Bigger Than Jesus

A long time ago D & I were in the car together and out of the blue she started singing "Hello, hello. I don't know why you say good-bye I say hello," over and over again. Then while Stef was here after Wesman was born I introduced her to "Yellow Submarine." That was a mistake on my part and we were serenaded with an unending chorus of "We all live in a yellow submarine, a yellow submarine, a yellow submarine. We all live in a yellow submarine, a yellow submarine, a yellow submarine," for the next six days

The other night I'm reading D a story from kids Bible and it was about the disciples. The story listed a few of their names; Peter, James, John, Timothy and Andrew. At the end of the story there are always a few questions to recap. One question was, can you name some of the disciples?

Her answer: Paul (not sure how she knows about him. I'll give her part points), John, (pause) George ...

I stopped her before she could get to Ringo.

New Van

We've been driving a Neon for the last 5 years. Not a big deal with just the two of us, a little tight with three of us and virtually impossible with four. So I started looking a little while back for used cars. The top three contenders were the Jetta Wagon TDI, the Honda CR-V & the Honda Odyssey. I found one of each that were close in price and mileage. The Jetta was the highest mileage, but being TDI was really just broken in. The CR-V was the most expensive, but a really great model with tons of features. The Odyssey was the oldest, but offered tons more room then either of the other two. So it came down to numbers and the Odyssey won.

We are paying $120/month LESS than the Neon and $200/year LESS in insurance. That's a savings of around $1600/year. The Odyssey is listed as using about $1400/year in gas, which is a lot and is certainly more than the Neon. But with the lower payments and lower insurance, we still come out ahead of the Neon, because the Neon used about $980/year in gas. So based on these estimates, we $1200 ahead of ourselves.

What also couldn't be overlooked was the enormous amount of room the Odyssey offered. It seats seven while the Jetta and CR-V each seat five (like the Neon). While the Jetta and CR-V would solve our storage issues for travel, neither would help us get more people into the vehicle. So although we have more room, both the Jetta and CR-V would be full. The Odyssey will comfortably take another two adults in the back bench. I'm sure Stef will be among the first to thank us for that...

Stoopid Leg

So I had been running every second day. Starting slowly, not in a rush, running easy, building gradually. Following all the rules for not getting injured (again in my case). Then Friday I started out and got a whole 48 seconds before an all to familiar feeling came in to my lower left leg. Pain.

So I stopped and walked home. Freaked Sue out coming home so quickly, but I won't risk going through another stress fracture. That being said, if running lightly brings back the pain, what kind of running won't? My answer is none. I'm not running anymore for a long time. I may take it with my doc, but that was a big waste last time. I'll continue to wait until the leg feels 100% again. In the meantime, I'm breaking out the old rowing machine for my cardio.

Twenty-five solid minutes of rowing gets me nicely into my fat burning zone and gives me some decent resistance training as well. I've also thrown in an intense ab work out for after the cardio. Hopefully this will burn off the ten pounds that creeped back on during the summer.

Wobbly

Warning this is a little more risque than usual.

So I'm putting Darcy down for her nap today and she comes out with this bit of advice for me.

D: I don't have a wobbly thing on my bum. My boy friends at Betty-Ann's do, Justin and Branden. And Wes has a wobbly thing. I don't have a wobbly thing. They have wobbly things, to tickle them. But I don't.
N: That's right, boys are different than girls.

I didn't laugh once while I was in the room. But I haven't stopped since.

Family of Four

Well today was the first day we spent as a family of four. No guests, no visitors, no extra help. It will be yet another adjustment for us to make, but I'm sure eventually we'll get our own laundry done again.

My sister, Stef, had been here for the last two weeks. Where did those days go? She was an enormous help and I'm not sure who's saddest to see her go, me & Sue or Darcy. She is definitely my best sister. But Marc might be a close second, if you ask her.

THANKS STEF!!!