Sugar and spice and everthing nice...

That's what little girls are made of.

Saturday, August 19th.

The crib is ready to go. The changing table is ready to go. The nursery is almost finished. As Kim said, "If she comes tonight, at least she'll have a place to sleep!"

Thanks to Chuck for helping when I came to the part of the instructions that said, "With the assistance of another person..." and looking at my 33 week pregnant wife...I said, "Maybe Chuck can come help for a bit."

Have I wrote about our crib? It's really really cool. Now it's a crib, but as she ages, it transforms like Optimus Prime into a day bed. Then as she outgrows that, it transforms like Megatron into a full-size bed. So, needless to say, unless we have other children who need a crib, this will be her bed until she moves out of our house!

I finally finished "To Own a Dragon" by Donald Miller. Never have I read a book that simultaneously breaks my heart while busting my gut. It was a tough finish after all that's happened this summer.

I want to post a little excerpt. I hope the copyright police don't bust me. I'll quote it to be safe:
To Own a Dragon by Donald Miller and John MacMurray.
Chapter eight: Making Decisions or How to Stay Out of Prison
"I was having trouble sleeping one evening, so I turned on Charlie Rose, who was interviewing this guy Salome Thomas-El. He was a black middle school teacher in Philadelphia, and he had a presence that made you respect him, a soft way with big words and the kind of peace that comes to a man when he has found himself, learned to love himself, and operates for the world out of strength.
Salome had started a chess club in his school, recruiting from the projects around the small campus. He told Charlie Rose what he wanted to teach these students was not how to play chess, necessarily, because chess doesn't really mean anything in the real world, but rather the art of making good decisions. He would walk up to kids hanging around outside a convenience store and ask them if they wanted to learn to play chess. Of course the kids said no, chess not being the most fashionable sport on the playground. So Salome would tell them that telling him no was a bad decision, that if somebody offers to teach you something, you should give that person respect, and ask more questions to find out if you might need this information in the future. That was a bad decision, Salome said to the kids, to dismiss me in that way. The kids didn't really know what to say, so they got tough, threatening him. Ah, Salome would say, another bad decision. I can see that, if you and I were playing chess right now, you would be losing, because in chess, you cannot make bad decisions and win. You have to make good decisions.
"Have any of you ever played chess? Salome asked.
"I know how to play chess," one of the kids answered.
"What is the legal move for a rook?" Salome asked the boy. The boy stood there silently until finally Salome spoke into his shifting eyes, "You are telling a lie, aren't you? You do not know how to play chess. A lie is another bad decision. If you knew how to play chess, you would not make so many bad decisions. you would know, intrinsically, the way to get ahead in life is to make good decisions. And so I will ask you again, and I want you to think about it for five seconds before you answer me. Don't answer right away, because this isn't wise. I want you to think about what I am going to ask you...
"Do you want me to teach you how to play chess?"
The children stood there, confused but interested, until one of them blurted out nervously, "Yes, I want to learn chess."
"Fine then. You have made a good decision. This is the first rule of chess. Make good decisions. The only possible way you can lose in chess, and for that matter in life itself, is to make bad decisions. If you do not make bad decisions, you will not lose in chess, or in life. And the more good decisions you make, the better your life will be. It is as easy as that. Who else would like to learn to play chess?" And of course, the kids belonged to Salome from then on, and he has influenced hundreds of children, lined up facing each other, their chess sets placed atop long tables, their hands quick to punch the timers, eight-year-olds, ten-year-olds, teenagers, playing men five times their age and beating them."

I think that's going to be our motto for the upcoming school year. Making Good Decisions.
Almost time for staff meeting. Time got changed from Mondays at 1 to Mondays at 10.
I think that was a good decision.