From the Past

Comparing babies . . .

First Week of Summer Vacation

Fishing in the Big Sioux!

Z caught his first fish -- a nice big catfish.  He caught it by himself!

Hot, sweaty and dirty -- just the way summer should be!

We finally (for the first time!) made it to the Tulip Festival in Orange City.  The tulips unfortunately weren't in full bloom, yet, given the late winter, but it was still lots of fun, and a beautiful day!

Z, Eden and Puffy Pants (a gift from Philip and Krista) with the tulips.

Krista and me.

That night after Z was in bed, I overheard him through the baby monitor saying this:  "Puffy Pants, I love you.  I'll never leave you.  No matter how old I am, I'll keep you right here in this bed.  Even if I get a new bed, I'll keep you here.  I love you, Puffy Pants."  Then he started singing, "I love you, Puffy Pants.  I'll never leave you, Puffy Pants."

The zoo:

At home:

World Religions Finale

This was my last semester teaching World Religions.  Next fall I'll happily pass it off to our new philosophy professor.  But I was very lucky in that my last semester of teaching World Religions was also my best.  I had fantastic students -- all theology majors, all willing to engage the material fairly but critically, and, best of all, all ready to have fun!

One Friday afternoon as I passed out our weekly quiz, this week's on primal religions, one student said, "Can I just sing 'All the Colors of the Wind' instead of taking the quiz?"  Once I'd established that "All the Colors of the Wind" is the song from Pocahontas I said, "Absolutely you can!"  So she and another student did.  Totally worth 10 points!

This led to the idea of having the final be a musical production, matching each religion to a song that demonstrated some of its key ideas.  What fun!  Unfortunately, I only had our dinky little camera, which ran out of memory before the show was over, but at least I'll have a little something to remember it by.  As I told my students when it was over, I think it was the highlight of my teaching career.

The musical was set in my very own World Religions class.  While the teacher drones on, and on, and on, . . . all the students fall asleep!  A dream sequence begins, in which the entire class is studying for the final.  As they discuss each religion, they are reminded of songs to match, and jump up to both sing AND dance!  The talking in between the songs was just as good as the songs themselves.  The roster of songs was as follows:

1.  Primal Religions -- All the Colors of the Wind
2.  Hinduism -- Circle of Life
3.  Buddhism -- original rap
4.  Confucianism -- You Bring Honor To Us All
5.  Taoism -- Let It Be
6.  Islam -- Where I Come From
7.  Judaism -- Tradition
8.  Christianity -- Jesus Loves Me and Joyful Noise

The camera is a little shaky at times -- I was just laughing so much!

The camera ran out of memory just as I started recording "Tradition" which is so sad, since the guys did a fantastic job.  I wish you could have seen them all lifting Nate (in his Micky Mouse hat) up to the ceiling on a chair while singing at the top of their voices.  In the midst of it all I heard one of them grunt out, "Feel the burn!"  Too funny.

Thanks so much to my wonderful students in World Religions, Spring 2013!  I couldn't have hoped for a better end to my tenure with that class!

Snow to Sun

Last Monday it snowed 7 inches.  By Friday it was sunny and 75 degrees.  Lovely spring.  We went to the zoo, played in the back yard, and had a picnic on our new picnic table.

There's nothing quite so fun as digging in the dirt and mud.

Making a tar pit in which to drown the plastic animals.

Lords of their domains.

Z and Krista

So true.

Underneath the giraffe sculpture.

I just want a nice picture of these two.

But it's very hard to capture them at their best.

The more I tell them to just look at me and smile . . . 

The weirder their expressions get!

Clean-up.  Who can resist that face?

Beautiful Messes

Hi.  Nathan here.  Have you ever paused to notice how the messes kids leave, usually so annoying, are in their own way poetic?  How the intersections of their whimsical toys and our serious adult lives result in something sublime?  Here are actual scenes from our house today, April 23, 2013.

Still Crazy After All These Years

The lyrics to that song don't really fit, but they're the lyrics in my head.

April 12 was our 10th anniversary.

It was the middle of the ice storm and we were still at the Strickland's house.  We weren't sure if we were going to be able to do anything since we couldn't really ask a babysitter to come to the Strickland's, and Lisa's power was also out so she was staying with a friend.  The Stricklands overheard our dilemma and insisted that we leave the kids with them that evening and go out and celebrate.  So we did.

We went to a local restaurant called Parker's and had a fabulous meal.  I decided I should get some sort of fun, celebratory drink, so ordered "a pom-tini, easy on the tini," to which our waiter replied, "Um, ma'am, it's pretty much all alcohol."  So Nathan jumped in to help and asked if they could make a bellini for me.  The waiter wasn't sure, but thought maybe he could, so I ordered a mango bellini.  He came back in a few minutes with a delightful looking drink, but very apologetic -- something about it being blended incorrectly -- and said that if I didn't like it he would take it back and try again.  I tasted it, I did like it, and I told him so.  He seemed very doubtful and insisted that if I didn't like it I should say so.  I protested that I liked it very much and he finally left.  But every time he came back to the table, throughout the evening, he would eye my drink suspiciously and then ask if I'd like to exchange it for something better.  Finally, after the third time he did this, Nathan said, "What you have to know about my wife is that she's got a drinking problem.  It's impossible for her to drink anything with even the tiniest bit of alcohol in it quickly."  When the waiter brought us our check he said he didn't charge us for the bellini because he just wasn't convinced I liked it.  He looked pointedly at my drink, which was still unfinished (after being in the restaurant for almost three hours).  As we were putting on our coats I said to Nathan, "I have to finish the drink or our waiter is going to think I've been lying to him this whole time!"  So we finished it off between the two of us.  It really was very good.

For dessert we had delicious creme brulee, in which they put little candles for our anniversary.  I gave Nathan ten gifts, each one corresponding to one the characteristics I love about him.  And for my gift Nathan simply handed me a CD and told me to go out to the car to listen to it.  (I think he'd originally planned to give it to me at home, but since we had no power, change of plans.)  So out to the car I went and popped in the CD (and turned up the heat).  I immediately recognized Nathan singing, and it was clearly an original song since the first line was about Winchester -- our wedding!  I have several times teased Nathan because he's never written a song for me, so I thought, "Oh, he wrote a song for me!  So great!"  I was all set to pop the CD out and go back to the restaurant when a second song came on, this one featuring Perry.  And then another.  And another.  The CD had ten songs on it, all for me, written by him (apparently over the last 5-6 years!), recorded at a friend's studio.  It is, without a doubt, the most wonderful gift I have ever received.

What a happy ten years.  How we hope for many more.