How’s Your Mama and Them?

I mentioned the fall colors last week. We have had more spectacular years than this one I think the dry weather is the culprit. My favorite tree is doing its best to make a showing in spite of the conditions. It is a gum tree located really close to Lakeview Market on Highway 49. It is in a woods but there is an opening where you can easily see it from the road. Its leaves turn a to a deep red and when I am coming home from work the sun hits it at just the right angle. If I ever run off the road at this spot in October you’ll know why.

We have had our first frost this week. And Bill Chatman, after dealing with a couple of mechanical problems, has gotten the wheat sown.

ABOUT MY MAMA. Mom has done really well since her surgery. They had her sitting up and taking a few steps the next day. When I went to see her on Wednesday afternoon she asked me to hand her some of the chocolate that had been brought to her. When I placed the candy in her hand I noticed that the heart monitor started beeping a little faster.

I took off from work again on Friday to move Mom from NorthCrest to Skyline Medical Center where she will have about a week of rehab. Everything went very smoothly and we are pleased with the facility. She will be in therapy every day until 3:00 so if you call or visit before then you won’t find her. What was very encouraging was that the occupational therapist said she was in good shape for a knee replacement patient three days after surgery. She’s had two days of therapy already and is finding it much harder than she expected. We appreciate everyone’s prayers.

CALENDAR CONFUSION. On Friday Aunt Mar looked at the calendar, not realizing it was on the wrong month, and thought it was Halloween. She panicked because she had no candy. She had decided she would put coins in little bags and hand that out as long as it lasted until Kenny called and in their conversation set her straight. Morgan has since fixed her up with candy (she and Aunt Mar even have it in little bags so it will be easy to hand out) and Mac carved a jack-o-lantern and brought it over.

TACKLING A BIG PROJECT. I am like the plumber who is so busy that he has no time to fix his own leaks at home. I have wanted to start converting our home movie footage to DVD for quite some time and have finally begun last weekend. After counting video tapes I estimate that we have over 40 hours of footage.

One tape I converted was filmed when Ben was born. Ben had never seen this before and really enjoyed it when we showed it to him. He did not know he was in a TV commercial when he was born and thought that was really cool (I included this footage on the DVD).

SO, HOW IS YOUR MAMA AND THEM? This question all got started by Jeff Crawford, a fellow I work with. He goes to church with the secretary at our office, Sherri Traughber. One weekend their church youth group went on a trip. Jeff was one of chaperones. Now Jeff is one of those people that likes to keep some kind of fun going on all the time. On that trip he called their pastor’s wife (who had stayed home with her kids) and asked, “How’s your Mama and them?” By the end of the trip just about everyone had called her and inquired about her mama and them (and I am sure the question was bounced around all the people on the trip as well).

Jeff was laughing about that with me the Monday after the trip so we have just continued the joke ever since. I’ll even call him up after leaving Krisle Elementary where his mom is the financial secretary to report that she’s okay. (Save this thought, I’ll come back to it a it later.)

I WORK WITH GREAT PEOPLE, however, I’m sure our secretary is trying to figure out what she can do to me right now. She used to have an alarm clock on her desk and occasionally I would set it to go off during the day. One day back in the spring I sat down in my office and heard this strange ticking noise. A quick search revealed the clock hidden behind a picture on my window sill. I recorded the ticking and emailed the sound to her to let her know she had been found out. A few days later I pulled the same trick on her except that I taped the clock to the bottom of her chair. It took her several minutes of crawling around in the floor to locate it. The clock has also found its way inside her computer before it made an abrupt disappearance. (Rumor has it that it is still keeping time in the ditch somewhere along Highway 431.)

Somehow our toy collection picked up about 100, three inch, plastic balls. They are in an assortment of colors. In looking around Sherri’s office this week I decided one of the wall cabinets above the counter would be the perfect place to store all those balls. (I actually used about 30 balls and rigged the top shelf of the cabinet so that everything would come out when the door was opened.) It was also a great place to store an alarm clock Jeff happened to have. I’m not really sure how that clock got set to ring at 3:45 Thursday afternoon.

On Friday, when I took Mom to Skyline, I had thought I might work that afternoon. As I was driving back from Madison I could tell I was too late to get a half day in so I called Sherri to let her know. When she picked up the phone I could tell from the laughter in the background there were several people in the office. When she heard my voice she immediately said, “We have something to talk about!” When I asked what it was she said, “Balls!”

A bit later in the conversation I heard Jeff’s voice in the background. I asked Sherri if he was talking about me. “Oh yes,” she replied, “He’s telling our pastor and his wife all about your tricks.” Not wanting to miss this opportunity I told Sherri to let me speak to your pastor’s wife. When I heard a strange voice say “Hello” I said, “You don’t know me but I just wanted to ask how your mama and them are doing?” Jeff told me later that he and his pastor got a good laugh from her reaction after they found out what I had asked her.

So on behalf of my mama and them,

Joe

Touches of Color

We are back in our routines now and last week’s vacation seems like a distant memory. The one really nice thing about this week is seeing the trees change their colors. It seems like our trees are normally more colorful by now but that may due to all the dry weather. Anyway, all the green is being replaced with yellows, oranges and reds.

DEALING WITH DISAPPOINTMENT. One morning Vicki walked into the kitchen. She found Ben and Nate at the table eating their breakfast. Nate looked really sad. His bottom lip was stuck way out. He was struggling to keep his composure. Vicki asked what was wrong. “It not my birthday,” was his reply. He and Ben had been arguing about this before Vicki came in the room and since he was so distressed Vicki asked, “Would you like to pretend it’s your birthday?” When Nate failed to answer Vicki looked at Ben and shrugged her shoulders. Ben returned the shrug and offered, “I guess he just likes cake!”

LIFE WITH A TWO YEAR OLD. For those of you who have lived through a two year old child you know there are days when you just want to pull your hair out. This was the case Friday morning when Vicki came out of the shower and found permanent black marker scribbled ALL OVER the bathroom door. After trying a multitude of products that failed miserably, Vicki accepted the fact that sanding an painting was in her future. Fortunately, a trip to Wal-Mart found “OOPS!” . . . this with a lots of elbow grease removed most of his artwork.

It seems like Nate has been on a “Search and Destroy” mission here lately. Maybe I just don’t remember it being as intense with Jenna and Ben but I’d almost be willing to bet that Nate has more of a desire to get into stuff than they did. The other day I caught him in the “catch all” drawer in the kitchen fishing out a screw driver. He had a look of purpose as he was walking away from the drawer and sure was mad when I took the tool away from him.

The pantry is also a battleground. I’m sure Nate thinks he is just being considerate by not bothering us when he wants something to eat. Our self-sufficient little boy solves the problem of unattainable foods by dragging a chair into the pantry to assist him in his quest. This has happened a few times and we are trying to break this habit. Tonight I heard him rustling around in there and said, “I hear a large rat in the pantry!” He came out, pointed at himself and proudly exclaimed, “That’s me!!!”

This morning he found a cassette tape and had pulled several feet of tape out of the cassette. I have warned him about this before. This time I took him to his room and warned his back side. After I was finished dealing with Nate I overhead Ben say to Jenna (they were in another room), “Yeah, I knew he’d get a spanking for that one.”

A VISIT WITH COUSINS. Uncle Paul’s birthday was Monday (he’s 93) and Jackie’s birthday is tomorrow. When we went to visit Uncle Paul on Monday Jackie was there and told us all his grandkids would be over to visit on Sunday. This afternoon I took Jenna and Ben to Uncle Paul’s house to play with their cousins. Judging by all the whooping and hollering I’d say they had a great time together. Ben is always glad to be with any group of boys but it just works out that Jenna is the only girl a lot of times. This is the same boat her cousin Bonnie is in as she is Uncle Paul’s only great granddaughter. They have really hit it off well with each other.

GROSS BUT CUTE. Nate has a mild case of diarrhea. Of course changing his pull up diaper is a painful experience. Early on when his skin was mildly irritated I got a good laugh because he was raising his head and attempting to blow on himself for relief from the sting. As his condition progressed he stuck to screaming in pain. What made our hearts melt was his bedtime prayer last night. Usually his prayer is simply a roll call of family and stuffed animals (and he might thank God for the food even though we aren’t at the table). Last night he told God how much he hurt went he “goes potty” and asked to be feeling better. He is doing much better today.

A PRAYER REQUEST. Mom’s knee replacement surgery is scheduled for Tuesday. Unless we hear differently we are to be at NorthCrest Hospital by 6:00 am. Please keep her in your prayers.

Joe

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An Update on Mom
Tuesday, October 25, 2005

I have just gotten home from the hospital and am about to leave for Aunt Mar’s. The doctor said Mom did very well in her surgery. She had a typical knee replacement plus he inserted a piece inside the bottom of her femur (the place where the marrow would be is hollow in adults) to strengthen the bone to help prevent a potential fracture. He also shaved the knee cap to a thickness of 12 mm and added “cement” to strengthen it as well. They will get her on her feet tomorrow.

Mom is doing well but is still pretty drugged up. She is just glad the surgery is over.

Vicki or I will be staying with Aunt Mar at night until things get back to normal or we feel they will get along fine.

Joe

Our Traveling Adventures

I am proud to report that we had a wonderful trip to Florida! We put over 1800 miles on the van and, except for hitting the tail end of Nashville’s rush hour on the way home, the driving was smooth. We also had excellent weather! Here’s how the trip went (please forgive the length)....

WE LEFT EARLY on Sunday morning and drove straight through. The only time we took a major stop was to eat supper in Gainesville. We were to stay in a condo in Poinciana which is near Kissimmee and about 30 minutes south of the Disney World area. We could not have asked for three kids to travel any better!

At one point we were driving down Highway 192 (which is just south of the Disney property) and the kids were pointing out all the weird things they saw on the souvenir shops. Vicki called attention to a store with a 50 foot mermaid on the front. Jenna didn’t see it at first and asked “where?”. Pointing Vicki said, “Right there. She’s huge!” Spotting it Jenna said, “Oh, she’s VERY huge.” Without missing a beat Nate said, “She’s VERY cute, too!”

We used our timeshare points for our condo which was basically a two bedroom apartment. The room the kids stayed in had a queen bed and a love seat with a pullout single bed. We had intended for Jenna to have the single bed but when we checked on the kids before going to bed ourselves we found Ben had crowded into the bed with Jenna. It seems that Nate’s little legs have a lot of kick in them. Needless to say Nate got the pullout for the remaining nights.

A DAY AT THE BEACH. Jim took two days off work to be with us for part of our visit so we met him, Dianna, Alex and Chris at the beach on Monday. We went to the Spessard Holland South Beach Park in Melbourne Beach. The park is kept up well and there is no commercial development nearby. We had a great time playing in the sand and water.

Nate was scared of the water at first and was content to sit under an umbrella and play in the sand. Once he learned not to take his sandy hands and rub his eyes he had it made. The rest of us waded and played in the surf and the kids tried to build a sand castle but it was below the high tide line and the water took care of their efforts pretty quickly. When Nate did discover the water he was very sad to leave. Fortunately, the showers the park provides for rinsing off were a great diversion.

For supper we drove back into Orlando and met Uncle Bob and Aunt Linda at Dixie Crossroads which is in a mall near Universal Studios. We had a good time eating and visiting.

A DAY AT THE AMUSEMENT PARK. Tuesday found us at Universal’s Islands of Adventure! I think the Pteranodon Flyers was the biggest hit with all three of our kids but Jenna also liked Dr. Doom’s Fear Fall a lot. Ben had a hard time deciding which he liked best but finally settled on Dudley Do-Right’s Ripsaw Falls (for those who remember this is similar to Opryland’s Floom Zoom). It is also etched in his memory that the T-Rex almost ate him on the Jurassic Park River Adventure (and he refused a second ride). We all rode the Popeye and Bluto’s Bilge-Rat Barges (this is similar to Opryland’s Grizzly River Rampage) and none of us survived it dry (except for Jim, Dianna and Nate who did not ride). Vicki, being a roller coaster connoisseur, took in all they had to offer and I think she would be hard pressed to have a favorite ride. She did say, after riding The Hulk twice, that it is a lot more fun to ride it while screaming. We are not sure if Jim has permanent hearing damage because of this.

It was here that Jenna’s penny pinching characteristics came to the surface. Before our trip we had emptied all the kids banks and rolled up the coins. Each one had $50 of spending money. Ben had already hit a souvenir shop and bought a couple of things that he wanted. Jenna simply could not let her money go. She finally did buy some candy for less than $2. Nate found it the next morning and ate just about all of it before he was discovered.

Since the park closed at 6:00 Jim and Dianna suggested we all go out to eat for supper but between three tired kids and being soaked to the bone we declined. This was a good thing because the kids were asleep before we got on the interstate and didn’t care a thing about supper when we got back to the condo and went straight to bed.

A LATE START. By Wednesday we were worn out and were very glad we didn’t have a full schedule. We stayed around the condo most of the morning and relaxed. We left at 11:00 and drove to Jim and Dianna’s house in time for lunch. Aunt Linda and Uncle Bob also came over and visited a while (but not nearly long enough).

All the kids had a great time playing together (and swimming in the community pool) and the adults had a good time visiting (we saw Jim for about an hour after he got off work). I had to laugh at Nate. Jim and Dianna have a small library and in that room their boys’ large collection of Thomas the Tank Engine stuff was stored (the wooden kind with the magnetic couplers). When Nate found this he simply closed the door behind himself and started in. I later found him in the middle of the biggest mess of train cars and track, happy as a lark.

After supper we visited a bit longer and left for our condo. As we were driving out of their subdivision I heard Ben sniffling in the back. When I asked him what he was crying about he managed to whimper, “Good-byes are sad!”

ANOTHER LONG DAY ON THE ROAD. We got up early Thursday morning and hit the road. We drove with a purpose and the kids all traveled very well again. The reason we drove so hard was that we had made reservations to stay in one of the railroad cars at the Chattanooga Choo-Choo and we wanted to have a little time to explore when we got there. They have a bunch of old passenger cars which have been converted into hotel rooms. This was a big hit.

After checking in we hit the gift shop, ate supper and wandered around their garden. The boys made a slalom course out of the columns that hold up the roof over the old passenger loading platforms and after being cooped up in the van all day we let them run.

SIGHTSEEING IN CHATTANOOGA. Our hotel package included tickets to several area attractions. After breakfast we visited the large model railroad that is on display at the hotel. Then we left for the Tennessee Aquarium and a film at the IMAX theatre. The film was a 3-D safari to find elephants, white rhinos, lions, leopards and Cape buffalo in southern Africa and was really good. The aquarium was also fun but since it tends to feature a lot of fresh water fish it isn’t as spectacular as the one in Gatlinburg which has all colorful, tropical, salt water fish.

When we had seen everything we had tickets for we got in the van and headed home. This was a very traumatic experience for Ben. I’m just glad he slept most of the way. We got home right after sunset.

BACK HOME, BACK IN THE FAST LANE. It is unlike the boys to sleep past 7:00 but they did yesterday morning. As a matter of fact, we all took it easy. It was at lunch that Vicki remembered that the choir retreat was that afternoon. Choir members had to be there at 3:00 to hear and practice the upcoming Christmas musical. While they were rehearsing the kids and I went up to Steve and Connie Freeland’s to try out their corn maze. Then we joined the family pot luck supper at 5:30.

All in all I’d say we’ve had a great Fall Break.

Joe

Ready for a Break

I used to be amazed at how quickly the weeks roll by. I’m over that now. That’s because the months are moving along at a good clip these days. It seems like we just started school a couple of weeks ago and now I look and the first nine week grading period has ended and we are starting our Fall Break.

BACK ON HER FEET AGAIN! That’s the good news from Pauline. She walked into church Sunday morning and to the church picnic that night. She has even driven her car this week! We are very thankful she is getting back to normal before Mom’s surgery.

SPEAKING OF THE PICNIC. We had a really fun time Sunday evening. We are beginning a new campaign to focus on retiring the debt from building our sanctuary five years ago and to expand our ministry. The picnic was one of several events to kick this off. We had live entertainment and all kinds of things for the kids to do. It was very well organized and from what I could tell everyone there had a great time.

SNACK SNOB. Vicki took Mom back to the Red Cross yesterday to give another pint of blood for herself. Thursday evening Mom called our house and asked Vicki if we had anything good in the pantry. We didn’t (but Vicki was about to make cookies). Then she kept asking what other sweet stuff we had. This made Vicki ask Mom if she was just desperate for something sweet to eat. It turns out that Mom wasn’t too impressed with the snacks the Red Cross served last week and wanted to pack her own food. Vicki brought her some chocolate oatmeal cookies to help speed up her recovery!

THE BLAME GAME. One day this week Ben was building some big Lego project. When he got done he pushed his creation toward the kitchen to show it off to Vicki. Somewhere in the hall his structure fell apart and crashed to the floor. Right after the crash Vicki heard Ben exclaim, “NATE!”

Vicki said, “Benton, Nate is in the kitchen here with me!. He didn’t knock that down.”

After a short silence Ben, refusing to let Nate off the hook, said, “I know...but he did it with his magic!”

SOWING SEEDS OF KINDNESS. Vicki was visiting at Jenna’s school yesterday and noticed a little girl in Jenna’s class who had a very joyous smile. Vicki made a comment to Mrs. Phillips about the girl and got quite a story. In all of this Vicki learned that none of the other kids really pay much attention to this little girl, except for Jenna.

Mrs. Phillips continued to tell about another little girl in the class who Jenna has befriended. Jenna takes it upon herself to look after this girl and help her with her class work. It turns out that this little girl will not talk to anyone but Jenna, not even Mrs. Phillips!

We feel pretty sure both little girls have a rough time in life right now. Their friendships with Jenna may very well be the closest thing to a normal relationship either one of them have. Sadly, this is the case for way too many kids. I don’t think anyone will ever need to explain to Jenna what Jesus meant when He said, “You are the salt of the earth,” and I am humbled to see my daughter spread her salt where it is most needed. What’s really neat about Jenna is that she has all kinds of friends and she doesn’t seem to draw any lines on who can be her friend and who cannot.

VACATION PLANS. We are leaving for Florida in the morning! We plan to make the trip to Orlando in one day and we hope everyone is a good traveler. Vicki took the kids to Judy DePriest’s for haircuts and Ben was telling Judy all about our upcoming trip. When she asked Ben what he planned to do in Florida he said, “Spend money!”

Joe

Fall is Here!

We are moving into that time where the days are warm but the early mornings are really crisp and cool. Steve and Connie Freeland have set up their pumpkins in the front yard and even have a small corn maze in a field behind their house. The Pinsons have been shelling corn and have about half of Mom’s corn harvested. Fall is here!

CATCHING UP WITH OLD FRIENDS. This has been one of those weeks where we’ve had something to do every night this week. Brent and Sabrina Freelend have been in to visit all their family and we wanted to do something with them one evening but with our schedule and three of their four kids getting sick (they were up all one night and even went to the ER for medication) it never worked out. I did get one chance to visit with them and really enjoyed it. All their kids are really cute. Seeing Brock was like seeing a three year old Brent again some 35 years after the fact.

Brent is a chaplain for Corporate Chaplains of America. One of the neatest things about talking to him is hearing how he has been able to minister to those he works with. He been able to introduce a lot of people to Jesus in his ministry!

GIVING BLOOD. I took Mom to the Red Cross in Nashville Wednesday afternoon to give blood for herself for her upcoming surgery. I have given blood twice in my life and both times, while it was emotionally rewarding, I went into shock over the loss of blood. The second time I waited an extra long time to make sure I was stable and still almost passed out when driving myself home. Now, if any of you need O- blood I’ll come through for you, but after those experiences I don’t make regular donations. I have digressed. Anyway, I took mom so that she wouldn’t have to drive back from Nashville. She did a lot better with her donation than I ever did. She donates again on Friday (there isn’t a 56 day wait when donating for yourself).

...SING WITH ME! Nate is learning the ABC song. Now, he doesn’t know all the words/letters and hums through a few parts of the song but he is learning. Nate can also count to ten. Unlike singing the ABC song he will not do this on demand, you have to be lucky enough to catch him at it.

I have seen it up close for three kids now and I am still amazed at how kids learn to talk. The funny thing is that it seems to go in stages--like some concept about talking takes a while to cook in their heads and then when they finally do put all the pieces together for using the concept their speech changes overnight. Nate has moved from 2-3 word sentences to putting longer strings of words together to better express himself.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO PAULINE. Friday was Pauline’s birthday. We celebrated with a dinner over at her house last night. Vicki made homemade spaghetti & meatballs and my personal favorite chicken/spinach lasagna. We also invited Derek, Amanda, Riley and Harper over for supper so it was a really fun evening. One of the best things is that the kids are getting to the point where they don’t all need constant attention anymore.

Mom brought three old photo albums over and we saw pictures from 1975-1977 that I had not seen in at least 20 years (which means Vicki had never seen them). That really added to the evening!

Speaking of Pauline, she is really doing well with her walking. She is starting to put her wheelchair aside and use her walker more. She plans to walk into church tomorrow which will be the first time she has done so in three and a half months!

FURNITURE, FURNITURE, FURNITURE. We went on a little outing today, stopping by a fall festival at a church in Springfield which was raising money for missions, visiting the park, etc., and while in town we stopped by a furniture store that was having a sale. What was so funny was that when we walked in Jenna got this starry-eyed look on her face and said, “This is beautiful! I wish this were my home.”

MRS. WHITTEMORE. Mrs. Venita Whittemore used to teach a Bible class and Mom would go to it on Fridays when I was a kid. Aunt Helen, Mom’s older sister, attended as well. When I wasn’t in school I was taken along. It was hard to leave for Bible class and see the Freelands riding their bikes as we left.

Most of Mrs. Whittemore’s teaching was way over my head at the time but one of the neatest things was her model of the Tabernacle. It filled a large table and her lesson was to set it up while explaining what each part of the structure meant. In 1976 my birthday was to fall on a Friday and after Bible class one day I slipped up to Mrs. Whittemore and asked if she would bring the Tabernacle for my birthday. When Mom found out she tried to tell Mrs. Whittemore not to do it because Mrs. Whittemore was about 80 at the time. With a sparkle in her eye she told Mom she would be glad to bring it and she did. Brent and Steve Freeland were my guests that day (I can’t remember where Brian was). It really made my 10th birthday special.

I have been thinking a lot about Mrs. Whittemore lately. The reason Mom dug up those old photo albums was because I asked if she had a picture from that birthday. I’ve also done a bit of research on her as I remembered that she taught several weekly Bible classes around Nashville. What I have learned has been most impressive, and humbling. Those who attended Mrs. Whittemore’s classes loved her dearly. I remember her lecturing and several ladies, Mom included, would tape her lessons. She was even on the radio with a weekly show named The Bible Class of the Air. When I called the station, WNAH, I learned that she had been the station owner’s Sunday school teacher and had been on the air from 1951 until her death in 1988. Transcripts of her shows were made available in booklets and I remember these at the Bible class. Mom and I got to digging around in her book shelf and found several hundred (with very few duplicates). These were distributed all over the world! The neatest thing I’ve learned is that there is a group of Mrs. Whittemore’s former students who meet every Monday to fill orders for these booklets. These things still go out all around the globe. To date over 61 million booklets have been sent out! They have even been translated into other languages.

Mrs. Whittemore never put her name on any of her booklets as she wanted all the glory to go to the Lord. She also never asked for money for her ministry, she just prayed for it. Those who continue her ministry still follow that model. I found a small web site about Mrs. Whittemore’s Bible class with a sample of some of the booklets on it. The “Listen to Venita!” links don’t work but the text is there.

Joe