Elephant

My wife sent me a short story she got from a friend of hers. Thought it was funny....

My five-year old students are learning to read.
Yesterday one of them pointed at a picture in a zoo book and said,

"Look at this! It's a frickin' elephant!"

I took a deep breath, then asked..."What did you call it?"
"It's a frickin' elephant! It says so on the picture!"
And so it does...

" A f r i c a n Elephant "

Hooked on phonics...woo hoo!

Ok... Ok.... Ok!

So I'm struggling getting back into blogging, especially now that I've been introduced to twitter.... that's right, I said twitter. Very busy week back from vacation but a good week.

I've realized a couple things now that I've had a little time off:

1. I love my wife. She is a fun person to be around and hang out with. She is a great conversationalist because she likes to talk and yet is a very good listener. I had a blast just hanging out with her, planning and dreaming and working on some home projects. She is someone you should get to know if you don't already.
2. I love and miss my kids. While it was cool spending time alone with my wife (the first time we were alone in our home for a week in over 12 years), I miss getting to see and hug my kids. They are great kids. Kristen has done well raising them :) They are fun to hang out with and it doesn't hurt that, at least for now, they like to hang out with us too. I know they are having a good time and they are getting a vacation from us as well. Everyone needs a little time away (yes Charlie, I know that's from Chicago).
   

Glad to have had the time off and am trying to be more intentional about doing this more in the future.

Peace.

And so it begins...

...my vacation that is! I had an opportunity I could not pass up and am very thankful for the chance to take a little break. I love doing what I do, but everyone needs a little time away (I think there's a song in that).

This week is kind of bitter sweet. While I get a chance to refresh, my kids are also taking off for Arizona. I know they will have a great time, but Kristen and I will both miss them. Obviously we get time just the two of us which will be nice too. It's been 12 years since we've been at home just the two of us.

Yep, my daughter just turned 12 - can't believe it! I don't know where the time has gone. I've started to panic wondering if I've shared and taught her what she needs to know. She's oficially a tween. The "T" stage is next and I just don't feel old enough to be the father of a teen. She's a great kid.... er... um... I mean young adult.

Dang that sucks. Time just flies too fast.

I guess you just can't take anything for granted, including time. So, I'm off to enjoy my vacation though I anticipate blogging more than I have been.

Peace.

New Fragrance by Calvin Klein

Remember Kramer and the Beach fragrance he wanted to create (which was later produced on the show by Calvin Klein)?

I now think that they need to create a fragrance for women called BBQ or Charred... possibly Smokey would work as a name as well. Delicious!

What's better than the smell of a campfire or a smokey BBQ on your wife when she's been out grilling before you get home? Shoot, I love the smell on my own clothes!

Kooky I know but we're all made a bit different. My other favorite - orange blossoms! Love it!

What's your favorite scent?

The Skinny

What a whirlwind couple of weeks. Hard to believe everything that has happened, but here's what's been going on while I was away from my blog...

Went from running the heater to running the AC. Not a big deal to most but I prefer the cold to the heat.... definitely worth noting.

My wife left me for another state with my girls... course it was to visit my mom and help take care of her after brain surgery. Go figure.

Because of the above I was a single dad of two boys for nearly a week. No easy task though my boys did an excellent job of keeping me in line.

Kristen's mom went into the hospital to be put on dialysis... she is now home.

I have actually planned a vacation... hard to believe I know, but I am planning to take a week off within the next couple of weeks, including from the weekend services I lead at The Orchard. This will be my first weekend off since August of 2007.

My wife is so hot! Ok just on my mind and had to say it :)

Dropped off my workout plan because of most of the above and because I was bored. Supposed to start back again tomorrow.

Twitter has taken over... I know I haven;t been blogging but I hope you have been at least keeping up on the twitter section of my blog to the right.

Twitter rocks!

Lights... what can I ssssaaayyy abbboouuttt lights? Yeah that's right... I might just have been shocked too many times by live voltage. Thanks to Bradster and a few electricians, the project we started around the time I took my last vacation has been completed! Ok so there are a few small things to be wrapped up and it is not the end but the beginning. The lights are a huge improvement!

Uh yeah... for the above, we hung 46 lights, ripped down 30, re-wired 18, dangled off a truss to hang some of them and then I proceeded to dream about lights for the next couple of days!

My Mac power cable burned up. Apple replaced it the next day.


I'm rocking on Guitar Hero 3 - my first Guitar Hero experience. Course I'm playing on easy mode but my kids think I'm a rock star.

Started a new message series this weekend... we're linking with more than 1200 other churches for a series called OnePrayer. Great weekend!

I guess that's good for now.
Thanks for hanging out.

Caption Please...

Found this picture online when my daughter and I were researching puppies.

She wants one of these but I haven't given the go ahead yet. Puppies are cute until they grow up.

I'll admit that this pic almost sold me.

Definitely need a caption though.
Peace.

Q: Favorite Cereal of All Time

I love cereal.

My wife doesn't understand it. But it's one of my favorite foods. I could eat it any time of day, and sometimes do.

Do you remember the cereals they had when you were a kid? I remember Buckwheats - that was pretty good. They had a C3PO cereal for a little while, and they even had Donuts cereal (that was good.... mmmmm... powdered donuts in milk). Life cereal, both regular and cinnamon.

Seriously... delicious!

Probably one of my favorites even to this day is Golden Grahams. I even used to like the S'mores made with Golden Grahams!

So, for you cereal lovers out there, which cereal is, of all time, your favorite?

Enjoy a bowl today!

My wife - An Amazing Mom

My wife, Kristen, is an amazing woman! This last weekend, we continued our series at The Orchard called, That's What She Said, where we've been celebrating and learning from some great women.

Mother's day weekend, we chose to do something different from what we've done in quite a long time. We rolled out a red carpet that ran from the curb inside to the auditorium. We dressed one of our guys in a tux (nice job Jason) and had him host the red carpet by cheering and celebrating the moms and women who came to one of the services. We had their pictures being taken on the red carpet and a live audio/video broadcast feed of the red carpet events being projected on the big screen inside the auditorium so the rest of the Orchard community could celebrate too. We had silk flower petals of various color all over the seats and floor in the auditorium. We also had more of a living room feel on our teaching platform where we got to hear from the hearts of four wonderful moms.

Scott interviewed four moms from The Orchard. Each shared about their struggles and triumphs as a mom. It was a great weekend! The last service of the weekend was packed and the ladies received a standing ovation! It was an incredible thing to be a part of.

I say all that to say that my wife is amazing! She is an incredible wife and mom. I know that she was very nervous about speaking in front of such a large group of people but she did not freeze up. She spoke clearly and intelligently.

I'm so very proud of you Kristen - not because of this event but because of the person you are and because you are my wife. I have to say though, I was beaming at the back of the room during every service you spoke!

If you get a chance, you'll want to check out the podcast here.

Never Ending Story - Update

I am impressed by the wit and creativity you all have unleashed on the previous never ending story post. Quite a humorous tale being concocted!

If you're not familiar with the story or if it's been a while since you've checked it out, you can catch up on it here.

Sorry, I just couldn't let the poor lunch lady bite the dust so soon in the story :)

What about the spindly man?

What's up with the ninja monkey wrangler? Why is he troubled?

Who's hat was thrown at the monkey?

What does all this have to do with ketchup?

You'll have to read and find out!
Thanks blog readers!
Peace?

Twittering

As you can see by my sidebar, I've joined the few and proud who are twittering.

According to wikipedia, "

Twitter is a free social networking and micro-blogging service that allows users to send "updates" (or "tweets"; text-based posts, up to 140 characters long) to the Twitter website, via short message service (e.g. on a cell phone), instant messaging, or a third-party application such as Twitterrific or Facebook.

Updates are displayed on the user's profile page and instantly delivered to other users who have signed up to receive them.

I used to think, "how am I going to twitter when I can barely blog" but twittering is easy! You can text your updates or IM your updates and people can follow along.

Kind of fun.

If you want to subscribe, you can follow me here.

How about you? Do you twitter?

Tweet.