November 10 – “Breaking tradition”

Our night with the three Kel Vaughan boys went pretty well.  Jachin coaxed and encouraged me through several rounds of Super Mario Cart on the Wii.  At least I think that’s what is called.  It’s all the race cars with a bunch of different racing venues – penguins on ice (Josiah’s favorite), a rickety old mine, the beach (my favorite, of course), and even somewhere in outer space.  Jachin wins every time, but for some reason he was particularly helpful and even compassionate.  Always helps to be a good winner.  Maybe someday I’ll be good enough to teach him how to be a good loser as well.

In the morning Micah and I snuck out to get some donuts again.  I guess that is becoming one of the traditions for spending the night with Nana and DadDad, like having pizza and watching movies from sleeping bags on the living room floor.  The difference was, this time Jachin was already awake.  Micah even invited him to come along.  He sent us off with his blessings, though.    And when we returned, he and Josiah were both standing at the front door to greet us.  After downing every bite of his dozen donut holes, Josiah came up to me.  I expected him to ask for some juice or chocolate milk or something, but instead he queried, “Can we have cinnamon rolls for breakfast now?”  Ah, yes, another sort of tradition I had forgotten about.  But I had assumed the donut treat trumped the cinnamon rolls.  Silly me.  I decided to try to get inside his three-year-old head for a brief moment, so I asked, “Weren’t the donuts breakfast?”  Looking up at me with that pity-mixed-with-amusement-at-the-utter-absurdity-of-old-people look, he sighed.  And with a shake of his head and just the hint of a grin on his face, he tolerantly replied, “No.  Those were just sugar.”  Indeed. 

Fortunately I was able to pass the whole cinnamon roll request onto Nana’s shoulders, and she wasn’t out of bed yet.  Interestingly enough, when she did get up, it was Micah who approached her about the cinnamon rolls.  She announced that we actually didn’t have any cinnamon rolls to fix, and fortunately they were fine with that.  Guess we have to remember what it was like to have three growing boys in the house. 

Psalms 119:9 says, “How can a young man keep his way pure?  By living according to your word.”

Father, help all six of our grandsons keep their way pure.  Oh, and our two little granddaughters as well.  Amen.