Noah's Big Day

Yesterday had to be one of Noah's better days in recent memory. It started with his basketball game, which went very well. His coach gave him the white star for effort, but on top of that he also gave him a box of M&Ms because his effort was exceptional. That was certainly unexpected, but it did seem warranted. Noah played very good defense and was around the ball a lot when it was time for a rebound. He also scored three times. I'd say the only knock was that he took too many shots, but he was open for most of them.

Things only got better after basketball. We came home, had lunch, and then went to Target. He had been saving his money for the Angry Birds Go Pig Rock Raceway, and since the first is allowance day he could finally make the purchase. We got it set up as soon as we got home and then he was off to the races. We even gave him some extra electronics time so he could play with the new karts in the game on Amanda's tablet. It was a special day, after all.

Meanwhile, Lily was playing at her friend Grace's house. Noah and I picked her up, but we did it by way of Gamestop. He still has a gift card from there, but he didn't find anything to buy. He did, however, enjoy playing the Wii U. He is pretty much all about the Wii U when he goes there, which isn't so bad. However, we don't get the welcoming vibe we get from Play N' Trade.

While the day was hardly like Christmas, it was still a really good day for Noah. It's nice when these things can happen once in a while.

Stormy Weather

We have had an interesting weather week. It was below 20 on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings. Friday morning it was around 40, which was really nice for my run. This morning it was 60 and balmy. This was good because Amanda was really struggling with the dust and whatnot that came off the Christmas tree as we took it down. We opened up the windows and aired out the house.

We needed a few things from Sam's and the weather seemed OK, so we braved the tornado watch. As we were getting in line I got a text from Amanda about a tornado warning, which of course is pretty serious. I looked at the radar on my phone and figured that we could beat the storm if we hurried. It turns out that the radar was a little bit behind on my phone. The skies opened up just as the person ahead of us was starting to check out. I figured that I'd have the kids wait with the cart and I'd brave the sheets of rain to get the van.

Just as we started our order someone came running in from the door yelling to "get to the middle of the store." I got my card back, took the kids by the hand, and we calmly walked to the middle of the store. We hung out there for a few minutes until the all-clear. We had a nice pocket of calm to come home in, which was nice.

We saw a few downed pine trees on the way home and a lot of pine straw on the road, but that was about it. Apparently they clocked 89 MPH winds at the airport. Amanda said that it wasn't that bad by our house. Nothing blew around in our yard, so I think that we were spared the worst of it.

Lily was a little shaken by the ordeal. Noah was completely fine. It's a good reminder that we are not really in control. It's also a good reminder of how incredible it is to worship the Creator of everything who controls where the storms go. I don't claim to understand why He sends tornadoes or any other weather, but I take great comfort knowing that nothing happens apart from what He wants.

Fish Story

Those of you who follow me on Twitter (@freedjpc) may remember Noah's business case for a fish. We got back our fish stuff plus another aquarium from the family we gave Lily's fish to when she lost it. Armed with all this, we set out after Christmas in search of a new fish.

Everything has been great for Lily. We got a new filter for her aquarium and it now hosts two beautiful guppies. One is called Rainbow (or Ray for short) because of his tail and the other is some version of Indigo because of his color. We just vacuumed out her aquarium yesterday and things seem to be going well.

It has been a different story for Noah. We first got him a beautiful red betta fish that he named Laser. That was the name he wanted for the fish in his kindergarten class, but the class chose Swimmy instead. Laser seemed a bit listless and, sadly, he died after a couple of days. We took him back to PetSmart and got a pretty blue and red fish. We also got a heater since our house is a little cold for tropical fish.

Noah named that one Nick. We suggested Swish, but he liked Nick. This was of course after Nick Swisher. Nick did better than Laser, but he died after 4 days. It was very sad because we just got back from the pet store with Lily's second fish and Noah discovered Nick at the bottom of the bowl not moving. We got our refund from Nick as well and went to a different store to get yet another fish.

Now we're back to red. We got the fish on Saturday and Noah still hasn't named it. I asked him if he was going to name it or if he wanted to wait to see how it does. He decided to wait because "it's hard" to get attached. There is something about naming the fish that makes it harder to lose it.

It's hard to be optimistic about this one, but we will see. Noah cried at the loss of the other fish, but got over it in about 10 minutes. We will see how it goes if this one dies. Hopefully he will do better. I tested the water and it seems to be OK, so I'm going to be cautiously optimistic.

Long Night

We had a brutal night last night. Noah had a fever around Christmas, but it went away. He had complained of an earache, but it also went away. The earache came back with a vengeance last night. He first came into our room at around 10:30, which was only rough because we had just started to fall asleep. We gave him some Motrin and sent him back to bed. Then he came back around 2:00 and was really miserable. We tried warm compresses and Amanda made a solution with olive oil, garlic, and tea tree oil. These things helped a little bit, but he was still pretty miserable. He finally fell asleep, though poor Amanda couldn't move with him up against her.

We all woke up to Amanda's alarm at 7:00. She had set this so we could get up for church today (ha!). We were trying out the alarm through Pandora and were heartily greeted with this to wake up. That was a shock, to say the least. Noah didn't even notice.

I got myself up and started doing my morning stuff when I heard Lily come out of her room. She threw up twice and had some diarrhea. So that pretty much did her in as well. The good news is that Amanda and I didn't feel sick. We just felt tired.

I took Noah to the urgent care where he was promptly diagnosed with an ear infection. We started him on his amoxycillin and I think he is on the road to recovery.

Lily has started feeling much better. We're not sure what happened there, but she ate a good lunch and has been listening to an audiobook all day on her iPod. Noah is also feeling better and has been enjoying unfettered electronics. We do make allowances when sick.

As you might imagine, today has been a pretty mellow one here. I did squeeze a run in before the skies open up later. This isn't really how I wanted to finish up my vacation from work, but apparently God had plans that were different than mine.

Merry Christmas

We had a great Christmas celebration here. It started off a little rough because Lily had been feeling sick for a few days. She had an earache on Tuesday, so Amanda took her to the Urgent Care. They diagnosed her with a double ear infection and sent her home with a prescription for some amoxicillin. As always, once she started taking the medicine she felt fine. That was good because it would have been a very tough Christmas day otherwise.

 I also wasn't feeling great Monday evening, so we ended up not going to our church's Christmas celebration. We hated to miss it, but we also know that it was going to be a lot of work to attend it. I think by Monday evening the only person with the energy to do it was Noah.

We went to the McKenzies' for the family Christmas celebration on Tuesday. We had a lovely meal with ham, mac and cheese, and various other trimmings. A wonderful time was had by all.

Of course, to the kids all of this is just a warm-up for Christmas morning. My videography was not quite as extensive this year, but I did capture the highlights. Lily had a hard time coming up with gift ideas, so we got her a refurbished iPod Touch. Now she has her own device with a camera and won't have to clog up ours with her "artsy" photos and videos.

Noah got a lot of stuff through my involvement with Amazon Vine. He still doesn't know that his big gift is a series of golf lessons with me. He was happy just to get this basketball hoop. He also got a batting tee and a big net that you can use for hitting balls. He also got a few new games for the Wii. It's pretty nice that the Wii is an old system and the games can be had fairly cheaply now.

We ended the day with some standing rib roast, which came out really good. We kept the meal simple with roast, roasted asparagus, and mashed red potatoes and gravy. Nobody seemed to mind the simplicity. 

Everyone had a wonderful Christmas. Although I tried to do this at dinner, I think that we need to do a quick refresher of why we give gifts. After all, the incarnation of Christ was the ultimate gift to everyone who believes. So as we enjoy our new stuff, we need to remember that:

James 1:17 Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

I hope that you and yours had as nice a Christmas as we did. Now that I'm off for over a week I look forward to catching up on some stuff and just relaxing a little bit. That and hitting golf balls.

Birthday Trip

We took a trip to Ohio to celebrate my 40th and Dad's 70th birthdays. We left on Wednesday after school and drove to Charleston, WV. We stayed at what has become our favorite hotel in Charleston and had a good night's sleep followed by a lovely breakfast buffet. The whole family enjoyed the pool for about an hour and then we hit the road to Ohio. It's not every day you get to swim in a warm pool while you can see it snowing outside. That did make for a cold run back to our room since the hallways were a bit chilly by comparison.

We had lunch in Marietta and got some coffee drinks for the road. It was in the low teens, so we decided to forego the riverwalk until another time. We got to Wadsworth and had a fun evening with Grandpa and Bubbe along with a great meal.

Friday was kind of a slow morning and then in the afternoon I went shooting with Dad while Amanda took the kids to see Frozen. After that my stepbrothers took me out to dinner, which was really fun. Of course, since this was a 40th birthday celebration and not a 21st we were still in bed at very reasonable hours.

Saturday was the really big day. While Uncle Mark went to the gym to run on the treadmill Aunt Jen took us to the local farmer's market and to the West Point Market. We got some goodies and then went home to get ready for Grandpa's birthday party. The video below was taken before lunch on Saturday.

What started this was Uncle Mark convincing Noah that he had to shovel all of his driveway, the neighbors, and the street (but only to the stop sign). Of course, Noah bought it. He and Lily enjoyed doing the driveway and even made a few bucks. Later that day when Lily saw Uncle Mark snowblowing the neighbor's driveway she exclaimed, "He has a snowblower?!?" She doesn't understand about keeping up when there is just a little snow.

We had a great party that everyone really enjoyed, especially Grandpa. It was fun to have him as the guest of honor and we even got to celebrate on his actual day.

Saturday night was fun because the twin cousins spent the night. They all slept in the same room and I think that everyone got to sleep fairly well. Lily had some trouble sleeping and she woke up one of her cousins to see the clock turn to midnight. The good news is that Lily was able to nap in the car on the way home.

Sunday morning started out a little rough because Noah threw up a couple of times. He didn't have breakfast, but his stomach seemed to settle down because he was fine at lunch and dinner. He also was fine today.

Now it's back to reality, at least for a week.

Our Little Host

Noah hosted his first sleepover on Friday night. A few months ago we had done a sleepover exchange with Noah's oldest friend Nathan. Noah slept at Nathan's house and Nathan's sister Rachel slept over here with Lily. Everyone had a great time and it was our turn to host the boys.

Nathan and Noah are good for each other. Nathan is much bolder and adventurous than Noah, which is usually good. You may remember that back in the spring the boys were playing outside on a beautiful Saturday and decided to wander off. However, in general this is a good thing.

One of the first things they did was to climb up into Noah's top bunk with a flashlight and tell ghost stories. I can't imagine that they were the stuff of Poe or King, but they seemed to enjoy themselves. There was a very cute time when they decided that they weren't going to wear shirts, so we had two little boys running around the house in their shorts. Eventually, they did go to bed and they even managed to sleep in the top bunk all night. Noah's room was in bad shape Saturday night so I suggested he sleep on the top bunk rather than clean off his bed. He said that he'd try it and I left him up there. I checked in later and found him in the bottom. Good thing I cleared it off for him.

I got the boys some doughnuts for breakfast, which of course everyone enjoyed. They played together for a while as I started organizing our garage. You can actually walk through it now thanks to some new shelves, so that's an improvement. It wasn't much fun for the boys, but they seemed to find things to do all morning.

Overall, I'd say that the sleepover was a success. Noah is definitely maturing as a boy. By that I mean that he and Nathan entertained themselves with making armpit farts among other ways of reproducing bodily noises. I wonder if that is on the pediatrician's list of developmental milestones?

Teacher Conference

I had a conference with Noah's teacher yesterday. It went well. The main thing we discussed was how we see him reading better than his tests would indicate. A lot of it comes down to how they have to assess him. When his teacher said that they were under "Common Core," her voice sort of dropped at the word "core." I commented that nobody's voice seems to go up when they say "Common Core," and she just smiled. It seems that when Lily was in first grade they assessed students orally, but now they have to write. This is not so bad, but it is something for him to work on. He's going to keep reading chapter books though. The trick with Noah is figuring out whether he really comprehends what he is reading. He has no trouble decoding what words are, but he may not be taking it all in.

His other subjects are going very well. He goes to Lily's first grade teacher for math and she said that they love Noah. Noah occasionally talks when it's not appropriate, but overall he is a sweet, well-behaved and well-rounded kid. He's certainly not one of those kids who seems like he eats pop rocks for breakfast.

He is also well-rounded in that he is not just into sports, Star Wars, Mario, Angry Birds, and Wii. His teacher said, that "Noah likes the ladies." He has made friends with two girls - Nina and Jasmine (or Jazzy as she is also known). One day Noah came home with a purple scarf tied around his wrist. That was a gift from Jasmine. Mrs. Griswold said that they had to change Noah's seat because he kept making faces at Nina.

I'm afraid that those big brown eyes are already starting to attract attention. It's all sweet fun now, but in a few years it won't be. It sounds like Noah is starting to be like a guy in an Axe commercial.

Weekend Activities

We had an extremely active weekend and I am very glad to be working from home today after it. We started it off by attending a Halloween party at the McKenzies. Amanda worked hard to get our costumes together and I think that they came out pretty good.

Being Barney and Betty Rubble was pretty easy, though in the future I have to remember how static electricity works as my costume kept clinging to my shorts. Nevertheless, the costumes were a hit.

Saturday morning brought frost and soccer. This was our last game, so I mixed up the players and positions a bit more. Noah was on offense and alertly stayed near the goalie while the goalie tried to drop-kick the ball. He picked up the trash and put it in the net! This was very exciting for us as it was a pure hustle play. We came home in the afternoon and had some grilled burgers before I watched the first half of Ohio State's pasting of Penn State.

Sunday we went to church early and then got ready for the Monster Dash 5k. Here are Amanda and her sisters in their Pink Ladies getups.

The race was an unqualified success for all. The ladies ran through the whole thing. I finished with a PR of 23:46, which made me happy. Then we headed over to Lilly's Pizza to eat and drink some carbs. Brenna spent the night last night, so I took Noah out to Buffaloe Lanes to play some arcade games and earn tickets. We finished with a long browse at Target, which is one of his favorite things to do.

All in all, it was a very successful weekend. Today I have a parent-teacher meeting with Noah's teacher. I am looking forward to what she thinks.

Family Weekend

We have had a fun, but busy weekend with Grandpa and Bubbe coming down from Wadsworth for a few days. It started Thursday evening with a nice dinner of meatloaf, mashed potatoes, roasted green beans, and an amazing caramel apple pie. Friday we took them to Adams Vineyards so that we could all get a sense of what Muscadine wine was all about. We had lunch at the NC Seafood Restaurant at the Farmer's Market so that they could learn about Calabash style seafood. It was a huge hit.

Saturday we went to Chapel Hill to check out the Coker Arboretum and to do a little shopping at A Southern Season. The Arboretum is not quite as massive as Duke Gardens, but it is a lovely place to take a walk. I think it would be incredible in the springtime. We finished the day with some good meat from the Meat House and, of course, some great wine provided by Grandpa Gary.

Grandpa and Bubbe are currently on the road to Cleveland and we are having a mellow Sunday morning since we have been going to church on Sunday evenings. Noah slept in until 8:00, which was later than the 7:30 he was directed to. He said he woke up at 7:30, but decided to be nice and stay in his room.

Later I made some pumpkin-spice pancakes with fresh caramel sauce. Everyone enjoyed it but Lily, who made her own chocolate-chip pancakes. She got Noah to help her so that he would be eligible to get in on leftovers. I guess that he was in a certain mode of listening to her because while I was talking to Amanda in our bedroom and Noah was in his room Lily shouted up to him to get his attention. He opened his door and angrily yelled, "What do you command me to do?" Clearly she has him trained well!

Justin is going to come over to play with Noah today. Lily and I are going to go out for some errands and to play chess with my new clock. But right now I'm going to keep hiding in the basement and do some reading.

Two Things

Amanda took Lily to a Jars of Clay concert yesterday evening, so I thought I would take advantage of a YoLo coupon to treat Noah (and me) to some yogurt. As I got in the car to pull out of the driveway I noticed some trash that I had to take to the dump. This was from the blinds in the upstairs bathroom that I replaced several weeks ago, but needed to throw out. Since we were going right by the dump I grabbed them and put them in the back of the car. We stopped at the dump for a minute and then went to Sam's for gas.

While driving I found the Durham Bulls game on the radio. I asked Noah if he wanted to listen to the Bulls game or to music and he chose the ballgame. That's my boy!

We went to Sam's and I left the radio on for him while I pumped the gas. When I got back in the car Noah announced, "I have two things to tell you, Daddy." This of course piqued my interest so I asked him what they were. He said,

One - he (referring to the Bulls' play-by-play man) said "dig into reading," which is the program I'm doing.

Two - there's a lizard in the car.

It seems that I brought in a small lizard with the trash. Noah wasn't too nervous about it, but we definitely didn't want it in the car. I don't know as that we ever got it out either. I will find out more when I come home this evening and hear about the family driving around in the van.

What really struck me was how he told the story. It seems like in the last few months he has made some great leaps in his verbal communication skills. We always expected stuff like this from Lily since she was such a good talker from the beginning. Noah, however, struggled for a while and didn't sound so bright when he was really little. It's nice to hear him becoming more articulate.

Our Kids

I don't think that anyone who knows us would ever need genetic proof that these are our children. Yesterday was a good case in point. As a reward for riding his bike without training wheels Noah got 3 days of unlimited electronics He used one day on the ride home and he used the second day on Tuesday. Amanda and I wanted to watch a show, so I left him in the basement playing Wii after dinner. When I took Oreo out at 9:00 I realized that Noah was still downstairs since nobody put him to bed. He was happily playing Wii. Takes me back to those summer evenings when I'd play video games until I could barely walk.

Meanwhile, Lily was engrossed in some 500+ page book that she started yesterday evening around dinnertime. Amanda and I turned off the lights at around 9:30 so I could sleep, but she stayed awake reading. I awoke with a start at 10:30 when I heard her saying Lily's name pretty loudly. I remember the last thing I said to Lily at 9:00 was, "don't stay up too late reading." Apparently she didn't heed that because Amanda noticed light in the hall and when she investigated she found Lily still reading at 10:30.

I also have caught Lily reading in bed with a flashlight. It's tough to punish a child for a thirst for books, but we also have bedtimes for a reason. It's a mixture of pride and frustration when she keeps breaking these rules.

Newfound Freedom

After a year or so of trying Noah finally rode his bike without training wheels. I understand that Lily was instrumental in helping him overcome his fear and just do it. He still needs a little help getting started, but overall he is doing great.

We are going to celebrate with some yogurt at Sweet Frog tonight.

Birthday Boy

Today is the big day. Our Pook turns 6! I made the drive to Raleigh this morning to get us some Krispy Kreme doughnuts and when I got back everyone was already awake. We had Brenna spend the night for fun and for her to help with the party. Everyone enjoyed Krispy Kreme, Noah opened his presents, and then they went off to North Cary Park for the party.

Swordfighting on the Wii

The theme of the party was "Jedi Academy." Everyone was greeted with a name tag and the title "Padawan." They were then presented with a light saber (half a swim noodle with duct and electrical tape to simulate a handle), which they got to decorate. 

They then had their training with the light sabers. This consisted of keeping a balloon in the air with their light sabers. After that they had to find Yoda to complete their training. This was a scavenger hunt with clues hid around the park. Lily and Brenna were key for this part, particularly in guarding Yoda on top of the climbing rock. Noah said that this was his favorite part of the party.

After that the boys dueled with the sith lords. In this case, they were Lily and Brenna who sported double-sided red lightsabers (whole swim noodles). Word is that Noah's friend from church Abel was the best at dueling as he really got his blade moving fast. They all had a great time with that.

Next, they had a pinata of Darth Vader's head. I guess it didn't last too long, but everyone had fun with it. I'm not sure who dealt the fatal blow, but everyone enjoyed the little treats inside.

Finally, they had pizza and cupcakes. It ended with the presentation of their diplomas as "Jedi Master." They also got a T-shirt with the jedi logo on it. 

As you might imagine, Amanda is pretty tired now. Noah is enjoying his unlimited Wii. I'm working from home and fighting the urge to play Wii with Noah.

Pomp and Circumstance

Noah had his kindergarten celebration today. He did all the same songs as Lily, but without as much gusto. We sat too far back to get decent footage of "Thank You." He did do a little hip action, but nothing like Lily. Still, he did sing all the songs and did the hand motions pretty much in sync with everyone else. 

This is a photo of Noah getting his "diploma" from Ms Snoots. He is the second Chamberlain to spend a year in her class. We are hoping he ends up with Mrs. Turner next year. 

Weekend Activities

We had a fun, but very busy weekend here. On Friday night I took Amanda out to see Star Trek in IMAX 3D. I was a little skeptical since I'm more of a traditional Star Trek fan, but it was quite good. Seeing it in 3D was really something. I spent most of Saturday painting. While Noah and I listened to and watched the Indians game the girls took a long walk with Oreo. Later, we went to see the finals for the NCAA Division II baseball tournament. There we saw the University of Tampa whoop up on Minnesota State. There were fireworks at the end, which Noah didn't think too much of. We got to see a few unique things at this game:

1. There was about a 15 minute delay because some of the lights went out.
2. We got to see a great dogpile when Tampa squeezed the last out
3. Some of the fireworks went off sideways and started a small fire in the landscaping behind the right field wall

Overall, it was a great time. Noah and his friend Nathan hung out and didn't watch much baseball. Nevertheless, they had fun. Lily and Rachel enjoyed getting their faces painted too.

A "selfie" Lily took in the car

Lily's flower just before demolition

Of course, this made for a late bedtime, but it was worth it. Everyone slept in this morning. We had breakfast, had a fine time at church, and then came home. I did more painting and the girls took another walk. Noah stuck with the whole game even though the Indians got bludgeoned today (final score 11-3).

Amanda suggested we have a family movie night, which we all embraced wholeheartedly. We watched the Karate Kid. Noah got really excited when Daniel landed the fateful kick on Johnny's chin.

I'm glad that I have the kitchen ready to be painted when the painters come on Wednesday, but it was still a lot of work. I did the trim to save us a lot of money. At their suggestion, I did it before they put color on the walls so I could be messy with the paint. I still have to paint the doors in the kitchen hallway, but I have made terrific progress. I think I'm ready to go back to work tomorrow so I can rest.

Lost and Found

We have had a busy weekend so far. We decided that it was finally time to replace our old TV, so I took Noah to Target to take a look at what they had. We ended up with a 47" Vizio floor model that we're very happy with so far. As I type this Amanda and Lily are happily watching "The Voice" through Amanda's laptop on the TV. However, the process of getting to this point was not without its bumps.

First came the shopping experience. Noah wanted to look at toys, which was fine with me. However, he forgot that I was talking to the TV guys. He got scared about it and I found him crying and scared. This happened once before at Sam's Club and I always feel terrible when it happens. He played Lego Star Wars on their XBox 360 the rest of the time I was working on my transaction.

Next came the breaking down of our old stuff. Our old TV was very nice when I bought it in 1996, but it has become something of a dinosaur. What it hasn't lost over time though is mass. I had Amanda help me take it out of our old TV armoire and as we took it out the plastic just disintegrated under our hands. She ended up dropping her end and the TV literally fell apart. It was as if the plastic had turned into marzipan. This ended my dream of putting the TV in the basement.

Noah, Lily, and I later went with Noah's friend Nathan and his dad to the NC State Red White game. We had a good time there except for them being out of food by the time we arrived. After we got home I asked Jeff if he would mind helping me get the old TV to the dump as well as some other miscellaneous bits that we had leftover from all our construction. We left Noah and Nathan playing in the yard, which Amanda knew about.

When we came back I found Lily in the backyard dragging Oreo by his collar back to our house. I asked her about Noah and Nathan's whereabouts, but she didn't know. It turns out that they weren't in the house. We started to search for them and I found them being escorted by a local mom. I thanked her for her help and then we started to interrogate the boys.

As you might imagine, it was not a very fruitful discussion. Apparently they were helping Lily retrieve Oreo the other time he got out and then decided to "go exploring." We explained again that they were not to leave the area around our house. It was much scarier than the time at Target, to be sure. Fortunately, it ended well for everyone.

I think that's enough excitement for now. My next post will likely include some photos of our redecoration in the bedroom and bathroom.

Party Time

The kids had fun Friday evenings. Lily got to go to her friend Grace's birthday party which was also a sleepover. It started with the girls going to see Oz. Then they came back for pizza and cupcakes. I don't know what else went on, but Lily said that they didn't get to sleep until 1:15. The girls wanted to make it past midnight and they did. I wonder if the energy of pre-adolescent girls could change our nation's dependence on fossil fuels.

Meanwhile, Noah spent the night at the McKenzies' because Amanda and I attended our church's membership classes that were on Friday evening and Saturday morning. He had a great time watching Ohio State beat Iona in the NCAA Tournament with Uncle Bill. They went out to Bob Evans for dinner and he very much enjoyed his pancakes.

As you might imagine, Lily was a little grumpy Saturday evening. She decided that she wanted a bath instead of a shower, which was fine. Amanda went out with a friend in the evening, so I had the kids to myself. Noah and I played a video game and when I put him to bed at 8:00 Lily was already sound asleep. Apparently Amanda found her asleep in the tub at around 6:30 and sent her to bed. She explained that it is dangerous to fall asleep in the tub, though I'm pretty sure Lily would have woke up. Nevertheless, our little Peanut was all tuckered-out. She did much better yesterday.

Talkin' T-Ball

Noah had his first T-Ball practice yesterday. We are doing Upward T-Ball at Colonial Baptist Church. This is the same church where I went to seminary. I applied to be a head coach, but was rejected because I refused to take a lifelong vow of abstinence from alcohol. I did make the cut to be an assistant though. Noah's friend Nathan's dad is also an assistant, which is good because he actually played some baseball. The head coach seems like a good guy too, so I think we will have a good time.

We only had six players show up for the first practice, which was understandable because there was not a lot of notice for it. There are two other boys and one is the coach's son. We also have two girls, one of whom may have never thrown a ball before. We're working on it though. Everyone seems to have a great attitude and as coaches we're trying to stay upbeat.

I thought it was funny to see the pile of kids in soccer and basketball, but that didn't quite prepare me for watching six kids go after a ground ball. We're working on "I got it!" but we know that it is going to be a process. Fortunately, we have a few practices before our first game.

Long Night

Our Friday night was one of those nights that come with the territory of being parents. First, I got paged for work at around 10:30. This was not too big of a problem as I went back to sleep very quickly thereafter. But then at 11:45 we heard Lily in the bathroom. She came to our room saying that she had thrown up. When Amanda got up to check on her I asked if she needed help and of course I was hoping that she would tell me she didn't. Unfortunately, she needed help.

Lily not only threw up, but it was all over her bed in a puddle. It was on her sheets, her bedding, and her dog. Amanda started getting the laundry going while I gave the dog a mini-bath. It was pretty gross having vomit all over his head. Of course, he didn't mind!

Lily wanted to snuggle with Mommy, which I fully supported. Our bed is probably big enough for the three of us, but I decided that it would be better to take my chances elsewhere. I climbed into Noah's top bunk and then had to make the bed in the dark. I had stripped the sheets when Noah threw up and we never remade it. That was interesting. I eventually settled down and went to sleep.

My phone went off again around 2:45, but I was able to settle back down after that. Nevertheless, it was not a good night's sleep. I waited in bed until Noah started to stir and then I brightly said, "Good morning, Pook!" He wondered, "What are you doing in my top bunk?" with a big laugh. That made the night all worth it.