A Post for Good Friday

For those few who visit this website...

"Any authenticity that we are going to have as persons of faith and any authority that we are going to have as witnesses to the gospel of Jesus Christ will come because of our exposure to bruises and scars. There is no other way to authenticity. There is a certain counterfeit pose that one may maintain, but as to an entrance into the full, the true authority, into the glorious liberty of the sons of God, that comes by exposure and by wounds. There is no other way. If one looks back at those who have deeply affected their generation, the discovery will be made that almost without exception they did it against some minus, some ache, some pain in their own lives ...

At some time, who can say when, there will be a crown of thorns pressed down upon your head. It may be some private anguish. It may be some profoundly disturbing condition in your own family. One cannot detail the direction whence the affliction will come, but when it does, you will have every right to rail against it and to cry out against that kind of providence, even to argue with God, to withstand him to the face ...

But do one other thing. Take it. Accept. For was it not our Lord's word that the cup he looked into, the awful agony which waited for him, did not come from unfriendly hands: "The cup which my Father hath given, shall I not drink of it?"

I promise you this, if you can take whatever deep hurt that occurs in your life and hold it up before God and say to him, even in bitterness, of this which you despise and this which you hate, "If there is anything you can do with it, take, and use it."

I promise you, you will be utterly amazed at what will occur," - Gardner C. Taylor, sermon delivered February 1, 1978.

(Hat tip Andrew Sullivan)

Happy St. Patrick's Day

Enjoy!

Merry White Christmas!

We hope everyone had a very Merry Christmas and that Santa was extra generous this year. We had a great Christmas and even had snow! The odds of that happening in the Portland area are less than 1%, so it was quite a treat.

Gabriel did quite alright at our house. Santa left him a Thomas & Friends toddler bicycle and a toddler digital camera. Both were hits, but the big hit was the Brio Aqueduct waterway toy that we got him.. photo is below.


It's a wet mess in the kitchen, but the boy has been captivated by it and Bebe has had a blast with it as well. Yeah, there's wet towels all around the place but hey - no single toy has ever kept Gabriel's and Bebe's attention in the same place at the same time for as long as they can play with it!

Nana, Papa, and Great Gramma were able to join us for Christmas, including a dinner with the tastiest smoked ham I've ever had. Organic and nitrate-free from New Seasons. Leading up to Christmas, we enjoyed Zoo Lights, the Grotto, baking sugar cookies, and leaving some cookies out for Santa on the fireplace on Christmas Eve.



In addition to the above photo, I've made a greatly overdue update on our Flickr! photo page with shots spanning from Maui in October to Christmas just the day before. Also included are Gabriel's SuperGabriel Halloween Costume courtesy of Gramma, Autumn Leaves, Tea Parties, Family Thanksgiving, Christmas Tree Hunting, Jill's Birthday (see post below), and Gabriel's first movie theater experience (and first foreign film The Red Balloon).

Happy New Year!

Happy Thanksgiving

At least there's going to be nice weather in Hillsboro for the rest of the week. We'll be spending Thanksgiving with Gramma and Grampa, the Sacramento Reids and four of the Gallup Proffitts. Gabriel's had a hoot playing with cousins. There is a Wachdorf gathering in Seattle this weekend that Jill and Gabriel might make for a day or two, but looks like he's beginning to feel kinda yucky.

So a Happy Turkey Day to everyone and their families. Oh, and on a related note, if you've lately been wondering how Rick is doing, there's actually a video of him to watch.

Cheers!

First Christmas Post

And Thanksgiving hasn't even happened yet.

But this time-waster is definitely worth a chuckle.

Far more to also write about than there is time.

Easter Dinner

Easter Dinner, originally uploaded by korynasz.

Here's a shot of Easter dinner with Gabriel working on eating all of the crust off the bread. Jack Nemeth is in the red shirt, Memo and Grandma on the left, Papa and Nana on the right, and Dada in the foreground in the blue shirt.

Mama is snapping the photo. Also visible is our new dining room set that barely made it in time for Sunday. I had to rent a U-Haul at the last minute to go pick up the set from Consignments Northwest because they called and canceled our already-delayed delivery.

I read the company owner the Riot Act but the best he could do was "help us load it if you bring a truck yourselves." I got this news on Saturday afternoon - how I managed to rent a truck that late in the day on Saturday is a milagro. With several strokes of luck I got the dining set back to the house and Jill and I unloaded it ourselves.

Unfortunately, because of the ordeal we didn't have time to dye Easter eggs with Gabriel, but honestly he had so much fun running up and down the U-haul truck ramp that he clearly had a great time anyway (REALLY BIG TRUCK, DADA!!)

But all in all, it was a happy Easter.

Jesus Party with Uncle Jap

Hopefully everyone had a great Easter. Ours was quite nice, if not a little unusual.

We're quite proud of Gabriel as he figured out the meaning of Easter. We told him that after he woke up from his nap, we were having a party - we barely hosted Easter dinner for the family.

On his own, he said it would be a Jesus Party. And that's basically right!

Jack Nemeth, Jill's uncle, drove down from Seattle where he's been the past four weeks assuming his new job as Marketing Director for the Seattle Times newspaper. He's been put up in a hotel downtown all this time, so I'm betting a friendly home-cooked meal was a nice change of pace from all of those terrible gourmet meals he's been having near the Seattle waterfront.

Sandy, Judy's sister, is getting things finished up with the sale of their home in Connecticut. She should be joining him full-time in Seattle sometime later this Spring after the home sells.

Gabriel did not immediately take to Jack. He wouldn't share his Joe's O's with Jack in church. But by the end of the evening, Gabriel was talking to "Uncle Jap" and chattering away. And, he gave Jack a good-bye kiss on his way out the door.

In all, we had the pleasure of Easter dinner with Gabriel's Memo, Grandma, Nana, Papa, Uncle Jack, Mom and Dad.

Dinner was very nice: smoked salmon - salmon fillets provided by Grandma & Memo - with some nice sides, including a yam recipe Jill improvised that turned out nicely, and strawberry shortcake for dessert. Not bad at all!