Posted on July 5, 2009 by margo
deacon has a july 4th hangover. we spent friday and saturday in yoakum and seadrift with clayton’s family. deacon had so much fun that he is sick now. he played non-stop the past two days and this morning all the partying caught up with him.
this morning he seemed ok…he woke me up as usual and we got our morning snack. the minute i picked him up though, i could feel he was on fire. i think he is sunburned on his head, shoulders and chest/back. at first i was going to keep him home with me, but deacon went to church with clayton. then clayton texted me around 10:45 to tell me that deacon was lying down on the floor in the nursery and then fell asleep for 30 minutes. this never happens!!!!
deacon walked in and went straight to the living room floor and laid down. he hasn’t really moved a lot since then. we gave him some tylenol and water and he is just relaxing.
here is the fun:
deacon and cousin blaze playing.
victoria zoo.
his shirt says ‘mom’s little sparkler’
we saw the ocean. (technically, san antonio bay, but we called it the ocean)
so, when i say clayton’s family…here they are (this is not all of them!). of course, deacon is not looking at the camera. he was laughing at pawpaw sticking his tongue out!
here is deacon with a sparkler. he didn’t enjoy the fireworks. he kept saying “fireman, fireman!” he is going to be quite a rule-follower!
Filed under: deacon, family, pics | Tagged: family, holiday, pictures | Leave a Comment »
Posted on July 4, 2009 by margo
ok, many people (just two) have already asked about the pool incident. i have some fun pics of the fourth of july, but i must post this one first.
scene: our apartment pool. two families are already there. one hispanic, one african-american, many children in the pool.
we walk in. one of the little african-american girls yells loudly, “why is that black baby with them?”. i pretend i don’t hear it. she yells the same thing again, “why is that black baby with those people?”. i make a split second decision. i ignore it.
right after that the mother yells at this child to stop saying that and the child’s older sister yells back, “you’re a black baby!”
but you read me right, i ignored it. because sometimes, just sometimes, i don’t want to be the educator-advocate-open book. i don’t want to be the poster child for the multicultural new definition of family. sometimes, i want parents to tell their kids to shut it.
95% of the time, i love to talk to everyone and their mom about diversity and multiculturalism and tell our story. and then 5% of the time, i ignore it.
had the little girl asked me a direct question later on when we were swimming around in the pool, i of course would have given her age-appropriate answers.
i’m not setting out to be rude, i’m just saying that sometimes it’s ok to not explain ourselves. a little mystery never hurt anyone.
and what is more mysterious than a run dmc shirt on top, and sparkly grandma’s flip flops on the bottom???
Filed under: Adoption, random bits | Tagged: family, multiculturalism, race | Leave a Comment »
Posted on July 1, 2009 by margo
sometimes there is nothing to blog about. other times i have 3 things pop into my head within 2 hours! today was one of the busy afternoons.
first, due to intense heat outside i went by our local craft store and bought some paints, watercolors and paper so we can have some fun inside. i think art education is one of the most important things you can introduce to a child. i worked for a year at a fine arts preschool. that was the most fun ever. kids are natural artist. when people say, think outside the box (to try and generate new ideas), kids don’t have that box at all, so creativity pours out of them. unless you’ve shushed or stifled that creativity.
at the preschool i worked for in fort worth, toddlers were self-contained and 3-5 year olds rotated through 4 classrooms in 3 hours. The classrooms were: music, creative play, art and science/reading/math. children were read at least 4-5 books a day through the different classrooms.
this was not a coloring pages type place. to this day, i hate coloring pages. why give a child lines? let them create what they are going to create. this was the philosophy in every classroom. i was amazed every day at the pride young preschoolers took in their work and even more amazed that they could create these things without much help from me.
practical applications for young children:
- give them blank paper and something to draw, paint, color, cut, glue with and let them go. give them an instrument and see what they do with it. give them some old clothes and hats and see who they become.
- do not give vague opinions like “that is pretty” or “good job”. give specific feedback like “i like the blue paint you used” or “that reminds me of a sunset” or “you must feel so proud of that painting you did”.
- better yet, don’t judge the work at all, ask questions…”why did you choose orange?” or “did you make that song up all by yourself?”
- never assume you know what that picture is supposed to be. don’t ask what it is supposed to be. this is just one way that we as adults strive to classify everything inside our box. maybe squiggles are just squiggles and when you ask that question a child is going to start to think everything has to be something.
here is some of deacon’s work:
dry-erase marker on white board
early spring 2009
watercolor on paper
july 1 2009
in this next picture you can see that he learned a new technique after the above picture. he realized that he could use his fingers in the watercolors. that is where the fingerprints came from. he also explored the darker colors in this picture.
watercolor on paper
july 1 2009
hmmm…the painting below is $900.00….maybe i should get deacon a beret and a smock!
coming up next on meetthefaulkners.com…why i don’t let deacon wear floaties and what we did when the little girl at the pool yelled “why is that black baby with them?”
Filed under: art, deacon | Tagged: art, deacon, education | 1 Comment »
Posted on June 27, 2009 by margo
today we went to yoakum to attend the 40th anniversary party for clayton’s parents. we had so much fun!!! here are the pics!
Filed under: family, pics | Tagged: family, pics | 1 Comment »
Posted on June 26, 2009 by margo
my child is made of 100% sugar. he is the sweetest thing ever! and he is continually cracking me up. today i brought him a deacon-sized guitar (or ukulele) from my mom’s house. he carried it around our apartment for the past 3 hours. he carried the ukulele and the case separately, but carried them both everywhere he went.
he made clayton get the big guitar so they could play together.
i was in our bedroom, in bed, studying for my ppr exam tomorrow and he would come in with the ukulele and the case and say ‘good morning’ (even though it was 8pm) because that’s what we say when you greet someone in a bed!
then as he was leaving he would say ‘bye’ and ‘i lo you’ (which is i love you) and go back out to the den to play with clayton.
3 minutes later, in he would come with the case and ukulele. he repeated this process over and over.
another funny thing he does is shut every open door in our apartment. any door that is open gets shut immediately by him. bathroom, laundry, bedroom doors all must stay shut. it is a little ocd but i’m not too worried about it (yet).
also, today while watching dora the explorer, he told swiper to go to time out. ‘not nice, swiper. time out!’ were his exact words. what is funny is that he rarely goes into time out. re-direction works like a charm on this kid. i can pretty much nip any fit in the bud with a question like, ‘do you want to help me with play-doh?’ or ‘where should we play bubbles?’ now that deacon can play games on my iphone that is how we re-direct when we are at restaurants.
this picture just makes me laugh because i didn’t realize that you play guitar better when wearing your fake crocs, but deacon said it helps.
in other news, we were cleaning out my mom’s house that she is getting ready to sell and we found 4 rolls of undeveloped film…do they still develop film? it is going to be fun to see what is on these rolls after all these years if the film hasn’t disintegrated.
what fun stuff did you do today?
Filed under: family, pics | Tagged: deacon, guitar, pics | Leave a Comment »
Posted on June 24, 2009 by margo
i stumbled upon some statistics from this blog. i clicked on the post because i thought it would be about why i should read my bible more…ooops. there is no devotional here, but the statistics did convict me that i do not spend enough time in the word.
Here are a few statistics:
* 93% of Americans have a Bible.1
* Only half of Americans can even name one of the Gospels.1
* The majority of Americans don’t know that Genesis is the first book of the Bible.1
* 60% of evangelicals think Jesus was born in Jerusalem rather than Bethlehem.1
* 22% of high school students think Moses was one of Jesus’ disciples.1
* Half of High School seniors think Sodom and Gomorrah were a married couple.1
* 1 in 10 Americans believe that Joan of Arc was Noah’s wife.1
* 60% of Americans can’t name 5 of the ten commandments.1
* Given thirteen basic teachings from the Bible, only 1% of adult believers embraced all thirteen as being biblical perspectives.2
* One-third of college attending Christians could not put the following in order: Abraham, the Old Testament prophets, the death of Christ, and Pentecost.3
* One-third could also not identify Matthew as an apostle from a list of New Testament names.3
Many Americans continue to believe that a Jewish man from 2,000 years ago was God’s son … simply because someone told them so when they were a child. This is the equivalent to believing in Santa Claus as an adult. If you choose to worship Jesus every Sunday, at least take the time to read the book about him. Otherwise you’re nothing more than a lemming.
[1] Various sources listed in this Politics Daily article, “Why a Real ‘Year of the Bible’ Would Horrify Its Sponsors“
[2] Barna Research Online, “Discipleship Insights Revealed in New Book by George Barna.”
[3] Gary M. Burge, “The Greatest Story Never Read: Recovering biblical literacy in the church.”
yikes…i don’t want to be a lemming. i don’t even know what a lemming is, but it does not sound flattering!
Filed under: church, confessional, worship | Tagged: bible, christianity, lemming | Leave a Comment »
Posted on June 23, 2009 by margo
ziza in deacon is pizza in english. pizza is what clayton and deacon made for dinner tonight. i captured the fun for all to see…
first, a short dissertation on correct pizza making procedures.
next, we spread the sauce. this step is not the most fun and deacon was looking for a way off the counter after about 2 seconds.
next, the most fun part, the cheese!!! deacon enjoyed this part and his attention to detail must be mentioned. every single little shred of cheese had to be on the pizza. not near the pizza, not next to the pizza, but directly on top of the pizza. deacon was thorough.
lastly, the pepperonis were added. deacon enjoyed this because when they had filled the pizza with pepperonis, clayton let deacon eat the rest of the pepperonis that didn’t fit.
our final product before going in the hot-hot oven.
and that is how you make a pizza.
Filed under: deacon, family, pics | Tagged: deacon, family, fun | 1 Comment »
Posted on June 22, 2009 by margo
and we’re back…
so, i thought taking a break from the blogging would be more peaceful. when actually what happened was all the stuff i usually pour out of my brain into this blog started backing up in my head. this caused much frustration. so, i cut the blogbatical short and overhauled the blog. check out all the pages because i updated, added pics, added links and more!
on to new business… first, i am refusing to watch jon and kate + 8. i watched the season premiere but it was so weird and icky that i haven’t seen any more of the new season. i’m resurrecting the ancient art of ignoring the unpleasant. people used to do this all the time (like in the 50’s). life could not have been so neat and tidy as june cleaver made it out to be. there was messy stuff then, but it was understood that people would just ignore it and talk about the weather. so, consider jk+8 ignored. starting now. could it be any hotter in houston???
second item on the agenda is this picture…
i can not look at this picture and not laugh…this is our buddy silas bottomly with deacon. we got to hang out with the bottomlys at an orphan conference that josh presented at down here in sugar land. here we were trying to get some cute pics of them together. silas was much too busy trying to get back to the wii to be sitting around.
deacon has this angelic-eyes-to-heaven-smiley thing going on. i swear i can hear silas saying, ‘what the hell…’ (not that he will ever use such language, it is just what he says in my head)….i love it…
summer plans include, but are not limited to: more teacher training for me, taking the PPR exam this saturday (study hints appreciated!), wedding, anniversary party, a family vacay to Schlitterbahn, much more tv watching (hello, dr. house, i’m talking to you!) and some reading, swimming, scrapbooking and maybe a big party that i’m planning…but more on all of that to come!
thanks for checking out the new and improved meetthefaulkners.com…
Filed under: Adoption, Friends, deacon | Tagged: Adoption, deacon, pictures | 5 Comments »
Posted on May 7, 2009 by margo
everyone did it for lent…(well, if you count ragamuffin soul and flowerdust as everyone). they went dark for lent and didn’t blog or twitter or fbook.
i’m not giving it up for spiritual reasons. i have hit a wall. i know i got a new camera and promised more pictures…but there is just no climbing over this wall where i constantly feel like i have to blog all the time but i don’t know what to say and i feel like i’ve said it all before and i’m actually boring myself.
i’d say i’ll update when we move forward in our adoption stuff…but that process is dragging so slowly i could probably take a 2 month blogbatical and you wouldn’t miss anything adoption related!
so, i am on blogbatical. just the blog though…will keep twittering and fbook and email, so reach me that way if you need me.
so i’m leaving on a jet plane…i don’t know when i’ll be back again. bye-bye wordpress dashboard.
Filed under: blogs | 3 Comments »
Posted on May 2, 2009 by margo
i got a new camera. i’m still learning how to work it. today we went to yoakum to hang out with family. here are some (of the 113 pictures) i took…
cousin blaze, yawning.
deacon was waving a jingly ball to try and play with his sleeping cousin.
deacon gave up on the sleepy baby and remembered his splash pad…
he loves this thing!!! he played on it forever!
look at that face…it is the face of pure sweetness!
his new saying is from dora…’awwww man’…
deacon wasn’t into the family pictures idea…this is one of the only pics he is in where he is not screaming to go play with the dog. and the only reason he is in this picture is because the dog was in it.
another awesome thing at pawpaw and nana’s…deacon’s bike…seriously, look at him here…where is the baby? he is all big boy now!!!
you should go ahead and expect a 800% increase in photos and video from now on…my camera is sweet!!!
ps–do you like that shirt that pawpaw is wearing? it says ‘family’ in amharic. if you want one, you can email or comment me and i can hook you up with one.
Filed under: family, pics | Tagged: deacon, family, pictures | 3 Comments »
