A Busy Month

I realize it has been a long time since I've posted here, but I've been so busy doing this month that there's not been much time for thinking, so there's really been very little to post.

Little Girl is having her first (and last!) dance recital today. We aren't happy with the requirements, but she enjoyed the classes so my sister decided to go ahead and let her finish this out, do her recital, and then she'll be done with dance.

We first weren't pleased with the choice of music she will be dancing to: I'm a Barbie Girl... Excuse me, but this song is about far more than Barbie dolls, and we really don't want our four-year-old singing it. Of course, she knows every word of it. Sigh...

The dress itself was to be expected, so we aren't upset as far as it's concerned. The hair MUST be curly, and that's a huge pain, as mentioned in a previous post, although Little Girl seems to have resigned herself to having curly hair for these events now, at least.

What we really hate is the makeup. And not just a little makeup, either, they want it smeared all over these little girls. When we went in a couple weeks ago to have the pictures made, the dance instructor started arranging Little Girl's hair, and suddenly gasped and summoned my sister over. She then proceeded to scold her for not putting on enough eyeliner! The child is FOUR!

Anyhow, when all was said and done, we had a room full of little Jon Benets. Now where I live is a dance studio run by a Christian woman which teaches interpretive dance to praise and worship music. Last weekend, the four little girls my niece's age who take dance at this studio performed in church. They wore no makeup, they wore long-sleeved white shirts with a knee-length blue tulle skirt, and carried scarves which were used in their dance. The song selection? Deep and Wide!! They were so sweet and did such a nice job. Now that's the kind of dance that preschoolers should be doing! If only such a studio existed in my niece's town...

Here is a picture of the little Jon Benets. I won't identify Little Girl except to say that she is the sweetest and cutest one in the picture. That should make it easy for you to figure out which one she is. :) Click to enlarge.

Bam Bams

I may be the only person in the world who finds this cute and funny, but I'll share it anyway.

I have a little three year old boy that I work with who could not say words with 3 or more syllables intelligibly if his life depended on it. We worked and we practiced and we worked and we practiced, and he's doing so much better. He can say triangle and rectangle, helicopter and firetruck. But his favorite thing in the world to play with is his toy ambulance, and despite the thousands of times we've practiced saying ambulance, he can't say it anywhere even close enough that anyone outside his family would have any idea what the word was supposed to be.

In conversation, he calls them "bambams", but when we slow down the word to practice, it could come out as just about anything. He's called them bambams so long that it's a struggle for his family and for me not to just call it a bambam!!

Well, Friday we were practicing once more, and we went over it and over it, AM... BU... LANCE, then put it together, and again some unintelligible muttering that sounded nothing like ambulance. I sighed, then looked at him and said, "Someday you are going to be able to say ambulance perfectly, aren't you?" He nodded happily and said, "Yeah. But *I* say bambams!"

Yep. You sure do. :)

Update: May 4, 2007 He said ambulance today, as clear as could be!! I'm wearing a green shirt today, and when I walked in his house, he said something that floored me, as he's never said any such thing before: "You wear green shirt, I like green shirt!" I started working with this little boy exactly one year ago, and he had less than ten words, and every single thing he's learned to say has been with huge effort. I can recall the weeks upon weeks of modeling two word phrases over and over, one word at a time, and try as he might, he just could not put two words together. And now listen to him chatter. :)

Beautiful Scandalous Night

We sang this in church Sunday. As we sang, I was fascinated by the thought-provoking imagery of the lyrics, but not immediately drawn to the song itself. By the time we finished it, however, I knew this song necessitated further meditation. The first run-through just isn't enough to convey the depth of the message that I recognized this song had to offer. So I came home, found it online, listened to it a few times, and haven't been able to get it out of my head all week. The juxtaposition of such paradoxical but true descriptors has really caused me to consider the cross at yet another level. I wanted to share this song in the hopes that others will experience this, as well. Don't just listen to it once! It requires repetition to grasp its full significance!


Beautiful Scandalous Night

Lyrics by Steve Hindalong; music by Derri Daugherty

Download the file here

Go on up to the mountain of mercy
To the crimson perpetual tide.
Kneel down on the shore,
Be thirsty no more,
Go under and be purified.

Follow Christ to the holy mountain,
Sinner sorry and wrecked by the fall.
Cleanse your heart and your soul
In the fountain that flows
For you and for me and for all.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

On the hillside, you will be delivered,
At the foot of the cross justified,
And your spirit restored
By the river that poured
From our blessed Savior's side.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

Go on up to the mountain of mercy
To the crimson perpetual tide.
Kneel down on the shore,
Be thirsty no more,
Go under and be purified.

At the wonderful, tragic, mysterious tree
On that beautiful, scandalous night, you and me
Were atoned by His blood and forever washed white
On that beautiful, scandalous night.

Uncurly Hair

My four-year-old niece is taking dance lessons and her first recital is coming up next month. Curly hair is apparently a recital requirement, so my sister thought it best if she experimented now to find out the best way to curl her hair and make sure it was going to turn out nicely.

So Saturday night, Little Girl wore sponge curlers to bed, and Sunday morning, when the curlers came out, and her hair was combed and bows added, my sister reported that she was simply too beautiful for words. Eagerly, Little Girl looked in the mirror to see her beautiful self -- and burst into tears.

"What on earth is wrong?" my sister asked, and Little Girl answered, "Everybody will laugh at me!"

My sister tried and tried to convince her that everyone would think she was beautiful. Little Girl's response was to say that she looked like the Beast when he was all fixed up to go to dinner with Belle and his fur was in curls and bows, and they said, "You look..." and he muttered, "Stupid!"

She was so upset that my sister offered to put her hair in a ponytail. Little Girl agreed, and my sister said the curly ponytail was still adorably cute. However, when Little Girl looked in the mirror, she again burst into tears, saying she was still curly, and she wanted to be uncurly!!

My sister told her that everyone at church would tell her how pretty her curls were, but she was not convinced. And so it was a very sad Little Girl that went off to church Sunday morning. Of course, everyone told her that her curls were beautiful, and after the fourth or fifth compliment, Little Girl became quite uppity about her new hairstyle.

Apparently, compliments aren't enough to make up for one's own assessment, however, because when she went to bed last night, she asked, "Is my hair gonna be uncurly tomorrow? I like it better uncurly."

Shirley Temple she will never be... :)

The Passion

And so one night I experienced Passover, as Jesus and his disciples did, and the next night found me in the Garden of Gethsemane praying with Jesus just before his arrest and subsequent crucifixion.

A group I am involved with from church is exploring nontraditional methods of worship, outreach, etc. We had an incredible worship experience one night last week.

As we had been instructed ahead of time, we arrived at the church, entered and found our own private place to worship. The lights were dim, candles were lit, music was playing softly. A chair was set up here and there, and couch cushions were piled up in several places on the floor. I quietly selected a cushioned floor spot and began to pray.

This was supposed to be a spiritual check-in time, and so I began by bringing God all of the cares and concerns I've had over the last few weeks. It was wonderful to have time to do this without either being interrupted by a husband or a phone, without falling asleep because it was time for bed, without feeling like I needed to hurry because I had ten million other things I needed to do. I do have prayer and Bible study time daily but it's very rare I get the lengthy uninterrupted time like I had on this particular night. And so I had time to bring everything to God and hand it all over to Him so that I could be free to worship.

And then the movie began -- we watched Mel Gibson's version of The Passion, without subtitles. It was a movie we had all watched before, but this time was different -- we weren't supposed to merely watch the movie, we had been instructed to experience it, whatever that meant to us personally.

It was an incredible experience, one I encourage anyone to take some time and do. Do it alone, make sure you'll not be interrupted, take the phones off the hook, don't make any more plans for the evening, set aside this time as God's, and try to experience the events you see on the screen instead of just watching them. It's amazing what God can show you and teach you through this. Much of what I experienced was too personal to share, but I will share a few things.

First, Jesus tells us to take up our crosses daily and follow Him. I may not have a literal cross as Jesus did, but Jesus' death on the cross was the Father's will for His life, something He didn't wish to do but decided to do anyway, and therefore to take up my cross daily, I must also decide each and every day to do whatever the Father's will for me that day is. I have been struggling with doing His will in one area of my life for awhile now, and though I have spent much time in prayer over the matter and on many days have made that decision that I AM going to do it even though I don't want to, my good intentions fall so quickly to the wayside when faced with the issue and I have to start all over again the next day.

So I came to this experience in anticipation of dealing with this matter of taking up my own cross by immersing myself in the experience of Jesus' taking up His cross, and trying to identify as completely as possible with Him. It was my sin He bore so that I can identify with Him, and therefore it was my desire to truly focus on identification with Christ tonight in whatever way that might lead to.

With this in mind, I prayed along with Jesus in the garden that not my will, but His be done. At the same time, I attempted to feel what Jesus must have been feeling that night, knowing what was to come -- not just the physical torture and death He was about to experience, but the heartwrenching knowledge that God was going to turn His back on Him -- something we will never have to suffer. Beth Moore offered up the idea in her study Jesus the One and Only that Jesus may have suffered more emotionally from the anticipation and dread of what He knew was to come than He actually did during the crucifixion itself. So often when we know we're going to have to do something extremely distasteful to us, the nervousness and dread while waiting for it to happen are harder than just doing it and getting it over with. I thought of this while watching Jesus' suffering in the Garden.

The first thing in the movie that was really eye-opening for me was when Pilate was offering up the traditional release of a prisoner during Passover. Jesus or Barabbas? I recognized for the first time that I identified with Barabbas. It wasn't a comfortable thought. I'd prefer to identify with the women who loved Jesus, or with the disciples, but the reality of it struck me as I saw the two men standing side by side, and Barabbas released. Portrayed in the movie as dirty, filthy, wicked, and crazy -- and had it not been for God's plan that Jesus be crucified, there is no way Barabbas ever would have been chosen by the people to be released. How blatant was the comparison that Barabbas' freedom was granted only because of Jesus' death, just as my freedom was also purchased by Jesus' death. And then as the movie depicted, did the man display the gratitude that Jesus deserved? Did he say so much as a thank you? Did he worship at His feet as he should have done? No -- in fact, he didn't seem at all grateful. He laughed and jeered and mocked the very one who made his freedom possible. And I identified with that man. After all, don't I make a mockery of the cross when I minimize its significance? When I choose my own will over God's in spite of all that He's done for me? When I fail to share its meaning with those who need most to know? Yes -- I am Barabbas.

The most difficult part for me was the flogging. My first thought was, how could men be so evil as to inflict such torture upon another human being? But I knew, and reminded myself, that it was me inflicting those wounds. He was bruised for MY transgressions. He was crushed for MY iniquities. And I kept repeating in my mind over and over with each crack of the whip, by HIS stripes I am healed, by His stripes I am healed. Every gash, every whiplash, brings healing to me. I found myself crying out to them as the beating just went on and on and on to stop it, to leave Him alone, He'd suffered enough. But I realized that I needed to cry out to myself to stop it. It was my sin that was inflicting those wounds, and yet I continue in my sin, just as the men continued the beating. How incriminating for me, to see firsthand what my sins, what my selfishness, what my pride causes to the One I love more than anyone else. If that isn't motivation to stop, nothing is.

I finished off the experience by feeling the pain that my sins bring upon Him, asking for forgiveness, and recommitting to take up my cross daily. Now if I can just bring to mind that flogging every time I am tempted to sin, maybe I can keep that resolution.

Funny Kids

Sorry I haven't gotten the rest of Easter posted yet, I had a large part of it written last night and then the browser froze on me and I lost it all, and haven't had time to redo it yet.

But I had a thought today that I should probably share some of the funny things kids do and say on here. Everybody loves laughing at kids, right?

So here's my funny moment of the day. Two year old was being most uncooperative. His mother says to him, "You sure are being stubborn today." His five year old sister OH so seriously stated, "I think he has mad cow disease."

LOL.

Passover

Happy Easter, everyone.

I wanted to share a little bit about how I experienced Easter this year. I taught Sunday School this morning so was unable to attend the worship service, but that was fine, because I had my Easter all week long. I'll post about Passover tonight, and everything else in a later post, as this will be very long...

Passover:

This truly is the epitome of Easter anyway, isn't it? Just think, all those hundreds of years before Jesus was ever born, God designed Passover to demonstrate to His people what He was going to do. The Messianic symbolism in the Seder meal is unmistakable -- to anyone who is open to the idea that Jesus could be the Messiah, of course, which is how Jews can continue to celebrate Passover year after year and sadly miss the whole point.

I celebrated Passover this year with five other families at our pastor's home. We didn't do the full meal, we did the shortened version. I would like to share some of the symbolism and how it applies to that first Easter. God paints such beautiful portraits that it is such a shame we don't always see them.

The first step in celebrating Passover is to remove all leaven from the home. The yeast symbolizes sin, and as we enter into a celebration of Passover, the removal of the leaven from the home shows a willingness to remove corruption from our lives.

Next we partake of the first cup, the cup of sanctification and freedom. God promised this to the nation of Israel, and although they view it as a promise yet to come, we know it is a promise He has fulfilled through the sacrifice of His Son.

The next step is the washing of hands, to represent the cleansing from sin. We know of course that Jesus took this a step further and washed the feet of His disciples at His last Passover meal with them.

After partaking of parsley dipped in saltwater (to represent the tears of suffering of the Jews in slavery) comes the breaking of the middle matzah. On a plate sits three pieces of matzah -- to represent, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The middle matzah, representing the Son, is then broken in half. One half is replaced on the plate, while the other half is wrapped in a linen napkin and hidden. To think that Jews do this year after year without realizing the symbolism of Jesus' body being broken for us just as He explained to His disciples as they performed this part of the ceremony together, and buried.

Next the youngest child asks the four questions, which enables the parents to share with the children the story of the Exodus, and to remind them of the promise God made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob -- a promise which has now been fulfilled, but for which they continue to wait expectantly.

The second cup is taken at this time, the cup of praise. Following this, the bone of the lamb is shown, representing the Passover lamb killed so that the children of Israel might live. Of course, Jesus is our ultimate Passover lamb, and His blood covers our sins, just as the sacrificial lamb represented this covering of sins in the years before Christ for the Jewish people.

After the meal, the piece of matzah that was hidden away (i.e., Jesus' crucified body) is found, broken, and eaten. "Take, eat, this is My body, which is broken for you," Jesus told His disciples. And then the cup of redemption follows, with Jesus' commentary that "This cup is the new covenant in my blood" -- the original cup of redemption was a reminder of God's promise that He would one day redeem His people, and now by Jesus' blood, we are indeed redeemed.

I couldn't help but cry at the next part of the Seder meal. At this point, a child was sent to the front door to look for Elijah, for Malachi prophesied that Elijah would prepare the way for the Messiah. An empty seat is always ready for Elijah at every Passover meal, in case this is the year that he comes. Of course, the child does not see Elijah coming, and his father tells him that maybe next year Elijah will come. This saddened me more than any other part of the entire Passover meal, to think of all those Jewish people looking for Elijah year after year after year in hopes that God's promise to send a Messiah will come true in their lifetime -- and here, Elijah already came 2,000 years ago, (Jesus identified John the Baptist as the Elijah who would prepare His way) as did the Messiah, and they missed him! How can a people looking so expectantly for someone miss him entirely when he arrives? It is truly heartbreaking.

The fourth cup is the cup of acceptance, or hope. Jesus says in Matthew 26, after taking the cup of redemption, that this fruit of the vine He will not drink until He takes it with the disciples in the Kingdom. This cup represents the hope of the Jewish people that they will live in a Kingdom of peace. Someday we will drink that cup with Jesus in His glorious Kingdom of eternal joy and peace, and the final promise will be fulfilled.

Is it any wonder, with this much symbolism, that Jesus commands His disciples to do this in remembrance of Him? I truly feel that the typical communion service practiced in many churches is not what Jesus had in mind. Perhaps it's fine... but isn't the symbolism lost when only this part of it is segmented out of the entire Seder that way? I feel that Christians would greatly benefit from celebrating the Passover in this way, in remembrance of Him. All of the traditional Easter celebrations are great, but a Seder reinforces the picture God drew for His people thousands of years ago and reminds us that all but the last promise is already fulfilled. It reminds us of Jesus' sacrifice as the Passover lamb, and reminds us of His broken body and His shed blood, by which we are redeemed. Yes, I believe that Passover is what "Easter" is all about.

A Visit Home

So I went home for the weekend, and anyone who knows me knows I always come back with stories about the little ones -- my four year old niece and six month old nephew.

My grandmother's older sister passed away in January and her only son lives quite a distance away, so he asked if someone would be willing to live in the house to take care of it for awhile until he decides what he wants to do with it. So last month, my sister and her little girl moved in. Living in an old house that has belonged to a woman in her 90s for decades has had its interesting moments. One such moment occurred this weekend.

My sister had found a box in the closet that had been mailed to our great-aunt but never opened. On it was a post-it note saying "Do not open. Return to sender." Since she's now been gone for a couple of months, my sister questioned what to do with the box. We had no idea what might be in it nor why she wanted it returned. Finally my sister decided to just open the box. "I might want whatever it is!" she declared. And so she opened it, only to discover a very useful item -- a package of adult diapers. :)

My niece immediately took the letter off the box and walked off with it. When she returned, we discovered she had written all over it. On one side of the envelope, she had written her name in the upper left corner, and MELEMEN in the middle. The other side read: "THK YU FR G US OER MEL. LOVE, (her name)"

Translation for those not accustomed to reading children's spelling: Thank you for giving us our mail. Melemen is mailman, of course. We were so impressed. Keep in mind this child is only four years old, and has NOT been formally taught to read or spell at all. She's always asking questions, "How do you spell..." "What sound does this letter make?" "What letter makes this sound?" etc. and of course we answer and play little games with her off and on for fun, like, "What letter does cat start with?" or "Can you think of words that start with M?" but we've never sat down with her and actually worked on teaching her to read or write. So there is Little Girl Story #1.

Little Girl Story #2. This is very sweet. Several members of the extended family were at my grandmother's house, and Baby Boy started crying. His mother took him into the next room to try and settle him down. Little Girl wandered in there too, but as we were all conversing, we didn't even notice, until she returned and announced, "Okay, everybody, I got him settled down." How we laughed. :) When asked how she settled him down, she said matter-of-factly, "I sang him a lullaby."

"Sing it to us," my aunt said, and Little Girl sang the following to the tune of Brahm's Lullaby so sweetly. I used initials (Baby Boy and Little Girl) where she sang names.

"Lullaby, and good night,
Go to sleep little BB,
LG loves you, yes she does,
You were sent from heaven above.
Go to sleep, go to sleep,
LG loves you so much."

Now does it get much sweeter than that?

So Little Girl is as sweet and clever as always, and Baby Boy is now sitting up and attempting to crawl by laying on his tummy, then lifting his belly up with only his hands and toes on the ground, almost like he's doing pushups. :) He actually is able to scoot himself forward a few inches doing this. No small feat, considering this is now a TWENTY pound baby!!!!!!! Amazingly enough, he refuses to eat food. They've tried most babies' favorites -- butternut squash, carrots, bananas, but he just spits it out -- yuck! Only milk for this baby!

Snippets...

It's been an extremely busy couple of weeks, so that's why the blog has been so neglected lately. But I have returned, with little bits to say on the following topics:

1. Sudoku. I learned several things about Sudoku following my last post. When questioned further by one reader of this blog over how I solved the Sudoku puzzles, apparently I was doing them incorrectly. Silly me, to apply common LOGIC to come up with the solutions -- time consuming, but correct. Didn't I know I'm just supposed to make guesses until I get it figured out? Uh, okay, so now I know why Sudoku keeps people occupied, if other people are just making guesses as to numbers and having to change them several times along the way when it doesn't work out. Sounds like a big mess to me, but what do I know? :)

2. Sudoku again. Although time-consuming, my method of solving Sudoku puzzles serves one great purpose. When one is trapped in an airport for over EIGHT hours, time-consuming Sudoku puzzles become quite welcome.

3. Airline security. Okay, I'm all for increased security, and tight airline regulations, and all of that, but I arrived (after several minor mishaps including a late start and getting lost...) at the gate at 6:45 am for a 7:30 am flight. Now mind you, on the flight back I was supposed to have a layover of 37 minutes. In that 37 minutes, they had to get my luggage off the first plane and onto the next. So if they can do that in 37 minutes, then why exactly is it that they can't get my luggage from the gate onto the plane in 45? Yep, they absolutely refused to let me on the plane. Oh, I could get on WITHOUT the luggage, but a week in Florida with absolutely nothing but the clothes on my back just wasn't all that appealing somehow... so I spent the next eight hours in the airport waiting on the next flight out. Did I mention it was a LONG day?

4. Perceptions of rudeness. While waiting to board my flight, FINALLY after the all-day wait, a man walked up to the desk and said that his 9 year old son was seated in a different section of the plane from the other three members of the family, and was there any way this could be changed? The airline ladies assured him that they would take care of it, but they had several other families whose seats were split up too that they were trying to get seated together, and they were going to have to work with it for awhile to get everything straightened out. The man said that his son was really worried and upset over having to sit by himself, and the airline ladies again promised him that he needn't worry, they would get it fixed so their family was seated together. A little while later, they called the man up again and said they were trying to get this fixed, but only found three passengers with their last name, and didn't he say there were four of them? Did one of them have a different last name? The man said no, and named each of them. The ladies looked and looked but could only find tickets for three. Finally the man said, "Well, he doesn't have a ticket, he's going to sit on our lap", pointing to a little boy in a stroller. Now I work with children for a living so I'm a pretty good guesser of ages, and this boy looked like an almost three year old to me. MAYBE he was big for his age, but I don't know... So when asked by the airline lady how old this child was, the man answered that he was 2. "Sir, he has to have a ticket if he's 2," the lady replied, very nicely. "What!?" the man gasped. "They told me on the phone that I didn't need one for a two year old." "Oh, no," says the lady, "UNDER two is free if he sits on your lap, but a two year old needs a ticket." The man calls his wife over, "We have a problem. They're not going to let HIM on the plane with us!" It was all I could do not to burst out laughing at the idea of the three of them flying off to Florida and leaving their two year old in the airport alone for the week. The airline lady quickly said, "Sir, we didn't say that, we don't have the authority to override this but we have a supervisor coming, and it will be his decision how to handle this situation." The man was belligerent and kept arguing that the child had JUST TURNED two, and he was TOLD he didn't need a ticket. He also said, if I didn't TELL you he was two, you wouldn't have known and would have just let us by. The lady said, "No, he DOES look over two to me, that's why we were trying and trying to find his ticket and couldn't figure out why he didn't have one!" The ladies were very kind and patient with him, and kept telling him that the supervisor would deal with it, please calm down, they simply did not have the authority to make that decision themselves. Finally the supervisor came, instructed them that in the future, they MUST buy a ticket for this child, but he would override it this time. So the man finally settled down. A few minutes later, his wife asked him if he would ask the ladies at the desk for help with something, and he kind of shook his head and said wait till we're on the plane and we'll ask one of the flight attendants. She said, but we need this taken care of now, and he muttered, "I don't want to ask THEM for anything." She said, "Why?" and he said, "Because they were just SO RUDE to me." HA! Who was the rude one, I ask you!?

5. Disney and the handicapped. I use this politically incorrect term because the handicapped person I went with uses the term to describe herself, so why shouldn't I? Disney has always catered so well to the handicapped. Going to Disney with a handicapped person definitely has its advantages, especially during the busier seasons. But Disney is losing their touch. The old rides, such as the Jungle Cruise and the Fantasyland dark rides, are still kind to the handicapped, allowing them to come in the exit doors and board the ride with only a brief waiting period. But the newer rides are another story. They're making the lineups handicapped-accessible, which should be a good thing, but it's not. I know that there are people who take advantage of Disney's accommodation of the handicapped, and will put a perfectly normal healthy person in a rented wheelchair for the day so they can skip the lines. I agree something needs to change to prevent such things from happening. But I don't agree that making all the lineups handicapped-accessible so there is no advantage to being wheelchair-bound is the answer. Some people may feel it's unfair for the handicapped to move straight to the front of the lines, but let those complainers BE handicapped for just a DAY, and I'm sure they would gladly stand in line at Disney World in exchange for the full use of their legs. Doing Disney in a wheelchair is really hard on people, and not having to wait in long lines on top of dealing with their various disabilities makes Disney an enjoyable place for the handicapped to spend a day rather than a miserable one. Of course, those lineups designed for wheelchairs didn't take into account people in large scooters, for which the turns in the lineups are just barely wide enough, making it a huge hassle for the person confined to the scooter to try to steer through, especially with crowds of people pushing up against it. Another accessible thing Disney has done with some new rides is that they have made handicapped-accessible CARS that a wheelchair or scooter can be pushed right into. Now this is very nice for someone who is unable to transfer. But most people who show up at Disney in a scooter or wheelchair are able to get in and out and take a few steps on their own or with assistance. We waited for ten minutes in rides that were walk-ons for everyone else because they made us sit and wait for the handicapped car to come around, when we could just as easily have taken a regular car and she could have transferred from her scooter into the ride just like she does on every other ride. Why must we wait just because there is a wheelchair car? So while Disney is probably applauding themselves for their efforts in making their rides handicapped-accessible, their efforts actually are making things harder on the majority of the handicapped people this is intended to serve.

6. Florida weather. Okay, so it was sunny and hot the first two days I was there, but the rest of the trip was really rather cool. Upper 60s. Most days were sunny, and the pool was heated so high that the water was almost as warm as bathwater, making swimming possible even on the cool days, so I really can't complain. But I didn't go to Florida for 60s weather!! It shot up to 80s again the day after I left. Of course, my first day home, we got six inches of snow, and the next day the temperature dropped to eight degrees again. That was my welcome home present, and made the sunny 60s look pretty good.

7. Crocs. After reading all the fuss about these odd ugly shoes on the Disboards, I was intrigued, but not enough to actually purchase a pair. But when these ugly shoes came out with Mickey-shaped holes, I was hooked. I had to own a pair. So are these shoes really as comfortable and easy to walk in as everyone claims? I say no. They're okay, they aren't UNcomfortable, but I'm not seeing them as being any MORE comfortable than a typical athletic shoe, which is just about all I ever wear anyway. My narrow feet may have something to do with it. My friend demonstrated how her Crocs would not come off her feet, by pushing the backs toward the front so there was nothing on the heels, and then kicking her feet into the air. The shoes stayed firmly on her feet. She couldn't kick them off if she wanted to. I tried it, and they go flying. I can't even walk without them flying off if I have the back strap pushed forward like that. Fortunately, they stay on my feet just fine as long as the strap is in the back against my heel. It's got to be those narrow feet.

I'll close for now... but stay tuned for more, now that I'm officially back. :)

Sudoku

Okay, I finally gave in to the Sudoku craze and thought I'd try it out and see if I liked it. After all, there are Sudoku books plastered before your face in every store you enter, and everywhere I go, I overhear people talking about it. What finally made me gave in is the other day I was standing in line at AC Moore, and overheard a lady saying, "So and so plays that game, did you know?" The person she was speaking to replied, "No, I'll have to call her and see what strategies she uses!"

Ah, strategy. My downfall. I love strategy games, always have. I like a challenge. So when I got home, I went to Yahoo Games, and selected Sudoku. Read the rules, and got started on their beginning puzzle. Now I solved it quickly and easily, but I understood that was the beginner puzzle -- it's supposed to be easy. I'll try a medium one now and see if I can figure that out, thinketh I.

Now it's definitely a timetaker -- it takes a long time to fill in all those squares and start narrowing them all down and finally ending up with the solution. But it was just as easy as the first puzzle, in my opinion. I was never challenged, I never came to a point where I couldn't figure out what else could be done and I had to stop and think, I never got stuck. And the challenge is what I like about logic puzzles...

So I tried the hard level. Same thing. Took some time, but never got to a point where I had to think. This game is nuts, I thought! Who wants to spend an hour filling in little boxes when it's obvious once they're all filled in what needs to go where? And I quit.

Until the next day. Maybe yahoo just isn't hard enough, I thought. These games are everywhere! Books and books of them! There MUST be harder puzzles out there, that challenge you and really make you think, or people wouldn't keep doing them! So I searched the internet until I found a site with four levels -- easy, medium, hard, and EVIL. Ahhh, an EVIL puzzle -- right up my alley!

Now it was a little more challenging, in that there were a couple times I had to go down the columns or across the rows to look for a number that could be determined definitely instead of just glancing and filling as I did the other three puzzles. But I still came to a solution without a whole lot of brainwork. So I just don't get it. Why is this such a craze? Why so popular?

And don't get me wrong, I'm not just saying I'm too smart for these puzzles -- I know better! When I purchase logic puzzle books, I get stumped on some of the moderates, and you can just forget the difficult ones. When I play Paint by Numbers which is similar to the type of logic needed for Sudoku, I often get stuck for periods of time on the harder puzzles, and sometimes I'm so stumped I can't finish them. So it's not that I'm saying I'm smart -- I'm just saying Sudoku, at least the puzzle I tried, including the evil one, is too easy!!

If anyone reading this is a huge Sudoku fan, please let me in on what I'm missing. Are there truly challenging puzzles out there somewhere that I'm just missing? WHY are you hooked on Sudoku? Why would the person in the line at the store want to call someone to discuss strategies? I didn't even need to think up any strategies!! Please help clue me in! :o)