An answered prayer

     I recently came home to two kids in despair.  You see it all happened when I brought home two kittens to them.  They instantly fell in love with these little kittens.  Since their mother is allergic to cats, and the cats have to live outside, the girls insisted that I build them a house.  Well, any time the girls were home for the first few weeks, I don't think that the kittens feet ever touched the ground, and with the kittens home right outside the window on the back porch the girls could watch them closely from inside the house as well.
     The kittens seemed to love the kids, as much as the kids loved the kittens.  They were even coming on demand when the girls called them.
     So when the girls get home from school one day and the kittens are no where to be found they panic.  By the time I get home from work, the girls have looked everywhere they can think of and are in tears.  The first thing I do, is get a little cup of food and shake it, and call for the kittens.  The girl comes running from near the back fence.  But the boy is still no where to be found.  This sets the girls off even more, as these two kittens have always stuck close together.
    They continue looking well after dark, searching the bushes with flashlights, and calling for their lost "Scrambler."  As bed time is approaching I mention to my youngest daughter, "Make sure you ask Heavenly Father in your prayers tonight to help Scrambler find his way home safely."  This is not good enough for my little girl though.  She looks at me and with tears in her eyes asks "Dad, can't we pray right now?"
     So we gather up her brother and sister, and kneel down to say a prayer.  Before we're even able to start the doorbell rings.  A neighbor that we've never met is standing at the door and asks "Do you guys have a cat?"  So we tell him that as a matter of fact we are missing one.  He tells us that he thinks it is stuck up in his tree.  He says he had been in the house, and an owl had started making a ruckus out in this tree, so he went to investigate and had found a cat stuck in the tree that the owl was trying to eat.  We promptly follow him to his house, and to the correct tree, and sure enough there is "Scrambler" up in the tree and to scared to come down.  So I get the honor of climbing up and getting him.
     As we return home we once again get on our knees, and this time we are actually able to say our prayer.  But now it is a prayer of thanks, rather than the prayer we had originally intended.   What a reminder to me that our Heavenly Father hears and answers our prayers.  Even the prayers of our heart, that we haven't had time to vocalize yet.  Especially if you have the faith of a little child.

Mikey to the rescue.

     This morning I was assigned baby sitting duty for our two year old.  While in the mean time Stacie was going to take our two girls, and one of their friends to a private screening of some neat new animated movie made on HP computers.
     Well, not to far into our babysitting adventure I get a phone call from Stacie "Do you love me?" she says.  Apparently she has slid off the road and onto the median in an effort to avoid an accident that had occurred in front of her.  Then all I hear is screaming from all the little girls in the car, as another vehicle narrowly misses them.
     So I pack up the boy in my truck, scrape all the ice of the windows.  Put it in four wheel drive and head off to rescue the day.  I can tell that I'm getting close when I start hearing sirens, and seeing flashing lights, unfortunately with all the traffic backed up because of the accident on the icy road it still takes some time to get to my poor stranded girls.
     When I finally reach them, I ignore the police officer trying to wave people past, and pull off into the median in front of Stacie.  Then I back up to where I can attach a tow chain to pull Stacie out of the median.
That's when Stacie jumps out of her car, and tells me not to hook up the chain.  "I don't know if I'm stuck or not."  She says.  "I haven't tried to get out yet."
     "What?!"  If you haven't even tried to get out, then why did I bundle up our two year old, and brave the dangerous icy roads myself to come rescue her?  Well, I pull forward to give her room to try, and she drives right up on the road behind me without the slightest inclination of being stuck.  Apparently, she was scared to try to pull forward without help, in fear of getting stuck worse if she were indeed stuck.
     In the end I'm just grateful that all of my precious cargo in the vehicle were okay, with just a little bit of mental trauma to show for their morning.  Plus, I got to be the hero by coming to their rescue, without even having to do anything.  At least I was a hero, until I wrote this up and broadcast to the whole world that Stacie slid her car off the road this morning.  Now, I'm probably in the doghouse instead of being a hero.
     Unfortunately, they missed their private screening of the movie.  Looks like now I'll have to pay to take them to it when it's released in the theaters.  Of course that means Corey and I will get to go too.

The insensitive jerk.

     The kids have had a Betta fish for sometime now.  He was a little blue thing, and they'd named him "Bubbles."  To me it was just a fish, but to them it was their first pet.  He hasn't been looking so hot lately, and I was sure that the inevitable was coming.  So when I came home from work today and found him upside down in the bottom of his bowl I wasn't surprised.
     I took him out of the bowl, put him in the trash and planned on trying to pull the old switcheroo with a new fish from the pet store before any of them noticed.  Well, Mom wasn't in on my evil plan and spilled the beans to one of them that the fish had died.  Of course now they all want to know where he is, and what we did with him?
     I guess in my line of work, on can get desensitized to death to some extent, and I hadn't fully thought of how this might affect the kids.  Now confronted with it, I realized that throwing the kids first pet in the trash can probably wasn't the most sensitive thing a caring Dad would do.
     So now I had to distract the kids, so I could go dig "Bubbles" out of the trash can.  I then emerge with a shovel, and little "Bubbles," and the story of how I'd saved him until we were all together and could have a proper burial for our friend.
     Even to an insensitive jerk like myself, this felt like a much more proper thing to do than my earlier actions had.  The oldest didn't seem to mind to much, she still has a fish that her younger sister gave her a few weeks ago for her birthday.  The boy seemed fascinated by it all, and was eager to help dig the hole.  The middle child though with her tender little heart was heartbroken.
     So I spent time talking with her about our religious beliefs, and how we believe in life after death.  That I believed her precious "Bubbles" had gone to live with our Heavenly Father.  This isn't much comfort to a 5 year old who has Great Grandparents pushing 90, it will be "forever" before she gets to see "Bubbles" again.
     I think it was a good learning experience for the both of us.  She got to learn about how life ends, and to experience emotions that are new to her.  I got to remember why I wanted to be a Vet to start with so many years ago, because I wasn't always the insensitive jerk I am today.  Once upon a time I was as tender hearted as she is, and wanted to be able to help the animals I loved so dearly.
     In honor of her beloved blue "Bubbles" she thought we needed to have a blue dinner to remember him.  I almost said well we already buried the blue fish under the tree, if you wanted blue food we should have filleted him and fried him for dinner.  But I put my insensitive tendencies on hold, and kept my mouth shut.  Instead I made rice for dinner, and added blue food coloring to the water.  She was pleased, my wife was disgusted.  A win / win situation in my book.

Out of the mouths of Babes.

     Recently I had the privilege of baptizing my oldest daughter as a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  It was a special day for our family, with many family members making quite a trip to be here with us.  I couldn't have been more proud of my daughter for her decision to follow the example of our Savior Jesus Christ by being baptized.
     After the ceremony was over, one of the presiding members of our congregation was making a few remarks.  At this point my two year old boy began to get restless, and started to make some noise.  So in an attempt to keep him quiet, I started making conversation with him.
     I said "Did you see Taylor get baptized?"  To this he nonchalantly replies "Yeah, she was in the water with Jesus."  To which I replied "Did you see Jesus?!"  Again he says "He was in the water with you and Taylor, but he's not there now."
     Now, I didn't see Jesus in the water with us, and I don't know if he was there.  But I do believe that he is my older brother, and that he loves our family, and was especially pleased with the decision my daughter made that day.  I also believe that if it was possible for him to be there that day, and he didn't have more pressing matters to attend to that there is probably no place he would have rather been than at the baptism of a beautiful young lady making a good decision.
     Taylor I love you, and the decision that you've made.  I hope and pray that now you have entered in by the gate, that you will stay on the straight and narrow path that leads to life eternal, by always staying close to your Savior Jesus Christ.  He loves you very much just as I do, and according to your little brother he was at your baptism standing in the water with you.

A role model for my son.

     Sometimes I worry about my son. Not that there is anything wrong with him.  It's just that he is the youngest in the family, and he has two older sisters who have a questionable influence on him.  Maybe if he had a dog that would help.  After all don't all little boys need a dog?  A dog would give him a partner in crime, someone to get in trouble with rather than playing kitchen with his sisters.  Someone to blame things on, when he gets in trouble.  You know the whole the dog ate my homework routine.
     Fortunately, he has a good role model in his life.  This role model takes the shape of a cousin who is several months older than he is.  A cousin who has no older sisters to corrupt him.  A cousin who is all boy.
     Recently this cousin was visiting.  Somewhere during the visit someone noticed that the two little boys were missing, and that they were awfully quiet.  That's when the search began.  It didn't take long to locate the two of them.  They were in the bathroom, and the toilet was completely full with all of my son's toy cars. 

 

     The cousin quickly denied any involvment "Corey did it!" he says.  The mothers  of said boys instantly start scolding them.  I on the other hand couldn't have been more proud.  Not only had the cousin helped Corey get in trouble, but he'd also shown him how to blame it on someone else.  A valuable lesson for a little boy to learn.

     Then Corey's cousin set a good example for me too.  I was ready to help the boys get the toys out of the toilet and clean them up.  As were the little boys.  Corey's cousin reached in and grabbed one, and his mother yelled "Don't touch that they're dirty!"  So the boys didn't touch them, and neither did I.  We sat back and watched the mothers dig them out of the toilet, and bleach them in the sink.  To think I was ready to go to my truck and get one of the shoulder length sleeves I use for preg-checking cows to cover my arm while cleaning the toys. 

     I'm so grateful that Corey's cousin set a good example for me too.  Why clean up a mess you've made, when you can get your wife or mother to do it for you?  I'm so glad that I've found a good role model for my boy, I think maybe I can learn a thing or two from this kid too.