I had to move the newsletter away from work email accounts as personal
emails are not allowed through that system. It took me a while to get
de-lazified enough to get the email addresses ported over.
August 10, 2009
Milo and Silas told Amber that eating their dinner was against the
word of wisdom. We had just read the story of Daniel and how he
refused to eat the king’s meat. They decided this was a clever ploy
to get out of eating what they don’t want. It didn’t work.
About four weeks ago we took a drive down to the shore to enjoy the
few days of sunlight we actually had this year. We didn’t go to one of
the crappy close beaches. Instead, we decided it would be awesome to
drive to one of the very far away ones called Long Beach Island. With
traffic the drive took about 3 hours. Traffic is one thing that we
have a lot of in New Jersey. Jealous?
The beach itself was very nice and not crowded. We spread out our
blankets and enjoyed the sun while the kids played in the sand. I
buried Silas a few times but he kept escaping. Maybe I should have
used wet sand. Milo didn’t trust me enough to let me bury him. He
kept complaining about liking to “breath” and “live”. Silly kid needs
to learn to be more flexible.
Later, I took the kids into the ocean where Silas enjoyed getting
buffeted by the waves. Milo was a little more fearful of getting
knocked over so much and wouldn’t come into the water to play. Silas
got drenched over and over again, but, true to the Silas way, was
happy the entire time.
That night we ate at a place called Chicken or the Egg which
specializes in chicken and eggs (Surprise!). The food was really
good. I got a sandwich called the “Goshdarnwich” which consisted of
French toast covered in syrup with eggs, cheese, and bacon. I could
feel my arteries screaming in pain, but my stomach rejoiced with great
gladness. Deliciousness, they name is “GoshDarn”. Mmm.
Three weeks ago we had an un-birthday party. We were bored and the
kids have been asking constantly about their birthdays. So we decided
to throw a surprise party. We picked up some pizza, blew up some
balloons, and bought some legos. Then amber and I hid behind the
couch and jumped out to surprise the kids. The kids had a blast.
Two weeks ago we went to the Bronx zoo. This zoo is huge both in area
and the number of animals. They try to capture the animals’ natural
environment as much as possible so every animal is on large tracts of
land. The zoo is not typical as you cannot simply walk over and see
the elephants, rhinos, and other large mammals. Instead, you have to
ride a monorail around the zoo and look out over the edge to see them.
Basically, it’s a guided tour. I was excited to hear they had a
panda, but disappointed to hear it was only a red panda. Dumb red
pandas. I was hoping for the black and white variety.
They had a lot of animals and we couldn’t even see them all in a day.
We ended up missing two or three exhibits. Overall, the zoo was
impressive, but the day was hot and the crowds were huge making the
experience not as good as it should be. They had a Tapir and 2 giant
anteaters, not to mention several cobras and other vipers.
Both Milo and Silas gave talks on temples in primary over the last two
weeks. I wrote Silas’ and Milo wrote his own with some help from
yours truly. I guess it was too much help as he complained heavily
that it wasn’t his words. This was Silas’ first talk so he was very
excited to be in front of everyone. In primary, he couldn’t wait and
every word of introduction was too much anticipation for him. He did
a great job.
The comments on the two talks were about what you expect for Milo and
Silas. Everyone was impressed at Milo’s vocabulary and ability to
write. Everyone thought Silas was adorable. At least, that is the
general consensus I got from the comments. Milo refused to draw
pictures for this one and so it was very straight forward.
After Milo’s talk, Milo and I left church and went home as neither of
us were feeling well. However, I did not want Milo to miss out on
church so I taught him a lesson from the family home evening manual.
I really enjoyed spending some one on one time with him and I think he
learned a lot. I’m sure he will whatever he learned against me in the
near future.
Both of the kids enjoy primary and constantly raise their hand. The
sharing time teachers rarely call on Silas but Milo gets called on all
the time. Milo never knows the answer and will usually repeat the
last thing the teacher said. This is an effective strategy.
Later
Jeremy
Typo my friend. “Deliciousness they name is “GoshDarn”. I believe you meant “thy” instead of “they”. Of course, I could be wrong but then your sentence makes no sense.