Thanks family and friends for your interest and support in our lives. We're really glad to be able to share it with you even though we are so far apart.
Judah has often blessed us with spontaneous songs at prayer time. He really does have a worshipful heart. Some of what he sings is precious and profound, and some of it is just kiddie drivel (much like our grown up songs if I'm to be honest) but it just about brings me to tears every time. Anyway, now he's learning to write (he's in the very early stages, so what's in the picture is probably the most he's written at one time) and while Ange and I were preparing dinner tonight he announced that he was writing a song. I helped him with the spelling of "hallelujah" (which I think I got wrong anyway!). Here's the translation:
God is our fun
He's our King
He's our Lord
For the Lord is our heart.
I love You Lord.
Hallelujah
God is powerful...
OK, so its a first draft, but the kid's 5! Yes, I'm a real proud dad, and super-blessed by the wonderful kids that God has given me.
Last week we celebrated Nathan's 4th birthday. We had what he described as being "the best birthday party in his whole life". And it was. We played lots of fun games including a good ol' fashioned egg and spoon race - with real raw eggs! Here are a few photos from the party. Thanks again to family for the gifts you gave, and for those that we were able to get him on your behalf. He is enjoying his new clothes and a Playmobil Knights play set and just loves singing and dancing to his new Colin Buchanan cd.
Some good friends of ours Bonnie and Reid Bristow invited us out on their sailing boat to watch the Chicago Air Show. Apart from the sea sickness, we had a wonderful day and some spectacular views of jets and planes that soared above us. Reid a commercial pilot, who once served in the air-force, was able to tell us about each aircraft as it flew by, and tell us what it is like to fly many of them. Here are a few shots from the day. Unfortunately, it was a rather hazy (foggy) day, so none of the shots were particularly good of the city.
A friend of ours recently got us into game of "coupon clipping". To explain what I mean by this; manufacturers will often advertise with coupons, offering a discount to encourage shoppers to purchase their products. So the game, is then to cut out coupons from the newspaper or print them from the internet and work them in such a way that you leverage an already good retail promotion, by working them both together. I've only been doing it for a week or so now, and here are today's purchases.
At Target, we spent $10.41 for all of the the products pictured below!
Here's how it all worked:
Target was running a store promotion where if you bought 4 Special K items, that you would get a $5 gift card. We also had two "Save $1 off 1 box of cereal" coupons and one "buy 2, get $1 off" cereal bars coupons, so the net result was
2 boxes of Special K Blueberry Cereal for $2.78
2 boxes of Special K breakfast bars for $3.78
Total: $6.56
With the $5 gift card, we put it towards our ice-cream bargain extravaganza:
Target had a promotion where by if you bought 5 Edy's (aka Dreyer's) ice-cream tubs or Frozen fruit bars, you would get yes, another $5 Target gift card. To add to this, we also had five "$1 off" coupons for these products that are usually $3.99 but were on sale for $2.50.
It worked out as follows:
4 tubs of premium ice-cream @ $1.50 each
1 box of all natural frozen fruit bars @ $1.50
Total: $7.50, less the $5 gift card from the Special K promo = net total of $2.50!!!!)
Then, we had a coupon for "save $4 off a participating Schick shaving product". Clayton happens to use the Schick Quattro razor (4 blades), and had been putting off buying refill blades due their expense. With this $4 off coupon, and the $5 Target gift card from the ice-cream transaction, we paid just 35 cents for a 4 pack of Titanium blades, a product that is usually $9.94!!!!
At Dominic's (aka Safeway), we bought the following for just $7.95 with$18.29 in total savings derived from manufacturer coupons and a great store promotion on cereal.
At K-Mart they were doubling coupons, so this meant that a $2 off coupon became a $4 saving! Here, the following products pictured below were purchased for just under $30. Doesn't sound quite as outrageous as my other purchases above, but actually, some of the items purchased are typically very expensive. Some highlights include: Jumbo pack of Huggies for $2.26, 3 FREE liquid hand soap pumps, and Scotch pop-up tape with dispenser for 19 cents.
Last week we were blessed to be able to attend our first ever "Family Camp" at Green Lake Wisconsin. No, we were not 'camping' as such, (although we have pitched a couple of tents together as a family) but we were attending a Christian non-denominational conference for families.
Every morning our boys attended a quality children's ministry program, while we sat through two excellent teaching sessions. The first of these was on marriage and parenting and, the second, an exegesis on the first few chapters of 2 Corinthians from a wonderful old theologian. In the afternoon we rested, and enjoyed the beautiful lake - playing on the beach, canoeing, paddle-boating and even fishing! Each night after dinner, the children were watched and even put to bed by a baby-sitter, while we worshipped and enjoyed another session of preaching, this time - insights from the story of the prodigal son, and then enjoyed the rest of the evening kid free until 11pm.
It was a wonderful time of refreshing and refocussing. Clayton and I both came away from our time at Green Lake feeling better connected to God and each-other, having heard from God with regards to marriage, family and even with a bit of vision and passion for how the Lord might use us as a couple when we return to Australia.
Most readers of this blog will already be aware that over the last few months we have felt God challenge us to step out in faith and begin raising financial support in order to ensure that we will remain here until I finish the PhD. This has been an incredibly daunting step for us. The bottom line is we don't like asking for money - in fact I think very few people do. However, we have been greatly encouraged by the generosity of those that have decided support us and by the growing number of random one off financial gifts. God has truly been gracious to us. He continues to provide just as he always has.
We deeply appreciate His goodness and our family and friends who support us with prayer, encouragement and finances.
This semester I've been taking an external subject at the University of Chicago on the gospel of Mark. This is an important part of my training because the University of Chicago is generally acknowledged as quite a liberal school, so its helping to acquaint me with the sorts of things that are said about Mark and more generally about Scripture from that perspective. Overall its been a positive experience and there have been some good discussions in class. I have a presentation to do on tuesday on the last twelve verses and was trying to explain my approach to Ange the other night after a day of work on it. Judah was listening "patiently" but broke in at one point and said "What's the point Dad?" A great question. I realised that it was a really good time for me to take a deep breath and try to explain what I was doing simply (to see if in fact there WAS a point). So I explained that while Daddy's "job" (we might use the broader term "calling" but my kids are still under the impression that I have a job like other Dads...) usually involves telling people about the bible to help them understand it better, next week Daddy will be talking to a group of people who know an awful lot about the bible but who don't believe that its God's Word in the same way that we do. He understood and I asked him how he thought I should approach the presentation. What should I tell them?
His answer: "Love Jesus." Another great answer. I pressed him for more and got the following: "The bible is God’s word. When we read the bible its God speaking not us speaking, because he wrote it. You know this. So you’d better believe it or you’ll be punished. I think they’ll believe it when they hear the punish part."
I couldn't stop grinning and affirmed him lavishly. What a refreshing end to a long day!
Here's a quick note on where we're up to from both of us.
The spring is wonderful here. Gone are the freezing temperatures, slippery roads and multiple layers of clothing. The temperature is steadily in the 20s (celsius) (70-80s fahrenheit) and the trees and flowers are in full bloom. If you've never experienced this kind of climate before, you've never experienced the relief and joy that a change in the season brings. Imagine the world under snow and having to stay inside one month and then bright and balmy with patches of stunning tulips in bloom the next.
Clayton has completed one academic year of his PhD and has passed some significant milestones. He has successfully defended his dissertation proposal, passed the candidacy interview (off his L Plates now), passed the German competency exam and started learning Latin, presented a conference paper in Boston and submitted his first article for publication. All in all he's on track to finish mid 2011 for a December graduation (just in time for our tenth wedding anniversary!).
Angela: Hmmm, what to report.... No doubt it's common for mothers with young children to look back on a month, a year or even longer, and wonder, "What have I done with my life?" When so much of it is consumed with the mundane; wiping bottoms, spills, sticky hands, dishes and runny noses, is that it? Is that all that it amounts to? Thankfully, there is a lot more purpose and reward in motherhood. Fortunately, the mundane is cheerfully contrasted by the joy and pleasure that one's children can and do bring. And compassionately, God meets us in the mundane. If we look for Him, He is there.
The boys: Judah, after one year of pre-school, is getting ready to start (US) kindergarten (= AU:Prep) in the Fall (late August - the start of the school year over here) and Nathan, who has been in 3 y.o. pre-school a couple of mornings a week and absolutely loves it, is excited about the prospect of going more often as of the new (Academic) year. Both Judah and Nathan are growing in their knowledge and love for God and surely must bless the Lord with their sweet prayers heartfelt songs. Jordan has well and truly crossed over into toddler-hood and loves to be considered "one of the boys", joining in wrestling and desperate to start pre-school! All three are a continual blessing in our lives (though often a challenge). They are all so different and we're very thankful that God has made us a family.
Nathan and Jordan still take a decent nap each afternoon, so Judah and I will sometimes get a little quality time together if I'm not preparing dinner or cleaning up after everyone. Today we were working on Judah's reading and made some great progress. After about 20 minutes, he was starting to loose focus, so we started to play a game where I would write a word that he'd not read before based on some of the concepts that we'd just learned, then he had to draw a picture of the word that he had just read. It was so wonderful to see the delight that he had each time he worked out the word. I was so proud that I had to take a photo of it to show you all. He had a bit of trouble with 'robot' as it wasn't really working with anything that we'd just learnt. But don't you just love the pictures? I was interested with how he'd do with drawing an abstract word like 'think'. I think he did pretty well.
And here's a picture of the family that Nathan drew while we were out and about. It's on the back of a bank statement that I had in my handbag - which explains the shape of the paper and the barcode. Child psychologist and loving aunty Georgie says that the presence of hands and fat little fingers, as well as a defined body shape (rather than limbs coming off a big head) are all signs of progress in his cognitive development.
This is Nathan singing a song that he learnt at pre-school. It is a beautiful song of thankfulness that he likes to sing around the house - it really reflects his heart as he is a very greatful and appreciative little boy.
I can hardly believe that it has been a year since Jordan entered the world. My only sadness, is that his family back home have not been able to share our joy in watching him grow and have missed out on getting to know him. I thought that I would share a little on our lad...
Jordan Micah Coombs...
Everyday, you light up my world. You are the source of so much joy and delight, and your smile always brightens my day. You are so cute and cuddly. I find you simply delicious!
You're a curious little boy who likes to explore. You are very independent and seem content to wander around the house playing without me following you.
You are loving and affectionate and love to give hugs and kisses. You are thrilled when daddy comes home, and will walk as quickly as you can to greet him at the door and will hold his leg until you are picked up and hugged. You LOVE your brothers and you're not afraid to wrestle a little with them either.
You're a contented little boy and it is a great blessing to me that you rarely fuss or cry for anything. What a wonderful thing it is to have you happy to go shopping or on walks in the stroller with me.
You are well loved Jordan Micah, and we are so grateful to God for giving you to us.
Here are a few recent pictures from a little photo shoot we had on the Easter weekend - a week before his birthday.
I've taken up a new hobby - baking bread. I've tried a number of different recipes, each one better than the last. Most have been pretty disappointing in terms of their crust colour and texture - very dull and lifeless. Like my dad, I enjoy a good crunchy golden coloured crust and a soft, chewy inside. This weekend I struck gold. I stumbled across a new technique and the results were extremely satisfying.
Here's how it turned out:
For those of you who are interested, here's the recipe:
Ingredients: 1/4 tsp active dry yeast 1 1/2 cups warm water 3 cups all-purpose flour, plus more for dusting. You may use white, whole wheat or a combination of the two. 1 1/2 tsp salt Cornmeal or wheat bran for dusting
Directions: 1. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in water. Add the flour and salt, stirring until blended. The dough will be shaggy and sticky. Cover bowl with plastic wrap. Let the dough rest at least 8 hours, preferably 12 to 18, at warm room temperature. 2. The dough is ready when its surface is dotted with bubbles. Lightly flour a work surface and place dough on it. Sprinkle it with a little more flour and fold it over on itself once or twice. Cover loosely with plastic wrap and let it rest for about 15 minutes. 3. Using just enough flour to keep the dough from sticking to the work surface or to your fingers, gently shape it into a ball. Dust a clean dish towel with flour, and wheat bran or cornmeal if desired. Put the seam side of the dough down on the towel and dust with more flour, bran or cornmeal. Cover with another towel and let rise for about 1 to 2 hours. When it’s ready, the dough will have doubled in size and will not readily spring back when poked with a finger. 4. At least 20 minutes before the dough is ready, heat oven to 475 degrees F. Put a 6- to 8-quart heavy covered pot (cast iron, enamel, Pyrex or ceramic) in the oven as it heats. When the dough is ready, carefully remove the pot from the oven and lift off the lid. Slide your hand under the towel and turn the dough over into the pot, seam side up. The dough will lose its shape a bit in the process, but that’s OK. Give the pan a firm shake or two to help distribute the dough evenly, but don’t worry if it’s not perfect; it will straighten out as it bakes. 5. Cover and bake for 30 minutes. Remove the lid and bake another 15 to 20 minutes, until the loaf is beautifully browned. Remove the bread from the Dutch oven and let it cool on a rack for at least 1 hour before slicing.
Jordan at 11 months squeals with delight and chuckles as he plays with his toy monkey, Curious George. He is very fond of this little guy and like to hug him in bed.
You may remember two years ago, footage we took of Judah at 3 years old "reading" the bible. Well now, here are a few snippets of Nathan telling a few bible stories at 3 and half.
Here's a reminder of Judah at 3 doing a similar thing.
Feb 28 was Judah's birthday (well for those who remember its actually the 29th but that doesn't come around all that often). We had decided to celebrate at Chuck E Cheese's (A cross between timezone and pizza hut - always a hit with kids) with some of his friends from pre-school. We had to get away by 9.30am and while we didn't think that would be too much of a challenge, we realised that unexpected things can always pop up, so we made good preparations the night before. We had left baking the cake until the morning because Ange wanted to make a giant chocolate chip cookie for the cake and well fresh is best, but everything else was prepared and we went to bed. After a skype call to family first thing in the morning we decided it was high time to make the cookie cake, and that's where things began to go wrong...
You see, the recipe called for two cups of cookie dough, but wanting to make sure it was a winner we had bought pre-made dough in a plastic tub. A brief argument ensued as to what proportion of this tub represented two cups. I won't say who argued which position because it simply isn't important. We together decided to just dump the whole tub onto a flat baking tray and put it in the oven. What could be simpler...?
Several minutes later things were going really well. The lump of dough had spread into a nice flat and perfectly round cookie exactly as big as the (flat) tray (with no sides)...but there were still several minutes to go - it clearly wasn't yet cooked. It kept spreading. And then smoke started pouring out of the oven, because as it spread it dripped over the sides of the (flat) tray (with no sides) and down onto the base of the oven where it began to burn. Very soon the kitchen was full of smoke. The next thing to happen should not have been unexpected, but smoke alarms are designed to be shocking and this was no exception. I swished smoke vainly and visited each of the smoke alarms in turn to see if I could remove a battery or rip them off the wall or something. No luck. This is college housing and this was a college installed system and I think somebody had already thought of that. Ah - that's it. Call the college switch. I dialled the number and patiently tried to explain. "I'm really sorry, we were doing some cooking and the smoke alarms have gone off. There is no fire, but I can't turn the alarms off...(all the while I could hear Basil Fawlty in the back of my mind "Is not fire, is only bell!"). "I'll send the officer" came the curt reply. I was about to explain that we didn't want to cause any trouble and if she could only give me the clue as to how to turn the blasted things off the officer need not come - but she had hung up. Well the officer arrived (very quickly) and we patiently explained what I'd told the girl on the phone. "I'm going to have to get you to evacuate the building" he said calmly. "What?!" I said. (Now I could See Basil Fawlty in my mind's eye as well as hear him. It was all I could do to stop myself from saying "NO. Is not fire. Is only bell!") "I'm really sorry about this" the officer explained "but once those alarms go off there's nothing we can do. The fire department will be here soon and technically they own this building until they reset the alarms. Please leave the house now." I'm pretty sure he doesn't have kids. We were all in our pyjamas and it was -8 C outside. Did he want us to just go and stand in the snow on the front "lawn"? What planet was this guy on? We got into our coats and boots. I'd hate to think what would have happened had it actually been urgent. I went and started the car and turned the heater on. We evacuated the kids there. By that time the fire department had come and some very important men in very important uniforms were bustling about. Even as I picked up Jordan and took him to the car one of them brushed by me. As he did he said in a very important voice into a very important device "Confirm - cooking smoke - over." Um duh. Actually he was very nice and when they were leaving he turned and said to me. "Where are you from?" (Come on Mick bring out Croc Dundee 4 - these people are forgetting our accent!). "Australia" I answered. He brightened. "Well when I get off my shift, I'll have to go and put the wobbly boot on" he quipped with a knowing wink. You folks have a good day." And he was off. Americans, Australians - any help on that one? What the heck's the wobbly boot?!
So back to the story. The cake still wasn't cooked. Nobody was dressed and we had five minutes to leave. Incredibly we almost managed it. I say almost for two reasons. The first is that we took about ten. The second is that the last thing we had to do before we left was to grab the cake. Unfortunately, we were now in a hurry. Hastily Ange grabbed the precious cookie which wasn't quite ready to be ripped off the tray. It prompty disintegrated all over her and all over the floor. She had to change.
It could only happen to the Coombs'.
Judah's birthday was a hit by the way. He had a great time and so did his friends. Now for those who have been as puzzled about my Basil Fawlty allusions as I was about the wobbly boot - here's some context. Enjoy.
So out littlest man is almost 10 months old now. He continues to bring us so much joy and has at long last been sleeping better at night. Jordy took his first steps almost 2 months ago and has not looked back since. Although still a little wobbly, he's walking all over the place. Naturally, he's into everything - especially the things that we don't want him to be into! He's now calling me 'mama', Clayton 'dada' and is saying 'baba' when he waves goodbye.
It's been a while since I last took footage of Jordan and I realised that I hadn't captured any of him walking. Here's a little snippet I took tonight before he went to bed.
Thought that the blog deserved an update on Clayton's progress on the PhD as that is the reason why we are out here in the first place!
He wrote a paper last semester for which he has been invited to speak on at a theological conference in Boston next month. This is an exciting opportunity and a real privilege. They have agreed to pay for virtually all of his expenses including accomodation, meals, registration and a large portion of travel expeneses. (He'll have to pay just $150, so that's not bad). I suppose that what he hopes to offer to this gathering of theologians is the chance for them to witness that it is possible for a Pentecostal theologian to make sense! hehe :) Actually, it works out well, as attending this conference would have certainly been worthwhile, but completely unaffordable.
Clayton taught his first lecture this week. He thinks that it went quite well, especially considering that he had only a couple of days to prepare it and that he was largely unfamiliar in the specifics of the area of study. (He found out that he would be teaching the same day that I put my back out and was left flat out in bed for days.) He was up late the night before the class madly reading. I volunteered to 'help' and stayed up reading primary documents dated back to the 300's. Fun! Actually, it was pretty interesting reading. One of the fascinating things that came up, was how the translation of scripture into different languages has led to significant divergence in doctine. The example that came up was of how the concept of 'penance' arose from the word 'repentance' being translated as such. Fascinating stuff that really helps vindicate (for want of a better word) Clayton's love for the ancient languages of Hebrew and Greek.
He seems to be doing well in his course. He has already overcome his fist hurdle of learning German (there is a lot of theology written in German). Next he has to do the same with Latin. He is getting a clearer picture of where he is going with his dissertation (thesis) and is enthralled in his research area. He's engrossed with the writings of some of the early church fathers, who in his opinion, were God fearing church leaders who upheld the authority of scripture, so he says that their work is great to read. He is really getting into it - sometimes I feel like I'm married to the character Ben that Nicholas Cage plays in National Treasure, or Indiana Jones (minus all of the action adventure hero stuff). It's exciting to see him passionately researching something historical from an angle that no one else has ever investigated, and Clayton being Clayton, is excited at it's potential relevance to us in the church today. What can I say, I married a brilliant man :)
He seems to be coping pretty well with the ongoing pressure and the never-ending piles of books that he has to read. It seems like regardless of how much work he has, he still manages to put the family first which is a real blessing.
It's FREEZING here!!!! Most of you who read this are either enduring an extremely hot summer Down Under, or are blissfully cruising through a Southern Californian 'winter'. So please spare a thought for us. Today will be our coldest day yet. As I write, it is currently minus 24 degrees Celcius, and it is expected to drop a further 3 degrees. Tonight on the weather report, the 'windchill' factor was categorised as 'brutally cold'. Brutally! So what do you do? You don't go out unless you absolutely have to. So we all stayed home today. Even Clayton worked from home. They say that in these sorts of conditions, your skin burns and any moisture freezes, so don't go out particularly if you have a runny nose!
Dad: OK boys. One story before bed and tonight its my turn to pick. Both boys: Ohhhhhh! (Ange reminds me that it is in fact Nathan's turn to pick) Dad: New plan - Nathan gets to choose one story. Judah: Ohh that's not fair! Dad: OK then, you be the answer man. How would you make it fair? There's one story and two boys - and its gotta be fair for everyone. What would you do? Judah: Well.....if I was a man... Dad: yes... Judah: If I was a man, then I'd say one boy gets to pick each night. Dad: Exactly. Judah: But if I was a boy, I'd say I get to pick every night!
What a great response! In the meantime Nathan has picked a story.
Dad: Now you know the difference between being a boy and being a man. Let's read...
