Leap Day 2020

Here is Madison with the friend that Camille gave her, Lacey.  The two spent some time on the couch today, a day of relaxing for Madison, although she did do some piano, and did help us cleaning up somewhat.  Daddy was after the cobwebs and using the vacuum all over the place.  There was a big spider that just had to go.  Sorry, big guy.  I'm usually gracious to spiders, but in this case, I was fresh out of mercy.

It was cold today, and that made it easier to stay indoors.  It is Leap Day, the day that happens once every four years.  We watched a clip from "Pirates of Penzance," one about an unfortunate character who was born on February 29th, and only gets to celebrate his birthday once every four years.

Mommy made a "Dutch Baby" for breakfast again, and it was delicious, especially with that flavored syrup.  We were cleaning up the basement somewhat, collecting things for a possible yard sale, if the community decides to do that again this spring.  At least we've gathered things up into little piles, organizing crafts and other options that are officially in the "out" box.  We finished "Thrawn" tonight, and rather than go back to Narnia, or some other things that Daddy wanted to read, the girls want to read the next book in the "Thrawn" series, so here we go.  Daddy put a hold on that next book, and just has to go get it from the library.  Needless to say, everyone enjoyed this current book.

We watched a movie on Disney Plus tonight about Timothy Failure, which wasn't quite what the trailer made it to be, but it was still a good movie nonetheless.  We had a nice day today, a relaxing day, and a good use of the extra day we were given this year.

Arendelle at KidPak

Tonight we had a fun event at KidPak, and it was one that united our "Frozen" cast, which is to say we had Camille with us in Gainesville for a skit tonight.  It was a unique skit, of course, because Elsa was here with the others, and the reasoning for this visit - at least within the skit - was to have a redo of Anna's birthday party.

It was a night that both parents and kids could sit in the audience to enjoy a KidPak service.  We had the worship band out there with a great set of music, and we had Pastor Lance leading things, and we had a bottom line about God's word spread throughout the night.

We did our Viking Ring Toss game, and it worked really well again.  What a fun way to keep the Nordic theme going!

Kids threw those rings towards their parents, the ones wearing the Viking hats, and of course were trying to get those rings around the Viking horns.

It was a close match, but you can see here we had a winner!  Tonight we gave away copies of "Frozen 2," which just came out this past week.  We also gave away "Frozen 2" themed versions of Monopoly and Uno.

It was a fun night!  We had families together for a nice time, an evening with praise and worship and laughter and games and a short message.  There was coffee and cupcakes afterwards, and a great time overall.  There were quite a few kids who came dressed up as princesses, especially Elsa and Anna.

It was super nice.  Here's one shot I insisted on, one that showed some of our main characters on stage together.  Camille will return to the KidPak Cumming campus on Sunday, and that's great for those kids there - but we'll miss her here of course.  We have something fun planned with Anna, Kristoff, and other villagers of Arendelle.  But tonight was a birthday party, one that included games, and a skit-within-a-skit.  The characters did a mad-lib that was party of the birthday party fun, and it was a lot of laughter from the audience.

It's obviously one thing we needed after this week, and it was just a great time for everyone who came.  We'll do this again in just two months or so, when things will all be about dinosaurs.

Of course we got home afterwards and Madison was all about getting to that next episode of "Clone Wars," where we actually find the previously thought dead character, Echo.  We'll have to see what comes next with this part of the story, because Wat Tambor is back, and so is all the Steampunkery that accompanies him.

This episode had a good bit of that in the end, as we saw Wat's evil lair.  There was all kinds of copper and bronze tubing, knobs, gears, and of course goggles.  Wat is a very interesting character from the first time we saw him back in 2002, I think?  Wow, I can't believe it's been that long.

Anyway, Madison wanted to hear the next chapter of "Thrawn," and we're approaching that end of that book.  Daddy will probably venture elsewhere after this one - there's a "Frozen" book that looks interesting, and we may read that one together.

We said our prayers, and were thankful for another good day with fun memories.  Madison paid a little extra today to get to watch some basketball games between students and teachers, and that sounded like fun, although she had more fun sitting with her friends than the actual game part.  She had a good day, but we all did, a day ending in Arendelle at KidPak.

Loving Friends

Ah, the strange things that happen on a FaceTime call with family.  You can see Madison and Mommy and a magnifying glass here.  I'm not sure why they pulled that one out, other than it was pretty funny.  Josh, Camille and Daddy were calling to say hello, and Madison was talking Camille through a bit of origami, helping her make the origami bird featured in "Frozen 2."  But Camille was also super nice today, sending home with Daddy a gift basket for Madison.

The basket had a new plush friend, Lacey.  She's a lamb that accompanied Madison in the car to taekwondo and back, and currently is sleeping upstairs with the other plush friends that Camille has gotten Madison over the years.

But also within were other gifts, just a super nice little basket way ahead of Easter.  But it was all done in love, to help bring some cheer to Madison after such a devastating week.

 In fact, there was a card in that basket, one that currently sits on Madison's nightstand.  It has some wonderful words in them, a sweet handwritten note, one that brought Madison to tears.  It still hurts, and it takes time.  But having loving friends like Camille is such an indescribably wonderful gift.

Madison's day at school went well, although I'm sure there were melancholy moments.  Her teachers let us know everything was all right throughout the day.  And it was all business at taekwondo.  It was the last day before testing, and as difficult as it was for the family there, they left the tragic news at the door, and focused on form and testing while on the mat.  But the recent events were clearly on many minds there.

We got home and watched a few episodes of "Kickin' It," and Mommy and Daddy are tearing through "Big Hero 6" as well.  We read tonight, and got to bed earlier after the devotional and after the bit from "Thrawn."  Today was okay, and we are moving on as expected.  But again, it helps so much to have friends and family there during the hard times.

Jesse

Tonight was easily the hardest thing we've ever had to say to Madison, and perhaps the hardest thing she'd ever have to hear.  We love her deeply, and for that reason, whenever she is hurting, we too feel a great deal of pain.

Pastor Lance gave Daddy the night off so we can be with Madison, and tell her the awful news:  her friend Jesse had passed away.

We did the best we could, but this was gut-wrenching, soul crushing, and any other terrible description you can come up with.  Mommy and Daddy were in tears last night when we heard about it, so how could we expect any less from Madison?  She was broken, and though the plan was to go to church tonight, we gave her the choice of what to do, and the decision was to stay home.  She got a bath.  She spent some time alone in her bedroom.  And she grieved.  We watched some television tonight, some "Kickin' It," because there were laughs.  But it was a supremely hard night.

We made the framed picture you see above, and it's there on her nightstand.  In the coming days, there'll be a funeral, and she'll have an option to go or not.  It'll take some time to get over this one, for all of us.  The taekwondo family is shaken to its core, as are those of us that remember him from KidPak.

We remember the roles all of us played in getting him to Summer Xtreme last year.  Madison invited him, and Daddy pushed to have him registered into a full camp, while another person sponsored him. At the camp, Tucker was his group leader and Bart, his taekwondo instructor, was the one who preached the message that brought Jesse to the altar during a call for salvation.  It all lined up, everyone playing their part to get him to the altar.  He's in heaven now, and this is our only glimmer of peace tonight.  God gave us this peace, and we pray that Madison feels an abundance of that peace that passes all understanding in the coming days.

Budgeting is Hard

Here's a little assessment that Madison wrote about her recent visit to Junior Achievement's Biztown:


     I apparently never went to college, but that meant that I didn't have to pay for a student loan or debt. My Net Income was surprisingly high. It was around $74,000 annually and about $6,000 a month just by my self. This is because some how I was the local store manager of Publix. The thing is that I only had a high school diploma. My gross monthly income was around $4,000, and including my "spouse's" gross income, around $5,000. The taxeswere just straight up annoying because that is less money to have for other things you need. Since I had one kid that was 8 years old and a spouse, the budget had to be tight. Our house monthly income was around $5,100, so I tried to prioritize the things we needed the most such as a house (rented), clothes, food, and kid's day care. Also, I had to pay a full on $115 for a science project for my kid, but that's life. I also had to put some money towards credit card debt, and of course the water bills, electricity bills, and transportation. Since I had a credit card debt around the range of $2,000-$4,000, I had to budget money towards that. Budgeting was really hard because you have to think about everything, not just one certain item you wanted. We couldn't own a house, so we rented one because I was also trying to get other expenses and items we needed such as food, insurance, water and power bills, credit card debt, etc. Also, I didn't have enough money to budget on vacation or some of the electronic stuff such as the internet, phones, and cable. There were some stuff that I was able to get that I could afford such as a concert, date night dinners with my spouse, going to the park, and going the the fair. They had said a few times to pay yourself first, so that is kind of what I did. Some of the expenses that had surprised me the most was the food and the clothes. I didn't expect the food to be that much for the spouse, kid, and me altogether. Same with the clothes. Whenever I'm shopping with my parents, I never thought about how much the clothes had cost. The food I thought wouldn't be witing the high 100's. I thought that the food would cost around maybe around mid $50-low $100's ($100-$110). I think I had to pay over $120. I didn't exactly get everything everything I wanted out of Finance Park. I thought that we would use the debt cards that we were given, and go around and buy things from other places like we did last year. To be honest, it kind of caused me to have some anxiety. It was a lot of presssure to do all of the budgeting.A big takeaway from the whole experience was that it was just super stressful. Another was that I thought we would go around and actually pay stuff at the different stores with our debt cards. One idea to improve the Finance Park is that they could do it more of in the 8th grade-9th grade grade level because in my opinion, that was way to stressful on my part. Also, the calculators were kind of hard to use, so maybe try to use a different type of calcultors that would be easier.

Anyway, good grades rolling in today, and we also had a nice night with taekwondo, and some work on a science assignment at home.  We're learning about organelles, those tiny cellular structures inside cells.  Madison hasn't been thrilled with science lately.

The weather finally dried out today a bit - although it was overcast. Still, better than nothing.  There's more rain on tap though.  Too bad the temperature is a little too warm, otherwise it would be a fairly snowy season here.  Fortunately, we did have our one snow event, and I'm glad we got out and took advantage of that.  We're grateful.

Not long until Madison gets her next belt in taekwondo.  She got her third stripe now, and is all ready for testing next week.  She's doing a great job with her form, and feels very confident currently.  She's moving up to brown belt next week, or a chocolate one, as they like to say.  Why not?  We have a camouflage belt.  So why not a chocolate one?

But we learned something tonight that leaves us heartbroken.  It was difficult to even talk tonight, or even write anything here.  We read, we prayed, and we prayed some more.  Madison doesn't know yet, but it will be a very painful moment when she finds out.  It's a very painful moment for Mommy and Daddy right now, a feeling shared by many of us in the taekwondo family.

Updates coming soon.

M&M Fun

RAIN.  We've had above average rain lately, and it's psychologically a bummer for all of us.  Fortunately it doesn't rain much on this amusement park that Madison and her friend dreamed up, a magical place called M&M Fun.  This amusement park project was based on a probability assignment.   Probability was useful in figuring when the park itself would be open, or when certain rides would be open, and so on.  Madison has decreed that the park would be open even in the snow, except of course the water slides, obviously.  It won't be open on Christmas or Thanksgiving, and it opens later on Sundays.  With all this probability, there's one thing that is certain:  M&M Fun is going to be a fun park!

Today we were at the library to pick up a huge stack of library books, most of them related to "Frozen."  It's research!  We'll probably be reading one of these at bedtime, but it's funny with Daddy sitting there in the car, reading younger readers books about Elsa and Anna (while Madison was at piano class).  It's research, okay?

Speaking of piano, here's a little chart Daddy made up to hopefully push Madison through those times she isn't quite up to doing piano practice.

She'll get the Tsum-Tsum Festival game soon enough, just doing thirty practices.  She actually has a head start on this already, as I was promising her this about seven practices ago.  So theoretically, she could have the game in three weeks or so.

Mommy and Daddy were at Texas Roadhouse on a date today, and that was nice.  Mommy got probably the best steak we've had in a long while, and the chicken was super delicious too.  It was a nice little break from all the goings-on lately, and a nice moment to chill.

It was a rainy day, but it was still a decent day today.  We read tonight, and read from our devotional, and we prayed tonight for Ba-Ba, and for all those struggling with cancer.  Soon enough, we were all ready for bed - we have an early morning tomorrow, so it's time to hit the sack, and go to sleep, dreaming of a visit to a special amusement park named M&M Fun!

Northern Lights Costuming

We had a nice moment this morning during the second service, one where Mommy was brought up on stage and honored for all her work at KidPak these past years.  It was something brief and certainly unexpected for Mommy.  But how nice the cast came out from hiding at that very moment to give her applause, and of course the entirety of KidPak was there cheering for Mommy and all the work she's done on costumes all these years.  This past series was especially a lot of work, many of these little bits of costuming all put together over the course of this one week, some of these done from scratch.

Nero's lederhosen outfit here was ordered online of course, but that was a lot of fun.  This one was just perfect for his character, and of course he was the loudest character on stage this morning.  Also of course, the little ones were just in love with Dawn, dressed up as Anna.

This young girl is pouring her heart out to Dawn right now, a scene we saw over and over again.  So many young girls wandered up to her for hugs and long passionate conversations about where Elsa is or things like that.

Calvin was dressed as a Viking, complete with the horned hat.  It was more of a cameo in the skit itself, but you can see him above as a host for the race segment of our series, where kids cheer on one of three dragon riders.

The skit itself went remarkably well, and it was all hinged on the gimmick of the fish monger, who you can see to the right.  Megan was back with us, and it was such a joy to see her again on stage.  Nerdo insulted her time and again about the fish smell, so she leaves, and comes back with the giant fish you see there in her hands.  And hits him with it repeatedly!

Our service was about all of the parts of the body working together, so this conflictt really lent itself to our bottom line, where Queen Anna has to come in and do a bit of preaching.

Still, it was great fun seeing the kids scream as Megan kept returning with that big fish, furious at Nerdo and walloping him on the back of the head with it.  Megan's character is named Rona, which is in fact the name of the fish monger in Arendelle.  Daddy read that last week, and sort of ran with it, expanding her character a tiny bit.

Here you can see Chef Florian warning Nerdo not to talk about the fish smell, as Rona has just been with the fish recently, but Nerdo is oblivious.  We made Nerdo a toy shop employee, as nothing in the books could ever match this character.

He's uniquely KidPak, as he's been for many years now.  You can see him above, regretting his words and decisions, somewhat repentant.  It takes a bit to get an apology out of him, but he eventually gets there.

Here he is, crying again from a different angle.  Notice Victoria's costume to the left.  Mommy made that from scratch as well, even painting the flowers on the bottom of the dress, cutting out stencils and working late with the sewing machine.

Another thing that was made was the origami note.  Upon it was a message from Queen Elsa, and a invitation to all to Anna's birthday party.  It's this Friday, a unique service we'll be having at KidPak, one where we'll have Queen Elsa there, as well as Kristoff and a few others.  Anna is seen here looking at the origami bird note that Madison made, a note sent from Elsa that says she's coming soon.

And here's Chef Florian, not quite ready to give away his recipe for his famous Flangendorfers.  We may have to have some Famous Flangendorfers at the party this Friday... if we can figure out what a Flangendorfer even is!

The service went very well this morning, a huge morning for the kids we hope.  Afterwards, we used a gift card this afternoon, one we got for Christmas for a local restaurant.  It was Mommy and Madison's very first visit to Cheddar's, and they enjoyed it.  As per usual, there's so much food there that we wound up taking a lot home with us, and will no doubt be enjoying it again soon.

We got home, and Madison was on the piano for a bit, but on her cell phone just as much, talking with her friends about all kinds of things she hopes we'll never know because she'd be embarrassed!  She did spend some time on her computer studying for a probability test she has tomorrow, and she plans on getting there early to school to study as well.

We watched "Big Hero 6" again tonight, along with some popcorn, and an extra episode from the series with the same name just for good measure. But we were in bed fairly quickly after that.  We read, and said our prayers.  Mommy didn't hear as much of the book at bedtime - she was asleep pretty quickly tonight.  She's earned that rest though - we're proud of Mommy!

Madison Avenue

Mommy spent most of the day sewing at home, and Daddy spent most of the day at the ONE conference, taking pictures of happy couples.  Madison took a bath, played piano, and did some homework.  But one other assignment Madison had was to create a few bits of origami for the skit tomorrow.  At the end of "Frozen 2," Anna sends Elsa a message by "Gale Mail."  The message is written on a piece of paper folded like a bird, one that Madison has been able to recreate, thanks to a little tutorial on the internet.  As of right now, we have our own little Air Force on the table, a small flock of these folded birds, evidence of Madison's mastery over that folding project.  

We had just enough energy and time to watch a movie tonight, and we decided to watch the movie that is responsible for Madison being named what she is today.

This is the scene from the movie "Splash," which we saw tonight.  It wasn't necessarily this movie directly that shifted our decision to name Madison what she is named today.  But this is the movie that brought about the popularity of the name Madison in the first place.  Somewhere along the line, the mermaid character from this movie gives her name, which is impossible for anyone else to say, because they don't speak mermaid.  Also, by saying that name, it apparently breaks glass and television sets.

Anyway, as our main characters walk along the street, it's decided our mermaid needs a new name.  So they go through a list of potential names as they walk, and then they see they're on Madison Avenue.  And it is right there that she decides she likes the name "Madison."  It's argued that "that's not a name, it's a street."  But the mermaid likes the name, and so that becomes her name throughout the movie.

The movie "Splash" became very popular at the time, and one of the results of this was a surge of new babies being named Madison.  The name grew in popularity, and now today it is commonly accepted as a girl's name.  We always liked the name, of course, and that was our final contestant when we were running through options of names.

As for the movie itself, it was fortunately edited somewhat on Disney Plus, but even so, it's amazing how much adult content Disney let into this one.  Of course, it's all under the banner of "Touchstone Pictures," but still, it was one of those movies I didn't know how much was in there.

Nevertheless, we enjoyed the movie, and now Madison has seen the movie that started the whole trend of parents naming their children "Madison."

We were pretty tired tonight.  We did get to read a bit from "Thrawn," and we're almost done with that one.  We read from our devotional, and we said our prayers as well.  It was a busy work day for us, and tomorrow is going to be a huge morning at KidPak.  Mommy has worked very, very hard to make it all a great morning for the kids.

Sew What

Mommy finished the Olaf costume today, which took so much effort on the inside structure.  It was all these pieces of foam, carefully glued together one small section at a time with hot glue and it just became this super time-intensive project.  But it came out well, as you can see below.  We'll be using this costume at our Forsyth County campus this weekend, probably passing it along at the ONE Marriage Conference this weekend, which by the way, Daddy was working his usual spot at.

Taking pictures of hundreds of couples.  If you see this backdrop and a couple posing in front of it, Daddy took that picture.  I took hundreds of these.  The line was from here to Cambridge.  Or Cairo.  Or Coruscant.  Wherever.  It was long.  That's basically my night right there.  And my day tomorrow.

Fortunately, I got home in time to read a little bedtime story to Madison, a happy little tale about a guy who works for the Empire, Commodore Thrawn.  He's not at Admiral yet, but he's getting there.  Currently, he's dealing with an art thief, or at least he's already dealt with that poor individual who thought he could outwit Thrawn.

We ended our day with a Star Wars story, which is funny because that's how we began the day.  We started a few hours later today, due to the potential for ice on the roads and a school delay.  That's why we turned on Disney Plus this morning to watch the very first episode of Clone Wars, season seven.  It was good - all three of us give it six thumbs up!  It felt weird watching that before going to school, but Madison set the alarm for this, and right after watching, it was time to head in to school.  She got there early, which was odd, because early was 9:50 or so.  School starts at 11:00am.  But she loves school, and that's not something I'm going to try and stop.

She had a good day today, getting ready for a test next week on probability.  She's tired of Daddy's jokes about what the odds of her doing well on that test are.  Odds are, Daddy's not done yet.  Probability, in fact, is pretty high!

Gandhi II

Madison has been studying India lately, and part of her studies has been the viewing of "Gandhi," which is a movie I've never seen.  But I have seen this one here:

Or, at least I've seen the trailer!  This of course is "Gandhi II," which is a trailer for a movie within the world of "UHF," that Weird Al classic that we've seen time and again.  Cementing it further into my brain, the audio for this trailer is a part of the "UHF" soundtrack, so I've pretty much got this entire thing memorized, from "Hey, baldie!"  to "Give me a steak, medium rare."

As stated earlier, there is actual studying of India going on, so don't worry about that.  Once Madison is done watching Gandhi, you can be sure I'll be showing her this trailer!

The rain has been the story lately, the relentless onslaught of precipitation that has broken us as a people, a deluge that has pounded us into submission.  The evidence of the amount of rain is there for all to see each time we cross a bridge over Lake Lanier.  The water levels are just about six inches away from being the highest ever recorded, and currently at the second highest level since about fifty years ago.  We have a few bridges that have been replaced recently, and some of those earlier bridges were so low that it appears like the lake could have overtaken them, had they not been replaced.  There's one on Mt. Vernon Road nearby that looks perilously low each time it is crossed.

Anyway, today Mommy was working on fixing our ginormous Olaf costume for quite sometime.  This involved a lot of hot glue and even more patience, but she's nearly done.  We took a good break tonight, and the two of us have been watching "Big Hero 6," the series, although Madison is not watching that one as much.  Which is funny, because the adults are the ones really into the cartoon!  When she sees it herself, she might get into it...  until then, we're at least having a good time.

We found out tonight that Madison goes to school two hours later tomorrow morning.  There is a freeze warning tonight, and although the rain will be done, the ground is so saturated, it was just easier to assume that the roads will be treacherous in the morning for everyone, and go from there.  So we're waiting until things get warmer, and then we're going to school.  The funny thing is the fact that we're setting the alarm clock anyway, that way we don't miss the premiere of season seven of "The Clone Wars."  So there's that!

Madison had taekwondo tonight, and she's almost there to her brown belt, at the twilight of her blue belt here.  She's moving forward quietly and confidently, and kicking people's faces along the way.  She's got these sudden quick strikes, and they have more power than before.  We're definitely super proud of her.  In fact, we're proud of her in many other ways too.  There are people at church that have been complementary of her about her kind spirit.  She's been helping out a lot of our volunteers, a volunteer herself.  But she's been one to be quick to offer her assistance, and it's been nice to hear others brag about her.

So tonight we went to bed a little later.  Of course we read "Thrawn," and Governor Pryce is turning out to be the jerk we all know and love.  Thrawn is such a great character, and it's amazing that we're sitting here reading about an extended universe character that has a whole book series written about him.  He's that fascinating, somewhat of a Sherlock Holmes character from the onset, only one found in a galaxy far, far away.  We read from our devotional too, of course, the one about Vikings.  And we  prayed for those who are sick, which includes many this time of year.  Things will get better, and of course a good night's rest is a start for that.

Grocery Store Management

Madison got a job at Publix today, of course not in reality.  She's not quite old enough for that yet, so to clarify, it was an experience at something called Junior Achievement's Biztown, where she got a job, had a family with one child, and had to work out her own budget, find a home or at least a place to rent, get a car, set aside money for this or that... and basically all the things that Mommy and Daddy are currently doing.  She was a manager at Publix though, and she's doing well there in her job.  When asked if she was ready to take the reigns and responsibilities of being a grown-up, there was a resounding "NO."  I think she's quite content to stay in Neverland just a little bit longer.  But it was fun pretending to be an adult, at least for a few hours today.  The kids loaded the bus and drove over just across 400 there, and found themselves in a magical place where all of the sudden they had to be responsible.  It sounds like a nightmare!

It was a good day though, although a cold one.  A cold and wet one.  Yes, the rain keeps coming.  That's the story of the year so far.  Some day we'll look back on this in wonder.  As for right now, we're all just a big soaked and soggy.  I don't mind the wet so much as the cold - it's been chilly too, which it's supposed to be, of course.  It's February.

Tonight we had a great night at KidPak, one with some fun illustrations about Thor and his Mjolnir.  We were talking about the helmet of salvation, using a Viking Helmet as an illustration on various kids.  We threw wadded up pieces of paper on them with words like "FEAR" and "LONELINESS" on them.  They bounced right off the Helmet of Salvation.  The hammer, of course, is referenced in Proverbs as God's Word, which is like a hammer that smashes the rock to pieces.  It was some great imagery, of course with a lot of Thor thrown in for good measure.  Daddy had the Mjolnir in the class, and gave kids a chance to lift it and see if they were worthy.  Naturally they all were worthy, of course because Jesus made us all worth.  Not because of anything we did, but because of what He did.

Anyway, it was a good night.  Daddy got home just in time for a reading of the devotional, and of "Thrawn," and some prayers.  And then it was time for a bit of sleep.  Daddy's a little under the weather, on and off.  Fortunately, Madison has been doing just fine!  We prayed for those who were sick, and those who needed help, and for everyone else in between.  And then it was time for a good night's rest...

Head Kicks

Here's Madison, Mr. Hamilton and his son Andrew, and of course Daddy - we're posing for the computer after a session of taekwondo.  It was pretty amazing to watch Madison this very day because she was super good with the sparring.   Her high kicks were especially lethal today, and relentless.  She admitted later that she should throw in more punches for variety, but the simple fact was that her kicks were accurate, quick, and a lot stronger than Daddy has seen lately.  You could hear her over all the other sparring couples out there, the impact from each strike.  It was hilarious, and yet slightly intimidating!

We didn't have school today, one last day to sleep in and relax around the house.  Madison did piano today, of course, but a good portion of the day was figuring out her phone, helping Mommy a little, and watching episodes of "Kickin' It" on Disney Plus.  Tonight we were watching a few episodes of "Big Hero 6," which is actually a pretty fun show.  We read tonight, from the devotional, and from this Star Wars book once more.  It's a big one, but we're probably looking at another week and we're done with this.  Daddy can't wait to get back to Narnia, although this book has been pretty good.  Daddy is also reading this Abraham Lincoln book afterwards, and it's nice.

Ugh.  We're still somewhat under the weather.  Daddy has been sleeping in the guest room, just because his nose is stuffy and what happens when you try to sleep and your nose is stuffy?  That's right, you snore.  There's a marriage conference this weekend, and they talk about the usual stuff, but do they ever talk about practical stuff like this?  No sir!  True love is banishing yourself to another room because you know you'll be snoring and you want your wife to have a good night's rest.  Yep.  It's lonely in there, but hopefully this too shall pass.

Anyway, it was a decent day today.  Daddy was at work, and Daddy was doing things like getting the car looked at and getting things caught up with work.  Speaking of which, Mommy was working on costumes today

She's making some of these hats and dresses from scratch, working hard in her sewing room, and creating these costumes for our characters for this series.  We were trying to think of a character name for this one girl in a "Frozen" themed series, and after a great deal of working through actual Norwegian names, there was this sudden memory from the recent movie, and I think the best name for a female character:  Samantha.  If you've seen "Frozen 2," you know what I'm talking about.  Anyway, here below is the script.  I tried to work in actual characters from the "Elsa and Anna" series to make it almost canon to the "Frozen" universe.  For example, Rona is actually a fish monger from the series of books, and she makes her appearance below.  Nerdo, however, is our own obnoxious character here, a rather aggressive and odd KidPak presence that I've worked into the skit below.  Anyway, let's wrap this up here now with the latest skit:

KidPak Adventures:  Northern Lights“Snowflakes”

CUE TRACK:  1 SKYDOME FROZEN

LIGHTS ON

NARRATOR: “The Queen of Arendelle has taken upon herself to meet as many of the people within the land.  Last time, we met Chef Florian, and that was a recipe for a good time for all!  But there are other citizens to meet, and a very important message as you’ll soon discover here at KidPak Adventures:  Northern Lights!”

FLORIAN, KRISTOFF and ANNA enter STAGE RIGHT

ANNA:  “Florian’s Famous Flagendorfers are fabulous!”

KRISTOFF:  “Chef Florian, you’ve got to tell us the top secret recipe!”

FLORIAN:  “Ah!  I’m afraid I can’t.”

KRISTOFF:  “Please?”

FLORIAN:  “I have but three words for you.  Let it go.”

ANNA:  “I see what you did there.”

SAMANTHA ENTERS STAGE RIGHT, carrying a BIRD-NOTE (origami note featured in “Frozen 2”)

SAMANTHA:  (handing note to ANNA) “Your highness!  I have a message from your sister!”

ANNA:  (opening note) “It’s from Elsa!  (to KRISTOFF) She must have sent this by Gale Mail. (reading the note)  Olaf and Sven got lost in the woods, but they eventually made it here safely. Honeymaren and Ryder are with them now, having a great time.  I’m planning on coming to see you  very soon.  Can’t wait!  (looking up, confused) Wait, what?”

SAMANTHA:  (to ANNA) “Your sister is coming by for a visit!”

KRISTOFF:  (to ANNA) “You didn’t think she’d miss out on your birthday, did you?”

FLORIAN:  “This calls for a celebration!  We will have free Florian’s Famous Flagendorfers for folks far and wide!”

NERDO:  (entering STAGE LEFT) “Wait!  Did I hear it’s your birthday, your highness!?  It’s time for a party!”

ANNA:  “Oh, hello there.”

KRISTOFF:  (to ANNA) “This… is Nerdo.  He works in the local toy shop here in town.”

NERDO:  “Yes sir! And for this celebration, we’ll need to have ketchup for everyone!  And I’ll make little wooden people, and little wooden boats too.”

SAMANTHA:  “Um… what do you need wooden boats for?”

NERDO:  (impatiently) “To deliver the ketchup to keep all the little wooden people happy!  Duh!”

KRISTOFF:  “I have no idea what he’s talking about.”

ANNA:  (to NERDO) “Well, I certainly do appreciate your…uh…enthusiasm…?”

Fortunately, RONA enters and saves ANNA.  The two embrace warmly.

RONA:  (entering STAGE RIGHT, excited) “It’s your birthday?  How wonderful!”

ANNA:  “Rona! It’s so good to see you!”

NERDO:  (to FLORIAN) “Who is that?”

FLORIAN:  (to NERDO, hushed) “That is Rona.  She’s just come back from fishing, but I wouldn’t make any comments about the fish smell, okay?  She doesn’t react kindly to that.”

ANNA:  (to RONA) “Hello Rona.  You remember Chef Florian here, and this is… (gesturing to NERDO)…”

NERDO:  (to RONA) “Oh my stars, yousmellterrible!  What kind of perfume is that you’re wearing?  Is it called Stinky McToots-alot?”

RONA is shocked

KRISTOFF:  “Rona was just preparing a fish dinner for everyone.  She’s a fishmonger, Nerdo.”

NERDO:  “No, she’s more like a stinkmonger!”

NERDO starts laughing hard.  

RONA:  “How dare you!”

RONA marches off STAGE RIGHT.

SAMANTHA:  “Okay, that’s cold.”

NERDO (moves to CENTER STAGE):  “Don’t look at me.  She’sthe one who thought today was show-and-smell.  I mean, wow, talk about global warming!”

As NERDO talks, RONA returns with an oversized fish. NERDO is facing the audience, so he doesn’t see it when RONA whacks him from behind with it.  

NERDO (falling down):  “Great googly moogly, you hit me with a giant fish!”

RONA:  “I guess you’re finding your dinner somewhere else, you little troll!”

RONA marches off STAGE RIGHT

NERDO:  (rising) “Okay, fine then.  (firing a parting shot)  Smell you later!”

RONA marches right back in STAGE RIGHT and hits NERDO with the large fish again.  He falls back again and looks up at RONA, who is clearly wanting to hit him again.

RONA:  “Say I smell bad one more time.  ONE.  MORE. TIME!”

SMALL PAUSE, as RONA stands over NERDO with a large fish, threatening.

NERDO:  (to RONA) “You stink!”

RONA raises fish to strike a mighty blow upon NERDO, but is stopped by KRISTOFF and FLORIAN.  ANNA tries to mediate.

ANNA:  “What is going on here, you two?”

SAMANTHA:  “I think she was going to hit him with a giant fish.”

ANNA:  (patiently looking back to SAMANTHA)  “Yes. I got that part, Samantha.”

FLORIAN:  “I think what she means is, why are you two fighting?”

NERDO: “Fishmongers smell bad!”

RONA:  “And who needs a toy shop?”

ANNA:  “Would you two just chill?  The truth is we all need bothof you.”

KRISTOFF:  “Nerdo, she only smells like that right now because she was out catching fish for everyone else.”

ANNA:  “One thing I learned about from Elsa… was snow.  All of us?  Well, we’re all like snow that packs together.  Only when we work together can we make something great.  If you don’t work together with others… well, you’re just a big flake!”

NERDO and RONA are affected by ANNA’s words.

FLORIAN:  “Well said, your highness.”

NERDO:  (overly miserable) “But I don’t want to be a big flake!”

SAMANTHA:  “Perhaps you should both apologize to each other.”

NERDO:  “I’m sorry I said you stink.”

RONA:  “I’m sorry I hit you with a giant fish.”

KRISTOFF:  (muttering to ANNA) “Now there’ssomething you don’t hear every day.”

ANNA:  “This queen thing certainly has some odd moments.”

CALVIN:  (entering STAGE RIGHT)  “It’s about to get odder.”  

CAST:  (shock) “Who are you?”

NARRATOR:  “Yes, who is this mysterious rugged stranger?  That’s a big question we’ll certainly answer soon!”

CAST nods at this good news.  All CAST gathers together, actively listening to NARRATOR.

NARRATOR:  “But there’s also something really big about to happen soon.  Kristoff, would you be so kind?”

KRISTOFF suddenly remembers something.  KRISTOFF covers ANNA’s ears.

NARRATOR:  “There’s a big birthday party coming up this Friday, a surprise birthday party for Queen Anna.  And guess what?  Queen Elsa is also going to be here!”

CAST cheers

NARRATOR:  “And because you’re all in Arendelle as well, each one of you is invited!  So join us this Friday at 7pm, right here at this very spot.  After the party, you’ll even have a chance to meet both queens, Kristoff and more.  So be sure to join us then.”

KRISTOFF releases ANNA’s ears!

ANNA:  “Okay, what’s going on?

NARRATOR:  “Until next time, thanks for joining us at KidPak Adventures:  Northern Lights!”

CAST leads ANNA off STAGE RIGHT.

ANNA:  “What’d I miss?”

CAST:  “You’ll see…!” 

FADE LIGHTS

Selfie

Madison took this picture with her iPhone, and liked it so much it is actually the wallpaper image on her phone right now.  I think the thing she keeps commenting on is the changing color of her hair, which goes from blue to brown to black in this image. You can see the lighting has everything to do with that, of course, from outside and from in.

We had a fairly full day today, starting out with a visit to the dentist this morning.  Since Madison was off of school for President's Day, we went to the children's dentist over there on Limestone Parkway, as we've done since forever.  I was happy to see Madison dart over the N64 games there in the waiting room where she immediately starting racing with MarioKart.  As for the dentist trip itself, unfortunately we'll be back in a week:  Madison has a cavity.  We'll have to be more diligent about flossing.  Or something.

Anyway, as soon as the dentist trip was over, we had another appointment in Cumming, one with the chiropractor.  The three of us went over there afterwards, stopping by for some Chick-Fil-A on the way.  We were in and out of there fairly quickly, getting our adjustments and doing our typical Star Wars name game in the waiting room.  Madison wants to play this each time, as if it required for every visit to the chiropractor.  Name a Star Wars character, thing or place that has a name that starts with A.  Everyone takes a turn, and then we name one that starts with a B.  And so on.

For the record:  Quinlan Vos, Qi'ra, and Qui-Gon Jinn.  Xizor, X-Wing and Xander.

Anyway, we did go home after this, and given that it took a bit of time out of our day, there wasn't much of that time left before we had to turn around and go to piano class.  Madison played piano at home a bit, but then she was surfing online and reading for a bit. She's been reading one of her Christmas gifts, a Star Wars book, "Lost Stars."  And yes, she's read that before.  But she enjoyed it so much that she read it again, and has been obsessed with turning the next page, and the one after that.

Meanwhile, Daddy has been reading this book, "These Honored Dead," which I began on Lincoln's birthday, oddly enough.  It's been a decent read, although I'm not hooked enough to read the entire series.  I'll certainly want to finish this one though, as there's a bit of a mystery here, one where Lincoln himself will show up a bit more.

Tonight we revisited a movie before bedtime, "Frozen."  Yeah, we've seen it twenty-seven times or so, but it's been a while, and truthfully it's a great movie, having put some distance between the years this thing was a phenomena, and now when it's almost like seeing a movie for the first time.  We'll say it's "like seeing a movie for the first time again."  That's a cliche, yes.

We read from "Thrawn" tonight, and we said our prayers.  Our friend, the pastor and taekwondo instructor, got some bad news about his mother tonight, so we were praying for her.  And also for our nation in this upcoming year, and for all those people sick with this virus from China that seems to have captivated the news.  We read our devotional, and we got to bed - a little later, but that's okay.  Madison has off of school tomorrow, and we can sleep in a little.  A little.

The Return of Chef Florian

How nice today's service turned out to be!  Sometimes we just go all-out wacky on stage, and sometimes we visit another world on stage, a place that isn't necessarily wacky so much.  We want to keep that magic around, and that's what happened on stage this morning - we had Anna and Kristoff, and Isaac and Dawn did such a great job portraying these characters on stage.

Mommy did a fantastic job with the costuming - they look marvelous!  The script was performed spot on in the first service, done with such love and reverence for the characters.  This was showing love and respect of the audience, who is still enthralled with all the characters of the "Frozen" movies.  The addition, as you read yesterday in the script, was a character from the books, Chef Florian.

Here he is, holding the hammer that's been handed to him - he has no idea right now what to do with it.  Of course, we learned this morning that the hammer is merely a reminder to him that God's Word is like a hammer, and that when we are unsure of the future or of anything, we just look to God's Word.  Then we see that God is with us, all the time, and He has a great plan and a future for us.  Chef Florian goes from being worried about his bakery to feeling more confident, and along the way there were a few laughs as well.  It wasn't as mad-cap as other skits can be, but it was just a pleasant sort of morning.  The hammer, of course, is the Mjolnir, although we didn't identify it as that in the skit.  Later on, Pastor Lance hoists up the Mjolnir and we began to talk about how powerful God's Word can be.  It is indeed like a hammer, as described in Jeremiah 23:29.

“My message is like fire,” announces the Lord. “It is like a hammer that breaks a rock in pieces.”

We even showed a few clips from the first two "Thor" movies to help illustrate this point.  Our Bible story was from the fourth chapter of Luke, when Jesus was tempted by the devil in the wilderness.  Of course, Jesus used the Word to crush his opponent to pieces.

Earlier in the service, we had our dragon races - along with the extended worship set we had, this morning was a huge and impactful day.  We had a great service!

The rest of the day was relaxing, this given that Mommy and Daddy are still - still - recovering.  I believe we'll be just fine by this time tomorrow.  Madison did some piano this afternoon, and all of us stopped to watch the President take the first lap of the Daytona 500, which was fun to watch.  Madison and Daddy took a lap on that track less than five months ago.

Tonight we watched some episodes of the television series "Big Hero 6," which actually were pretty fun.  I think we got three episodes in, and have determined that we're watching the rest of the series now.  We're all still a bit under the weather, at least Mommy and Daddy are.  The events of the morning are big in many ways, and these sort of wear the energy down anyway.  So it stands to reason that we were in bed early tonight, after reading some "Thrawn," and our devotional, and praying.  Daddy slept in the guest bedroom, as he's done the last few nights:  stuffy noses mean more snoring, and I was hoping Mommy can sleep well tonight.

Anyway, it was a decent day today.  Rain is here somewhat, and more rain is on the way.  Some of the campaign signs are actually halfway submerged in pools or places where the lake has elevated.  The dams can't release any of the water from Lake Lanier or Lake Allatoona yet.  The latter is actually about eight feet above pool.  Lake Lanier is around five feet above pool.  That is a lot of extra water just waiting to go downstream.  To think that Florida and Alabama were fighting over that water the last decade or so.  And yes, they'll be fighting over it again someday.  But now everyone is concerned about this quantity of water, only because there is a lot more expected in the coming week.  We're soaked!