A Little Quiet Time

I'm not the most disciplined man in the world in any realm of my life. Spiritual disciplines included, I have to confess to a high degree of 'flux' in all of my routines. Still I know the value of quiet time and try to get some in before leaving for work as often as possible.

Coincidentally, Isaac often gets up early. We normally send him back to his room to lay down. But, recently I've started letting him come into the living room with me. The understanding, though, that I try to make with him is that mornings are for Quiet Time. I'll let him come out 15 mins early, but he has to spend that time looking through his picture Bible. Somewhat to my surprise he has accepted it readily. The photo was one I snapped just before sitting down with him at the end to pray. We pray together on these mornings.

If my greatest fear is that I'll not lead him properly, somehow cripple him emotionally or, worse, spiritually, my greatest joy is when I see him growing, maturing and best of all moving toward a spiritual life.

Proverbs 22:6 Train a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not turn from it.

The Joys of Home Maintenance

Cheryl and I have been putting off some home improvements and maintenance for quite some time now but this weekend we got started in earnest! We recently had the siding replaced and need to get the painting finished but that meant power washing some parts of our house. So we borrowed a pressure washer and got to it. While we had the machine we decided we might as well wash the brick ... and the walk ... and the driveway, patios, etc. What began simply enough turned into an entire day of pressure washing just about everything! I have to admit though, it is pretty cool to see the concrete gleaming now. It is rather noticeable - so much so that we had fun 'writing' with the washer!

Prayer for a Portal

I'm filing this one in under odd, funny, faith builder. A little backstory: I've been working on the "Topical Memory System" from Nav Press in an effort to grow in the area of scripture memory. Currently I'm working on "Prayer" and the verse that I'm memorizing is Phillipians 4:6&7.

Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving make your requests known to God. And the pease of God, which surpasses all comprehension, shall guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. (NAS)

At work I have a major project - our 'portal' website - to get off ASAP and we're having LOTS of troubles with it. I sat this morning at my desk after a frustrating round of calls and meetings with people trying to get this up and running. I looked at my memory card and read over it a few times when I realized that this is what that verse is talking about. So, I prayed. When I looked up, there was the log on screen where only gray had been before.

God sometime chooses the oddest places to reveal himself to me. I was humbled and yet again in awe of Him.

Little Helper

Isaac is at the age where he is interested in just about everything. I love that. If there is one thing that I really hope I can share with Isaac through our lives (beyond a love our Savior), it is a profound curiosity about the world around us. He has a good start already!

The other day I was changing the oil in my car and you know where Isaac wanted to be - right in the middle of it! ... Literally! I had to warn him a few times to back up or he was going to get oil dumped on him. He wanted to work the jack, turn the plug and filter, pull out the dipstick, ... anything Papa did, Isaac wanted to do. And within reason, I let him. Yes, the job took quite a bit longer, but who cares. I can vividly remember when my dad would let me in on the mechanic-ing. Great times. I hope Isaac has some of those same memories.

Taggin' in the Bloggerhood

Yo dawg! ... hehe Ok, I know you know that I know you know I'm a lot closer to "nerd-core" than "Hard-core" so I'll spare you my lame attempt at ghetto-speak. I'm going to start blogging a wider range of topics and I'm setting my sites on some blogging related topics up front! Today: Tagging.

If you use "blogger", you've seen the "Labels for this post" blank below the editor window. But, do you use it? Uh, no, What's it do? Glad you asked! The labels are stored with your blog as a list of words that you choose to describe the content. Different internet sites have started using this system to give users yet another way to drill through the ba-zillions of giga-bytes of stuff out there to find what interests them. Sounds simple, but is something to consider before you start tagging: what type of style of tagging do you want to use. There are basically 2.

"Cloud Tagging" (my term) involves tagging every key word or idea in a blog. Every blog is different and you'll quickley end up with a LOT of tags across your blog. This can be good if you want to be able to get really specific on a "search" but bad because the list is too long to really browse. Yahoo does a lot with the cloud style to make it easier to use.

Blogger is friendlier to "Category Tagging" where you pick a defined list of tags and limit yourself to those. Because Blogger lists them (with counts) it makes for a manageable list. It also gives you essentially multiple blogs. When people click on, say, your "pets"category (posts that you tagged "pets"), they see only those posts. It's like a mini blog!

Whatever you choose, stick to it! It is hard to change later! I do the second style - categories. Take a look at my "tags" list on the side for an example. Have fun tagging - don't tell the police I told you how!