Want Not

"digging deep I guess I say
is more pridefulness of that day
in truth I know that it is clear
I was distant, God is near"
-Poor Old Lu, Digging Deep

I've heard other people say it dozens of times, but you really can learn so much from children. Asher (most of the time) is still just honest and open, even when he's disobeying or in trouble.

Consider the following exchange:

(Asher is at the bottom of the stairs holding a Pringles can. I'm in one of the upstairs bedrooms talking to Sharon.)

Asher: Daddy, can I have a chip?
me: Sure, Asher. But I only want you eat one. We have supper soon.
Asher: Okay.

(A few minutes pass, and then I come out and start downstairs. Asher has a chip in each hand, so many in his mouth he can't swallow, and chip pieces all around him on the stairs.)

me: Asher, how many chips did you eat?
Asher: I don't know daddy. I wasn't counting.
me: Asher, daddy told you that you could have one.
Asher: Oooooh. I ate MANY more than one!

Recently I was a chaperone for Asher's preschool trip to a local orchard. We didn't get to go apple picking like we used to over near Chicago: Asher got to pick exactly one apple and he didn't even get to eat it. But it was fun to watch him interact with the other kids, and get to spy on him learning about becoming friends.

Some pictures:

Here are the other pictures, since I know most of you are really here for little bit (the first one is self labeled in the picture, in case you didn't know what you were looking at):

More pictures are available (as always, I don't post every one here) at our PicasaWeb page.

I know the original meaning of the song I quoted at the start is about sharing the Gospel, but I'm mostly reflecting on the goodness of my life and my happiness with my family - wife and sons. Being redeemed makes everything else so very sweet, and it seemed nice to be happy with all I've been given. I'll leave it as an exercise to the reader to work out why these two blog posts go together.

But, I confess a slight retraction from the idea: one reason we haven't posted pictures for a while is I haven't taken very many - because my 5 year old Nikon D70 (I bought one of the first) is broken. The card reader is giving me the dreaded CHA error (pronounce it "sha", picture yourself in the 80s, and have fun with my camera dissing me.) Since I don't have a place close by to have it looked at (and some Nikon repairs shops can't seem to fix it) I'm gonna try to follow Stephan Mantler's directions to try to fix it. So, technically, although I feel content, I do still want - a least a little.

UPDATE: I just finished reassembling the D70, and it works great. None of the pins were bent or damaged, so I think the ribbon cable on the bottom of the camera must have come loose, and I fixed that while reassembling. Bring me the finest muffins and bagels in all the land!