Happy Birthday Jairus!

Here is a look back at Jairus' second year -- starting from October 2007, one for each month including a picture from today. What a fun adventure this second year was. :)

Dear Jairus -- May the Lord continue to bless you. We hope your 3rd year is even more fulfilling. Keep learning, exploring, smiling, and spreading joy. We love you!!!!

Not quite picture perfect

Well, this morning we went to have Jairus' 2 year pictures taken. He had a good time until the photographer wanted to actually take his picture. Our normally smiley little boy did not want this strange lady to take his picture. And he was not very impressed with all our antics to get him to stand in one place or even to smile. He wasn't even too sure about pictures with mom and dad! Anyway, I will post some of them here for you to see. Enjoy!

Return to Peru

8 years ago, one of the things that impressed me about Lake Country Christian School was the commitment to missions. For years the high school has sent out spring break missions teams. And in March of 2009, Joe and I will lead one of these teams to Lima. We are taking 15 9th - 12th grade kids to a place that is so very close to our hearts. I have wanted to take an LCCS team for 6 years, so it is neat to see this come to fruition.

All the details are still being worked out. So that can wait for another blog. But, I am excited and nervous all at the same time. I am excited to go back to Peru. I am excited to work with these kids while God works through them. He is so good at multitasking -- in one experience He grow us and allow us to be useful to the kingdom. Being exposed to Peru will help shape these student's worldview and future. Plus, I just love my kids at school! 14 of the 15 I have taught. Sharing this experience with them will be pretty special. I am also nervous. We have never led a mission team before. Yes, I know Lima, but it is different when15 others answer to you and depend on you. And the responsibility of taking kids out of the country in and of itself is pretty heavy. But I figure that God has been using the massive trips to DC/NYC to prepare me. If I can help take a group of 100 back east for a week, then 15 kids in South America is doable. Plus, I know that I don't do it anyway. It is all about what God can do. And I believe He can do a lot!

So, if for some strange reason Peru comes to your mind in the next few months, pray for us!

OCD?

At what age do people start to exhibit OCD tendencies?

This week we have been doing a fun little experiment with Jairus.

It all started one evening when Joe noticed that all the fridge letters were organized in straight color coded lines. He asked if I had arranged them that way. Nope -- I have no time to organize fridge letters!! I need to organize closets and such but not the front of the fridge! Well, Joe hadn't done it...so that left Jairus. As we were pondering this possibility, Jairus came to check out what we were checking out. Joe rearranged a couple of the letters. Jairus responded with a quick "no, no, no" and put them back in their places in the color coded lines! Wow, we were impressed. Not only does he know all his letters and their sounds, but he can color code them. Hmm. That's pretty cool.

But next morning I was second guessing this talent Jairus exhibited. A family friend had been over that weekend, maybe he arranged the letters for some strange reason. Hey, it's possible. I would have called to ask but it was 5:45 am. So, that day Joe set up our spy cam - aka, the DVD recorder. As Joe fixed Jairus breakfast, the camera recorded his morning play at the fridge. At first it just looked like normal sing along with the leapfrog letters. But at the end of 6 or 7 minutes you can begin to see the pattern. He was purposefully placing them in lines again arranged by color! Sure enough, we had proof that it was Jairus!

Now I don't think he can be terribly OCD, because when Joe messed up the letters, Jairus was ok with that and actually left them messed up the rest of the day. But, this morning Jairus rearranged them again into his color coded lines. He played with them during the day, messing them up again, but tonight he was organizing them in lines.

And to think that the last couple of weeks I was worried about finding the time to set up his toy storage to help him learn to categorize and organize. (I read it in some magazine.) Jairus seems to be doing just fine without my OCD help!

The 10%

Jairus is honestly happy most of the time -- I would say 90% of the time. If he isn't smiling he is pondering or concentrating. It is easy to get fun pictures of him because he is usually agreeable. But every so often he is whinny or grumpy or upset. And for this blog I have a few pictures of that 10%. These just crack me up, so I thought you would enjoy them too.

The situation: a haircut!

I tried to prepare him for the event. We went to the fancy place that has cool firetruck chairs and plays Thomas the Train videos, but it really didn't help too much.

He wanted his daddy to rescue him!

Now at one point he actually calmed down for a minute or so. When the lady was using the clippers, Joe said it was a motorcycle on his head -- vroom. (side note: Jairus has an obsession with motorcycles that started this summer on the trip with my parents. Now he has a 6th sense to find "cycles." He sees them everywhere -- the opposite side of the interstate, parked as we drive by, in the 3rd lane over, or in a 1 mile radius! And he always points them out with a cute little "gycle!") You could actually see his little brain processing this. How could a motorcycle be on his head...it sounded like one, but it didn't look like one. I wish I had a picture of that! After a short time, he figured out Daddy must be crazy and went back to fussing!

Even when we were done, he let me know that he wasn't very happy about the whole ordeal. But a sucker seemed to make life better again! All is well in this world!

Responsibilty (by Joe)

Who is responsible for this?

That is the question we should be hearing in these uncertain economic times, but instead we are hearing, “_______ is to blame.” Fill in the blank (the President, Congress, the Red, the Blue, the Star-Bellied Sneetches, etc.). Right now there is a cry to hold the businesses accountable for their actions. They extended risky loans, so it is their fault. Let me remind us, “It takes two to tango,” or in this case, the dance requires many of individuals to accept loans that they cannot possibly repay from institutions who were encouraged to make the loans. Who is better qualified to assess one’s personal financial situation, a business that makes loans to hundreds of thousands or the controller of one’s own checkbook? Don’t get me wrong, loaning money to someone without evaluating and considering the risk involved makes for poor business, but accepting such a loan is no better.

John Leo said, “You can’t run a society or cope with its problems, if people are not held accountable for what they do.” George Pataki said, “When government accepts responsibility for people, then people no longer take responsibility for themselves.”

Until an individual is held accountable for his own actions by other individuals, why would we ever presume to hold an organization accountable for its actions? Ultimately, someone must pay the price. The piper will not go unpaid, and I assure you, he is coming back for our children.

If we don’t hold an individual responsible for committing perjury, how can we hold Enron accountable for its lies?

If we don’t hold individuals responsible for their own credit card debt, how can we hold Fannie Mae accountable for making bad loans.?

If we don’t hold young people accountable for their decisions to have sex, how can we hold O.J. Simpson accountable for killing his wife?

How can we exit this current situation?

Say what you want about the government’s contribution, the US exited the Great Depression by taking personal responsibility. In my high school American history class, I clearly remember the text describing the mindset of the day, “Americans believed that they could improve their lifestyle by working hard and practicing thrift.” Today’s circumstances call for no government policy or program; it calls for personal responsibility. The government may have contributed to our current dilemma, but at the grass roots of this problem is many individuals making bad and selfish decisions and refusing to take responsibility for them. Instead we are blaming someone else.

It didn’t work out so well for Adam to blame someone else. Yes, Jesus Christ ultimately took responsibility and paid for Adam’s sin, but Adam still suffered some of the consequences. Now, we are asking the government to be crucified for our sins. Remember that government is not God, and I guarantee that it will not be as gracious a Redeemer as our God.

Go Eagles!

Last night we enjoyed a beautiful fall night with good friends and faithful fans under the stadium lights cheering on the Mighty LCCS Eagles. I thought I would post a few pictures for your viewing pleasure.

We have gone to a couple of games this season, and as you can imagine, Jairus loves cheering on the team. He gets caught up in the excitement and clapping and yelling. It is so much fun because he is such an intense fan.

At the game a few weeks ago, Jairus learned the phrase "Go Eagles." And last night he proved that he remembered he was an Eagles fan! Actually, now any time that he plays with his football or sees a football game on TV, he cheers "Go Eagles." When this first happened a couple weeks ago I figured I had a genius child in my house. We just turned on the Monday night Dallas vs Philly game and Jairus yelled "Go Eagles!". I was so impressed that he figured out a.) we aren't big Dallas fans and b.) that the Philadelphia Eagles were playing. But my feet were brought back to reality when we were watching another football game that next weekend and he cheered "Go Eagles" for some random team. I have learned that Eagles = Football. And there is nothing wrong with that! :)

These pictures show Jairus cheering, of course. He loved the cow bell Luanne let him borrow. And after the drum line played at half time, Jairus started playing his drums! What a little copy cat!

Thought I would throw in one flash to the past picture just for kicks. This was his very first football game last fall.