February 16 – “Happy Birthday, Josh”

We are in Mansfield today.  It has been great to play with Zak and experience his youthful reckless exuberance.  That's another way of saying I lay on the floor and he jumps on top of me.  Then we roll around and wrestle a while.  Then ol' DadDad has to take a break.  A long break.  Then he's ready to start all over again.  That's what it means to be two years old.   Caleb is growing.  He has a lot of hair and in some light it has a bit of a red tint to it.  MeeMaw is happy about that.  He also has a favorite time to be awake.  Sometime between 10:00 p.m. and 2:00 a.m., he decides that it is time to be awake.  Wide awake.  And that usually means vocally awake as well.  He fusses and cries off and on for about two hours every night sometime during those time periods.  Then he goes to sleep and is fine for the rest of the night.  That's what it means to be five weeks old.   We made our usual visit to Panchos today.  Can't beat that TexMex all you can eat with those great sopapillas.  Glad I remembered my Zantac.  Mom loves it.  We miss it.    We stopped by Josh's church to perform a rescue operation.  Seems Zak had dropped a small toy down the leg of a chair support in their sanctuary.  Christi had an idea for the rescue.  She pieced together two wooden dowels and put a piece of chewed bubble gum on the end.  She hoped to fish it out by sticking it to the gum.  It stuck to the gum all right.  But the gum came off the dowel.  Every time they tried it.  Josh then tried turning a piece of masking tape inside out.  Still didn't work.  Even duct tape wasn't working.  Until I had the idea to tape a bent paper clip to the dowel and then put some duct tape sticky side out around it.  The concoction actually worked.  We rescued not only the small toy, but also most of the gum that had found its way down there.  A nasty, sticky mess, to be sure.   Tonight we had a little birthday party for Josh.   Nathan sent him a carbon monoxide detector.  That's what it means to be a fireman.  Nathan also helped me pick out what Chris and I got him.  It was one of those high falutin' academic theological dictionaries.  Nathan and I chose it.  Not because it was two or three inches thick, though.  We picked it because of the guy's name who wrote it.  Vanderhooven.  Now that's a name to wrap your arms around.  It just sound like a fun name to me.  Have no idea where it comes from.  Doesn't matter.  It's a cool name.  Vanderhooven.  Happy Birthday Josh.   Philippians 2:9-11 says, "Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."   Father, thank you for the name my parents gave me.  I'm proud to be a Vaughan.  But thanks also for the name you have given me – "Forgiven."  Amen.