we tried to make him realize that if it didn't work, it was just because there wasn't enough wind today and that we'd have to come back and try again on another day.

Well, all of that was moot. Conner and I walked out in the field, a gust came by, I let go of the kite, let out a little string, and *zoom* we were flying. Easy as that. Figures. I didn't have to run or anything .... to get it going. I did have to run a little later to keep it aloft as the wind shifted and we got too much slack in the line.

It was a fun day and Conner really enjoyed it. I'm going to have to find a better reel though because this one was really hard to work with and Conner couldn't hold it very well without the string pulling out on him. At one point the wind was moving it around a whole lot and Conner said, "It's dancing on me" in a completely serious tone since he had heard me using this phrase earlier to describe the way it was behaving as the wind started to shake it around quite a bit. I thought it was just hilarious that he used it not 5 minutes later.

The kite is a Cobra by the way, in case you can't make it out. Anita said that there is a dragon version that she wanted to get, but they didn't have any more of them. I was bummed... I'd have enjoyed a dragon a lot more :).

Planting Some Flowers

....and eating some dirt!



I've got a great photo series for this that I'll post later. But, for now, I had to show off this pic!

Conner's First Dentist Visit

Conner had his first dentist visit today. I didn't go with them, but Anita said he did an awesome job. She said he was still, didn't fuss or get scared, or anything.

I'll try to get her to get on here and tell some more about it. She has two or three other posts she needs to do anyway, so I'm going to bug her to come on and update this post with more info as well.

Lawn Warriors

So, here we are. The lawn warriors. Sunday was a really beautiful, sunny, and bright day and so when we got home from church I decided it was time to break out the lawn mower and start it up for the first time this season. The yard was getting a little tall in places - especially around the back near the shed and down beside the driveway - and it was definitely time to mow. I knew if I waited much longer it was going to be a very painful ordeal in that I'd just be chunking piles of grass all over the yard.

Of course, this meant that the boys had to join me in the mowing fun. This year however, it isn't just Conner mowing around behind and beside me. Anita made sure to buy another toy mower last year so Zach could join in the fun. He of course was quite ready to do so. Though, he did tire of it more quickly than Conner and started just running around the yard. Conner on the hand will follow me around for 30 minutes if Anita will stand out there and let him do it that long. It's really funny and cute. He loves it. Let's see how much he likes it in about 6 or 7 years when he starts pushing it by himself. hehe. :)

Zach's Getting so Big

Well.... he isn't really. The kid doesn't even weigh 20 pounds! However, he just looks so much bigger and older every day. It's so hard to believe how fast they grow. I took this picture on Saturday and didn't look at it till today and I just thought he looked so much older in it for some reason. Notice though he is standing at his favorite place and touching something he isn't supposed to be touchng (as usual).

Another of Conner's Creations

I'm pulling some pictures tonight and thought I'd post Conner's bridge that he made before we left for soccer practice last Thursday night (4/6). He puts his railroad strut pieces together like this all the time to use them for different stuff besides their intended use. Sometimes he'll make guns, swords, art pieces (as seen in a prior post), buildings, crutches!, dumbbells "to workout his strong muscles", or any number of things. Well, this night, he made a bridge which by itself isn't too much of a stretch for him. However, I thought the way he used the items of the room and even created some kind of environment using the pillows under the bridge was pretty cool.

Easter Egg Hunt

Today was the big Easter egg hunt at church and I thought I would recap it for everyone since nobody got to come down/up/over for it. The committee that Anita chairs coordinated the whole thing and it was a huge success. I think they "hid" (read: threw out in the yard) close to 1600 eggs or something like that. Maybe it was 1200, but either way... a TON of candle-filled little plastic eggs. The little kids (toddlers through Kindergarten) picked up eggs inside the fenced in playground, and the older kids picked them up in the rest of the yard. The men stood along the road outside to make sure none of the "big" (1st grade and up) kids went out in the street. They were all excited beforehand and many of them were caught peeking out the windows in the fellowship hall to try and find the best spots to go get eggs - Conner included.

I think Conner probably needed a bigger bucket - like 5 gallon.

He was one of the big kids in the small area and he didn't have any problems filling his bucket up really fast. Zach on the other hand, was a little slower, but he managed to have fun and pick up enough eggs to nearly fill his bucket.

After it was all said and done, the kids had to all come inside and we had to empty the plastic eggs out because the church recycles them and saves them for next year's egg hunt. When it was all over, the buckets didn't look as full, but they were still a nice pile of sweet candy goodness. Both boys surveyed their loot pretty intently looking for that perfect first piece of candy.

Eureka! Found it!

Another neat thing that happened Sunday was we had a guest speaker at our Methodist Men's breakfast. A young (using that loosely here) man of about 24 or so named Paul. He is one of the Sudan Lost Boys. He is going to school at David Lipscomb universvity here in TN and is working on going into ministry and missionary work. He, along with some other 30-35,000 boys marched 1,000 miles from Sudan to Ethiopia in the late 80s (around 87 or so) to escape the religious war raging in their homeland (Muslim north against the Christian south). They all traveled without parents - either having left them behind to continue in the fighting or having already lost them to the war. Paul said many children died during the exhaustive march. Many were eaten by wild animals. Others died of starvation, disease, or dehydration. Remember, this man was about 7 or 8 years old when he went through this. He said nearly 10,000 died by the time they reached Ethiopia. After they spent a few years in Ethiopia, they ended up having to leave once again due to civil war that was breaking out there and threatening their safety. They took foot once again and marched nearly 1,000 miles once again to Kenya where they ended up staying in refugee camps that at least provided them safety. These boys traveled with little to nothing. Many of them carrying with them nothing but a bible as their sole posession, and using their faith as a foundation for strength to get through the ordeal set before them. Paul said he was in Kenya around 10 years when he got the opportunity to come to the US through a relief program. He came here in 2001 I believe if I remember correctly and he has been in the Nashville area since 2002. He's now a second year undergraduate student with goals, unbelievable faith, a message of hope for others, and a passion to help and minister to others. He was a pretty remarkable, kind and very interesting guy. He was fun to talk to and I really enjoyed getting to spend a little while just chatting with him during the Easter egg hunt.

A Stormy Night

In last night's storm we had some hail, lots of wind, and tons of rain. There was actually enough rain to make a nice river run through that drainage ditch at the back of our property - which is fairly rare. The water was high enough we could see it by just looking out the window and looking back behind the shed where you could see it flowing. I'd say it was probably 5-6 feet deep back there at one point. Fortunately, the drainage system works well and it goes away pretty quickly.

I didn't get the camera out fast enough to catch a good picture of all the hail covering the deck before the rain melted all of it. There was a nice size piece that bounced up under the eave by the door and it hadn't melted yet because there wasn't much rain hitting it. I held it for probably 30 seconds before Anita got the picture too, so it was actually quite a bit bigger I'm sure when it fell.

Conner wanted to go out really bad into the rain. We told him he couldn't because it was raining really hard. So, what did he do? He disappeared into the other room, and came back in rain boots, a jacket, and a hard hat and said, "I'm ready to go outside, I've got my storm clothes on." At that point, we decided he made a good case for himself and since it hadn't hailed in probably 15-20 minutes and the lightning had stopped, we let him go stand out on the deck for 2 or 3 minutes in the rain. His gear worked pretty well. His clothes didn't get wet at all.

Zach really wanted to go out as well, but his rain gear was significantly less sufficient. He really enjoyed looking outside and watching the rain and hail though. When Conner did go out, he tried to go out too and wasn't really too happy about the fact that he didn't get to go either. He was mad enough about it in fact, that Anita finally just said, "FINE. We'll ALL get out in the rain then." and she picked him up and stepped outside for about 10 seconds and then brought him back in.

All in all, we had a great evening "surviving the storms" and we were exceptionally lucky that our power didn't even go out. It's hard to be all that happy though, when you know how many people are moving on from destroyed homes and others are carrying on without loved ones this week.

Going House to House

We had a pretty heavy round of storms come through tonight as many of you know. There were tornadoes touching down all around the counties around Nashville. Many homes and businesses were destroyed and there were quite a few people killed. They started about 3:00pm on Friday and really started rolling in to our town around 4:00. That's when the hail started at least - about 4:15. I shut down my computer at that time, and turned everything off and went to be with everyone else in the other room as we watched the weather on the news and the rain, wind, and hail outside. We rode through that first wave and then Anita and I went to the kitchen and made some dinner together, which was a lot of fun.

While I was praying before dinner, Conner piped in with "and their houses" - referring to the houses that were already being shown on the news that have been destroyed. After we started eating, he looked up and said, "We need to go house to house." Anita and I both looked at him and kind of at the same time said, "What? What are you talking about?" That's when he said in all seriousness, "We need to go house to house and fix their houses." Wow, I tell ya. Kind of hits you when you hear a 4 year old that has that much compassion and recognition of the world around him. Just from us having the news on - even though he was running around and playing and looking outside most of the time - he was aware of the damage and realized how devastated these families are that their homes were destroyed.

As a parent, you can't help but be proud. As a christian, you can't help but evaluate yourself and think, "Man, do I measure up to a 4 year old?" I mean, most of us as adults immediately feel saddened and our hearts go out, but realistically, how many of us think inside, "I'm glad that wasn't us" as our first thought. When, shouldn't our first thought be, "How can I help them?"

Us Goofing Around After Dinner

Sticking to my Feet

This morning, Anita went and got Zach out of bed after he woke up and he went running into the kitchen and got his placemat off the table and brought it back to the bedroom. Anita figured that meant he was obviously hungry and he had a plan. So, she went and got him a plastic baggy full of Cheerios and a sippy cup of water and brought them back to our room. She turned on Little Einsteins for him and he sat on the floor at his placemat while she crawled back in bed.

Well, all this seemed like a good idea.

Later, Conner crawled in bed with us and we all lay there watching some tv and just relaxing. All except for Little Z. He was busy running around and doing stuff that we couldn't see because we weren't really looking down at the end of the bed for him. We could hear him and knew he wasn't in trouble or anything, so that was good enough. When we all finally decided to get up, I went to the shower, Anita was still getting out of bed and Conner started down the hallway. The next thing I hear is Conner saying, "There are Cheerios EVERYWHERE! They are sticking to my feet when I walk."

Yup. Little Z had been busy. They were spread all around the end of the bed and then all down the hallway. I thought I had heard him at one point running up and down the hallway accompanied by the little swish swish sound of a plastic baggy. I guess that they were just shaking out as he ran. We'll probably be finding them for days I suspect.

Conner's Coloring

Anita called me in after Conner got home from preschool yesterday to show me something. Conner had colored a picture of a rocket at school that was just amazing to us. This is by far the best coloring job he has done yet. He stayed in the lines exceptionally well and used several different colors for different parts of the ship and everything. We thought it was pretty cool. Of course, it is hanging on the fridge, and I figured it should hang on here as well :)

Conner Singing the Solar System Song

This is a post of Conner singing the Solar System song that I posted about a couple of weeks ago. I hope you can hear it okay.

First AudioBlog

I signed up to use AudioBlogger, a free service for putting sound files on the blog. I figured I could use it to let the boys record stuff. Also, I thought it would be a fun way to record little things while we are on the road. The service itself is free, but I have to pay for a long distance call, which I'm okay with since it costs me all of .05 a minute to do so, and it's either prepaid on the cell, or free on the weekends, so there! :)

Look for more audioblogs soon. I'll try to get Conner to do his Solar System song for everyone tomorrow and see how that works out. hehe.

Conner's creation

I just went walking through the living room to go to the bathroom and I saw that Conner had built this cool looking thing on the floor. I thought it was so cool looking I had to take a picture of it. He was kind enough to pose with it for me :)




Then, I got both boys to pose with me for a picture. It's not a great picture, but I thought it was still cute.

Fun Faces

I'm sure everyone was tired of just seeing me make faces, so Conner helped me out.

What Brad Needs

This is funny. I was reading about this on some blog and thought it sounded fun to try. Using Blingo (which uses Google's search), I typed in "brad needs" (including quotes) and you can see what I need.

Here's the top 10 things Brad needs:

Brad needs a pair of wrestling shoes.
Brad needs your help!
Brad needs babies!
Brad needs donations.
Brad needs positive energy and to focus on his battle with cancer. ('doh!)
Brad needs to phone home.
Brad needs to get a little looser about scheduling stuff.
Brad needs some serious modifications to his educational setting.
Brad needs a cordless, lapel microphone.
Brad needs to dump Big Lips and be single for a while.

Crazy Amish Dwarf Guy

I took some pics the other day of the beard in the "frizzed out" position. This is achieved by me running my hands upwards through the beard hair. It is so stiff it stays in place like this. It will stand out from my face more in this position and just generally has a completely more wild appearance to it. So, I - as usual - was making faces and taking pictures of them and thought I'd share a few of the poses that came out of them.



Perplexed Dwarf




Psycho Amish Dwarf




Angry Amish Farmer




Classic Calvin Pose...on a Dwarf

Church

Just had a short thing I wanted to post. I wanted Anita to post it, but she is busy working on a resume.

Today at church I sang in the choir. This is my third week. yay! It's still a very new experience for me. We sang In Remembrance today, a piece we've been working on for a few practices. I really liked it and thought it was very beautiful. The tenor part had several notes that were a little high though. I think I hit them. I hope so.

Anyway.... today was also Communion Sunday (our church does communion the 1st Sunday of the month). We also use (at least for the moment) the method of tearing the bread off of a loaf and then taking a small cup of the wine (grape juice) - intinction, for those in the know. This was the first time I had been in the choir while we did communion. The choir is the first group to go down after the clergy and people serving. We were all wearing blue robes today and Anita said that after we were down front doing our communion, Conner leaned over and said, "Do we go after the blue group?"

Also today, Ken and Kayla Roe were serving communion. Kayla is our good buddy who babysits the boys. They just love her and I think the feeling is likewise. I know Anita and I do, she's awesome. She had the bread and her dad had the platter of cups.

Well, when it came time for Anita and Conner, they went down front and kneeled at the rail. Then Kayla came by with the bread and instead of regular loaf bread they had Pita bread which is harder to tear off. It got to Conner and he went to tear his piece and tore half the loaf off and before anyone could help him, he went ahead and started eating on it. Anita said Kayla was having to do her best to contain her laughter while she went to serve the rest of the line. What can I say? The boy likes bread. Holy bread? That too.

Something's Knocking

Okay. Last night, Anita went out with her friends and I stayed here with the boys and after I put them to bed, I came through the living room and could SWEAR I heard scratching coming from over near the toybox/window area. I stopped and listened, then went and walked over there and stomped on the floor and sure enough. I could hear scratching. Well, Anita, for several days has been pestering me that "something is under our house". She's been complaining about the cats running around crazy and looking in the vents and stuff. Morpheus has been sitting for hours by the vent in our bedroom, but I figure, hey, he's a cat. They're odd anyway. You know?

So, hearing the scratching confirmed it for me. I finally agreed with her and told her I believed there was probably a mouse running around down there somewhere and he's probably scratching on the floor boards and getting up under the insulation somewhere.

Tonight, I get home from church about 7:30 and Conner is running around the house in his rain boots and carrying a flashlight. Anita is on the phone in the kitchen and Conner is just running back and forth saying something about "something's knocking outside". I started talking to Anita when she got off the phone and the whole time, Conner just keeps running back and forth in the living room and kitchen and he finally comes over to us and gets my attention and says, "Something is knocking out there." Anita, obviously having heard this for awhile finally looked at me and said, "You have your shoes on still - just take him outside and look around to calm him down."

I agree to comply and Conner and I take off outside. He with a flashlight and rain boots and I with a grin on my face. We walk around the house and stand out back by the window where he said he heard the knocking. There, of course is nothing out there and I say, "Okay bud. Nothing here." He's shining his flashlight around seeing some stick and stuff on the ground, he kicks some and says, "Maybe it was these." I decide to go over near the window and look around and Conner comes over and sweeps his light by to look at the stuff on the ground by me. I ask him to borrow it, and I sweep it around and then run it over the vent that goes to the crawl space. As I do so, something glows. I pause, move the light back slowly and I see what it is that's glowing. A pair of eyes looking out at me.

HELLO! HOLD THE PHONE! THAT'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THERE!

I nearly jumped out of my skin. But, of course I kept the whole super cool "daddy" composure and just sort of took a step back and pulled Conner back with me. I then bend down and shine the light directly in the vent and there looking back at me is a GIANT FREAKING OPOSSUM! This thing is sitting on the little ledge inside the vent and is crammed inside there. He was probably a 15 lb sucker. He didn't do anything. Just stare at me. He was probably hungry, I'm sure scared, and maybe tired.

One of our vents in the front of our house has been off for awhile. AGAIN. It keeps falling (now I suspect, it hasn't been falling at all) off. Well, last Thursday I went to get the mail and took the time to close the vent up really good, tighten the screws, and put a giant rock against it (it is really low to the ground under our front stoop) to keep it in place. So, I'm guessing that was the last time Mr. Rat-Looking-Marsupial saw the light of day (or night, since they are nocturnal).

I went and uncovered the vent tonight and I hope it leaves. Of course, he'll probably leave and then come back. grrrrrrrrr.. stupid animals.