King or Queen of the Hill?

   

Mom and Dad were able to come in Tuesday Evening (early Wednesdaymorning).  We had to hide them in their room and hide their car in the garage so that Molly wouldn’t see them before she left for school.  She probably would have had a rough day knowing that Papa and Grandma were playing with Spencer, Ryan and Dakota without her.

It was a fun surprise for her when Grandma and Papa pick her up from school.  While they were waiting for Molly, they all played on the school playground. 

The pictures that stuck out the most to me were these two by Ryan.  My question is which is he – King of the hill or Queen of the hill?

Bowling With Jesse

I didn’t have the luxury of being present for this event; but one day, while at work, Linda and Jesse (while she was still visiting a couple of weeks ago) took the kids bowling.  I have never imagined our family as big bowlers.  Big . . . Yes! but not big bowlers.  When I came home and they told me they had gone bowling, I was a little disappointed that I didn’t get to go.  In fact I think it is a good idea for us.  It’s fairly inexpensive and you get to throw balls at stuff as hard as you want.   Plus, with kids you can use those gutter blockers, so you can’t miss.  How fun is that!  You can tell by the pictures that they seemed to have a nice time, so I am looking forward to our next excursion out to the local bowling alley.

Yes . . . Soon we will all have matching shirts emblazoned with Crowded Ship Bowling Team . . . probably bright orange with brown stripes . . . and matching shoes . . . and cool bowling balls . . . I am so excited!

My 12 String Martin

 

 

 

 

In the past couple of years I have grown to love the guitar. My appreciation of the instrument is much greater than my ability to play it though. While I have been striving to grow in my ability to play the guitar, I have learned to appreciate the different aspects and uses of different types of guitars. I learned to play on a classical guitar, but quickly sold that guitar and bought my first acoustic / electric guitar. I found a nice used Washburn and it has been a wonderful guitar. I have since bought another classical guitar. I bought it for Linda as a present . . . yes, I realize that was not a great idea. Since then I have enjoyed playing it quite a bit. It has a softer, more mellow tone that sounds beautiful when finger picked.

Almost two years ago, we had a missionary come to our church and he played his 12 string guitar. From that day on I have wanted to get a 12 string guitar. Linda and I have looked at them a handful of times and on each occasion she had a preference for the Martin 12 string. It has a beautiful sound and resonance. It was a bit much, so we would have to save up for it.

Well, by my birthday this year, we had enought to purchase that Martin 12 string guitar. I love it.

I hope you enjoy the pictures. I realize that I am probably a little more excited about it than any of you will be. That’s okay though.

The Birch Run Zoo

A friend of ours from Wisconsin came and visited us a few weeks ago.  We had heard about a little zoo up in Birch Run, so while she was here, we went up to check it out.  We had a pretty fun time with the kids.  For a fair price, we all were able to see a number of animals pretty close up.  All around it was a fun trip, and we will probably go up and visit again some time.

Above are some of the pictures we took while we were there.  Below are some of the video clips I took.  We all had a fun time taunting the tiger, attempting to get him to “bark” at us.  He did, and we all about wet our pants.  Superfun!  Enjoy.

Crowded Ship Wordled

I came across this site a few months ago from a theology blog.  They had wordled most of the New Testament.  I have since then used this site to wordle some of the New Testament and use them as notebook cover pages.  I think they are kind of cool.  They often are very close as communicating the common theme in the book/text. 

This particular wordle is all the posts from the “Crowded Ship” blog.  I thought it would be fun to see if some theme stuck out.  As of now I can’t seem to see anything.  Deck, potty and bathroom are three words I wasn’t expecting to stick out so significantly, but I suppose it doesn’t surprise me.

Do any of you see anything that I’m not seeing?

“Well, probably we are around, I think we are either going potty in the bathroom or on the deck. Just think a little bit . . . the beach.

The New Deck is Finished . . . Mostly

Probably about a month ago, we were able to primarily finish the deck.  We were thrilled with the process and proceeded to call the inspector for the final inspection.  Little did we know, although we probably should have, that the railing around the deck needed to be at least 36 inches above the deck.  As you might notice, the 2×4’s are sitting on the deck in this picture.  This made the height only about 33 inches.  After a little thinking we decided to lift all the rails a few inches (look at the railing in the pictures above).  That wasn’t much fun, but I think I like it better now anyway.

I as well put the skirting around the bottom.  The wood that was used as the skirt was given to us by a friend and was wood from a deck that he had taken apart.  The brown spots in the cracks are stain marks from the past deck.  We might stain over it, but I kind of like it as well.  I think it gives it kind of a antique look.

So, for the most part we are done.  We have already used it quite a bit.

Potty Training

Preface . . . Yes, I realize I haven’t posted in almost two months.  I went through tonight and figured out about 7 posts that I should have posted, and those should be coming out in the next week or two . . . 

What do

stickers,

gumballs,

suckers,

charts and toilets have in common.  You got it! Potty training.  What a joy!

 

 

First, what is it about getting a sticker on a piece of paper that would drive someone to want to go to the bathroom in the toilet instead of continuing their convenient practice of “potty at will” in my diaper . . . but apparently it has its enticements.  I think the gum and suckers are probably a little more of an enticement myself.  Either way it seems to be working.

Secondly, competition seems to be a factor in this game as well.  If one of the boys has received a sucker or gum for accomplishing their task, the other one is not content to wait to go to the bathroom, even if they don’t need to. 

Imagine the amount of time spent in the bathroom while potty training twins – twins that like suckers and gum.  We’ve placed a love seat and TV in there – at least for the next couple of weeks.

As far as an update is concerned . . . while Dakota’s chart seems to indicate his lead in the competition, Ryan seems to be picking up on the practice a bit better.  He advanced from pull-ups to underwear today.  How exciting!

I just realized how sad my life is . . . I’m excited that my son is wearing underwear.  There must be more to life than this.  But then again, think of all the money we will save not buying diapers.  WOO HOO!

Just a final note . . . on a couple of separate occasions one of the boys have asked me when we are going to get a urinal in our house.  Spencer, especially, prefers the urinal.  I’m just not sure that is the most practical choice for a family’s bathroom.  I told him to consider the resale value of our home and the potential hindrance such an item might have on another family, say with all girls.  He didn’t seem to care.

We hope to bring you a follow up soon on their progress.  I am sure you are all eagerly anticipating the post. Just consider . . . I haven’t posted in almost two months, so probably by the time I update, they’ll have their own home’s with their own urinals.

Our New Deck

I have a few more little projects to finish up both decks. I want to put a wooden skirt around both decks as well as paint them both the same grey as the house. As well I need to put up the spindles on the railing. Those tasks will take a little bit of time, but I will post some pictures when the project is completely finished.

Buried in the Beach

We were able to go to the beach a couple of times throughout our time up north. It really was a very pleasant beach. The very cold water seemed to coincide with the small amount of people present on the beach. Either way, we went swimming, and after a bit of freezing, you could get used to the water enough to enjoy it. I did at least. I think that it is possible that I have a bit of insulation helping me out. Spencer came out to me at one point and I could see that much of his face seemed to be a purplish color. This seemed a bit strange to me so I asked him if he was cold. He attempted to stop shivering long enough to tell me he wasn’t cold. “Oh, well if you say so, do you want to go out further with me?” We really did have a nice time. As you can see, Dakota seems to be the most leary around the water . . .

  

   

Bat Catcher Extraordinaire

For the last two weeks we have been on vacation.  You would think that I would have had a little more time to posts during those two weeks, but apparently not.  We started out our two week vacation with a trip up to Michigan’s northern peninsula. 

A side note to this “batty”story . . . On the way up, I noticed that in the middle of the road on highway 2, the highway that runs along the southern edge of the U.P., there was a rumble strip.  I had never seen a rumble strip in the middle of the road, only on the sides.  I commented to Linda that I thought it a bit odd.  Really, if it were that good of an idea, wouldn’t everyone be doing?  She concluded, and I just might concur, that the reality is that the U-pers are just a bit more advanced mentally than the rest of the country.  Therefore, we now conclude whenever we see anything we find ingenious, we give credit to the great people that live in the U.P. 

 . . . We had a wonderful and restful time for a few days at a small cabin that is hid away a quarter of a mile off of highway 2.  A beautiful setting, complete with a beautiful screen in porch, a fun loft for the kids to hang off and the beautiful melody of a small babbling brook. While the weather seemed to encourage the mosquito’s, the screened in porch was a haven for us all.  We were able to rest, sleep, play, swim . . .  and catch a bat.

One evening dad and I were just sitting up talking after some action movie, probably it was dumb, but it was action . . . and hey! we’re guys.  In the middle of our rigorous debate, a small bat (I meant to say, a wopping papa bat that was the size of a large hawk) swooped out of the rafters and about made me soil my pants.  We kicked into action, partially out of a commitment we have towards our wives and children, and as well a desire to sleep without this particular enormous bat flying above our heads all night.  We scoured the whole cabin looking for a tennis rack or something of equal bat fighting power.  We were at a loss, as we “batted” our hands at the stealthy creature.  We lost him for a moment as he seemed to burrow in a knot in the wooden walls, but came out again as dad threw his shoe up at him.  I climbed the spiral staircase to the loft and much to the chagrine of my lovely wife, having slept restfully up to that point, began swinging at the bat with the largest and most powerful weapon I could find . . . a pillow on one of the beds.  I must have swung at that bat two dozen times.  I then came to the conclusion that if I swung down at it instead of across at it, I might have better luck. 

The bat made one last ditch effort to escape his inevitable demise and I clobbered him as hard as I could with that soft downy pillow.  The clash sent him sprawling onto the floor, daised.  I covered him with the pillow until my fellow bat catcher climbed the stairs with a cool aid pitcher to place the bat in.  We scooped him up into the pitcher and victoriously walked him outside to release him into the wilderness of the U.P.

We may be beastly, but we are humane.

As for my wife’s sleep the rest of that evening, the pillow that was used to beat the bat, and the cool aid pitcher used to house the winged criminal . . . they were all cared for with equal gentleness (obviously not the gentleness of the capture but instead the release).

    

Click on any picture above for a magnified version.