McDonnell Place

Monday, October 31, 2005

One Year Ago

One year ago today our dear friend AJ went home to be with his Lord and Savior.

Sweet and tender Redeemer, be with Kellie and Eli today. Guard their hearts and minds. Speak tenderly to them and give them hope, peace, and life that come from You alone; You who can not only restore but redeem their lives from the pit. May the 22nd year of her life give You even greater glory than the last! Praise You for how You've been maginified through her faithfulness! Glory be to You, for Your sovereignty and mercy, forever and ever. Amen.

Kellie's website: www.ajandkellie.com

Friday, October 28, 2005

an email to Shaun just now-

Subject: Your daughter...

...after getting out of the shower with me this morning, and after having been set in front of the mirror on our closet, began walking towards me while I put my contacts in my eyes with some brown log-like object tightly grasped in her hand as if it were an ice cream sandwich- and this at the same time I began to notice an awful stench. For some reason, despite all the history- it took my mind only too long to register what was happening.

She ate poop. Again. And then looked at me and raised it towards me with a piece hanging off her tooth and her face scrunched as if to say why didn’t you tell me this stuff isn’t edible? I thought everything was edible!

But you know what’s said; as a dog returns to its vomit, so a fool repeats his folly. (Proverbs 26:11)

Well I guess she's learned that one the hard (and very literal) way.

Thursday, October 27, 2005

Genie-tals

This morning Evan wanted to talk about Aladdin, as he sometimes does. It scared him when we last rented it, but he tells us he wants to try it again. Well today he mentioned something about the genie's pee pee. I said, "Wait- go back- what about the genie's pee pee?" And he mumbled some long run-on sentence about the genie's belt and the way he did something with his pee pee. Everything became very clear in that moment- our child thought we were exposing him to some pornographic cartoon this whole time-

Here son, come! Let us eat cookies and stay up into the wee hours in mommy and daddy's big bed so that we can teach you about all the horrors the world has to offer you!! What, it freaks you out? Why ever would it do that? It's fun! Get in the spirit of things! Hear the eery Arabian music? See the flashing fire and swords? And look what the big blue man does with his pee pee while he sings!

Thankfully, he expressed this to me at long last so that I could clear things up- "No, Evan, that's not a pee pee, that's the genie's tail- it's really just like smoke. It's just pretend- you know that, though- right..." right, right-right- not a pee pee, not a pee pee, not a pee pee! He paused while his brain digested this new information. "It's just smoke- it's pretend," he repeated.

All of this goes to say, (to those of you who recall my mentioning how terrified he was way back when)- well it's NO WONDER, now is it! And how will I ever undo what damage has already been done?

Yesterday

telling secrets

catching flies

Madalyn and Angie

Evan's follow-through- I don't know when this happened, but all of the sudden he started throwing like a boy- look at him!

exploring

our little bird dog

Do I even need to give this a caption??

Lions and tigers and bears- oh my!

Wednesday, October 26, 2005

Running out of Steam

Today, as I tore through the grocery store in Shaun's big t-shirt, hair pinned back, and not an ounce of makeup on my face, Evan said to me, "Look at you, Mommy! You're so cute." And I don't care if he says please or thank you or anything else for the rest of the week- he's earned enough points to get him through. He also dropped something shortly thereafter and told me he "ran out of steam."

Madalyn is close behind him, though, as this afternoon she poked me in the eyeball with a finger coated in macaroni and cheese goo and said, "eyes." She also tried to slip herself my folic acid pill, that was next to her on the table- it made it into her mouth just before I fished it back out- thinking it'd be a high enough dose to be pretty toxic for her small bod. What kind of kid eats a pill anyway? Okay, so lots of kinds- or they wouldn't put them in childproof bottles. But this wasn't even a pretty pill! It was tiny and white, like the kind we used to have to hide in our dog's cheese so he wouldn't spit it out- I don't even know how she spotted it. Only Madalyn.

We later went to feed the ducks with Angie and Kaley. It was so fun and the kids were so cute- all holding hands and walking down the boardwalk at Crane's Roost. But not so pleasant was the foul smell that followed us there in my car. So revolting, in fact, that I'm considering tearing up all the carpet again- only this time for good.

At first I thought it was Madalyn's vomit- that we didn't clean the carseat well enough. I should've know that it was the husband's doing- that he'd given Evan a container of chocolate milk (a bribe to say, "see, don't you love daddy more" that always backfires on him in the form of sugar-shock.) This container, this time, he'd left exactly where Evan had thrown it, on the carpet under the seat, to leak out what was left and sour to the point of mutating bacteria that's sure to form some sort of new mass hysteria. The Avian Flu won't come from China- it'll come from our car.

I'm telling you I've never smelled anything this nasty- and I've smelled a lot of nasty things. Like when I visited my roommate's pig farm in college and they literally pushed operating masks in our hands, or like the time Evan pee'ed in his Lego table and we didn't discover it for a day or so, and then I had to clean it out while gagging and even after all of that, tossed it to the trash.

Beth Moore says mothers are the only ones who can function while still covered in lava. Soaked to the skin, I would usually offer my body to the flames and jump into the crisis with her... (Feathers from My Nest.)

So true- too true, these words came back to me as I dumped nearly a bottle of vinegar on the carpet in the car, and scrubbed it with wetwipes while saying repeatedly, "This smells so bad, Evan. I've never smelled anything this bad..." And I still haven't gotten out the stench.

This incident led to me stopping by the dumpster to rid my car of all trash- everything had to go that minute as if my life depended on it. The kids looked at me with the same confusion they did when I went around collecting boxes near dumpsters for our last move. She is sooo weird. What this time??

And it does seem a bit early, but what the heck- let the nesting begin!

Tuesday, October 25, 2005

Life on Drury Lane; anything but dreary

The Muffin Man is at it again, and bun #3 is in the oven and cooking!

Evan told everyone the good news on the phone last night. He told a few people that there was a baby in my belly button, and a few others that there was a baby in his belly. But despite these confused statements, I actually think he does understand what's happening, because when I asked him if he remembered when Madalyn was in my tummy and it was really big, and then when we brought little Madalyn home, he said, "Yeah. In Jacksonbille."

A while back we would ask him if he'd like a new brother or sister and he would answer with an emphatic "No!"

That was until we realized he thought we were suggesting a replacement for Madalyn. We've since sorted that out and been much clearer with him. Now when we ask if he wants a boy baby or a girl baby he says, "a grill." We were telling some people last night that he says he wants a "grill baby" while he was listening, and then he became very frustrated with us; "No! No, that's my grill-" (pointing to his toy grill,) "a GRILL baby," like don't you hear you're saying it wrong?

Seeing as how we're barely pregnant, there are still a good nine months of waiting ahead of us. The due date calculators online gave me June 30th and July 2nd. Madalyn's 2nd birthday is July 1st. We'll have to celebrate early so the next kid's grand entrance isn't an immediate assault on her place in our hierarchy and home. Nana, I assure you that they'll always have their own seperate birthday cakes- most probably made by Publix and not me from here on out- but as unique and special to them as they each are to us.

3Behold, children are a heritage from the LORD, the fruit of the womb a reward. 4Like arrows in the hand of a warrior are the children of one's youth. -Psalm 127

My prayers for our children? That the following would be fulfilled in their lives:

26 He who fears the LORD has a secure fortress, and for his children it will be a refuge. Proverbs 14

16 May Your deeds be shown to Your servants, Your splendor to their children.17 May the favor of the Lord our God rest upon us; establish the work of our hands for us— yes, establish the work of our hands. -Psalm 90

28 The children of Your servants will live in your presence; their descendants will be established before You. -Psalm 102

Sunday, October 23, 2005

shovels while it snows

If I were an Indian Princess, that might be my name. Let me explain- I was making a memory book for Madalyn at Photoworks, and searching quotation sites for the captions. Here are a few I most appreciated:

Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing is like shoveling the walk before it stops snowing. ~ Phyllis Diller

Before I got married, I had six theories about bringing up children. Now I have six children and no theories. ~ John Wilmot

Children find everything in nothing; men find nothing in everything. ~Giacomo Leopardi, Zibaldone Scelto

Before you were conceived I wanted you
Before you were born I loved you
Before you were here an hour I would die for you
This is the miracle of life.
~ Maureen Hawkins

Friday, October 21, 2005

A Fear Diagnosed

We tried again last night, with semi-success, to read Evan's new Bible. I explained that there were lots of new stories in it and we would read a new one- not the old, terrifying one- a new one. He reluctantly agreed and we turned open to Abraham and Sarah and God growing His people.

I'm not sure Evan heard much because the entire time I read he was soothing himself saying, "It's not the fire one. There's not fire. It's not the fire one..."

So it became very apparent that the snake didn't scare him, nor the concept of sin, nor all the villages destroyed in the flood. What scared him was the page illustrating sin in the world that came from Adam and Eve's choice. It shows a woman running from a fire, a boy raising a club to a growling dog, a woman stealing a loaf of bread...things of that nature. But of those things, the fire scares him. Just like in his book If You Give a Pig a Party, for some inexplicable reason, the peanut butter and jelly page scares him.

I figure it's okay he didn't get anything out of last night's lesson, so long as we're overcoming the fear-factor. And I think we are, because after we read I told him again that he didn't need to be scared of the fire page-that it was just showing all the bad things that came when Adam and Eve didn't listen to God-but Jesus came to protect us from those things-that He wants to give us good things, and now He even loves us when we don't listen because of Jesus.

As I said these things, I slowly opened the page again that I was talking about, so that I could see, but at an angle that he couldn't really see...and would you guess what happened as he cautiously peeked over to look with me, and carefully listened to what I was saying?

He got a huge grin on his face- the grin of an overcomer! God is good, and Evan knows this. Praise Him!

Thursday, October 20, 2005

Are You Ready for This?

This is God.

Evan has some Max Lucado movies he's obssessed with, (I've mentioned Flo the Fly,) and in the movies the characters talk to God. He was drawing the different characters- Hermie, Wormie, Flo, and then he drew something that looked like a grey caterpillar, (Hermie's a caterpillar,) and so I thought maybe he was confused and thought God was some all-powerful caterpillar we pray to every night. I complimented the drawing and then turned to Shaun and asked, "should I even try to explain this..." No, of course not, was his answer.

But as we were discussing this, Evan, (overhearing us,) drew a new picture of God (this one on the left,) as if to say, "I'm not stupid- I'm just trying to express my concept of God artistically, MOM. Come on, think outside the box a little, would ya?"

What fascinates me the most is that there seems to be some sort of halo- like in all the classics. Go figure.

I mentioned reading the Bible to Evan in my last post, but I should've gone into more detail...

Out of the hundreds of "My First Bible"s at the bookstore, (which was completely overwhelming,) I somehow ended up with a great alternative to the one-lesson-per-page Bibles made in masses. The ones with characters that look the same in every book- you've seen them- with the angular faces, usually standing next to a jagged fire on a jagged burning bush, or some other Biblically-burning object, making them both sharp and dull at once. The kind that usually fits several chapters of Scripture onto one page, which is somehow both too much information and too little information for the mind of a three year old- well not this book I stumbled upon. David Helm actually geared the translation towards a toddler, rather than the adult cliff notes of old. And Gail Schoonmaker, makes some mean schoon in her illustrations, that are anything but dull or jagged.

Now that I've done an advertisement for them, let me complete it with the product test results-

Evan was most interested in the illustrations and answered all of the questions I asked. One of them was:What would you have done if you were Adam or Eve- would you have listened to the snake's words, or God's words?

And as I'm asking him this, I'm telling myself- okay, so there's no right answer really. No need to panic. If he says God, well then that's very commendable- if he says the snake, well then that's just truthful...

His answer? The snake.

So of course I begin telling him that he was right, he would've probably chosen the same thing Adam and Eve did, which is why we all needed Jesus to make things right. By the time we finished covering the flood, I wondered if maybe this was a little much in one night. But he didn't seem confused or overwhelmed. His conversation was both enthusiastic and reverent with all we discussed, and he seemed throrougly interested.

However the next night, (last night,) he was given the choice of reading "Corduroy," and then the Bible, or no books at all. He chose no books at all. So I'm thinking maybe we should dive into the New Testament tonight- maybe all the way to "God's New Kingdom Spreads." Yeah- there seem to be a lot of smiling faces and joy in those chapters. But like "they" say- you can't take the Bible in bits and pieces- that's creating a whole new religion. And if there are going to be villans in Evan's life like Cruella Devil, Jafar, Ursela, and whoever else- well then, he might as well come to grips with the real enemy in this world. If he is going to admire the beauty of the princesses and the strength of the warriors in these films, well then it would be a crime not to introduce him to their Author- to the Ultimate Warrior, the Prince of Beauty, right? Right. Or as Madalyn said after dinner last night, after Evan finished praying over our meal- "Amen!"

Tuesday, October 18, 2005

this evening

This evening we made a home for a stuffed Flo the Fly in the cubby of Evan's headboard. We colored pictures and taped them to her "walls," gave her a small stuffed dog, a blanket, and everything a stuffed fly could want. When Evan wouldn't eat his dinner, Shaun snatched Flo from the table when Evan wasn't looking, (she ate dinner with us, too,) and we told him she flew away because he wasn't eating- it worked! He ate all of his broccoli quiche!! When he got out of bed after lights-out, I told him Flo would have to sleep with me if he got out of bed again. He listened- the lights stayed out!

Only later did it occur to me that maybe this isn't the best technique. It might breed nervous behaviors, or an unhealthy understanding of doing things to get your way- "legalism"- or of doing things to keep your friends happy- "peer pressure." But that's parenting for you- there seems to be a positive and negative possibilty that might stem from every discipline tactic created. We're the ones learning by trial and error and there's so much head-scratching I should start lotioning my scalp. However, when I was reading Evan's new and first Bible to him in bed tonight, covering creation and the flood, I realized that if God is big on discipline- if He sees it fitting and character-building, "nuff said." Right?

But then the question was never "to discipline or not to discipline" for us- the question was HOW.

this afternoon

Running errands in the car-

Me: It's a beautiful day God made, isn't it?

Evan: Yeah! It is!

Madalyn: No. (Her mouth forming a small "o".)

Me: No? Yes it is!

Madalyn: Nooo, (shaking her head, looking out the window.)

Shortly after this conversation, a low-rider passed us blaring some rap song, the base full volume- boom bada boom bum bum bum...both kids start slapping their legs to the beat together with huge smiles on their faces- staring at each other. Who are these children?

this morning

Evan, standing on the potty-stool, waiting for pee pee: "What is going on in here!"

Monday, October 17, 2005

After Their Noses Ran

We made it to the Fall Festival! To quote Napoleon Dynamite, "Yessssss!" It wasn't until Sunday afternoon that we got ourselves there, but we did. We did it all-

We had hotdogs, orange drink(aka syrup,) shaved ice, and a funnel cake. I could've hit every stand there, though, and big-time regretted my choice of hotdog when I later spotted the barbecued sandwiches and coleslaw...mmm. Evan probably enjoyed himself the most. He got in one of those huge, inflated jumping things that's probably the equivalent to a large, soft petry dish, breeding all kinds of germs- I mean his were sure in there, so who knows who elses. When his turn was up, I had to pull him out by his ankle, kicking and screaming. Lovely. You should've seen how impressed everyone was! What is it about the more you give a kid, the worse they act...what's that saying? Well it's true. We were also impressed to see him brave the 30ft inflatable slide all by his lonesome. Hilarious to watch such a tiny thing come down in the midst of much bigger kids. Nevermind that he couldn't seem to stay on the cloth he was supposed to ride down on. I mean, I was on pins and needles, most relieved when his pants didn't set on fire- but not only did he not ignite, he seemed to thoroughly enjoy himself.

While Evan was conquering these mountains, Madalyn was insisting on a HUGE orange balloon. Shaun forked out 4 bucks for two- (he's totally wrapped around her pinky finger if ever a dad was.) One of those balloons popped against the heat of the car when I was lifting a kid from the stroller- right in my fluid-harrassed ear, and if I wasn't already deaf going to the carnival, I certainly was coming home. The other balloon we let Evan release into the sky to go and kill sea animals. Like in his Curious George books. He thought that was way-neat.

What else? Oh- the kids got tatoos and played that fishing game where the girl hides and puts stuff on your pole. For the record, Evan has quite a cast and almost pulled down the entire display with his rod. He caught a ball, a rubber frog, and a pad of paper, and was nice enough to pass the frog on to his sister. He's cool like that.

He's also spent a lot of time high-browing his sentences this weekend. He's been saying "actually," and "normally." He hasn't figured out all of his tenses yet, but almost. He still says, "Did Madalyn knock it down? Is that what she dude?" (Instead of did.) And of course, "good grill," is still in regular use. He was also telling Madalyn at the carnival to not get things sticky with her hands and to just be patient, it was okay. "No big deal," is another thing he likes to say. Yeah, that's us- paper plates, plastic cups, and lots of time spent carefree in the nude. Spilled milk? Somebody ate dirt? A whole roll of toilet paper unwound? "No big deal." Jimmy Buffet style. After all, we're Floridians.

the face of a carney

does this kid look like she's been to a carnival, or what?

ERIC- is this the snot you mean...?

after the festival

I think her hair may actually be growing some...

life in my shoes- this is a very accurate impression of my life at times

big girl