Buddha is watching you

We decided to go to a Chinese restaurant for dinner tonight. Has anyone else noticed the lack of a really decent, sit-down Chinese restaurant? We tried one we'd never been to before, in Lakeville. Tak Shing.
A few minutes after we'd sat down, Sam noticed the Buddha shrine right above our table. "What is that?"
"It's an idol." I replied.
"Really? Is it really?" He was incredulous. We assured him that some people do worship Buddha and no we didn't know whether the people who work in the restaurant worship Buddha.
He averts his eyes.
"I'm not gonna look at that anymore, because if the waiter sees me looking at it, he'll think I worship him."
Well, that's an interesting take. Is this kind of like not causing "your brother" to stumble?
He tried shielding his eyes, covering only one eye, asking why we made him sit in the chair facing Buddha.
We told him that it means nothing to us. It's just a piece of plastic. As worshippers of Jesus, it means nothing.
I'd catch him gazing at it, and he'd see me and quickly avert his eyes. "Oh!"
He'd turn a little in his chair and we'd ask what he was doing and he'd be all secretive and gesture and whisper, "You know, you know why, right?"
So, Sam's proclamation as we left the parking lot was, "Are we going to come back here to eat again? I hope not!"
Oh, one more funny Sam moment. As we were giving our order, I asked the waiter if they had any sodas that were caffeine free. Just Sierra Mist. But I was dying for a dark soda, so I risked it and ordered a Diet Pepsi. He told me they also had Diet Mountain Dew. I exlaimed, "Oh my, no! That would not be good!"
As the waiter left, Sam mouthed to me, "Why didn't you tell him you were gonna have a baby?"
I don't know what type of connection he was making in his mind between the soda and the baby.

The Bible-uncensored...sort of

I read the story of Dinah tonight with Sam and Caleb, which led to a discussion of biblical circumcision. When I got done explaining what was done, Caleb's reaction was, "Ouch!!"
The other sticky subject was of course, the fact that Dinah was raped by the prince of Shechem. The version I was reading explained it this way: He took her and hurt her, treating her like she was his wife.
Later, I wanted to see how much of this Sam was getting, so I asked him what the prince did that was so bad. He responded that he'd treated Dinah like she was his wife when she wasn't. I wonder what he thinks this means? I wanted to question, but I wasn't that brave!

My day at Kindergarten

Today was my first day of helping out in Sam's classroom. I LOVED it!! And do you know why? Because my job was organizing the Scholastic book orders. I remember watching my teacher do this in grade school, and I was envious. Seriously, I love to organize, I love books, I especially love touching new books. I got it all! On the downside, I couldn't help but note who ordered Spongebob...

After my hour-long project was done, I got to take a few kids, one at a time, and sit down with them at a table to work on rhyming words. I have to admit, the first kid I picked was Sam. He breezed through it. The two other boys I worked with had a looser understanding of rhyming, but I still had fun with it.
One little girl, who I hadn't talked with at all today, actually painted me a picture. It was so sweet...I hope she doesn't feel bad when she notices that I forgot to take it home.

Sabbath rest

Mercy: A refraining from the infliction of suffering by one who has the right and power to inflict it.

Have you ever thought of the Sabbath (which we typically think of as Sunday) as a showing of God's mercy and grace?

"Cursed is the ground because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you, and you will eat the plants of the field. By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return." Genesis 3:17b-19

Basically, we were cursed, because of our choice to turn away from God and choose sin, to work really really hard. For everything.

The Sabbath is God's demonstration of grace to us. That even amidst this curse that He proclaimed on us, He is merciful and gives us one day out of every seven to REST! It's a gift! It's not just that day that you should avoid shopping, the day that you should not clean your house, the day that you should focus on things spiritual, the day that you should leave the labors of your yard, the day you're only allowed to walk so far. It is the day that SHOULD be received with gladness, joy, and maybe even a sense of unworthiness. God is gracious. We deserved the curse. But one day out of seven, He reveals His grace in this special observance called the Sabbath.

I just never looked at it that way before!

Receive His grace.

Right to vote

I do not like politics. Part of this is due to the probability that no matter who we have as a "leader", individuals are the ones who really make the changes. The changes that matter, anyway. For some reason, I also just can't bring myself to care much about high/low taxes, taking money from this or that person/group, or giving it, government programs, aid packages, etc. Someone always gets the short end of the stick on these decisions anyway. And who's to say it's the "right" or "best" person to get it?
So as for myself, I have almost completely 100% made up my mind not to vote. Now, if Billy Graham was on the ballot, I might make it to the polls! But, the fact is that I would be voting for the "lesser evil". Think what you will about the candidates, they all have their issues.
I believe strongly that it is not "a Christian's duty to vote." Where the heck do you get that?? I do believe that it is a Christian's responsibility to pray for our leaders and for God's will to be done in the outcome of the election.
Just to be sure to generate some discussion here, I also think that if you are a Christian voter, you have a responsibility before God to think morally first, societally (is this even a word?) second.

I wanna hold your hand

What do you think the rules should be in a Kindergarten classroom regarding hand-holding? Okay or not okay? Sam's teacher has deemed it "inappropriate". Kindergarteners should not be acting like boyfriend/girlfriend. Well, I agree if that was their intention... Sam doesn't even know what that means. It was a little hard to explain to him why he would no longer be able to hold his friend Maddie's hand in class. Anyone have any advice?

Getting to know me

I have been tagged by J Mom.
1. Link to the person who tagged you
2. Post the rules on your blog
3. List 6 random facts about yourself
4. Tag 6 people at the end of your post
5. Let each person know they've been tagged by commenting on their blog
6. Let the tagger know the entry is posted on your blog

6 Random Facts About Me: (or, "What You Never Needed to Know")

1. I hate trends. Even if I liked it before it became popular, if everyone's suddenly into it, I'm turned off.

2. My most famous random fact: I have no bellybutton. I should've been named "Eve".

3. I wrote a novel from 6th to 11th grade. The main character was named "Elizabeth".

4. Although shy growing up, I did some pretty gutsy things, like selling the neighbors flowers to the rest of the neighborhood and swinging a stick around "just for fun" in Kindergarten (ended up hitting a girl in the eye). Huh, maybe that's where Sam gets it...

5. I have this weird fantasy involving a small space (like a submarine or something) that can only hold a certain amount of people, each bringing items to survive on in one grocery bag each.

6. I love food. In fact, my first doll was named "Hot Dog". I also, at various stages of my childhood, had pets named "Twinkie" and "Cupcake". I notice I refer to my children as "Punkin Pie" or "Sweetie". Maybe someday, we can have a "Haagen Daaz".

In turn, I will tag:
Jen at The Mulvihills, Candice at Godfrey Family, Beckie at Three Men and a Lady, Dad at Flint: The Hard Truth, Jennifer at Everlaughter Life, and Brendan (or Molly) at Ecclesia Domestica.
Follow the 6 steps at the top of my entry and come up with some random facts!

Sam the Missionary

Sam's mission work:

On the bus the other day, he asked the little boy sitting next to him (who apparently refuses to tell Sam his name) if he knew who Jesus is. The boy said no.

"He's the Lamb of God." Sam replies.

Huh, I wonder if that mother will get any interesting comments the next time her child sees a lamb.

Getting Even

Who likes odd numbers anyway?

Like 3.

4 is so much more rounded out.

Coming April 2009....

(By the way, this is also an even numbered post. And today's the 4th!)

The park rocks

I run into some pretty interesting parenting "philosophies" at the park. Now, I try not to make all these judgements about what kind of mom she is by the one incident, because hey, I too can look like less than the ideal mother (sometimes).

However, sometimes words are a dead give-away of the philosophy of the parent - conscious or not.

The mom today was begging her 3 1/2 year old not to throw rocks. Over and over. As he just laughed. Now, everyone who knows my children knows that they would never so blatantly disregard my authority.

Sense the sarcasm.

So the kid laughed and threw some more rocks, a handful of which hit me in the leg. The mother gasps, "Did you see what you just did? You hit her with those rocks! Now you stop throwing rocks please!"
The boy laughs some more.
The mom, "It's not funny!"
The boy ignores her and throws rocks some more.
The mom tries to reason with him. "Look, you can throw rocks but you'd better make sure nobody's around that's gonna get hit!"
The boy has no response. Other than more laughter. More throwing. Totally ignoring her.
Oh, and all this is always accompanied with "We're going to leave. We're out of here right now if you throw rocks ONE MORE TIME!"
I think he picked up on the fact she wasn't following through.
So she finally says, "You know what? You're going to hit one of these little kids if you throw rocks, and then you'll be in trouble.
Because apparently he wasn't getting into any trouble just for his disobedience and disrespect to his mother.
As I said, interesting philosophy.

I wonder if there are any moms out there blogging about what they've seen me do.