Lakers win...Big deal

After watching the NBA finals, I give it a big 2 out of 10. 10 being the highest. It was boring to watch. I was rooting for Orlando Magic, but they played not much better than the Mavericks played when we last saw them embarrassed themselves in the their last NBA finals.

John was telling me last night that Kobe has been placed number 13th on the list of best NBA players. We both think he was ranked too high, Kevin Garnett was placed 30th. Dirk Nowitsky was placed 50th, this maybe due to his jailed pregnant girlfriend. At any rate, this NBA finals was a dud to watch.

Now the only sports on TV is baseball. Another yawn! HOWEVER, The Texas Rangers are doing pretty good this year, and a lot of people including myself are jumping on the bandwagon. I haven't watched a game yet, well, perhaps only an inning but I do read their stats and sports commentaries about them. Maybe they'll make the playoffs, I still think it is along shot for them to make the world series. Long shot! But at least they are playing good this year. - sandra.

8th Year Wedding Anniversary

John's strongest feeling about our 8th year anniversary was Thankful. Mine was Impressed.
Impressed because there was a time that I didn't think we would see our 6th. I am also thankful that we were able to climb that wall and finally walk past it. While climbing that wall, we fell and cried, but every fall we got up and tried again and here we are now on our 8th better than our 6th and growing each day.

John gave me this beautiful inspirational frame. I love what it says. He also took me to eat to my favorite Sushi place. I didn't eat Sushi of course. I did eat Eel, cooked, Miso soup and Tempura.


Here it sits at my office right besides my baby's picture.
I don't expect jewels or nothing expensive. After what we have been through I have learned to cherish those things that can never be replace. My marriage. -Sandra.

Baby Seaman No. 2 Update

This is our Baby Seaman Numero 2 at 20 weeks. This was also the first time John got to see the baby. He missed out last time. This time we got to count baby's ten toes. The doctor checked to see if it was a boy or a girl but of course didn't tell us because we prevented him from it, it was hard, but we would rather find out at birth.

Time is definitely going fast this second time around. I thought I was 18 weeks but was told 20. I guess that was the last time I checked what week I was on. I also gained 5 pounds. It didn't help that I had eaten a banana split the day before and that I was weighted 30 minutes after I had eaten lunch, and when you count the weight of the clothes, give and take I think I have only gained about two or three pounds max. But that's ok. -Sandra.

Undesired Gender

By Father Jonathan Morris

Over the last few months, with underwhelming media attention, home “gender” tests appeared on the United States market that can determine the sex of an unborn baby as early as eight or ten weeks into pregnancy, according to its American design company.

So underwhelming was the product rollout that, apparently, even Drudge Report missed it. Yesterday the newsmaking Web site linked to a story in the New Zealand Herald about a “controversial product” making its way from Australia to the shores of its southeastern neighbor.

Much more newsworthy for an American site like Drudge, would have been a link to the American company, IntelliGender, that designed the product and that is already selling it in local Walgreen and CVS pharmacies in every big and little town in America.
Drudge did well, however, in pointing out the societal relevance of such a product. The new technology will now make it possible for women or couples to make a decision to abort a child on account of gender, before signs of pregnancy are visible.

This use of the product, of course, is not highlighted in the marketing pitch of IntelliGender. It boasts only that the “gender prediction product” (about 80 percent accurate in home testing) is a “fun pre-birth experience” and “bridges the curiosity gap between conception and sonogram”.
Personally, I find the new technology and accompanying controversy quite interesting, on various accounts. First, it should be said, the new test, if used for good purposes, is perfectly acceptable from a moral perspective. Non-intrusive tests intended to determine the sex of an unborn child at any stage of pregnancy, including well before viability, are a fine use of science. In fact, knowing the sex of a child earlier on in pregnancy may help expecting mothers take stock of the reality of the unique human beings they carry in their wombs. Directors of pro-life pregnancy centers often say sonogram technology is the most powerful tool of persuasion in their goal of encouraging women to carry their babies to term.

Needless to say, there will be some men and women— great numbers, I fear— who abuse this scientific progress and choose to use the early knowledge of gender for selfish purposes.
The real controversy, then, should not be over whether the government should ban these tests, but what the government will do to supervise Planned Parenthood and other government-supported abortion providers as they deal with cases of women seeking abortions of pre-born children of an “undesired gender”.

President Obama has promised that his Administration’s policies of education and support of women with unwanted pregnancies will reduce the number of abortions. Given Planned Parenthood’s well-known record of providing abortion on demand, despite federal and state restrictions prohibiting this, it would be wise of Obama to act swiftly in protection of the little boy or little girl whose only sin is his or her gender. Leaving Planned Parenthood to its own moral restraints will guarantee sex selection as the next selfish motive of another silent genocide.

God bless,
Father Jonathan

‘Up’-lifting

By Mark Earley
Pixar Reminds Us of What Matters

In recent years, Disney’s Pixar Studios has been something of a godsend for parents looking for wholesome, high-quality entertainment. With great films like WALL-E, The Incredibles, and many more, Pixar has provided family films with heart, films that tell genuinely good stories and avoid the crassness that’s so prevalent in many children’s films today. And their films, without being “message movies,” usually provide plenty of food for thought for both kids and adults.
Pixar’s latest effort is simply titled Up, and it’s well worth seeing. Up tells the story of an elderly widower, Carl Fredricksen. Faced with the prospect of being sent against his will to a retirement home, he decides to fulfill a lifelong dream of his and his wife’s, and heads off to Paradise Falls in South America.

From the advertisements for the movie, you’ve probably seen how he gets there—via an elaborate, only-in-the-movies gadget, made up of his house and an enormous bunch of balloons. But Carl’s journey also has something to tell us about the dangers of hanging onto a dream—even a good dream—too long and too hard.

You see, Carl is so obsessed with getting to Paradise Falls that he loses sight of the importance of relationships with others around him. When a little boy named Russell stows away on his flying house, Carl treats the child as little better than a nuisance. And once they’ve made it to South America, as Russell makes friends with a bird and a dog that they encounter, Carl sees the three of them as creatures who are only useful if they can help him get to his destination.
His goal isn’t a bad one. It’s even noble in a way, as he’s pursuing it partly in honor of his beloved late wife. It’s just blinded him to the needs, desires, and worth of others. It’s like C. S. Lewis wrote in Mere Christianity about pursuing good things in bad ways. He said, “Pleasure, money, power, and safety are all, as far as they go, good things. The badness consists in pursuing them by the wrong method, or in the wrong way, or too much.”

What’s interesting is that the villain of the movie is, in a way, exactly like Carl. This villain was an explorer who was unjustly called a fraud when he couldn’t prove that he’d discovered a new South American species. So he spends his life obsessed with restoring his reputation, to the point of running roughshod over any person or anything that gets in his way. His desire for justice—not a bad thing in itself—drives all other moral considerations from his mind.
At the heart of the story is this dilemma: Will Carl become just like this cold and cruel man, or will he finally come to see what’s really important? It takes a poignant reminder of his happy, love-filled marriage to open Carl’s eyes. And I can tell you, it’s a reminder that doesn’t leave a dry eye in the theater.

So take your family to see Up. It’ll help all of you see adventure—and human relationships—in a whole new light.

Housework

The things you do when you are a homeowner. John decided it was time to trim both of our trees. The big one at the front of the house and the one on our backyard. Fun.

And of course, here's Sofia putting her two cents in the job. Trying to climb the ladder and going after her daddy. This is pretty much all she could do.

John's proud moment

Here it is! His first Corn out of his garden! I think this is his third year trying to get one of this to grow and it finally did. John did his homework and started to work on the soil way back in December. He was so excited!

The middle corn is John's compared to the non-organic corn. I ate the big corn, I'm eating for two and there was no way, I was going to eat John's first Corn.

Here's the lucky garden corn all ready to eat after it sat on the barbecue grill.


Below are the tomatoes! Can't wait! Last year we weren't very lucky, but this year we will have a tomato fest! There are so many coming out.
And below is John's first pumpkin making its debut. We'll see how far this one makes it. So far, John was able to kill the bugs that infest this plant. He decided not to go organic with pumpkins. But that's OK with me, don't like pumpkin anyway you put it. I just like them for decoration for Halloween.

Sofia at the Mall

I work near Willow Bend Mall in West Plano and after we left the Fusion Festival in Frisco, this past weekend, we decided to go somewhere cool. We got here and Sofia was amazed at the place! She didn't move from this position for 5 minutes. She just couldn't believe the amount of kids playing around her.


Sofia kept looking at us in amazement! Watching your kids play can be entertaining. This place is great for kids and even though she didn't do much, she enjoyed herself.

So, on our way out, we saw this! It is a place where kids can practice their surfing skills. It was awesome to look at, actually John and I wanted to get in the action but decided that we would look foolish. John went back in time on his days of surfing in Hawaii.

Toothbrushing

Sofia's teeth didn't start showing until she was close to a year old. Now, she's got three teeth on top and one on the bottom. Still slow in the process of growing teeth, which her Doctor reassures me she's doing fine and tells me that babies that get their teeth later have great teeth! So, that's a relief. But this weekend when I was feeding her lunch I noticed something on her top teeth where the gum begins and tooth ends. It looked like a dark line. I freaked out! I thought it was food stain that got stuck but when I rubbed it off it didn't come off. I freaked out again.

I'm a big on teeth cleanning. I carry my floss everywhere I go. John freaked out more than I did, I was concerned and thought that perhaps it was time to start brushing her teeth. Her teeth are still very far apart from each other so, I didn't give it much thought. John immediately went out and bought Sofia a small soft toothbrush and toothpaste, with no fluride, safe to swallow of course. I called her doctor today and was told that I should start brushing her teeth twice a day. Morning and night. So, I immediately did a retro thought and went back to my childhood when my mom never had us missed cleaning our teeth. No matter how tired she was, she was right there every night and every morning until she was sure it had become something that we did like putting our shoes on every day.

I'm doing alot of that retro memory stuff alot now that I'm a mom. So, now, we are adding one more thing to do with Sofia when she gets up and before she goes to bed, until she gets it on her own. Next thing might be potty training. Not looking forward to it, but I am looking forward on saving money on diapers! -Sandra.

Andrew's Graduation

My nephew Andrew Maloney graduated yesterday from 6th grade! He's an honor student and wants to be an Architect. He's pretty good with math and loves to build stuff. So, 6 more years he will be graduating from High School, God Willing, and my sister and my brother n law will really be crying then. Sofia will only be seven years old then.

An Unhappy Trend

I never believed in having babies outside of marriage. I am a firm believer that children need two parents not one. I didn't want babies early on. In my twenties I was too selfish to even think about babies or marriage. I was all about me, myself and I and all the fun that came with it. I wasn't putting off marriage, I was just not ready to settled down or looking for anyone. I had decided that it was going to happened when God had already planned it in my life and that's how it happened for me. So, when John and I got together it was the begining of John and I and the end of me, myself and I. But I was fine with it, I had grown tired of just me and I was ready to share. -sandra.
_____________________

By Chuck Colson
Decoupling Children and Marriage

According to a recent report by the Centers for Disease Control, 40 percent of American babies born in 2007 were born to unmarried mothers. That’s up from 34 percent only five years ago.
When most Americans hear the expression “unmarried mother,” what nearly always comes to mind is a teenage girl. But that’s not what’s driving the recent increase. In 2007, only 23 percent of the out-of-wedlock births were to unmarried teenagers. The rest were to women in their 20s, and now increasingly, in their 30s.

The increase among older women accounts for the six percentage point increase of the past five years. In 2007, 60 percent of all births to unmarried women were to women in their 20s and 17 percent to women in their 30s.

Or, as Emily Yoffe of Slate magazine put it, “the vast majority of unwed mothers are old enough to know what they're doing.” Yoffe sees these numbers as evidence of “an extraordinary decoupling of marriage and procreation.”
But what’s behind this “decoupling”?
A significant part of the answer lies in changing ideas and attitudes towards marriage. Marriage is no longer seen as an institution whose ends have a communal, as well as personal, purpose. Instead, it is an expression of private affection whose ends are almost entirely about personal fulfillment.

Thus, getting married is increasingly something you do after the rest of your life is arranged to your satisfaction. You go to school, find a job, get established in your career, and then you think about getting married. As a result, the average age when people first get married has risen by five years since 1970.

But while our ideas about marriage have changed, our natures haven’t. One thing that Christians and dyed-in-the-wool Darwinists can agree on is that we are driven to reproduce ourselves. With a few exceptions, no matter how successful we might be, many feel that if we leave no descendants behind, all the striving is beside the point.
What’s more, our biology doesn’t care about our sense of personal fulfillment. A woman’s most fertile period is her late teens to early 30s—precisely the time when young people are going to school and getting established in their careers.

Thus, the longer we put off marriage, the more difficult it will be to fulfill one of our most fundamental instincts—have a child.
Throw in the complications of meeting “Mr. Right,” getting to know him, and deciding that he’s the person you want to marry, and the “ticking clock” begins to sound like Big Ben.
So it seems that more and more women have decided to have children while they still can, regardless of their marital status. The result is, in Yoffe’s words, a “culture [that] is out of touch with the needs of children.” And I would add that what a child needs most is a stable, loving family with a mom and a dad at the helm.

Re-coupling marriage and procreation will not be easy in this “me-first” culture. That’s because marriage and having babies—as fulfilling as they are—are not about self-fulfillment. They are about love, fidelity, and self-sacrifice for the good of the other—for the spouse, for the children.
That message is a tough sell these days. But it’s a message our culture ignores at its great peril.

God Bless Husbands

This past Friday, I woke up sick so did Sofia. She woke up with a 102.1 temperature so, I called her doctor and they only had a 4:30pm appointment. So, I decided to work from home since I wasn't feeling well. The day got worse for both of us. I thought I was just getting a regular cold like the one I got early May, but no, it was the flu. By the time, John and I took Sofia to her appointment she was at 103.7 temperature and my body was aching but I kept going. By 7pm that evening, I was in bed shaking and cold with a temperature of 101.5 and getting worse. I called my OBGYN and he called in antibiotics. I started to cry because I didn't want to harm my baby with drugs or any of the sort but my sister reassured me that it was necessary or else I might end up in the hostpital or worse.

So, I spend my weekend in bed while John attended to both us. He cooked chicken soup for us. I know he was tired last night but didn't complain. I know he was worried for both us and I was worried for my babies. So, God Bless my husband.