Thanksgiving in NYC

This is us at the Macy's Day Thanksgiving Parade. We woke up on Tuesday and decided to head to New York for Thaksgiving. So we canceled our plans with friends and froze the turkey and off we went. We checked out the balloons being inflated on Wed. night and then went to dinner with our friend Julie, whose apartment we stayed in for the night.

Malachi and Brad with Scooby at the Wed. night inflation.

The kids thought the balloons were so great and even bigger than our apartment!

So it rained ALL day on Thursday! We got there at 8:45, which was about 3 hours later than the people directly in front of us. And then the people around us saw that the kids were with us and they let Brad, Selah and Malachi up to the FRONT row in Times Square. The parade started at 9 am with clowns, bands and the huge balloons. The kids really liked the princesses, Dora the Explorer, SpongeBob and the Sesame Street float.
Here's our view of the parade. We had the best seats in the house, except for the hooked up kids sitting warm and dry in the MTV studios directly across from us.

We then trekked through soggy NYC to FAO Schwartz. This is a great toy store. It's the one with the big piano from the movie BIG with Tom Hanks. The kids got to play on the piano, work thomas trains, hang with life size lego creatures and gaze admiringly at all the toys. Malachi is really into Batman for the moment. So here we are with a lego life size replica.

Because it rained most of the day, Charis' view was of the plastic covering over her stroller. So this picture is simply for the record books. But here she is in FAO with Brad.

men, sweat pants, and the 'y'

We took the kids to open gym at the YMCA today and I have officially decided that sweat pants should be banned on any male over the age of 5. Men up here in Mass. love to wear them and I just feel embarrased by even looking their way. And it seems that the same me who wear them also put an arbitrary "y" on the end of their name, even if it wasn't there on their birth certificate. There's never just a Mike or a Joe or a Tim, it's always Mikey, Joey and Timmy. And they're always wearing sweat pants at the Y.

"The New Faces of Christianity"

If you want a great read, which informs us about the state of global Christianity and how the movement of Christianity from the Global North (the West) to the Global South (Asia, Africa, South America), I must insist that you read Philip Jenkins' new book "The New Faces of Christianity: Believing the Bible in the Global South". He is the writer who was widely acclaimed by all authorities for his 2002 book, "The Next Christendom", where he traces the Church's movement "south".

In this book, he examines how this reality of the Churches exodus from the West ("the Global North") has affected the way that the Church is reading the Bible, for both better and worse.

Very engaging. Very constructive to our own walks. Helpful in prayer.
It's a great encouragement for us, that we would grow in understanding how to read the Bible in our context and how easily we can make ourselves irrelevant as Western Christians if we are not careful. It challenges us too to seek what Christianity should look like in the West.

Princess Party Extravaganza!

We now have a 5 year old in our midst! We had a great time at the "Royal Birthday Ball." There were games of treasure hunts and an apple version of hot potato (taken from Snow White...except nobody died). Brad and I conquered the castle cake. The kids all dressed up in prince and princess outfits and looked fabulous. Our Texas friends would be proud because we introduced our non-southern friends and their colons to the wonderfully processed dish of 'queso'.

Selah got some wonderful gifts almost all having to do with the princess' from Disney. She was beyond excited and bubbling over all day.

Selah's 5th Birthday

Selah's birthday has become the event of the century. She keeps saying that it's going to be the best day EVER! We're going to have a prince and princess party with games and a cake and lots of noise. I'm going to attempt a princess castle cake. I'm prone to starting huge projects and never finishing them or figuring out that there's NO way possible that I can conquer the project at hand. So think of me on Sunday as I'm stacking cakes and wrestling with icing. I'll send pictures next week of the much anticipated occasion.

Happy today by thinking about tomorrow?

That which will satisfy us the most in the future will most fixate us in the present, to enjoy what is today.

By contrast, what is illusory, promising what it cannot deliver, never satisfying as I hope, will inevitably force my eyes forward to the future, for I intuitively know the fragility of its claims, the insecurity of all hope vested in it, whether my child's education or safety, a job advancement, retirement, or whatever else. As a result, I leave today and live tomorrow.

In effect, I'm as good as dead, for living people walk around today; tomorrow doesn't exist; yesterday is no more.

This is the power of Christ: as I gladly expect his future return, the coming vindication of his people, I can rest at ease and with joy today!

The Prostitutes and the Wife

The greatest temptresses I may face are named "tomorrow" and "someday". These are the loose women of Proverbs, making many promises yet allusive, all the while robbing me of wisdom and vitality. May we always remember the wife of our youth, who remains faithfully by our side, described in Proverbs 31. Her name is "Today".