Tag: family

  • Going Green-ish

    One of our family goals this year was to make some changes to how we consumed the world’s resources. Some of it is a desire to live more simply and some of it is just a realization that the stuff our little family does, when added up with millions of other families, really impacts our planet. So while we’ve been at it for a month, this is the first time I’ve talked about it on the blog. Simply put, I wanted to make sure we were actually doing stuff before I said we were going to be doing stuff!

    Here are a few things we’re doing so far this year:

    • 3 weekends ago we planted a little garden. We know it’ll take a couple seasons to truly get it productive, but we wanted to get something going. As the seasons go on we plan on expanding the garden. We definitely have the space in the yard. We just need to build up the beds.
    • We joined a CSA to support locally grown, organic produce. We picked up our first box this week, this is big change in how we spend money on groceries.
    • We are installing a drip system for watering outdoor plants. San Diego is a coastal desert. That means that we only get a little bit of rain each year and watering plants in the garden is a big deal. This will help us waste less water as well as hopefully make the garden grow a little better. The people from Drip Depot have some sweet stuff, can’t wait to see how it works.
    • Get serious about waste! Kristen asked for, and got, a worm composting system for Christmas. While it isn’t a huge impact, we want to reduce our food waste that goes in the garbage by at least 25%. We’re also trying to be more conscious about buying things we can re-use and recycle.
    • Still rocking the trolley when I can. We’re in a bit of a funk with this because of my travel schedule and the weather. But I’m doing my best to eliminate the need for a second car (we only have one) by taking the trolley to and from work. We eliminate the need for a second car by keeping our work schedules flexible as well as being quick to rent a car when needed.

    We’ve tossed around, but not acted on, some other ideas. More on this as the year goes on.

  • Christmas Recap

    This morning we are vowing to leave the house at some point. Yesterday, as is our habit, we hunkered down for a day of pure family. It turned out to be a really nice Christmas.

    Christmas technically kicked off on Thursday night with a fun little trip to Orange County. A couple from our community group invited us to their family’s traditional Christmas Eve party. That was a lot of fun! Apparently, this group of people have been hanging out on Christmas Eve together for more than 20 years. So the house was filled with a mixture of joy and shared known. It was really cool to see the generational aspect of the whole thing, the embracing of some traditions, and it really just got our family in the mood for Christmas.

    Christmas morning, the kids got up early, as decreed in the New Testament. At about 5:30 they woke us up with, “It’s Christmas! Can we open presents NOW????” We made them wait until 7:00 before we opened presents so mom and dad could at least see straight… and we had to listen to them count down every minute!

    Ah, the anticipation of children and the power of parents to torture by saying “be patient.”

    Best Present

    • Paul: Nintendo DS
    • Megan: Sweet digital camera and a photo blog to share
    • Dad: Membership to J.R. Organics CSA
    • Mom: A new wedding ring (she had lost hers a few years ago)
    • Stoney: A new collar
    • Lovely: A cat bed

    From about 8:00 AM on we all just laid around. The kids played with their toys. Mom and dad watched some movies. I think that was about it until lunch.

    christmas-ham

    Since Kristen isn’t feeling great I was in charge of Christmas dinner. With just four of us… we kept it simple. Ham, cranberry, rolls, mashed potatos. Oops, I forgot vegitables! (No one complained)

    After dinner, we all kind of scattered and just rested. Paul fell asleep about 2:30 PM and didn’t wake up until 3:30 AM! Megan watched TV with me. Kristen took naps off and on all day. We were basically bums!

    Later, I watched the Chargers dismantle the Titans intersperced with endless episodes of Mythbusters. And that was Christmas.

  • Our Christmas Video

  • 61 Minutes: The Kitchen

    I’m learning to love time lapse videos so I thought I’d start off by making a series of my own.

    Here’s an ordinary 61 minutes in my kitchen. A mom makes dinner, cleans up, takes the dog for a walk, a dad sneaks a snack, the kids come and do homework.

    There is something extraordinary about the ordinary, isn’t there?

  • Stoney and Friends

    Stoney and Friends


    Stoney and Friends

    Originally uploaded by mclanea

    I woke up this morning to see Stoney, the family dog, laying on his blanket completely surrounded by the kids Webkinz.

  • Thoughts on Disney on Ice Princess Classics

    Last night, our family went to go see the Disney on Ice show. It was great family fun. I remember when I was a kid wanting to go, the kid across the street always getting to go, but being disappointed that I never got to go. So I was a little surprised when Paul said he wanted to go because he is definitely not into princesses. In fact, we had a nice chat earlier about what kinds of wild animals it would be fun to release onto the ice to chase and eat the princesses.

    With all of that pessimism in me– it’s worth noting that we had a good time. No, really. It was fun.

    Some random thoughts.
    1. I’m glad we told the kids in advance we weren’t buying anything. It’s not that we’re cheap, it’s that we don’t want to blow money on $15 light up Disney princess spinning toys. And we ate dinner before going so no one needed a $12 Disney funnel cake. Overall, we got out of there with just paying for parking. I feel like somehow I earned $100 in bonus money.
    2. It has two acts. One was plenty. Seriously, we thought the thing was over. The kids were cheering. All of the dead princesses had been kissed by their princes and were back to life skating around in their costumed glory. It was over when they announced, “we’ll be back after this intermission for the second half of our show.” The second half ranked up there as the longest hour of my life.
    3. Now I know what happens to Olympic skaters after they reach puberty. They get jobs with Disney on Ice. I always said that skating didn’t prepare you for actual life skills, I was wrong.
    4. “Are those real men daddy?” Paul, sitting at the edge of his seat asked me this question when a troop of men in tights skated to the center of the ice rink. “It’s complicated son. Complicated.”
    5. Dress your kid like a princess, you spend $300 at Disney on Ice. Seriously, 75% of the little girls in the audience wore Disney dress-up clothes to the show. You could hear the vacuums from parents wallets as kids begged for matching kitsch.
    6. Big kids, too. Looking around, there were lots of kids who weren’t into in nearly as much as their parents. That’s the awesome part of Disney’s business model. Don’t introduce too many new characters– think about generations of kids who want to be Snow White, Belle, and Ariel when they grow up. There was a lot of sing-along from the parents. Reminds me of the McDonald’s business model. Hook ’em while they’re young!
    7. Megan was very satisfied. Like a lot of 8 year olds, Megan loves fantasy. She’s very interested in reading and stories. So this was right up her alley. She told me last night, “I just hope I can remember the order of all of these princesses for my journal.”
    8. Did you know you can watch streaming video from ustream.tv on your iPhone? I learned that last night during the second half of the show. I watched some puppy cams, kitten cams, and some strange show about people who want to pay to travel to space. No, they aren’t going to allow you to travel to space on your credit card. Pay cash up front. Makes sense.
    9. I have fun going places with my kids no matter what. Hey, I drag them to football games so putting up with 2 hours is no big deal, right? It was way easier than 2 hours of a princess birthday party.
    10. I love being a dad. There’s no other way to say that. It’s full of life lessons as I try my best to teach life lessons.

  • Warp Speed!

    warp-speed

    That’s how I feel about the next 90 days. This week starts the first of three National Youth Worker Conventions. For me, it’s a huge honor to be able to go to the three U.S. conventions and to play such a cool role. On site I am in charge of capturing the story of the convention for our internet audience, snapping a couple thousand pictures, filling a years worth of blog content, co-leading a seminar on social media and video, plus a whole littany of other normal stuff the whole staff does on site.

    What this really means is that this is my busy season. Between now and the end of the year I’ll be gone about a week a month for work. Of course, while I’m gone doesn’t mean that regular work doesn’t get done, it just backlogs. And I stil need to use a weeks vacation in there. So the pattern is go away for about a week. Rest HARD on the travel day. Push through as much work as possible. Rest HARD some more. Get everything together to go back on the road. Repeat.

    The point of this post isn’t to lament about the next 3 months of my life. Not at all. Trust me, I consider this insanity to be a blessing. I am thankful to God for the opportunity. The point of this post is to think about the question, “How do you find sanity when your life hits warp speed?”

    Here’s how I do it. I’d love to hear how others go through similar times.

    1. Embrace some insanity. This might be super unhealthy, but when I’m on site at a convention, I focus on what needs to be done. If these trips were a sport I want to make sure I leave it all on the field.With thousands of attendees coming I want to do whatever I can to make their experience awesome.

    2. Schedule rest when on the road. The attitude of #1 above will kill you if you aren’t disciplined. Last year, I was so wide-eyed about the whole thing that I barely slept, said yes to everything, and allowed my schedule to get out of control. This year I’ve blocked out times for meals, rest, and “me time.” I’m an introvert– this is for my sanity and everyone else’s safety.

    3. Schedule rest when at home. I’ve gotten better about not working on weekends, I need to keep that pattern going through this busy time. I also need to look at holes in my schedule and stay home to work a bit during the week, leave early when possible, stuff like that.

    4. Do fun stuff with the kids. My travel stuff is hard on the kids. Sure, they don’t express it. But I can tell when I come back that it hasn’t been easy without me. I’m cooking up some evil plans to spend time with them.

    5. Accept that some stuff won’t get done on time. As much as it drives me insane to know that I need to do that, I just need to decide which things get done on time and which things are less important and get pushed off until later.

    6. Take notes. My mind swells with ideas/thoughts/reflections during these times. This year, I’m going to capture so much more with Evernote on my iPhone.

  • Paul’s Birthday

    Hard to believe it, but our little baby boy just turned 6. Here are some pictures we took yesterday down by Point Loma Nazarene University.

  • Philly Pictures

  • NYC Pictures | Day One