M is for Mommy

Last night I was stalking googling old friends, a fav internet pasttime for me, when I came across the following story. Jeff and I were in missionary orientation with Mike and Jeanne Melon and their kids, Jeanne and Gregory, back in 2001. They served an ISC term in Paraguay. I'm just proud to know 'em. This article is from a blog called "Remember Me" . Jeanne and Gregory left New Orleans mid-day on Saturday before Katrina hit. Mike, a bi-vocational pastor, completed his work shift and got home just after Jeanne had left. He had planned to leave immediately. But, when he got home he discovered that two senior adults had no way out of the city and would not leave. Mike purposed to ride out the storm and try to take care of them. Mike’s . . .house began taking water about 8:30am and he watched as the water came up the road. He said it was almost surreal. He and the dog relocated to the attic with some food and an axe in case he had to cut his way out. About 1pm in the ...

I just did the Presidential Candidate Calculator . It's a little self-test that tells you which presidential candidate you're most in agreement with on certain issues. Mostly, I learned that I know NOTHING about the major political issues being discussed in the US right now. [They do offer good explanations of the pro- and con- side of each issue.] My result was very surprising. The only thing I can figure is that, even though they weight issues, they don't weight them strongly enough. Either that, or I've been watching too many Alias episodes. . .

I'm taking advantage of Parker's loooonnnng summer break to teach him his letters. We can't start our reading program until he can recognize both upper- and lower-case of all letters. He has learned some letter names in Portuguese, which makes for some interesting interchanges. We're up to I . Mommy: This is a Big I and this is a Little i . What's this (pointing to Big I )? Park: EEEE! Mom: No, it is pronounced EE in Portuguese, but we say I (aye) in English. Park: A ye! Mom: This is an igloo. I makes an ih sound like in igloo . What other words start with the ih sound? Park: CHURCH! Church starts with I ! [clicking sound is heard as pieces fall into place in Mommy's brain] Mom: Very Good! Igreja starts with I .

Sorry, I'm running a little late. I hope that everyone had a very happy holiday season. We really did. We spent our December in Porto Alegre as a family, just the four of us. We had never had Christmas with just the four of us, so I wanted to take the chance to really teach the kids about Christmas, what it means, and start some traditions for them to enjoy through the years. (This was all inspired by the fact that we spent the entire day of Thanksgiving in the car rushing to get to Florianopolis that we totally forgot to ACTUALLY GIVE THANKS or EVEN TALK about the holiday with the kids). [BAD missionary mom, BAD, BAD missionary mom] Anyway, we did have a good season. Here are some things we did: We listened to LOTS of Chrismas music. I DO recommend Charlie Brown Christmas, I DO NOT recommend Christmas with the Rat Pack (they change a lot of words to things that were apparently cute back in the 1950s). We really enjoyed, as much as anything, the weekly Free on Itunes holiday choice...