My first Post to my new WordPress.com blog

I’ve been wanting to start  a new blog, that is accessible to more of the family–perhaps this will work.

Here’s a little story from out daily life:

Lately, Mark has been  into reading about mammals.  We bought a number of non-fiction books on mammals (and checked out a very large number from the library from the National Geographic Society that are written for kids and my dad bought the Thornton W. Burgess books.  So we’ve been reading those  lately.

Well, this past Sunday (on 2/10) we had a terrible time getting to church due to the snowfall–not just our driveway was clogged, but everyone’s, as is often the case, plus the roads.  I shoveled for about 20 minutes clearing things out, then out we went. If our neighbor hadn’t come through with his plow down, we might not have gotten out of there with our Subaru.

When we got to church, we were 15 minutes late–and while we’re usually not as early as we want to be to church, or any event, it’s pretty rare for us to be that late.  I’d just sat down when everyone turned and looked at me.  Al Badgley was the most helpful–he held up the program pointed to it with an imploring look, and mouthed something like ‘you’re next!’  Not having a program to refer to, I stood up and started walking up to the front of the church when I thought better of it.  I stopped and asked someone to see their program and read it–turns out I was supposed to do the "Prayer of Confession and Assurance of Pardon."

Well, that’s fine–I’ve done plenty of wrong things and still don’t feel too guilty.

I said a prayer and tried hard to make it sound sincere and contrite.  Afterwards, as I was going around the church greeting folks and making small talk, Shirley (Byrne’s Mother) told me it was a VERY humble prayer.  I told her "I always try to make my prayers more humble than everyone else’s."  Thankfully, she laughed.

Then Mark ran up to me and said, "Daddy, come see this!" and then blazed off towards the basement.  On the one hand, I try to get him to not run in the sanctuary, as it upsets the traditionalist in me.  But on the other hand, I know in my bones that if little boys are made for anything, it’s running around and getting into things.

I set out after him at a jog.

Before long, I caught up to him at the top of the stairs and he was all smiles, "Watch this!"

He grabbed the top of the handrail of the stairs with his hands, then swung his bare feet up and wrapped them around the rail a little lower down and said, "Look daddy, I’m a SLOTH!"

I had to laugh at that.  I guess the mammal books are paying off.  Read your kids some mammal books when you get some time.