Archives for October 2006

This blog is starting to be a family picture site. Maybe it should be an internet news site like so many other blogs I read, but I guess right now one of my key learnings and values I’m trying to hold hard and fast to is the value of my family. I don’t think I’m naturally good at this and I’m trying hard to fix it. Coaching soccer. Hanging with my kids. Trying to make time for the memories that will last a lifetime. These pictures help me remember what’s most important in life and make me smile. Hopefully when I post them they encourage you too.

Anyway, the boys had a halloween party at school and they all picked a star wars theme this year for costumes. TJ is OB1 Canobe, Jake is Yoda and Tyler a Storm Trooper. Then on Sunday after lunch with some friends, we made our annual trek to the pumpkin patch. We usually let them play on whatever extra junk there is there, like hay bails and stuff, and then they can pick any pumpkin they want with one parameter. The only rule is, no matter who you are, you have to be able to pick it up and carry it to the car yourself. Guess that might get interesting when they’re 17, 14, and 11- though maybe by then we’ll just be blowing up pumpkins instead of carving them.

May the force be with you.

For everyone of us, I guess there is some definition of what hell on earth is and in jokes or whatever, it becomes the thing that Satan would do to you as torment should you go to hell… cuz it annoys you to no end.

Well, mine would be CRUNCHING. Specifically people crunching food. I won’t even give my kids gum because it drives me nuts to listen to someone pop it and slop it around in their mouth. I don’t even chew it myself… cuz it annoys me. I have no idea why or what happened to me in my childhood or while in my mother’s womb or whatever, but I HATE crunching and listening to people chew. Now that I’ve posted this.. I’ll probably now be given a CD of crunching and crunchy food to all my children to enjoy in my presence for Christmas by all my good friends who think tormenting me sounds fun.

But anyway, in my seminary class, there is this Marine type guy who eats his way through every class. At every break he finds more food. Not sure where he digs it up, though he has a very large bag he brings with him. But two weeks ago, he sat across the room and crunched like crazy. I think I heard every chew in the middle of my spine. Last week he sat right next to me and I thought I was going to dunk his head in my coffee- but the Marine look caused me to hesitate, plus I need my coffee in seminary and even drowning a cruncher might not be worth it. This week the guy is all the stinkin way across the class and crunching like crazy. Not like open mouth, like a cow crunching…. just like chewing an entire box of snap crackle pop that has been in the freezer to enhance the crunch factor…. and now we just got back from a break and some lady just brought in a freakin freshly popped bag of popcorn and the whole place stinks like it… I can hardly wait for some old lady to come in with her freshly nuked tuna caserole- which likely won’t crunch, just stink up the place.

This only seems to reinforce another opinion I’ve been trying not to entertain, but that my hell might be having to sit in seminary class- which I guess is why I’m bloggin in the middel of it… plus, I’m trying to occupy myself so that I don’t throw anything at the cruncher.

Well, as my Disneyland Day 1 post would imply, we stayed a second day at Disneyland and California Adventure park for “Disneyland Day 2”. It was tons of good ol family fun. Lots of memories. Here’s the photo set from day 2. My personal favorite memory… pic on top row.. second from the left, “oh yeah baby”… the words from Tyler after we zipped passed the upside down loop of the rollercoaster at California Adventure- which we had too many fast passes for our group to go on… so Tyler and I went twice, back to back. He laughed most of the time and gave me the biggest hug when it was over.

Took the kids out of school and went to Disneyland with my sister, my brother in law, my wife’s parents, my parents, and my family today. Good times. Cool thing is this is the first time my entire family is tall enough so everyone gets to go on all the rides and we don’t have to toss a coin to see who’s going to wait with the munchkin. Jake even went on space mountain. What a trooper.

Here’s a photo collage from today. I’ll let them say the thousand words.

We have collumns now. Looks like fort knox says the wife. Me and the boys say we need to add automated potatoe launching cannons soon to defend the house from the neighbors.

Stucco will be nice. Maybe then the neighbors will think we are just trying to change our yard instead of fortify it. One weekend at a time.