Baby Bowser #2

Arriving circa October.

This, as of today, is my legitimate smile. I’ve acquired Bell’s Palsy, so half of my face doesn’t work. Thankfully my face is not nearly as bad as many Bell’s Palsy sufferers, but this thing has really thrown me for a physical loop. Stacie and I have much to be thankful for and know that this is all in God’s great plan in light of a fallen world we live in. Thanks for the prayers and hopefully I’ll be back to normal smiles soon. I’ll be putting my feet up for a while and letting my body work on healing itself (yet another wonder of God’s creation).

Israel was great. We really loved being there and are even more in love with the fact that through Jesus we can experience richness with God anywhere. For some reason I’m having trouble exporting some pics, so here a a couple from the first batch.

The Wailing Wall

Aroma coffee. If this placed branched out to the States, Starbucks would be no more.

Mount of Olives with Jerusalem in background.

Garden of Gethesemane

Skull Rock

At the Garden Tomb

We had two days off school this week because of the worst snow storm England has seen in 20 years. It was awesome. I think everyone could have done with a couple more days off, but in light of the fact that we have a weeks vacation and are off to Israel tomorrow, there are not any complaints here.

The bucket enjoyed the snow for all of about two minutes. We snapped the pictures quickly.

Estie didn’t really like the snow angel action, but she left a great mark.

This post won’t be anything like Aristotle’s politics because I have yet to gain such wisdom, but I do wish to write on a subject which very rarely crosses the horizon of my thoughts.

I was deeply touched yesterday while watching the inauguration. There are probably a couple of good reasons for this. One is that deep down I’m an emotional guy. I get all teary eyed when they play the national anthem for Olypics athletes, including the guy from Togo who won his country’s first ever medal this summer (a bronze in the single man’s kayak). The second is that even though I thought I was patriotic before moving overseas, the patriotism inside of me has grown by leaps and bounds since being here and finally I loved watching a peaceful transition of power. Again I think the latter of the reasons is more deeply rooted in my current living situation.

It is with a tinge of humiliation and a dash of “I don’t care” that I admit that I didn’t vote. I really didn’t want to and I didn’t take the time out to educate myself on either of the two candidates. In light of that, what I felt yesterday is nothing new and has been said a number of times on other venues, but I loved seeing my president being sworn into office yesterday. I loved it because I am an American and because as an American, he is my president. I love that even though I didn’t vote, I could have and that I could have voted for the other guy and at the end of the day Obama is the president of the United States of America and for that I should be thankful.

Although I truly dislike hearing about the “first black” everything all of the time, I was deeply touched by the Reverend who prayed at the end of the ceremony, his thoughts and words should have been touching to all ears.(I dislike hearing about all of the first’s because I feel like it just moves us back a couple more steps. Can’t we just all be people now?)
That’s probably enough political jargon for the next four years or so. We’ll get back to pictures and crazy stories in a couple of weeks…speaking of weeks, in a couple of them, Stacie and I will be going to Israel for a week. We’re really excited and will be posting pictures and stories soon.

So I thought I’d throw some pictures of the bucket out there to appease the viewers.

I know that this may seem wrong, but as honest as I can be with those of you reading, I prayed that God would give to me this picture. Trite as it may seem, this is one of the most convincing answers to prayer I have seen. We’re not planning on being into Santa, but seems like Estie won’t be missing him too much anyway.

This is one way to avoid eating your grapes. I guess we’re getting boring in our food variety these days…either that or jetlag.

Bowser Christmas day in London. That is the National Gallery at Trafalgar Square behind us.

Only Jesus and Estie know what’s going on in that kid’s mind at any given moment.

See above.

I could tear up and laugh hysterically every time I look at this picture. Estie and her mother have me under the most magical of all spells.

That is one happy kid. When we were flying to the States, Estie did laps up and down the aisles. Thank goodness she didn’t try to stop and say “HI” to everyone.

Oh what I’d give for a US Dr. Pepper right now. Those things are too good. Bless you Mike for picking me up from the airport with a cold one ready in the car. Now, if that’s not a good friend, I don’t know what one is…oh yeah, then he took me to Lupe’s!

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags? Gift bags, I am quite possibly the world’s worst wrapper of Christmas gifts.
2. Real tree or Artificial? Real for the look, artificial for the ease and lack of needles falling. (This year we have a real tree for the first time in Stacie’s life.)
3. When do you put up the tree? Saturday after Thanksgiving.
4. When do you take the tree down? December 21st
5. Do you like eggnog? No
6. Favorite gift received as a child? Don’t remember…bike maybe?
7. Hardest person to buy for? everyone.
8. Easiest person to buy for? Self
9. Do you have a nativity scene? Yep
10. Mail or email Christmas cards? Email…too expensive to ship everything overseas.
11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received? Couple of different things…see question 14.
12. Favorite Christmas Movie? Home Alone or National Lampoon’s Christmas Vacation
13. When do you start shopping for Christmas? Couple of days before the present is to be given.
14. Have you ever re-gifted a Christmas present? Definitely
15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas? Blue Bell Homemade Vanilla
16. Lights on the tree? Yes, white, simple.
17. Favorite Christmas song? O Come, O Come Emmanuel
18. Travel at Christmas or stay home? Travel, lots of miles.
19. Can you name all of Santa’s reindeer’s? Dasher and Dancer and Comet and Blitzen, Rudolph, that’s it…

20. Angel on the tree top or a star? Nothing really.
21. Open the presents Christmas Eve or morning? Whenever we are celebrating, no solid traditions yet.
22. Most annoying thing about this time of the year? Finals.
23. Favorite ornament theme or color? Silver
24. Favorite for Christmas dinner? All of it.
25. What do you want for Christmas this year? Spices and Tea.
Tagging: Patti, Jamie, Seth (you have to do it in the comments), Mike

My niece told my sister that her Aunt Stacie and her kid lived in England, and that was in outer space.

Silly girl, outer space is much closer to Maryland than England.

Not sure why, but this has always been one of my favorites as well. Something quintessential about coming to the LORD with only what you have to offer, not trying to conjure up something more.

Please be praying for a couple of things: Stac and I would like to have kiddo number 2 soon. There is lots of grading to be done and we do not want to get caught up in the craziness of the end of the semester.

The bucket is crazy. She babbles all the time and is into everything. I didn’t realize that when people said that before that they were literally implying that there was not one thing that their kid was not into. Seriously.

Our girls won first place at the bball tourney over the weekend in The Hague. Always a good time and definitely some good meals to be had as well.

So Stac and I have decided that one way that we want to prepare our hearts for the Christmas season is to try and DCB (December Blog Challenge) together.

Her song of choice today was Joy to the World, thinking that we would prepare our hearts and prepare room for Him, as the song says.

I have always loved Oh Come Let Us Adore Him. I think it might be my all-time favorite as it makes clear the simplistic beauty of adoring Christ as LORD.

Our prayer is that each of us would prepare room in our hearts and lives during this awesome season for the adoration of Jesus.

Be blessed and fear not, for there will surely be some fun and pictures along the way as well.