Warning: Cute Videos of Grandchildren

What I wonder is: How's his kindergarten teacher going to handle him this year?

Here's a conversation between Zaya, who is five, and Mim, who will turn four this month.

The Last Lazy Days of Summer

Art and Carina are taking two days of real vacation at the lake. I'm keeping the kiddos. They are industrious and leave little time for computer blogging...right now, however, Mim is watching a veggie tale movie and Zaya is playing on the wii--Super Paper Mario.

Yesterday, we set up the shark pool.....It was great for exercise, most of which consisted of running back and forth to turn the water hose/sprinkler up or down. Here, Zaya is holding his hand over the sprinkler part, getting ready to release the spray all over Mim.

After that, they rested on the warm porch chair. Zaya was all worn out from pretending to be a sea sponge and eating marine snow and from being a sea slug, which "doesn't leave a slime trail like other slugs." He was also--very briefly--a dung beetle, rolling its ball of dung ahead of him while he crawled on the grass. Not long after this I found him asleep in his sleeping bag in the guest room. He was probably pretending to be a mole.














Mim doesn't nap. She spent this time turning my living room into a block city and putting stickers into a Victorian Dollhouse Book. Of course this had to be a joint effort, as the stickers were amazingly detailed. I detached the stickers while she looked at the model picture and told me which room they fit. Turtle even got involved in this while I was busy. He was able to finish the attic stickers. Then it was on to drawing on the light board and getting out the little china for a tea party. I looked at the floor and told Mim she was a little messer. She told me I was a messer too, so we got into an argument over who was the biggest messer. It's still going on this morning.

Zaya slept on until Clay and I had to wake him for our exercise at the gym. I thought both children would get bored quickly there, but they entered into the program with glee, exercising on every machine that was small enough for them, jumping on the mini trampoline, and rejoicing in the fact that they were really "getting in shape."

It rained in the afternoon. Zaya stood and watched it from the window. He assured me that the rain was coming from nimbostratus clouds. I asked him how he knew and he told me that the rain was misty and there wasn't any lightening or thunder so I shouldn't worry.

They were both up this morning at seven, because I had put them to bed at 8:30. (They didn't exactly go to sleep at 8:30, but I'm not saying how long it took because Carina just might read this.) Zaya told me he saw a crack of light coming in his window so he was able to use his sense of sight to know it was morning. Mim used her sense of hearing; grandpa's obnoxiously loud cell phone alarm works anywhere in the house.

Anyway, we made cinnamon rolls for breakfast. I tried eggs first, but they only ate the white...with a little salt. Cinnamon rolls are more fun anyway. I cautioned Zaya to stay away from the hot stove, and he told me: "if I were Lava Spikit the heat wouldn't hurt me. I would just harness its energy and use it for power." I told him that he was not lava Spikit right now so he should still move away from the stove. He did; they are both very obedient.


When the cinnamon rolls came out of the oven, Zaya remarked: "Wow! they sure have changed a lot." Mim immediately instructed him that it was "irreversable change" and he would not be able to change them back. "I know," he said, and popped one into his mouth.

Well, Mim is bored with the video now and Zaya's batteries have run out so this calls for me to finish in a hurry. After this, I may need a vacation at the lake myself.

Where's Waldo?

We took a trip for a church conference and spent four days in Kansas City.
Every day, at least once, we traveled across the Missouri River or across Stateline street and spent some time in Missouri, but at night, we stayed at a hotel in Kansas. The first part of the convention was for pastors and their families.



It was good...inspiring and well planned, classes in the morning and free afternoons, so that the pastors could use part of the convention for a family vacation. My only complaint is that I over-ate...the food was too good and they fed us too frequently. My lack of self-control, however, can't be blamed on the convention.

Here are some pictures of interesting places we visited. The most fascinating was the riverboat Arabia, excavated and brought up from the Missouri in 1988. It was crammed with supplies for households up river--dishes, clothes, tools, buttons, beads, perfumes. They have a web site that shows much more than I did.

One day we accompanied a group to a wild ride/theme park. We didn't do the wild rides--my stomach likes to stay attached and upright, thank you--but we got in a good walk, had our cartoon picture made, and rode the river ride on a pleasant, cool day.









The second part of the convention was broader and geared for the entire church...well, really geared for the younger set of the entire church. We discussed church plants and trends, some of which are depressing...and I did so much want to be encouraged. Oh well. We visited the center of town, where two young couples are involved in founding a church among the yuppies who are moving back to the inner city and reclaiming it. There are 20,000 people in their field, and very few churches. That district of the city is called Waldo, so the theme of the convention was: "Where's Waldo"?