A Great Performance, A Wonderful Christmas, and A War Hero

Well, here we are at the end of 2003. It seems like just last year I was watching the 24 hour New Year's celebration on TV when we ushered 2000 in, not to mention '01 and '02. Christmas has come and gone yet again and we feel very blessed to have experienced everything God has brought into our lives this past year.

I SIMPLY MUST BRAG. Last Sunday's musical went very well. Everyone involved in the production did a superb job. I was most proud of Vicki who was one of the narrators. I kept wanting to turn around to people sitting behind the sound booth and say, "That's my wife down there. I discovered her. I even get to live with her!" She delivered her lines with the confidence and expression of a pro. There were probably 700+ in attendance.

A VISIT WITH FRIENDS. Brent Freeland, for those of you who don't know him, is a childhood friend of mine. He and his two older brothers, Brian and Steve, are three very special guys who lived down the road from me. We were even roommates in college a couple of times. Brent, Sabrina, and their kids live in Virginia and they surprised Brent's parents with a visit this week. I got a couple of chances to visit with him and was really blessed by that. Isn't it neat to think about all the people God puts in your life?

CHRISTMAS ACTIVITIES. Kenny and Lori Swann had their annual Christmas Party in their barn on the 23rd. It is part of our traditional activities and simply a lot of fun. We had a Christmas Eve service the following night. It is really nice to take that time to celebrate Christmas with your Christian family. On Christmas Day we went to Mrs. Connie Swann's new house for our traditional brunch (she is Kenny's mom). There was way too much good food there. After that we came home for the kids to nap and then went to Pauline's house to exchange gifts with her before all going to Aunt Mar's for some family time there. We were worn out when we got home.

CHRISTMAS GIFTS. We were all overly blessed this year. To hit the high spots, Nate got several little toys. Of his toys he likes the blocks the best, but when Ben fires up the train he got the blocks are forgotten. Ben's train is a motorized Thomas the Tank Engine set. It has a little track to run over and Harold (the helicopter) flies around above. After Nate derailed the train several times Ben just runs it across the floor now. Jenna got a Barbie laptop computer. She has been engrossed with that thing. I think it is a bigger hit than the Leap Pad she got last year (probably because she is a bit older). Mom, Aunt Mar, and Pauline went in together and got the kids a battery powered John Deere Gator. It is neat to watch them drive across the yard. They take turns driving and the passenger always has his/her arm around the driver. Vicki and I bought ourselves a digital camera. We are enjoying the ability to delete bad shots.

SOMETHING TO LOOK FORWARD TO. For those of you who don't know my Dad served as a gunner on a B-29 in WWII. He flew 32 missions against the Japanese Empire. In doing some research on his unit in the past I ran across a picture of a gunner on another plane in his group. This fellow, Sgt. Krantz, was on his 7th mission in early January '45 when his window was shot out by enemy fire. As the plane depressurized he was sucked out and dangled outside at 39,000 ft. for 15 minutes by a harness he had made himself on Christmas Eve and Christmas Day of '44. The picture shows this. He was pulled back in, survived the 6.5 hour trip back to Saipan, and made a full recovery. He was the only frostbite case in the South Pacific.

Yesterday my cousin, Jackie, came by the house and brought me an article from Clarksville's local paper, The Leaf Chronicle. Low and behold, there is Mr. Krantz in the article talking about his experiences. I had no idea he lived an hour away from me! I looked up his number and gave him a call and he said, "Why don't you come by for a visit some time?" I'm going this next week! While he didn't know my dad, I have never before had the opportunity to talk to anyone face to face about those missions (I have talked to Dad's pilot on the phone though). I am really excited to connect with Dad in this way.

I don't know how long they keep old articles posted but you can read it on their web site. Jackie, thanks for dropping that article by.

THE RETURN OF THE KING. Vicki and I watched The Lord of the Rings 3 last night. It was really well done and lives up to the expectations set in the other two films (in our opinion). It was just l_o_n_g. I am looking forward to seeing it again from the comfort of my couch and with the convenience of a pause button.

Joe

Busy Days, a Happy Reunion, and a Crazy Dad

We have been at church five of the seven nights this week. I feel as if I have hardly seen my kids as I have gotten in from work, eaten supper, and left for church to work on sound, lighting, or the set for tomorrow's musical. Vicki has usually been an hour or so behind me. I hope we have a good crowd at church tomorrow.

We hope all of you have a most wonderful Christmas this coming week!

DUE TO A HECTIC SCHEDULE. One day this week Vicki and the boys went shopping at Wal-Mart. We have a Super Wal-Mart here in Springfield. It is supposed to be the third largest in the nation. If they make it chances are you can find it at our Wal-Mart. While there Vicki bought groceries. However, when I got home from work she mentioned something about having to go to Food Valu in Cross Plains after choir rehearsal because she didn't have all of the ingredients she needed for cookies Jenna was to take to school the next day.

Well, Cross Plains is a small town and Food Valu rolls in its sidewalk at 9:00. Since the rehearsal went long we had to drive to Kroger in White House. They are open 24/7 so we knew we could find what we needed. If it hadn't been so cold we would have made a mini-date out of the trip and had milkshakes at Sonic.

So we get home, relieve Pauline so she can go home, and Vicki starts in on the cookies only to realize that it two trips to the store she only has a few drops of vanilla. Thankfully Pauline had some. (If anyone can relate to this Vicki would love to hear from you.)

DAD IS OUT OF HIS MIND. Last night we decided it was high time to go through the kid's toys since the inventory is about to grow next week. Vicki was feeling a little sick so when Nate went down for a nap she did too. While they were sleeping I rounded Jenna and Ben up and we started cleaning their room out. I figured the best way to do this would be to take all of their toys and put them in the hallway. That way the room would be empty for a thorough cleaning and we could organize and weed out what went back in.

Vicki woke up as we were finishing the "empty the room" phase of the job. As Vicki was surveying the scene Jenna walks up to Vicki, holds her hand up to the side of her mouth, and says in a low voice, "This is all Dad's idea." Then she shakes her head and says it again. Vicki said the look on her face seemed to say, "I think Dad is crazy, but I'm following orders."

THEY GROW TOO FAST. In helping to fold and put away a little laundry I sorted out the pajamas. Now its easy to sort Jenna's pajamas as the boys don't wear pink. But Vicki called to me later to let me know that I had put some of Nate's night clothes in Ben's drawer. Neither boy should be that big! They grow so fast!

A HAPPY RENUION. Ben has this stuffed bear that he LOVES. I am sure that if we could find a picture of it when it was new we would be shocked at its present condition. Last Friday Ben spent the night with Mom and Aunt Mar. When I picked him up we didn't see Bear so I figured we had simply left him over there. We did not know Bear was in the bottom of Ben's backpack or we would have gotten it for him when he asked about it on Saturday, Sunday, Monday....

Ben spent the night over at Pauline's last night. In packing for the trip Ben found Bear. I didn't see it but I heard this happy shout behind me. When I turned to look he was hugging the stuffing out of that thing.

SCHOOL IS OUT. Can you believe Jenna has a half a year of Kindergarten under her belt? We can't!

Joe

Breakfast, Birthday, and Things That Go "Beep" in the Hallway

It has been a cold week with some rain. We have even had snow flurries which has piqued Jenna's interest in the weather forecast.

THE INSTIGATOR. That would be Benton. And Nate is his gullible victim. For example, several weeks ago when our furnace was having problems it was suggested that we get a carbon monoxide detector. We have it plugged into the outlet in the hall and Jenna and Ben have explicit instructions not to touch the test button (which makes the thing emit its 85 dB alarm). They have been really good and have followed these orders. Nate has found it since he started crawling but pushing the button once scared him out of his wits and he left it alone until the other day. That was when I hear Ben whispering to Nate, "Push this button Nate," followed by a series of loud beeps. Well, we know the CO detector is working anyway.

CRAWLING. Nate still scoots a lot to get around but he is starting to actually crawl more. When he crawls he is using Jenna's style of dragging one leg. The problem with this is when he wears a one piece outfit his left leg comes out of the leg of his clothes and gets trapped up inside, a frustrating predicament for the boy.

It is fun to watch him because he has a good idea where things are now. He still explores but you can tell when he has some object on his mind and is moving with purpose.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY. Vicki celebrated her 34th birthday on Wednesday. We went out with Mom, Aunt Mar, and Pauline to Cracker Barrel Thursday night. Aunt Mar baked a chocolate cake and Pauline made a blackberry cobbler for the occasion.

I did give her a gift she really liked! Beginning on Thanksgiving weekend I dug out our wedding video and imported it into the computer. I divided the video into sections (rehearsal, rehearsal dinner, wedding, etc.), marked these sections with chapters, and put it all on DVD. Then I got the bright idea of scanning all the wedding pictures in. We had 84 pictures from the professional photographer and an additional 217 snapshots that others took and shared with us. We are really blessed with these snapshots as they capture so many little things about that day that the photographer and the video camera missed.

BREAKFAST WITH SANTA. This morning the Senior Beta club at East Robertson High School had a breakfast with Santa fundraiser. They had a Santa who was really good with kids, a great breakfast, and a short line. It was a lot of fun.

LETTERS TO SANTA. Jenna dictated her letter to Santa the other day. They hand out these forms to all the little kids in the school system and the letters are printed in the Robertson County Times. The letters would be organized by school (East Robertson Elementary) and teacher (Linda Jakes). One thing Jenna wanted was the tape of The French [Grinch] Who Stole Christmas.

PHOTO OP. We spent a roll of film shooting our Christmas card picture this week. Out of 26 pictures we had four usable shots. One of these days they'll all sit still and smile. ( I can dream, can't I?)

CHOIR REHEARSAL. Since Pauline now lives next door Vicki decided to rejoin the choir for the Christmas program which they will perform next Sunday (December 21). She had rehearsals three nights this past week and will have to be at church five nights next week. I also have to attend next week's rehearsals because I am on the audio/visual team. Vicki is one of the narrators in the program. It amazes me to hear her practice her lines as memorizing things like that is extremely difficult for me.

A PRAYER REQUEST. Please pray for Mrs. Mildred Swann. She is a relative (obviously), good family friend, and member of our church. She had a stroke the other day and is in critical condition at St. Thomas Hospital in Nashville.

Joe

Decorations, Pronunciations, and Dead Batteries

I can't believe it is December already. It seems like we just celebrated New Year's such a short time ago and here we are doing the holiday season all over again. Ho! Ho! Ho! Here we go!

OOPS, I FORGOT TO REPORT one thing we did last weekend. You'll remember that I painted the hallway back in October when everyone was gone to Virginia. Last weekend Vicki and I bought more paint and painted the back hall the same color tan as the main hall. For those of you who have never been to our house, our back hall was originally the back porch to the house so two of the walls are clapboard like the outside of the house. We could forget all about the roller as this job required a four inch brush. It looks much better!

DECORATIONS. We typically decorate for Christmas on Thanksgiving weekend and can get almost all of it done before Monday comes around. This year, since we chose to paint the hallway, we have had to decorate throughout the week, and we are still not done. I will hold Thanksgiving weekend as sacred for decorating for Christmas from now on.

I'll have to say though that Jenna is now old enough to be a really good helper. She and I made quick work of putting up our tree, Pauline's tree, and Mom and Aunt Mar's tree. We have discovered one product that is THE THING TO GET--NET LIGHTS! They come as a 100 light set in a 6 foot by 4 foot net. I have always dreaded putting the 6-8 strings of lights on our 9 foot tall tree in the past. I always get the lights too close together as I wrap them around the tree and run short when I get to the bottom. Now I can put 3 nets on and fill in the bottom with a string or two of lights where the nets don't reach in less than 15 minutes.

I'M SLIPPING. Vicki has always wanted to put some kind of outdoor lighting up on our house which is something I have completely refused to do. I have no interest in spending that much time up on a ladder on a cold day hanging lights just to take them down on another cold day a month later. (Although, I guess I could do like some houses I see and leave it up all year.)

Well, this year we put up a plywood nativity set in front of our mower shed. We have always hung a large wreath on the back of this shed for the cars going toward Cross Plains to see but never had anything for the traffic going the other direction to enjoy. Now we do. The kids were very enthusiastic about the project.

We got this set from my cousin, David Lee Thompson, who moved this past summer and did not have room for it in his new yard. He made the figures and Betty Jo, his wife, painted them. There are about 15 figures. The tallest ones are about 3.5-4 feet high. I have two flood lights aimed on them and they show up very well at night. We pray it will be a blessing to all who see it.

MIKEY HE'S NOT. Nate eats everything. He is a pleasure to feed because of this virtue, but we have to be vigilant about baby proofing the house because he also likes to dine on dead ladybugs, potting soil, and long, lost Cheerios.

OUR PARROT. No, we don't have a new bird. I am talking about Nate. He is in those early stages of mimicking sounds and words he hears us make. As I was leaving the other day he said "Ah-Ba" to me. He is also waving now.

I'm really curious as to how Nate will pronounce some words as he gets older. We thought is was funny when Jenna would say "think um" for "thank you". Ben says "fink you" for his version. Another example is Jenna's "fellffunt" and Ben's "ef-flent" for the word "elephant".

CALL THE RAILROAD. For those who don't know Memorial Boulevard is the main drag through Springfield. At one place there is a railroad bridge that goes over this street. The other day there was a train parked on the bridge. As Vicki and the boys were going to the YMCA Ben said, "Uh oh! That twain's battewies have wun down."

Joe