Wyatt and His Snake-Wrangling Ways

Wyatt never ceases to amaze me. He has one of the most loving hearts of any man I've ever met, he's demonstrated such character that he is already a deacon at our church at a young age, he's always willing to help, and he can smile like a champion as he's holding a snake in his hands. He and I found the snake when we were picking up leaves at the Harshman's. To be exact, I was holding the bag and Wyatt was putting the leaves in the bag when he noticed one of the leaves was showing a little more kinetic energy than it should have. A hop, skip, and a jump later he picked the snake up to find it a new home so we could finish our chore.


Here's the crew that helped out on Harshman Help Day. As you can tell from the smiles it was a lot of fun. It was great to see so many people able to help the Harshman's get ready for their new baby on the way! It was the perfect temperature and a little wet. So for a guy like me it was tons of fun playing in the mud. If you notice, Wyatt's pants were a little dirty from a multi-man job of removing a tree stump in the front yard. Also, Adam got to put his new Expedition to use on the job. The rest of the outside clean up included killing plant life, setting fire to old plant life, and using my truck for hauling off more plantlife to the city compost. The moral of the story is everyone needs a truck, or at least needs to know someone who has one. There is something so primal and fun about hauling stuff around in the open air. It's a rush. Who needs drugs when you got trucks and yard waste?

On the way home I still had the tree stump and about a wheel barrow full of walnuts. Fortunately, there were signs posted on the way directing me to a place that was buying walnuts. It was a short 2 or 3 mile winding road into "the country" and ended at a barn with a sign directing me to the back. I pulled in and was third in line. In front of me was a man and his wife dropping off their truckload of walnuts. They were very tan for it being November and them being in their 60's or older. Her hair was exceptionally blond for her age as well. For some reason their appearance just contrasted with the surrounding. There was a walnut hauler (I think that's what it's called) grinding away with all the belts exposed, the sky was grey and the air was misty. A brown horse was casually chewing on some hay. It was cool enough to be comfortable if you kept moving a little and there was an old farmhouse and barn enveloping the walnut hauler. A dad and his probably 16 and 8 year old sons were doing the job of unloading the walnuts from the tan couple's truck. They were fit like you'd expect from a hardworking farm family and they all wore overalls. It was a refreshing site. Anyway, I finally pulled up and had them unload the walnuts. The 16 year old remarked "I'm not sure that's going to fit" when he saw the tree stump. The dad said I could drive out into his field and throw it in his dead tree pile. What a bonus! Driving in a field! So when I got back after unloading the tree stump the 8 year old came running up with a $5 bill in his hand. I leaned out the window and said, "Keep it. Thanks for letting me dump the stump." (Or something like that without the rhyme.) And it was funny because he had that expression on his face like you see on "Dennis the Menace" and he was thinking "Gee, Mister. That sure is swell."

After that Carlye got home from our friend Lena's baby shower. She had a super time and it was supper time. My mom, dad and grandpa came over to celebrate my mom's birthday. We had some delicious homemade mac-and-cheese, which is a Provard specialty, and had some birthday cake, too, as we watched the Cards win! What a day!

My thanks today is to my mom. She's the one that made sure I grew up in a church and thus helped introduce me to my Savior. There's no way to describe the kind of gift that is and I hope she knows just how grateful I am. She's been a comfort when I've gone through rough times in my life. She's listened when I've doubted myself and reassured me that she had confidence in my overcoming whatever challenge I was facing. She's generous of her time and would completely exhaust herself to help any of her kids or grandkids. She strives to know Christ better. She tolerates physical pain that is beyond my comprehension. She is funny and witty. She does this thing where she bounces her hands like a maestro when she listens to a song that she likes. She is many wonderful things, but above all she is my mother and I love her. Thanks, mom.

Guys and High-Fives... Why?

What a beautiful group of friends and followers of Christ. This picture was taken a week ago and unfortunately due to my lack of memory I forgot to take the picture until after Adam and Wyatt had already left. Sorry guys. I can't say how happy I am to have met such wonderful people at my church! The picture is of our Thursday night Financial Fun group. It's a group of God-fearing folk talking about financial issues that are a part of life and how to deal with those issues inside of a marriage and what the Bible has to teach about all of it. I'm sad to say next week is our last week. It has been so much fun and great fellowship and my wife and I have truly grown together each week as we discussed everything we learned at the end of the night. Thanks especially to everyone for pitching in by bringing food, leading discussion, and just being a part of the discussion. It's always comforting to hear that you're not alone in dealing with challenges. My prayer is that everyone who participated was able to open up just a little bit more in their communication with their spouse on such potentially volatile issues and also identify ways to live properly in their relationship with money.

Tonight's session was exceptionally fun. The Bryant's were awesome as usual. They are blessed teachers and great guides on the path toward living a fulfilling marriage. I can honestly say that Jeff's teaching to the guys really opened my eyes to how much more I should be striving to honor my wife and appreciate her natural inclinations that sometimes seem so foreign to me. Also, we had some amazing food. Carlye makes some amazing chili, thanks to her skill and a her mom's recipe. Dana, the SUPER CHEF, made some tasty cornbread muffins. And then we had some dessert. And wow did we have some dessert. Brownies, cheesecake, cookies, and chocolate cake. Yum. In fact, I just polished off my third piece of cake before I started writing this. And, finally, some of the guys stayed to watch the cardinals play an absolutely awesome 7th game of the NLCS. Did I say play? I mean win. They won and in dramatic fashion. Part of it had to do with Todd's Fantastic Four shirt and the other part had to do with my Superman hat. Wyatt and Adam are witness to those two things pretty much winning the game tonight. And the girls that stayed seemed to have their own good time in the other room.

Well, that was the night. It has been a week since my last post. I have to thank Moose for prodding me to keep up. It's been a pretty busy week. I'd go over what happened, but at the moment I can't remember exactly what happened, although I'm sure there was some pretty cool stuff. If I do remember I'll let you know.

As to exercise...well I really don't want to say, but it has been a week and 2 days since I've done anything. I think that's right anyway.

And, finally, aren't the Sinnokrak's the cutest couple ever? Like totally.

Oh, and does everyone know what a pee-pee teepee is? The answer will be in my next post...if I remember.

My First Blog Pictures!

Here's a couple pitchers (that's how it is said in Cabool and most of the towns I grew up in :) from our trip this past weekend. I'm learning how to add pictures so I hope Todd and Paige are cool with me putting these on here. Of course, it only took me 14 hours to figure out how to put these on my blog so don't be too worried about me putting YOUR picture on here. Anyway, this is in the car on the way back. I forget how fast Todd was driving when we took the picture?

Catching Up Or Shall I Say Ketchup? Did You Mean Catsup?

It has been a few days since my last post. Here's a not-so-quick recap of what has happened since.

Last Tuesday I moved my dad back to his house with Kyle's help. Then, my buddy Erik from Portland came in to stay overnight last Wednesday night. That was tons of fun since I hadn't seen him in about a year. I got to eat at Buffalo Wild Wings for the first time in 3 months. That is one of my favorite restaurants in town. Then, last Thursday we had the first "Financial Fun Thursday" at our house. That was tons of fun, too. Our Sunday school class is full of awesome couples. Of course, if you're reading this and not in our Sunday school class, you are invited as well. Just ask me about it. Then on Saturday Carlye and I had the privledge of seeing Cabool with two of the coolest cats this side of the Mississipi, Todd and Paige Ferguson. We went to Paige's extended family pig roast and they had some kickin' food. Awesome desserts. I think I had about a dozen chocolate covered pretzels, a piece of carrot cake, 2 pieces of apple pie, 2 different kinds of brownies, and that was just dessert. (By the way, that's the first time I've ever referred to people as cats, because, generally speaking, cats cause me to have a runny nose and itchy eyes and that's not cool.) Monday and Tuesday I cleaned the reeds/cattails out of our pond. I was told by the previous owner to do this before the first frost and we are expecting our first frost either tonight or tomorrow night, I forget. Also, I got to hang with Kyle for a couple hours yesterday and he's quite the business minded guy. I admire him for his tenacity and prayerfulness. Also, last night Carlye and I hung out with Wyatt and Christina. We heard some pretty crazy stories about Wyatt's trip to Africa. I mean crazy. It was supercool listening to what he experienced. If you don't know the stories you need to ask about them.

So that was my week of non-blogging. It seemed everytime I sat down to blog I was just worn out and couldn't put a cohesive thought together. But, today I decided I would take 15 minutes to catch up.

My exercise routine has been unroutined this last week. Since Tuesday of last week I have not ran once. Monday and Tuesday I did do my crunches and curls. Today I plan to add the pushups and then start running again tomorrow. I need your prayers on this one. I've been very busy this last week and haven't made running a priority and now the momentum has slowed. So we'll see what happens.

Today my thank you is to my Sunday school class. Carlye and I are building some great relationships with several couples in the class. When we first got married we were told by several couples that had been married for 25+ years that it was very important to find a group of God-fearing couples to build strong friendships with (ah, the preposition at the end of a sentence, it's a thing of beauty, eh, Paige?). I pray all the time that God gives our class the strength to stay and grow in friendship together. Carlye and I are frequently motivated to do better in our marriage because of the loving God-led relationships we see in other couples in our class. So, before I ramble on too long, thank you to all of you who make an effort to be active participants in our Sunday school class and the relationships that extend outside into other days of the week. You are a great encouragement in our lives. You are a group of amazing people and we are praying for all of you.

Also, thank you Dana and Todd for your attempted-anonymous gift. You are some kickin' rad buddies and right now I'm pouring a little of my apple juice on the carpet in your honor.

And finally, it's official, Carlye's mom and dad are coming to town November 10-13. We're so excited to see them again. In fact, "I'm so excited I just can't hide it. I'm about to lose control and I think I like it... I like it."

Adam the Wordsmith

Exercise report: 2 miles / 100 crunches / 100 curls / 75 push-ups

I've got nothing to say other than Adam's blog today had me laughing for a long, long time. Mad props to you, Adam. (Haha! Do you get it? Mad props!)

Mr. End-My-Sentences-With-A-Preposition Man Vs. Run-On-Sentence Boy

Exercise Report: 4 miles / 100 crunches / 100 curls / 50 push-ups.

My sister-in-law Kelly celebrated her birthday today. Also, my sister-in-law Kate's mom celebrated her birthday, too. Happy birthday to them!!!

In just a couple months, December 6th to be exact (which on a side note happens to be my brother Eric's 32nd birthday and if that isn't weird then you should know all three of his kids are born on March 14th. If that isn't weird, then you're hard to please) I'm going to be celebrating my 30th birthday. 30 years. I can't believe it. I remember thinking 30 was old when I was 18 and in my first year of college. At that age I thought I could practically live another whole life before getting to 30. Well, now I realize I lived that whole other life...and it passed in the blink of an eye. (I dig cliches.) At 29 approaching 30, I'm much more cogniscent of how quickly life moves. However, there has been so much joy and pain in the last 11 years. I add pain, because I'm a big believer in the joy that comes from suffering. Not that I'm sadistic, but a little trial and suffering, or however much God allows, helps me keep perspective on the good things that I am given.

Two years ago, when I went to Nicaragua to help some dentists with the Rainbow Network (www.rainbownetwork.org), I remember seeing women sweeping their houses and yards with a broom. Of course, the house and the yard was dirt. No grass, just dirt and that's how they wanted it. Because of the lack of available medicine and doctors, having grass was a matter of life and death. With grass came chiggers, spiders, misquitos and other insects we take for granted here, but there could cause death from infections or viruses that we can easily treat here in the US. And because of the poverty there was no chance of mowing so unless the grass was cut by hand it would grow to attract other things like snakes and rodents that carry disease.

I've had some serious bouts of poison ivy in the last 15 years. Sometimes with my whole body covered in infected blisters (I hope you're not eating) with puss oozing constantly and the itching a level of torment I can only imagine belongs somewhere evil. It was during those times that I prayed the hardest for God's protection and relief. It was during those times that I realized how much I had taken my good health for granted. Anyway, you get the point. I've enjoyed the good and the bad that I've been given over the last 29 years. Sometimes I couldn't understand why something was happening only to recognize the lesson a little while down the road. The good speaks for itself. I have an amazing wife with a baby on the way, a wonderful family, and a group of friends that I'm constantly thanking God for. (From now on just call me Mr. End-My-Sentences-With-A-Preposition Man. It's a superpower beyond my control.)

Over the last 11 years I have met many incredible friends. I want to say thank you to 2 of those friends tonight. I met both of them 11 years ago during my first year of college. Alan and Chris are almost as close to me as brothers. We've had a level of committment and trust in one another that I've only known family to have. We've done so much together I won't even begin to make a list (to sum it up we survived Amway together, travelling 20+ hours straight together in a car and living nearly 3 hours apart for the last 8 years). My thanks is simple to them, because if they are reading this, after 11 years I pray they know how much I value their friendship. Thanks for being constant friends and 2 guys I know I will be able to lean on for decades to come!

Remembering Koi

Memory is something special. Could you imagine life without memory?

That occured to me tonight as I was talking to my wife on the way home from Starbucks. Our 2nd and 3rd "dates" (I use quotation marks because she doesn't think they were dates, just friends hanging out) were at the same Starbucks we went to tonight. As usual, she remembered exactly what I had to drink even though it's been over 2 years! I remembered being there and some of the conversation. However, generally speaking, I don't remember much. My wife can verify that. (By the way, Carlye, if you read this, please forgive me if I remembered incorrectly that they were the 2nd and 3rd dates.)

It's a strange thing. There is so much I don't remember. Sometimes I am amazed by the things I don't remember. I would go into detail, but I don't remember what I didn't remember. I just know it is frequent. My point is that when I do remember things I feel a sense of accomplishment. Then, once I do remember what I was trying to remember, I am filled with all the interconnected memories my mind has linked to that one memory. It's an explosion of thought in my mind. The emotions, the smells, the sounds, everything floods back. I'm not sure what my point was in writing this other than to point out how interractive and sensual memory is and to remember to treasure it.

Now let me talk about koi. The fish. I'm assuming you were thinking koi meant something other than a type of fish. I don't know what that something would have been, but I want to be certain we have an understanding of what I'm about to discuss.

My wife and I have koi. I think there may be 5 or 6 of them. I feed them every other day. I add more water to their pond every other day. I clean the pond filter every other day. I clean the dead plants from the pond once a week. I do so much for these koi. It seems like a lot considering I don't know how many there are. They hide in the cattails and stay deep in the water when I'm around. Why do I do this? Because they were there when we bought the house. Also, my wife likes them. But, why do we like them that much? I'm still working on this one. Please feel free to add any comments on this topic to add to our continual dialogue "to sell the koi or not to sell the koi." Or, if you like, please feel free to make an offer to buy one of the koi. Just kidding, I'm not authorized to request offers let alone accept them. And besides, the big orange one (or maybe he's yellow...I can't remember) is getting more comfortable with me. In fact, today when I leaned over to change the filter he just stayed near the surface and stared at me. What do you suppose that meant? He had a slight edginess about him, like one of his koi friends dared him to do it. Either way (not that I gave you 2 ways), I think we're making some headway. Someday maybe I'll have him jumping through tiny hula-hoops on fire while spraying water from his mouth and winking his left eye. Wouldn't that be something? Still would it be worth all the hassle? A trick like that could get old fast.

Exercise report: I ran 4 on Friday.