“We do not live in a praying age. We live in an age of hustle and bustle, of man’s efforts and man’s determination, of man’s confidence in himself and in his own power to achieve things, an age of human organization, and human machinery, and human push, and human scheming, and human achievement; which in the things of God means no real achievement at all. What we need is not so much some new organization, some new wheel, but the Spirit of the living creature in the wheels we already possess.”
Dr. Reuben A. Torrey, The Power of Prayer
Matthew, Jenn, my dad, and I had some fun raking the leaves this weekend. I think he’s going to make an excellent helper.
It’s funny but I think he’s imitating me and my dad in the determined and focused way he’s walking with the rake in this next photo.
What do you think? Here’s a photo of my dad blowing. See the resemblence?
Even though Jenn’s pregnant, she also managed to help with her new purple hair do.
Matthew had a blast this holloween trick or treating and answering the door. His outfit is adorable and thank you to Moma Lynn who created the outfit for him. There’s photos here and a few more in the galleries.
Here Matthew is showing his Native American Indian warrior pose. Don’t ask us where he learned it.
I came home from work a little early so we can do some trick or treating before the sunset. Our first stop at our neighbor Steve. He opens the door and after a short while, Matthew walks in and makes himself at home! Steve kindly showed Matthew his aquarium with colorful fish swimming around.
After one more stop, we realized that it is entirely too early to trick or treat, so we went for a short walk and visited my parents in the next court. My mother was bursting with excitement. First she wanted her camera. I told her I already took some pictures. Next she wanted to wake up my dad from his nap. Moments later she was asking for her camera again. Then she wanted all my brothers to see Matthew, but she didn’t know what they were doing. And finally she wanted to show Matthew to her coworkers at Cindy’s house. 
Next we went next door to John and experienced his haunted front door, with bats and scary things hanging from the roof. After a short time at their front door chatting, Matthew decided to go inside and check things out. John and his wife are grandparents that have a little room with toys. She led Matthew to the toy room and generously gave him a firetruck.
Another house had a little dog that came out and licked Matthews face, he giggled. Another house had a bag full of goodies with sees candies, and a candle from Illuminations! Another house had a party going on inside. The people that happened to be at the door the same time as I, entered the house and joined the party!
Back at home, we were giving out some Endangered Species chocolate from Whole Foods. The chocolate is fair traded, sustainably grown without choping down rain forest. A portion of the profits (10%) are given to protect endangered species. The chocolate has excellent flavor and it was reasonably priced. We’ll probably buy more of it next year. We were giving those out slowly, but we also had a large bag of Costco chocolate. So we picked up the pace and started giving out handfulls. But then an hour later we realized that we were running out of chocolate. So we put Matthews candy in the bowl and started giving that out! Besides, he doesn’t need that chocolate when we almost always have much better chocolate in the house.
After a short time, Jenn looked for something more to give out. She found some packets of Swiss Miss hot chocolate. We were giving out several packets at a time. I was very skeptical that people would want it. But by that time (8:30pm) most of the trick or treaters were teenagers walking around. It was cold that night so they loved the idea of hot chocolate. One teenager, obviously chilly, said she was going to make some when she returned home!
Matthew loved answering the door. He would run to the door when someone knocked. He wanted all of us to come to the door. Even with with Jenn answering the door, if he didn’t see me coming he would stop and yell for me until I followed! While at the door he would enoy watching the kids and say bye in his own loud way as they left.
Jenn is in her first trimester. It was a little scary at first because we actually thought she was having a miscarriage. She had all the signs of a miscarriage and the doctor brought her in expecting that this was the case.
Earlier that morning I was in submission to God. Altough I couldn’t understand why he would allow a miscarriage, I had no choice but to accept what God gives us. Boy were we suprised when she came back with ultrasound pictures showing a the fetus at 3 weeks old, with a heart beating! It was a short time from submission to praise.
This experience really helped me understand how easy it can be for some people to discount the life of an embryo. At 3 weeks, we have no emotional connection and it doesn’t really feel like there’s a baby in the womb. I was sad, but I wasn’t broken like a father who lost a small child. It is hard to feel love for the life of an embryo. Our society has shown us by example with abortions and embrionic stem cell research such an easy decision. But the truth is, human life exists in an embryo, it just needs nurishment, protection and time to grow. Just like me and you.
Please pray for us and the health of our baby.
What is diaperless poop? Well read the story and learn about this unique phenomena.
Matthew had stepped out of the shower and was walking around naked. Jenn was also stepping out and drying off when Matthew started saying “Moma Moma” and reached out to hand her something. It was a big round peice of poopy, which was more like a colony of small poopies all bunched together. And there were other poopies that he thoughtfully put on the wet wipe bag. So that was easy clean up for Jenn.
As strange as it sounds, our son has aquired a skill treasured by the Chinese. You might have seen the characters in the Karate Kid movie trying to catch flies with chopsticks as a test of agility and mastery. Matthew didn’t use chop sticks, but he did use his bare hands!
Jenn called me just as I arrived at work to tell me that our son has caught a fly. 
Apparently he was following it around the house for a while. Jenn had told him not to touch it because it’s dirty. Of course, Matthew couldn’t resist to follow this fly on it’s journey around the house. The fly landed somewhere, giving Matthew enough time to walk up and grab it. I was waiting to hear that he had put it in his mouth like our dog Sayrah. Thankfully, our courteous little boy kindly turned and handed it to Jenn.
Oh the suprises of parenthood! 
