Colson's Minecraft Adventures

Colson is obsessed with Minecraft. I bought him the game for his birthday, after he'd been talking about it for months. He talked about it so much that every time Ava heard the word "Minecraft" come out of his mouth, she'd slap herself in the forehead.

He's been watching these videos on YouTube that are about a family who plays Minecraft together. They talk through what they're doing. Here's one of them:




Well, I got Colson a video camera for Christmas. He decided he wanted to start making his own Minecraft videos. This is his first one. He's made changes to the format since this one, but he wanted to still keep them in order. Zach and Ava add commentary throughout. All 3 kids are talking about becoming "famous on YouTube".

Monday Mornings With Zachary

Today Zach discusses the merits of his siblings. He also invites you to share the woes of living with excema and teaches you about "bleeders".

Monday Mornings With Zachary

In today's interview, Zach tries to show off his spelling skills, but is thwarted. You can tell how badly the pollen is affecting his excema, he's scratching throughout most of the interview.

Monday Mornings With Zachary

Watch today's video to find out what's in store for Zachary's hypothetical future younger sibling.

Monday Mornings With Zachary

In today's interview, Zach talks about the plus side to being orphaned. He also invites a guest in at the end, to offer a differing opinion.

My Stephen King Day

Some pictures and video from the aftermath of the bug poison spraying....

You Have The Luxury Of Not Knowing What I Know

Cole and Ava have been getting annoyed by having to do things for Zachary. The two things that annoy them most are buckling and unbuckling him into/out of his car seat, and making him a bowl of cereal in the morning. Eric and I were starting to get tired of the constant bickering over whose "turn" it was to do these chores each day. They'd each whine that they "always did it" and it "wasn't fair".

One day, I the kids and I were out running errands. When we got home, I pulled the van into the garage. The usual procedure upon arriving home involved me choosing one of the big kids to unbuckle Zach, to avoid the inevitable argument. This particular day, I decided not to do that, in order to see what they would do. So I just got out of the car and walked into the house.

As I walked in, I could hear Cole and Ava beginning the argument over who was going to unbuckle him. I ignored it, and went into the kitchen. I started unloading the dishwasher, and even from the kitchen could hear Cole and Ava yelling at each other inside the car. Funny enough, Zachary wasn't chiming in. Normally he'd be yelling back at them to just unbuckle him. But it was as if he sensed that they were hanging themselves, and he was just going to sit back and watch the show.

After about 5 minutes, I heard Ava say, "I'm just going in the house, you do it". And sure enough, a minute later she waltzed into the house, shoeless, and walked right past me up to her room. She had no idea that I'd heard the whole thing. I didn't say anything to her yet, because I wanted to see how the entire situation would play out before I played my hand.

I couldn't hear anything from the van for another 5 minutes. Again, Zachary was playing this super cool, he hadn't yelled once. After 5 minutes had passed, Cole walks in with his shoes off. He says hello, and then proceeds to walk upstairs.

I let him get all the way upstairs before I calmly called them both to come downstairs. I made them both stand in front of me. I asked Colson to go unbuckle Zach, and made Ava stand there until Colson came back.

When he came back, I bent down and got real close to their little faces, looked them both dead in their eyes and said, "What you both just did was h o r r i f y i n g..........." I then gave them the leave-no-man-behind speech. "In THIS house, we don't leave our family behind, no matter how we feel about them. You don't have to like Zachary, you just have to feed him and let him out of his car seat". I told them that their behavior was disgusting. I asked them how they thought Zachary felt knowing that his brother and sister had left him all alone in the van with no way to get him out. (Of course, I left out the part about how much I knew Zachary had LOVED the whole situation, knowing somehow that it would all play out in his favor.)

I preached that the word "fair" has no meaning in this house, especially when it pertains to taking care of each other. I told them I'd wiped their butts every time they crapped in their diapers, and that certainly wasn't fair. When you love someone, you don't think about fair.

Cole and Ava were properly moved by my Jack Nicholson in A Few Good Men speech. I was dying to tell them that they couldn't handle the truth, and that my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to them, saves lives. I decided that might be a bit much.



The next day I called them both into my room. I was ready to dole out my King Solomon judgement. I said, "I have made a decision about the cereal and seat buckle situation. Colson, you will ALWAYS make Zach's cereal. Ava, you will ALWAYS buckle and unbuckle Zachary. Ava, if Colson isn't here for some reason, you will make Zach's cereal AND buckle him. Colson, if Ava isn't here, you will also make Zach's cereal AND buckle him."

I haven't heard a peep about either task since.

Talk About A Bad Hair Day

Ava and Zachary were playing dollhouse together. I heard her say to him, "Don't touch the girl on the roof, she's dead". Of course, that piqued my interest. I poked my head in and asked, "Why is the girl on the roof dead"? Ava answered, "When her hair sticks straight up like that, I don't like it, so I make her be dead. But we put flowers by her grave".



Moral of this story? Make sure your hair looks good when you see Ava. Apparently you're dead to her otherwise...

Monday Mornings With Zachary

In today's interview, Zachary speaks on fears, math, and the meanings of words.

What Do You See?

This is a classic example of the abstract/concrete difference in children. We were at Melissa's house the other day, and Luke and Zachary were playing together. They both had a cup of dry cereal. Zachary pulled a piece of dry cereal out, and called out to Melissa and I to look at this particular piece:


Zachary: Look! This one is a "P"!


Luke: That's not a P!! It's CEREAL!!!!!


For an abstract child, things make them think of other things. For a concrete child, things are what they are. For Luke, why would you look at cereal and think of anything other than food? For Zach, why can't that piece of cereal be anything he wants it to be? Reality versus imagination. Practicality versus possibility. Both sides extremely necessary to make the world go 'round. But both sides never quite understanding the other.

That's the clearest example of the abstract/concrete difference that you can get.

Monday Mornings With Zachary

Zachary elicits way more comments than I do, so we're going to make Monday Mornings With Zachary a regular feature.

In this interview, Zachary discusses career goals, marriage plans, illiteracy, God's age, and what happens when you're kidnapped.

The Perfect Pet

Eric took the kids to the Q-Mart last Saturday, where they went into a pet store. A few days ago, we were all in the car and I was asking the kids about the pet store.


Me: Zachary, what was your favorite animal that you saw at the pet store?

Zachary: The dead fish!!

Interview With Zachary

This is a conversation I had with Zachary the other day. He was making me ask him questions.

Highlights include Zachary's attitude towards pets, Zachary trying to name the biggest number in the world, how he would escape from a park, and how he would scratch himself if he had no arms.

Never A Dull Answer

My Mom, to my kids: I have a riddle for you. What has 4 legs, a back, but can NOT walk?



Zach: I know! A DEAD person!




(Colson's answer ran a close second, "A statue of a pig!")

I'm On The Hunt

Here is a video of my Dad playing RockBand for the first time.  He's on drums with Zachary.  Mom is singing, and Colson is playing guitar.  Mind you, neither Mom nor Dad have ever heard "Hungry Like The Wolf" before.  

The excitement that Dad feels cannot be contained.  Duran Duran really blows his skirt up.

Beware The Trees

One Thursday, as I was making lunch for Zachary while Ava was at school, Zachary said "Mom, I don't like eating by myself down here".

I asked him why?

He said, "Because that tree is always watching me".

"Which tree?", I asked.

"The one with the one eye", he said.

I asked him to point it out.





Because both Anne Shirley AND Mr. Tumnus ("Even some of the trees are on her side!") confirmed the existence of Dryads for me as a child, I told Zachary that the tree was just watching him to make sure he stayed safe.

You don't see the eye??

The End Of The Boardwalk

Our last beach trip was June 2008, headed to Sarasota again to visit Pop. Zachary's first airplane ride. He was so excited.


Water park, Stratego, Gator Cruise, Mini-golf (Zach plays golf like McEnroe plays tennis)...

(Pop's backyard)

And of course, loads of beach time.

























My runner-up pictures of this set:




And the winner for Suzanne's Favorite Photo of 2008 is:



Hopefully my beach memories have brought a little sunshine into your dreary winter days. And hopefully "On The Way To Cape May" will stop running on it's endless loop in your brain before summer is upon us again...

Lesson Learned

In the summer of 2007, we took a trip with Melissa and her husband and their three kids. We went to Charleston South Carolina, where Melissa's mother lives. Miss Sharon had graciously allowed us all to take over her gorgeous house for a week. It was a week full of mini-golf, the pool and the beach, Guitar Hero and amazing food. Eric and I drove down with the kids, stopping at the Baltimore Harbor to take the kids to the National Aquarium.


The kids just loved being at the beach, and the Charleston beach was beautiful.

(Melissa's oldest son, Gavin, in the middle)

This was the beach trip that gave us all the scare of our lives. I will retell the story. Mom, scroll down past this part as quickly as you can.

We all went to the beach one day, Eric and I and our kids, and Melissa and Michael and their kids. The beach was fairly crowded that day, but not enough to trigger the panic button. The beach we were on that day didn't have a lifeguard, it was a "swim at your own risk" area. The water was fine, there was just no lifeguard right there.

We chose a location to spread out the myriad assortment of beach equipment that comes with 6 kids. The kids were given instructions to only go into the ocean with an adult. The 3 big kids wanted to spend most of their time in the water, of course, which meant Eric and Michael had to spend most of their time in the water.

Eric and Michael were doing a changing of the guards act for most of the afternoon, taking turns coming back to home base for a break. At one point, Melissa and I, who were sitting on beach chairs with the little kids, saw Gavin and Ava running towards us. I can't remember how this part played out exactly, but somehow the message was communicated that Colson was missing, or that Daddy was looking for him, or something. But it was conveyed casually, in that childlike way where nothing bad ever happens.

Melissa casually said "I'll go check with the guys", and I stayed with the baby and the kids. I watched her walk down towards the water, where Michael was standing. She spoke with him, and then she started walking down the beach. I couldn't see Eric at this point. But I still had no reason to worry, the guys had been playing around with the kids all afternoon, I figured Cole and Eric were together.

Unbeknownst to me, Micheal had told Melissa that Cole had been lost for some time, and she didn't want to come up and tell me yet. I think she thought she should try to find him first, hoping her motherly sixth sense could accomplish what the guys hadn't so far.

After a certain amount of time, Melissa came back and said something like "Don't freak out, but the guys are looking for Cole". She said she would stay with the kids, so I went down to the water. Michael was down there, and he told me that during one of the changing of the guards, a breakdown in communication had occurred, and Colson thought Michael was staying the water with him, and Michael thought Eric was going back into the water to stay with Cole.

So the last anyone had seen Cole, he was in the water. That is when a little tiny sprout of nervousness sprang up in my soul. But I stayed calm, knowing it was probably nothing. Michael told me that Eric had walked up the beach to look around. So I headed off in the direction that Eric had gone, scanning like mad for Colson in the ocean. My assumption was that he was in the water, knowing that was the last place he had been seen.

When I caught up with Eric, who was heading back in my direction, and he didn't have Colson with him, I got really nervous. I could tell he was starting to get very worried as well. When I started asking him questions, I realized that a really long time had passed. That it was getting close to 20 or 30 minutes since they had started looking. That's when that sprout started growing like someone had poured a whole bag of plant food on it.

I realized that Cole drowning wasn't the only scenario. That he could have come out of the water, and been kidnapped. I started running back towards home base. Eric kept walking slowly, scanning the crowds and yelling Cole's name. As I ran, I was having a hard time keeping my heart out of my throat. All I kept thinking was how I'd heard that in a kidnapping situation, time in precious. You have to notify the police ASAP if you want any hope of them finding the kidnapper. And I kept thinking "Oh my god, it's been 30 minutes at least".

On that run I was also preparing myself for what I was going to do if Cole was gone for good. I thought about funeral arrangements, I thought about the phone chain that would have to take place to let everyone know, I thought about what I would tell Zach and Ava, and I thought about what I would do to reassure Michael and Eric that it wasn't their faults. Lastly I thought about what I was going to do to handle Cole's death. I was preparing my brain to handle the news that might be coming. I was praying fast little vomit prayers in between each of these thoughts, because I couldn't stop long enough to pray a real focused prayer. All of this was accomplished in the two minutes it took me to get back up the beach.

I got back to where Michael was standing, and he handed me his cell phone and told me to call 911. I think he suggested it before I walked down the beach to meet Eric, and I said something like let's give it a few more minutes. Now I was ready to make the call.

I called 911, my first time ever doing so, and within 60 to 90 seconds, the lifeguards up and down the beach had been notified. The 911 operator kept me on the phone, and said she was sending an officer my way. She told me to go up onto the boardwalk to meet him at the entrance to our particular beach. As I ran up that way, I remember thinking that if I found the guy who had taken Cole, I would hurt him badly. I wouldn't kill him, but I would find a way to inflict massive amounts of slow excruciating torture on him.

I saw the police officer walking towards me, and I hung up with the 911 operator. The officer was on his walkie-talkie and I heard him say "You've got him?". He saw me and said that they thought my son had been found. We ran back onto the beach, there was a big Baywatch style jeep-dune buggy type thing at our location, and a bunch of lifeguards. All of a sudden we saw Eric walking up carrying Cole. My first instinct was to act as normal as possible and not let Cole see me upset. So I gave him a big hug and a smile and said "We found you!". Turns out he had come out of the water and had gotten disoriented. He had been wandering around in the crowd of beach umbrellas and beach towels that whole time, looking for us.

The authorities made sure everyone was okay, and left. I learned a valuable lesson that day. CALL 911 RIGHT AWAY! That's what they get paid for. They "mobilized their units" so fast I was amazed. My instinct is to not bother people unless I know for sure it's important. But that's what they do. It's their job. And isn't it so much better, in that kind of situation, to be safe than sorry? I will never hesitate to call 911 again.

I don't think I cried much over this then. My mindset in times of extreme stress is to stay calm and clearheaded, and make sure that things go as smoothly as possible and everyone is taken care of.

But I will admit that I got halfway through writing this, and I fell apart. I cried like I haven't in a very long time. That was definitely the scariest, most "real" moment I've had as a parent. I don't want to ever revisit it.

And here's my opportunity to thank Michael and Melissa, for being exactly what you would want people to be in that situation: clearheaded, calm and supportive, and helpful without being aggressive. Perfection.

It wasn't Cole's day to go. I'm very thankful to God for that.











And my favorite picture from Charleston 2007 is, of course:


Our last stop will be Summer 2008, another Sarasota trip.