Happy Birthday Kevin!

Kevin and Candi and Mikey's cousins came to town... Kevin on the way to a worksite and the girls to stay for a few weeks. The first day they were here was Kevin's birthday! Here are some pictures...


There are more pictures from the day right here!

Around and around

A few days I uploaded a couple hundred pictures from our camera to Flickr; I haven't had time to caption them properly yet, but in the meantime, here are a few pictures of Mikey and Hannah on the carousel at Grace Church this past May!


All of the carousel pictures

Bonus picture: Hannah on the carousel a year earlier (July 2008):

Service for Wayne

The service for Wayne this morning was wonderful... everyone was very sad to lose him but the music and the message were very joyful. Wayne was a joyful person; a joyful service was the only option! He was an amazing guy. He came from a difficult childhood but became a terrific father and grandfather, and one of the most generous people you'll ever meet. Pastor told a story of a time when the church was picking up kids for service in three trips with a little passenger van; when Wayne heard about it, he bought them a bus! He was and is very much loved, and a lot of tears were shed today. We went to the graveside and heard the Scripture passage read, then we stayed a little longer... but Wayne's grave is right next to Cathy's Mom's, and seeing Grandma's grave again after two years was hard on Mikey, not to mention Cathy. It's still hard for even me to remember 7-year-old Mikey crying for his grandma; he started getting really sad when he saw her marker so he and I went and sat in the car instead of staying at graveside. Cathy stayed a little longer than we did, then we left to go to lunch.

In Cathy's family they always get together for lunch after anything like this; it was so fun to see people we haven't seen in a while! Every time we do it we always say, "We've got to get together when it's not a sad event, just to have fun!" Maybe this time we'll actually start doing it.

Afterward we went to Cathy's dad's house to see him; he wasn't able to make it to the funeral, but he was up and talking to Cathy's brother and nephew and the nephew's wife when we got there, telling stories about Wayne and stories about fishing and all kinds of stuff. Cathy's dad was in much better spirits than we would have imagined. I think maybe although everyone would want Wayne back if we could have him, we are all happy to know that he's well now, no longer battling pain every day. We're going to check in on Cathy's dad more often than we have been doing lately; we love him and we don't want him to feel like he's being abandoned by everyone he cares about.

It was a hard day. But it was a good day. Lord, thank You that You are with us even in tragic times. Be with this family; comfort, protect... and Father, help us remember to come together in good times as well as in the hard times. And come back soon!

Wayne

We just found out that Cathy's cousin Wayne died this morning.

Wayne was actually a cousin of Cathy's; he and Cathy's dad essentially grew up together. He has always been a favorite of hers. In fact, Mikey's full name is Michael Christopher Wayne Jones. Finding out he is gone is not a surprise, but it is still a shock.

Wayne was a successful businessman, and he was one of the most giving people you could ever meet. He bought the crib that Mikey slept in when he was a baby, and that Hannah sleeps in at my mom's house now. He gave us our second car, the one that I drive to work from time to time (an old car that he had anyway, but his impulse was to give it to someone who needed it instead of having it towed and crushed... and it's run very well ever since). I've never heard anyone in the family say a single negative thing about him. He is greatly loved.

Wayne had some serious health problems. He had a weight problem which he was constantly struggling to get under control, and that led to the usual list of associated health problems, but the thing that finally took his life was cancer. Over a week ago they started talking to hospice people, so it was clear that it was very serious. We did not know that it was going to end this soon.

Wayne knew Jesus. We know that he's not lost to us, and that where he is now there are no weight problems and there is no cancer. We rejoice for that, even though we miss him a lot. Seems like sometimes when we lose someone, things about them come into sharp focus... we realize and understand things about someone that we never understood when they were alive. Sometimes we just never heard the stories. I know that there are some great ones about Wayne, and I hope to get a chance to hear some of them in the coming days.

Love ya, Wayne. I look forward to seeing you again one day!

New words for Hannah!

Ice cream on the outside is just
as yummy as ice cream on the inside!

Tonight after eating some yummy chocolate ice cream with the family, Hannah was sitting at the table playing with a bouncy Tigger she has, and she dropped the toy. Cathy and I were talking in the kitchen, and Hannah surprised us (as she sometimes does) by saying, clear as day once you realized what she had said, "Tiger!" At first we didn't realize what she had said... then we were so excited! (She understands most everything we say, but she seldom speaks yet past "uh-huh" and "uh-uh" and "yeah" and "ap-pool"... you know, the yummy fruity red things. She's a big ap-pool fan... maybe even an ap-poo-holic. But I digress.)

So we gave her Tigger, and she played for a while, and I was doing something else when I heard her going "AAAAAH! AAAAAAAH! AAAAAAH!!!" Tigger had fallen down again, so I told her, "Hannah, if you need help you need to say 'Daddy!' or 'Mama!' instead of 'Aaah!' Let's practice... I'll go around this corner and you say 'Daddy' and I'll come right away!"

No such luck... no "daddy".

Then I decided to punt: "OK, Hannah... say 'Da!' and I'll come!" and as soon as I went around the corner, she said "Da!!" and I came right away! She did it a few more times, and then we tried her out on "Mama" as well (it's every mama's dream, you know, to hear the baby say "mama"). She said "Mama" right away! Twice in a row! And Mama came running!

Toon Art

This evening we went to Hardesty Library, where a cartoonist named Steve Quinn was appearing in their new theater, Connor's Cove. He was there to show the children the basics of drawing cartoon characters. On the way in, each person was handed a ticket for a drawing (no pun intended) at the end of the performance. Mr. Quinn drew Fred Flintstone, Dino, Charlie Brown, Yogi Bear, and several other cartoons for them, and showed them how to draw some of the cartoons, step by step, from basic circles/ovals through finished product. At the end they drew tickets to give away all of the pictures that he had drawn that night, and Mikey won a poster-sized drawing of Scooby Doo drawn in black magic marker!

It was fun that Mikey won the picture of Scooby Doo, because it was actually the second artist-drawn cartoon character that Mikey had received within just a few weeks! Not too long ago we went out to Promenade Mall to see a rock & roll art show (there were vintage photos of rock stars, album art, art done by the stars themselves, etc.) and at the show was a guy named Ron Campbell. Mr. Campbell was there because he worked on the animated Beatles cartoons, including Yellow Submarine (apparently he breathed life into the main Blue Meanie, among other things), and now he spends a lot of his time creating original artwork in that style and featuring the cartoon Beatles, and selling it to fans and collectors. Well, Mikey doesn't know too much about the Beatles, but he certainly knows one of the other projects Mr. Campbell worked on... Rugrats! When we told him Mikey likes Rugrats, he immediately asked Mikey what Rugrats character he would like a picture of. Mikey chose Chuckie, and Mr. Campbell picked up a paintbrush and drew him a beautiful picture of Chuckie, right before our eyes. What a great guy!

Big Round World

Yesterday we went to Oklahoma City to visit my uncle Frank and his son, my cousin Frank Jr. and their wives. We stayed until it was pretty late (OKC is almost 2 hours away) and it was waaaaaay past Hannah's bedtime. She and Mikey had spent most of the weekend at Meme's house (the reasons for that are a whole 'nother story) and they really love her, so Hannah was not only sleepy from it being late, but she was cranky because she was in my car instaed of Meme's car! So we got into the car and she started crying... and by "crying" I mean "screaming her head off." She was inconsolable, and very un-ignorable. Finally we decided to try to see if she would go to sleep with some music. I put on my Ashley Cleveland Men & Angels Say CD, hoping that the hymns would calm her down, but it didn't do the trick. So I finally put back on the CD that she had seemed to enjoy earlier: Big Round World by Trout Fishing In America. As soon as she heard the first part of track #1 (the title track) she quieted right down, and didn't cry another peep until the song ended! Then would you believe it, when the song was over she started screaming again! But then as soon as track 2 came on, silence again. It was hysterical! She didn't cry after every single song, but she never cried as long as a song was playing. Finally she conked all the way out.

TFIA has been nominated for Grammy awards several times (including for Big Round Workd), but they've never won so far. I think the "made the baby stop crying" award is much harder to earn, and if you ask me, MUCH more valuable!