Lexical Light

Pumpkin Painting

The girls painted their pumpkins this week. This morning I painted a pumpkin* in honor of today being Mia Belle's due date: 

What's more fun is that I had a doctor's appointment this morning, w/a non stress test. Thankfully the doc & nurse appreciated my attempt at humor, despite the trail of paint flakes I left throughout the office. 

As for a baby update....ain't nuthin' goin' on. 1cm. Mia's OK & I'm OK so we are just going to see what happens.

*I'm not a big Halloween fan, which makes Mia's due date quite ironic. October 31st is also Reformation Day. Since I am a fan of Martin Luther and the Protestant Reformation I sometimes use that to answer the due date question. The humor of connecting Luther's October 31st posting of the Ninety-Five Theses on a church door in 1517 to me "posting" them on my belly 500 years later is a stretch. Imagine this painted on my pumpkinesque tummy:

  ...not quite the same the same effect as a pumpkin.

What's Cinco De Mayo? (Redux)

Is Cinco de Mayo a cooking term for synchronization of a condiment?  Not so much. Neither is it Mexican Independence Day. My first year of blogging I did a post explaining it.  Here's the do over of my May 2, 2005 post: (Just to prove I'm still a blogger and still breathing...not necessarily in that order.)

In Texas, we hear a lot about Cinco de Mayo this time of year. But how many of us actually know what it is?  Allow me to help.

Literally, it is Spanish for the fifth of May.

Historically, it is a Hispanic holiday that celebrates the Mexican army’s victory over the French in 1862 in the Mexican town of Puebla.

It is NOT Mexican Independence Day. That is Dieciseis de Septiembre or September 16^th, which actually commemorates September 16^th of 1810, over 50 years before the Cinco de Mayo battle.

What Cinco de Mayo does celebrate is a battle significant because the Mexican army was about half the size of the French army and much less prepared, yet they managed to defeat them.

According to the History Channel, this was not a major strategic victory, yet was important in boosting Mexican moral. It also, according to Cincodemayo.org, played a major role in relations between Mexico and the United States.Some speculate that since it was during the United States’ Civil War, the U.S. may not have been able to counter a French invasion into the U.S. if the Mexicans had not defeated the French.

Researching this raised more questions than I have time to answer, but I hope you now have a better understanding of Cinco de Mayo. I do.

For more info:

Go to mexonline.com for an interesting paragraph about who celebrates Cinco de Mayo. Reminded me of the recent beverage commercial with the scenario of a fake mariachi band in Cleveland getting exposed as posers. The drink was bottled in White Plains, New York - where all authentic Mexican beverages are bottled.

This link from about.com has a short, easy to read  summary of  Cinco de Mayo.

Also on about.com are other articles on  Cinco de Mayo's history, activities for children and recipes.

Click on this map to become more geographically literate and to get a better sense of what happened. (France landed in Veracruz, heading for Mexico City 600 miles away. The US couldn't offer help because of the Civil War. Mexican General Saragossa was able to stop the French.  This will tell you the rest of the story.)

Added May 4, 2005:  Educators (of all "branches") can find useful links and book reviews on the childrenslit.com Themed Review page for Cinco de Mayo.   

Mother's Day

I had a lovely Mother's Day. The morning was spent finishing up Aaron's b-day party, including a "church bus shuttle" to drop of some kids. When I got back up, Jack serenaded me and blessed me with flowers, chocolate, cards and handmade gifts from the kiddos. In the afternoon I got to take a nap. My sis' called and go to enjoy this month's phone message.

Another fun thing was this Hallmark e-card I got from a crazy ese. It dramatized how kids talk to Mom and what she hears. "We have a bleeeder!!!" is just one of the phrases from the card that are now part of our family vocab. Go  see it. You will laugh. 

Thanks, strong handsome Jack and kids for a lovely day.

Good Friday

According to Wikipedia, Good Friday is a holiday celebrated by most Christians to commemorate the death and crucifixion of Jesus Christ. Because the interdenominational church I attend doesn't have a service on Good Friday and I wasn't brought up in church, traditional or otherwise, the day doesn't look that different from my other days.

I did explain to my kids the significance of Good Friday. I also explained that we want to make sure we walk in a relationship with Jesus, honoring Him everyday, in addition to holidays. We talked about how other churches celebrate with special services. We also talked about how chocolate bunnies, eggs, and rabbits have nothing to do with the real meaning of Easter.

Though I don't usually observe Good Friday in a formal setting, I pray I will always be mindful of the grace afforded me through the death (and resurrection!) of Jesus and will pass that truth on to my children.

Oh, yeah, we'll still eat the bunny on Sunday.

 

Strong, Handsome Jack

Post Preface:

*An unintentional blog pattern this week was a male name in each post title. Go figure. I'll finish the week-and the pattern-with this post about my favoritest man in the world.

*This pic is the "World's Best Dad" trophy Fifi made, as part of her crafted from love gift basket for Dad.

Though his first & last names are somewhat common, my husband is definitely more than "Just Jack."

Today on Father's Day he played bass in the church worship band both services, came home for a brief rest, then went to prison - to preach. (Though that sounds like he's neglecting his family, he's not. We're careful about over-committing, he's regular serving gigs just happened to fall on the same day this month, which also happened to be Father's Day.) It is indicative of his heart desire to serve God.

I'm thankful Jack has proved to be the father to our children I thought he would when we were dating. How he adored his niece & nephew were indicative of his ability to love kids. He's also taught me about receiving the love of our Heavenly Father.

7 yr old dd Fifi: "My Dad is like Superman, but you should call him Spiritman."

9 yr old ds Gameboy: "He's a good Daddy. He plays games with me."

6 yr old dd Songbird: "He's a great Daddy because he makes me eggs & sings my song & scratches my back."

4 yr old dd Bellaboo (out of breath from playing w/him): "I love Daddy. I like him, he plays games with me. I love Father's Day."

Thanks to my Heavenly Father for  my  halfpastjack.

Christmas 2005

As a Christian blogger I would feel remiss if I didn’t post about one of the two most significant holidays of my faith. (The other is Easter.) I celebrated in the traditional way with family, friends, Christmas Eve church service, presents, etc. It was a lot like years past, but there was something different. About 3 this morning I got a special gift. Do I dare call it an epiphany? I was thinking about the irony of why we get gifts when it’s Jesus’ birthday…a simple thing that confounds the wise. We talk of giving Jesus the gift of our heart, but what does that mean? This morning I learned what it means for me this year, yet even that revelation is a gift from God because apart from Him I can do nothing.

The bottom line is that this Christmas will be a memorable one.  I hope to share more later. 

A Caroling We Went

The night started off innocently enough as a get together of 3 families who are “long-time, not seen enough now” friends. We treated ourselves to pizza from Papa John’s, threw in a salad for good measure and had plenty of Christmas cookies. Midway through the evening we took a stroll around the neighborhood, 10 kids (ages 18 months to 12 years) and 6 adults (30 somethings), to look at Christmas lights. We didn’t set out with the intent to sing loudly off key as we enjoyed the lights, but on the way home a few of the girls started singing the Batman version of Jingle Bells. Kids are always a great excuse to do things you wouldn’t normally do with a group of adults, so I took advantage of that and redirected their singing to the traditional Jingle Bells, followed by We Wish You a Merry Christmas. Then one of the 5 year old girls lead us in Joy to the World. (Traditional carol versions, not the  Three Dog Night Version.) Oh what fun it is to exercise our 1^st Amendment rights…hey!

I’m not much of a caroling fan if you have to stop at people’s house and bug them, but it was fun strolling around singing, especially when we were able to sing of the actual reason for Christmas…Jesus’ birth! I may have to add walk by caroling as a new tradition. 

Live Blogging Thanksgiving: Epilogue

Friday, November 25,  1:15 pm

The live blogging Thanksgiving experiment is conlcuded. It served it's purpose in terms of being a limited record of what we did. I could have written more and done a better job of it, but I will resist the urge to delete the post.

My bro, SIL & niece are lovely hosts. They make everybody feel welcome and relaxed, all through the year. (I still think they have a triptophan filter in their A/C. It's not uncommon for people to nap at Chucklehead Estate.

The ratio of time spent preparing the meal to the time spent eating still floors me. We were all seated at the table together for about 30 minutes tops, and that's a generous estimate. The adults lingered a bit longer and enjoyed some conversation. Still, we started eating about 1:45 and the dishes were done by 3:00. (Lil sis' can do some dishes.) 

Have to go watch the Longhorns beat A&M, though not as decidedly as I'd like to see.

My First Live Blogging Experience: Thanksgiving

Warning: This is my first go at "live blogging" so there will be even more rambling than usual. I'll be working on just getting the ideas out, trying not to edit too much. I'll also be trying to limit my time on the computer. We'll see how it goes. I think one point of live blogging is to promote interaction/conversation, but that's not the case today. I'm hoping most of my millions of readers are able to interact ftf w/people they care about. Personal journaling and writing practice are my main goals for today.

10:10 am Though it seems to fly against one of the main tenets of Thanksgiving...family togetherness, I decided to live blog Thanksgiving this year. 

I didn't plan on live blogging today. All I said was, "That's a blog post," after venting my disgust with the Thanksgiving parades this year  A couple of years ago I noticed that Macy's started focusing a lot of time  much on Broadway shows. If they were family friendly Broadway shows, but at the time it was "Chicago." Not the kind of thing I want my family to see anytime, but especially not on Thanksgiving moring while we're waiting for the giant Arthur and Snoopy to come floating by. (Maybe they've always done that and I just don't remember.) Since I've noticed that, I've resigned myself to being on guard w/the remote while watching the parade.

10:29 a.m. More later on the parade issue, back to how I ended up live blogging. I was just going to draft a post and was looking for dh laptop. Then I commented about live blogging and before I knew it my computer savvy sisinlaw had me set up in the foyer with my own little writing desk. I'm just off the living room, in sight and earshot of most everything going on, including the TV, which, like it or not, has become part of our family tradition. Granted, right now I'm the only one paying attention to it. Dh & kiddos are outside enjoying the perfect November weather, wait..they're back in. Bro is back from a Wal-mart run.  Sisinlaw is doing her thing in the kitchen. Boo just asked me to get dressed and come out front to find nuts for the centerpiece. Gotta go. 

I'm dreadfully slow at this. It may not work. Oh, well. I'll be back.

1:07 pm All the guests have arrived at the chateau. Here's the guest list of 15:

• My bro, SIL, & niece  (Host/Hostesses w/the mostest)
• My mom
• SIL's mom, dad, sis
• My sis & her beau (in from California)
• My dh & 4 kiddos

How can I get away w/blogging in the midst of Thanksgiving prep?  First, my family knows better than to ask me to cook. Second, there are currently five willing and able bodied women in the kitchen in various stages of prep. (In addition to my brother & niece who are used on an "as needed" basis.) Third, the kids are occupied in other places. DH & SIL's dad are visiting on the porch.

Here's what's happened since my last entry:

• DH took kiddos to explore the woods in creek behind UC's (Uncle Chuckle's aka my bro) house.
• Fifi fell in the creek. She recovered from the trauma, Dad washed her off. Later when recounting the incident she wished Dad would have gotten a picture of her in the water so she could scrapbook it. She even suggested captions: "Let's have a dip."  "Let's take a swim."
• DH & the kids played Narnia. There weren't enough girl characters, so Boo decided she would be Juicy. (You know, Lucy and Juicy.)

1:18 pm. Sensing that it's time to log off.  I guess this should more aptly be called "kind of live" blogging since I'm maintaining a steady posting stream.

Happy First Day of Autumn

Here in central Texas we’re observing it with 100-degree heat and anticipating lots of rain and wind from Hurricane Rita. Those of you a little farther north have hope of actually wearing a sweater instead of being a sweater.

FYI: The Autumnal Equinox is one day of the year when the length of day and the length of night are equal. (The Spring Equinox is the other.) In the Northern Hemisphere is marks the beginning of longer nights and shorter days. (It’s the opposite in the Southern Hemisphere.)

Education World has loads of links to fall activities and information.

What's your weather like today?  Does it look/feel like autumn where you are? Are your leaves starting to change? If you'd be so kind to leave a little comment about your weather I'd appreciate it. Thanks!