EDIT ADD: I just got word that Frank P’s lawyers are accepting letters of character reference for Frank. Awesome. I’m there, and so is Christy.

I’m excited that I get a chance to help, even if in a small way. I’m also extending the invitation to any of you. If you knew Frank, and would be willing to write a letter speaking to Frank’s character, comment and I’ll send details.
If you can help, please do—also, keep praying.
Thanks folks.

————————————-
Yeah, I’m starting that count with the day after Christmas, because that’s really when the vacationing began. Before that was 3 services on Christmas Eve, cooking the Christmas meal on Christmas Day, and then the clean up. So we’ve done some fun stuff in the past couple of days.

We went sledding. Nathaniel loved it, and to tell you the truth, so did I. It was super fun, and I even had a few flashbacks to the days of yore, when my little bro and I would go out sledding for hours in the knee-deep snow. Noah also had a blast. He’s a little dare-devil, he is…I’m posting video on my .mac site soon…

We watched the movie Invincible. I think I was forced. I didn’t really get the appeal of the movie, but let’s be honest with ourselves, Daniel + sports in a movie doesn’t mix. I had no emotional reaction, and I thought the characters were a little weird. But again, it might just be the whole sporty movie thing. It’s just not for me.

We went bowling tonight. I still suck, but we had a grand ole time–and my scores weren’t as bad as they were last year. I think I bowled last year for the first time in decades, and I got a 23. No, there’s no typo there, I got a 23. But this year, my scores are at least triple that…haha

I have a new photo page up too, with Christmas pics.

You can read about it here, or here, or watch the news story here or here.

It’s at times like that words fail me. Not because I’m upset, or disappointed in Frank, and not because I think any less of him, or because my memories of Frank and all he gave and did for the Midway Praise Orchestra will be tainted, because they won’t and I’m not. Words fail me because now, more than ever, I’m certain that I’m an adult. I have never experienced a friend–a comrade, a dude my same exact age–being arrested for something like this. I don’t hardly know what to do or say. I really want to help, to show support and love in a time when most people are probably judging and condemning, but I don’t even know where to start. It might be different if we still lived there…

I got a phone call last night and an email with a link to the story. I immediately called a mutual friend, who said she’d found out when getting online to check the weather.

It is also very strange to watch the news reel and see the detective and reporters talking about Frank, my friend, like a dirty criminal. Saying things like, “He’s been teaching since 1999, so he’s been out there for several years…” like he’s been “at large” or something. Ugh. It made me upset to watch. I mean, he’s been accused-not convicted, and it was more or less by the girl’s father, not by the girl herself. I’m not naive, but I’m also not going to be throwing any stones and neither should you…in this country I think we’re still innocent until proven guilty.

I also called my old friend Chuck. Frank knows Chuck from church and a lunch or two that we all shared together. Chuck is going to try and reach out for us all. Go Chuck, go…and I’m praying. Praying my butt off for Frank, his wife, and their respective families. Praying for all of the students and teachers that know Frank, and are potentially freaking out like the rest of us are. If you know Frank, please join me in prayer. I can NOT IMAGINE what he and his family are going through.

QUICK SIDE NOTES:
**Why is my mom’s pumpkin pie the best in the world? I’ve tried other pumpkin pies–lots of them, from the far reaches of this earth–and none compare to my mom’s pie. It’s freakin’ awesome.

**Nathaniel got the coolest present last night. I might just have to commandeer it and play with it myself.

Despite what the time on the actual posting of this entry indicates, it’s 4:20 AM as I currently type. For quite possibly the first time in my life, I can’t sleep. I literally cannot think of another time in my 27 years that I’ve had a problem sleeping. It’s not like I’ve been up all night, no-I went to bed and slept for several hours. But something beckoned me awake this eve.  I think this has something to do with the fact that I’m sick (and so is Christy), and it might also have to do with the Triple-Grande-Nonfat-Caramel Macchiato that I had at 8PM.
Nonetheless, here I am, listening to the rain fall snacking on Vitamin C, turkey lunchmeat, and tapioca pudding. Yum.

As some of you know, or might remember, two years ago on Christmas Eve Nathaniel split is head open on a pew after our evening service at church. It was one of those scary 9-1-1 call things-complete with blood gushing all over his little clothes, an ambulance ride to the hospital, and several stitches in his forehead. Good thing we were back in bed so Santa could come…well, this year, on Christmas day, Nathaniel gashed his head on a large 4×4 beam outside riding around on his brand new scooter. The first few minutes after the initial thud and screaming began, this was all too familiar for us. He was convulsing in pain again, his hands were clasped tightly on his forehead again…thankfully this time the bump did not break his skin. No blood, no stitches, no hospital. After we got him to calm down and got his tiny white hands away from his wound, it turns out the place he gashed on the beam is a good 1-2 cm away from his scar from the last wound. Now that was crazy. We decided that from now on Nathaniel would spend Christmas locked in a padded white room…

I must admit, the after Christmas clean-up duties are insurmountable. I cannot believe the mess that stupid tree makes! I now sit in Twain Harte, after a day of continual cleaning and driving. I cleaned, and I drove, and now we’re here. It’s like a whole day was taken from me, ripped from my life. In fact, I can hardly remember it all…it’s like a blur…but DO know this–in our house there is nary a Christmas decoration left, hallelujah, amen.

I’m going to load up and render video from Nathaniel’s school play. You’ll be able to watch it on my website on the videos page. It’s absolutely adorable. He was one of four Narrators chosen out of about 60-70 kids. There are four Kindergarten classrooms and they chose one child from each class to Narrate–Nathaniel was the one from his class!  I got the whole thing on tape, it’s a good 15 or 20 minutes. Even if you can’t watch it all, just catch a little bit of him doing his part. Christy worked hard on it with him.
The night before the show, Christy asked him, “Nathaniel, how are you going to say your lines?” to which he song-singedley replied, “With exPRESSION!!!!!”. So cute. 

I’ll never forget the time I found out that there was no Santa Claus.
I must have been 7 or 8 years old, maybe younger. It was not necessarily around Christmas time, but probably not too long after…perhaps in February or March…and it was my older brother, Dave, that broke the news–he must have been 14 or 15 years old. I was in his bedroom for some reason, and we got in an argument. Now, my brother Dave was really anal about his bedroom when we were young. He would know if anything had been touched in there, and so maybe that’s what we were fighting about, I don’t know. It’s not really important–the point is that we starting fighting like siblings do, and it escalated to the point where Dave said something to the effect of, “Oh yeah, well there is no Santa Claus!” Well, of course I didn’t believe him at first, but then he provided proof-the box the bike was in I had gotten that year from Santa was in his bedroom. I’m pretty sure I screamed and cried for a long time after that…
Well…I certainly don’t harbor any bitterness against my brother or anything, I mean, I tortured my little brother enough too. What else are brothers for?

Today was great.
We had family from down here over to our house today for Christmas dinner, so we spent some of the morning cooking, but it was great fun to watch the kids (mostly Nathaniel) open his gifts. He said some pretty hilarious things…I wish I could remember them all…here’s a few:

“I LOVE sewing!!!” after receiving a sewing thing…

“All of my wishes came true!!” after getting his scooter and a set of jacks from Santa Claus…

“I am sooooo thankful” about getting his presents…

and there are so many more that I just can’t think of right now, but it was very funny.

Noah is not in a good place. He had some gluten a week or two ago and it has caused a tremendous amount of regression in his behavior. He has turned back the clock about 6 months on most of his skills. He still functions well, but he is not interacting well. He is not following instruction well, he is constantly “stimming” (negative stimulative behavior that gives great pleasure to his mind, but brings him deeper into his own world), he is grunting and screaming again and is not attentive during his therapy. He had some french fries he wasn’t supposed to have almost two weeks ago. His behavior worsened, and we and his therapists noticed. The unfortunate thing is that gluten can take several months to work its way out of the blood stream. So we’re loading him up with fluids, trying to get stuff through his body, but he continues to act strangely. We’re hoping the symptoms go away soon.

You should check out our site again, I’m continually changing it and adding stuff to it–this time I added video clips and some new Buzzlighter scores (including Mike’s scores on his first and second time through the game). Also, if you like the show Friends, you’ll love SCENE IT-Friends Edition. True to form, we got Mike a game for Christmas and then played it…it was VERY fun, even though I’m not a huuuuge Friends fan like my wife and some other people I know.

Yay for holiday break!

What? We have a website? Wait…isn’t this a website? Well…yes, and I also have myspace and facebook and all kinds of stuff. In fact, I’m all over the web. I have almost as many pages as Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie combined…ok, no I don’t, but still–it’s a little ridiculous. So why? Why not, I say…

Due to the pleasantness and ease of .Mac, and iWeb and iLife and all of the awesomeness that is Apple…we now have our own webpage here.

Currently there are some photos (a lot of Midway folks are there) and a welcome page. However, soon I will start uploading video clips and other stuff for you to gander at. I am hoping to create a timeline of Noah’s progress through video clips, so the world can see the benefit of ABA therapy and how it has changed the life of our child. Additionally, I hope that we can create some kind of resource for parents of autistic children, so they can be encouraged by our stories, or something. We’ll see how it all pans out, but I had a fun time creating the photos page last night, and uploaded it live this morning. Check it out! Have fun!

For some reason we just discovered a whole set of pictures from the
Midway Praise Choir performance at MUSICalifornia in April of 2005. I
never knew they were there before, but take a look at them all via this link, or take a gander at a few notable pics below.

There’s Mike on the screen^^

ahhhhh….Shantelle….

Good singing in the background!

Mmmmm….

Thank you Uncle Lee & Patti!!

I was really blessed this past weekend with what God did with our musical at church “The Father’s Gift of Love”.  Not only did the show really come off well–everyone noticed.
I was showered with compliments, our choir felt like they had succeeded and attained musical heights they would have never dreamed of–or certainly hadn’t thought of in a long time. When it was all over, I felt like NOW the choir was behind me 100%-not that they weren’t before, but now I REALLY feel like they are on board.
It helps a team when you win…and this show was a WIN.

Praise God.

EDIT ADD: My grades are in. I thought for sure I was getting a B in Music of Business, but an A- it is! That leaves me with a stunning 3.95 for my first 18 units…
Check it out for yourselves…

Mom & Dad would be proud!

---

A quote from one of my favorite authors, John Fischer.
____

Our mark as Christians in the world will be more compelling and effective the
more useful we are to society. Lined up against society and locked in a culture
war that sets us apart makes us that much easier to dismiss along with our
beliefs. But as Christians who are contributors to the social fabric, we become
an asset to the community, making our faith that much more attractive. At least
our faith stands a better chance of being rejected for what it truly is rather
than for other reasons.

____

I still remember the first day John Fischer came into my life. He spoke at a chapel service at APU, sometime in Fall of 1997, or Spring of 1998. Without introduction or any spoken word, he got up on stage with a guitar and proceeded to sing the entire Joan Osbourne song “One of Us”.

Here’s the lyrics:

_____

If God had a name, what would it be
And would you call it to his face
If
you were faced with him in all his glory
What would you ask if you had just
one question

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah
yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on
the bus
Trying to make his way home

If God had a face what would it look like
And would you want to see
If
seeing meant that you would have to believe
In things like heaven and in
jesus and the saints and all the prophets

And yeah yeah god is great yeah yeah god is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah
yeah

What if God was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on
the bus
Trying to make his way home
He’s trying to make his way
home
Back up to heaven all alone
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for
the pope maybe in rome

And yeah yeah God is great yeah yeah God is good
yeah yeah yeah yeah
yeah

What if god was one of us
Just a slob like one of us
Just a stranger on
the bus
Trying to make his way home
Just trying to make his way
home
Like a holy rolling stone
Back up to heaven all alone
Just trying
to make his way home
Nobody calling on the phone
Except for the pope maybe
in rome

____

He sang the whole song–I thought he’d just sing a little bit and talk about it–but he sang the whole song, in the original key and octave (as the female artist). He then gave a perspective-changing, life-altering talk about worldview–except he never talked about worldview, or talked in a way that was meant for persuasion. He just spoke, with great passion, the kind of passion that draws you…

Since that time, Christy and I, along with many of our friends, have kept up with his books and other publications. He is a fantastic writer, and the type of person that is radically passionate and SMART. I highly recommend his stuff. He does a daily devotional for Purpose Driven.

I’m a subscriber…

What a great weekend we’ve had!

 
FRIDAY:
A very fun staff Christmas party for our church staff, plus spouses. We went to
this really awesome house in Upland
for the party, and it was incredibly fun to just sit around, eat tasty food,
and talk with friends. Also, did I mention it was pretty fancy? There were
people walking around serving Hors de Oeuvres, live entertainment after dinner,
and delightful desserts. The best Christmas party ever!!

 
SATURDAY:
You heard about our great time at Dave & Mary’s
apartment in Burbank.
I hope we can become good friends. We loved hanging out with them, and
Nathaniel and Noah loved playing with their baby—well, Nathaniel sure loved it,
Noah doesn’t really engage in that much play, although he still had a great
time.

 
SUNDAY:
Amazing services at our church in the morning. Our choir sang at both services
(normally they just sing at the traditional service) along with the kids choir
and handbells. It was a lot of stuff going on! Everyone pitched in the week
prior to the service in communicating how the service would flow, and it
worked. The services were nearly flawless in that respect…except when I forgot
about one thing and jumped too early into a song…other than that, it was
awesome. I was so proud of everybody that worked hard to make it happen!

 
Then—off to San
Diego. It was so fulfilling to see the kids choir
performance that evening at Midway. Seeing how the kids choir ministry has
flourished tremendously under leaders that we invested in and worked with for
so long while we were there was incredibly fulfilling. In fact, I cannot think
of something more rewarding. To see Hakim and Steffanie and all of their
teammates and volunteers working together to continue carrying on the vision WE
implemented—it was just wonderful. GREAT JOB to all of you in kids choir! You
are changing lives!

 
Also—we enjoyed spending time with our old friends. We love
you all! Thank you for sharing your love with us whenever we come down! And on
that note—every place we have lived and served, we leave, and generally cut all
ties with our friends in that area, etc…It’s not purposeful, we just throw
ourselves into whatever we’re doing at the time, and are not usually looking
back a lot…until now. We hope to keep the friends we made in San Diego forever. There are too many strong
bonds there to be broken. We will never forget you, you San Deigoans!

 
MONDAY:
Christy’s birthday. It didn’t have the best start (during
the day) but we had a blast with friends at BJ’s for dinner and playing
catchphrase afterwards. It was a grand old time…get it? A grand OLD time?
Hahaha…although, Christy sure felt better that she was not the oldest person
there (Joe came).  

We all got Christy this leg massaging device from Brookstone
for her present (everyone chipped in, it was so dang expensive). She says it’s
the best gift she’s ever received, and you know what? It’s mine too…cause now I
won’t have to give her the massages myself! Yahoo!