Tag Archives: family

The Art of the Narrative

I just bought the most expensive iPhone application since I began using my iPod touch. $9.99 doesn’t sound like much, but for an iPhone application, that’s a premium.

Allow me to explain how this happened.

When I was a kid, once or twice—or perhaps if I was lucky, three times—per year, my dad would round everyone up in the car and we’d go for a little drive. Sometimes, he’d even invite his old college buddies (who were basically like family to me) to come along. The drive wasn’t always the same route, and we didn’t always need to take the drive at the same time, but the destination was always Michigan and Trumbull.

Tiger Stadium.

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Back Home—Home Always Feels Nice

We’re back in St. Louis after a day trip up to see Amanda’s mother and visit with her while she recovers from surgery. The good news is that it looks as though she is doing much better than even yesterday, but we still do not know when she will be able to leave the hospital.

Amanda and I thank you for your prayers and wishes for her recovery and for our safe travels. Thankfully, the children made the trip with a minimum of fussing. They really were very well-behaved in response to our asking them to bear over twelve hours in the car.

Tomorrow is a day for getting some web work completed and also for relaxation.

First Responsibilities

The family and I are packing up this morning and leaving for the day to make the trip north to Chicago to visit Amanda’s mother.

She continues to be hospitalized in intensive care due to complications following normally routine surgery. The situation appears to be more serious than we had first understood.

We would appreciate your prayers both for safe travel and for her continued recovery.

Photo Album: 桜

Last year, we planted a flowering cherry tree in our front yard. By the time we bought it, it had already flowered for the year. This is the first year we’ve been able to see it in bloom. The 桜 (sakura) appear in bunches of three on the branches. It’s not overly impressive yet, but I imagine as it matures, it will become very impressive to see.

As we are scheduled for some rough weather in the next couple of days, I decided to take some pictures now while the blossoms were still in one piece. I hope to take some pictures a little later after more of the buds have properly opened.

Perhaps we’ll grab a picnic blanket and lunch and celebrate 花見 (hanami). It’s nice to have a fun connection—however tenuous—both to our nation’s capital and to friends who live quite far away.

It’s an Endurance Test: How Long Can I Go Without Sleep?

It was bound to happen sooner or later. For the first real time in the history of this household, a round of sickness is washing throughout the entire family. Joshua started the madness last week Wednesday, and it seems as though he tried to close the circle last night with another round.

The youngest two have so far been unaffected, but the delay in appearance from the first child getting sick to the second (three full days) has the entire house just waiting to see what happens. Amanda finally got hit with it all day yesterday, and I called off today because I was certain it was headed in my direction next.

Thankfully, I haven’t been hit by it so far, and I seem to feel all right, even though I’m almost certain it’s just a matter of time before I’m in the same boat. In any case, Amanda certainly needed my help cleaning up after the “event” and tending to the children in their respective cases—which usually means forcing them to sit still and take it easy while they recuperate from being sick.

None of them actually want to remain still and just be sick.