Painful news

Friends, I have very painful and sad news to share with you all. Erin Elton passed away on Sunday morning (6/22/08). Many of the details are still unknown, but it was unexpected. Mom Thompson spent much of Saturday night and Sunday morning visiting with family as they helped each other deal with news that no parent, grandparent, brother, or sister is ever ready to hear. There are a lot of people who are experiencing the worst pain and sorrow of their lives right now. I would ask each of us to keep the Elton/Fiertag family in prayer. The theology of death can be an obtuse and debatable subject, but I think that all our hearts yearn for God to work some healing and reconciliation through this lamentable crisis. Let us pray together.

Erin was Linda Fiertag and Joe Elton's daughter. Therefore, she was the niece of Linda and Tom Thompson.

There will be a viewing at Adams-Perfect Funeral Home in Northfield, NJ on Wednesday 6/25 at 7pm. The funeral service will be at the Church of the Nazarene, also in Northfield, at 11am on Thursday 6/26; there will be an additional viewing prior to the surface Thursday at 10-11am.


In His confusing but capable hands,
Brian

Day 8 – Goodbye Hershey

Today was the final day in Hershey, tomorrow we head for home.

We wound up getting a late start. I had some banking issues that needed to be straightened out. It seems someone stole my debit card number and did some recreational shopping on the internet for some video games.

What to do, what to do? We used our last ticket in Hershey Park yesterday so today we had a couple of choices. We could go the Hershey Gardens and smell all the pretty flowers and watch the lovely butterflies flutter all about. Or we could venture deep inside the damp dingy earth with the possibility of being attacked my ravenous bats.

We chose the bats and set our GPS (Tommie Girl) for Crystal Cave. Now I know what you’re thinking. Didn’t they go to Indian Echo Cave earlier in their trip? And once you’ve seen on hole in the ground haven’t you really seen them all? You would be correct on both counts. But what made this trip worth while was the scenic route our GPS took us through to get to our destination. We traveled along all these winding, twisting, and hilly roads giving a view of the mountains and valleys we normally wouldn’t get to see. It was really a nice trip.

Upon returning we went to the chocolate factory and bought lots of candy and had dessert for dinner. The kids did the little Candy Factory Works where they got to wear a hat and received an official Hershey Workers badge.

We capped off our night by sitting in the parking lot of Red Robins and watching the fireworks that Hershey Park has on Saturday nights.

I’ll be doing a final blog tomorrow night to sum up our trip home.

Blog ya tomorrow,

TC

Bonus picture.


This is Christopher being silly by pressing his lips up against the truck window that hasn't been washed sense New Jersey.

Day 7 - Wet and Wild, That's The Ticket.

This morning I was thinking. What the hey? My family needs an adventure, the kind of adventure that would bring them face to face with some of the most ferocious animals in America and parts of Canada. So with supplies in hand (Dunkin Doughnuts’ coffee) we saddled up and headed into the captive wilderness also know as the zoo. To the left you will see a picture of the ferocious Prairie Dog.

ZooAmerica is the zoo at Hershey Park. It is included in the price of your ticket which is a good thing because I don’t think we would have paid a separate admission to get in. It was a nice leisure walk and there were a few animals to look at, but I’ve seen more animals at the Cape May County Zoo that has free admission. They did have a couple of Buffalos and couple of Elk and a couple of Alligators I think I stop there its starting to sound like roll call on Noah’s Ark.

After the zoo we went back into the park so the kids could get on a couple of the coaster again and so mommy could ride the Ferris wheel. We did see a couple of shows, then someone had the bright idea to ride the Canyon Rapids water ride on which we became totally soaked. See picture.

All in all we had another great day and I had a giant Bar-B-Q turkey leg for lunch. What could be better?

Not sure what we’ll do tomorrow, but I’ll bet it will be something.

Blog ya tomorrow,

TC

Some bonus pictures.

Day 6 – What Were We Thinking?

We must be insane, that’s all there is to it. That would explain how we could let our children talk us into going on this coaster called Fahrenheit. It was the second coaster of the morning we rode with Sidewinder being the first. We waited in line for an hour just for a 60 second thrill. Here is a YouTube video so you can see what we went through.

After a few hours in the park we decided chilly weather or not we‘re going to the Boardwalk. What? A Boardwalk in Pennsylvania you might ask? Well that’s the name of the waterpark that is inside Hershey Park itself. I thought they may have a separate entrance, but no you have to cart all your stuff from the very entrance of Hershey Park to the very back of the park. Christopher and I rode all the water slides and he played for quite a bit in the East Coast Water Works section. You can see what it looks like in the picture.

The air became very chilly so we decide to change back into our clothes and finish the rest of our time in the park. We were able to ride a couple of the coasters again after sunset which was pretty cool. We closed the park with the final ride being the Tilt-A-Whirl.

That's it for today, I think we are planning to do the same thing tomorrow with the addition of meeting some friends from church for lunch.

Blog you tomorrow,
TC

PS. Here's a bonus video of a ride Darlene and I rode called The Claw

Day 5 - I See Dead People

Not really, just where their buried. The weather didn’t look to promising today for the waterpark or Hershey so the Carty Clan decided to make an advancement on Gettysburg.

The trip was grueling. The DVD player didn’t work correctly and Christopher was locked into some fierce battles with video games characters. But an hour later we made it.

We purchased the audio cd tour that you listen to as you drive all around and it explains the different points of interest. The tour is supposed to take about 2 hours but I think ours took about 5. We kept stopping and getting out for pictures and to read all the plagues that are about the battlefields.

Oh, no. Its looks like there’s about to be another skirmish on the battlefield.
In this picture it looks like daddy's had enough of Darlene and Christopher. Just kidding, I wouldn’t trade of anything unless the Gypsies gave me something really good.

After the tour we went to the visitor’s center to watch a film about Gettysburg.

We had another great day. Tomorrow is suppose to be half day in the waterpark and the other half in Hershey

Blog ya later,
TC

Day 3, 4 – Are We There Yet?

Yes, the Carty’s have arrived in Hershey. We started our 3^rd day off with a little shopping at the Outlet Mall in Lancaster. We then made our way to the Indian Echo Caverns. The kids really dug it but to my dismay there was neither an echo nor any Indians, oh well maybe next time. After the cavern tour we headed off to Hershey. Our hotel is just 3 minutes from the park so driving there is no problem and there is very little traffic. We didn’t check in until after 5:00 so we weren’t going to be able to do much in the park and we decided to visited Chocolate World and do the little tour. As you can see from the picture I didn’t make it through. Sorry Chip the Pepsi didn’t work. J

Day 4

We went to park a 10:00 in the morning and the kids had us ride most of the coasters. We have 2 left to ride, The Side Winder and Fahrenheit. We did manage to squeeze in a few other rides through out the day.

Below are links to a couple YouTube videos of the coaster we rode. Enjoy

Storm Runner

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H5YyoFxI5Ug&feature=related

The Great Bear

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y6L4U5-k_ew

Sorry for the double day post. The Internet access at the hotel is very spotty.

TC

Toby's Surgery

Toby is doing well after his surgery.  He continues to be in quite a bit of pain but the meds are helping with that.  We are on our way today for his first therapy session.   We have been told that it will be painful.   For those who wish to see, I have included a video of the surgery.  Don't watch it if you think you will pass out.  I am not responsible.  I think its  really cool but others around here think its gross.  There is no sound with the video so don't hit your computer. The tear is about an inch long in an upside down l shape.  He has four tiny incisions.    

Great weekend!

Saturday was our 11th Anniversary and of course, Sunday was Father's Day. What a great weekend, we had! Friday night we loaded our canoe (Thanks, Brian!) onto the van for the first time. It took us an hour since we hadn't done it before, but now we're pros. Saturday morning after breakfast, we took the kids to the lake down the street for their first canoe ride. We spent the day canoeing, swimming and playing on the playground there. The boys loved it! and they did great staying still in the canoe. We're sore now, but we had a great time. While we were swimming, a couple of fish swam up to us. If the boys hadn't moved their hands occaisionally, the fish would've taken a bite! In fact, they did nibble on my bathing suit. Chase thought that was especially funny since I jumped in surprise! We expected to go to the Nashua River on Sunday, but it was cold and rainy. Oh well. At least now we know we can get the canoe loaded quickly and easily whenever we'd like to go!

Brian had bought the canoe when he lived with us and left it for us when we moved to PA. Brian... it turned out to be a great canoe to keep stable while the boys were in it. Despite the struggle to lift the canoe, the weight of it helped Karen feel safe that the boys weren't going to tip us all out! Thanks again, Brian! You guys will have to come up and go with us sometime... show us how it's really done!

Chip

Day 2 - Hey What's That Sound...

...is that the Chattanooga Choo Choo? No, it's Thomas The Train. What a beautiful day we had together today. The weather was great, we headed over to the Strasburg Railroad and got to see Thomas The Train who was there to give rides to all the the good little boys and girls.

Christopher snapped this picture of him for Chase and any other little ones that like him. The picture on the right is a Thomas made out of Lego's.

We had a really nice train ride, very relaxing and yes we did hear the ghost whistle of a train lost long ago. :-)

We didn't think to far ahead and did pack a lunch to get off at Walnut Grove as Uncle Earl suggested, perhaps next time

After the railroad we headed up the road to The Choo Choo Barn which is a 1,700 square foot Model train layout with over 150 hand-built animated figures and vehicles and 22 operating trains. Oh no what do we have here? A car accident, I hope he wasn't talking on his cell phone while driving.

After the Choo Choo Barn we decided to drive over to Dutch Wonderland.

We weren't sure we were going to go but decided to throw caution to the the wind and we had such a good time there with the kids. They rode the roller coaster "Kingdom Coaster" about 4 times, we rode it with them twice.

This ride was called 'Turtle Whirle." This picture is in honer of Grandmom Thompson who every time we go to the boardwalk, has to ride the big spinning bears ride. So grandmom, this rides for you.

After Dutch Wonderland it was time for a nap mainly because I fell old and needed a nap (How

I 'm going to last at Hershey remains to be seen) To cap off our night we played a round of miniature golf and pizza at Pizza Hut.

Tomorrow we plan to do some more site seeing and maybe visit one of the caves around here and then we head off to Hershey.

I may be doing a Picasso thing to upload more of our pictures but I'll have to get Shari to show me how it works. And speaking of Shari, here is a picture of my 2 favorite girls.

That's it for today. I'll blog you tomorrow.

TC

Day 1 - And We're Off!

Off to where? you might ask. Well the Carty's have begun their first family vacation and we thought we would share our adventure with everyone. Our first stop on this momentous occasion is Lancaster Pa. We will be spending our entire vacation in Pa. by visiting Strasburg and then off to Hershey.

After we checked into our hotel, it was off for a quick bite to eat then off to church.

We went to the Saturday night service at Lancaster County Bible Church. What a perfect way to start off our vacation by worshipping God and lifting up His name. The praise band was great and the sermon was very timely.

They are in a series titled "The Dash" and this weeks topic was spending time with those around us and make the most of the moments we have especially when life around us is so hectic. It was a great sermon and I can't wait for them to post it online so that I can listen to it again.

Well that's it for tonight. Tommorrow it's off to the Strasburg Railroad and Choo Choo Barn.

TC

Prayers for Toby

Toby is having surgery on Friday to repair a "Slap Tear" in his right shoulder  Click Here for info on "Slap Tears".  We believe this injury was caused during a wrestling match on January 11.  This was one of Toby's Toughest matches.  It was a hard fought clean match.  However his opponent used Toby's arm as leverage.  Toby finished the season strong wining many matches but felt some pain each time.  We thought it would heal but it hasn't.  An MRI confirmed the tear.  Toby will be in a sling for 6 weeks and them have 3-4 months of Therapy rehab.   The doctor told him that he should be fixed up ready to wrestle in 6 months.  So he will miss football but should miss only a few weeks of wrestling.  His goal is to be ready right after Christmas.

Becca and I have been involved in a small group at church since last Fall. In this group we've been duscussing many issues related to how we grow our food, ship our food, eat our food, etc. After reflecting on numerous problems that seem global, or at least national, in scope, we focussed on local solutions. What can we do? I'm not going to get into the specific issues that we discussed, bet if you'd like to hear more, just ask. As a reaction to what we were discussing, we decided to start what we now call Ploughshares Community Garden; it's on the grounds of our church, Frazer Mennonite Church. The garden is a collection of individual plots, open to anyone in the community. They are 20' X 20, but people can sign up for 1/2 or even 1/4 plots if they want them. People can plant whatever they'd like. We didn't publicize it a whle lot because it was our first year, and we wanted to start small, with 8 full-sized plots. When we officially opened it up to the congregations and the surrounding community, we filled up in a week. So, there will definitely be talks about expanding for next year.

Becca and I signed up for a plot this year and are having a blast. Our plot is 20' X 20'. For most of it, we are experimenting with raised beds (shabby though they may be). We have 4 beds. We are using straw as our mulch. The beds are arranged rectangularly; each is the length of the plot. Although it's pretty difficult to see much besides the marigolds (trying to keep the rabbits away) and the straw, we also have:

Bed 1

• a few other types of flowers (just starting to poke up)
  

Bed 2

• peppers


• spinach (we started from seed and its pretty far behind)


• cucumbers (same deal)


• pumpkins


• lettuce


• radishes (at least we think. . .long story)


• potatoes (We weren't planning on groing these, but friends of ours had extra, so we planted a few. Now, they are these huge beautiful leafy plants that are the most exciting looking things in our garden)


• spring onions

Bed 3

• tomatoes


• more lettuce

Bed 4

• crookneck sqaush


• watermelons


• amish melon (looks like a cantelope on the seed package)


• more pumpkins


• Butternut squash
  

Everytime we go to the garden, Gryff comes along. We tye him up on the outside of the fence next to where we will be working.
We are really having a blast and learning as we go. Becca and I started a bunch of things from seed in our basement under some flourescent lights. Then we planted the cold weather stuff. The weekend before Memorial Day, Mom and Dad came back herer after Andrea Spengler's graduation. We spent the afternoon working in the garden. That's the day that we really got the most done. Mom and Dad were a lot of help. Becca and I are pretty much flying by the seat of our pants when it comes to most of this stuff, hence the "learning as we go." So, Mom and Dad's experience and knowledge was invaluable.
We were having trouble with rabbits or possible groundhogs and, we think, crows. We planted Marigolds to try to keep rabbits away and we put netting over the beds to see if it will keep crows away.
So, we haven't actually harvested anything yet, but we're excited that things are at least growing.

Heaven on earth? - Denver, CO

We're in Denver, CO for a 10 day vacation with some friends from when we lived in California.  They have a daughter 4 months older than Zach and all three of them are really enjoying each other!  It's been great fun!  In the 5 days we've been here, we've hit at least a half dozen different parks, an indoor pool, a stream, a lake, been into the mountains (Evergreen, CO), downtown Denver and just tooling around the Highlands Ranch area.  It's been so nice to spend time with these good friends who not only share our love of all things outdoors, but also share our preferences in schedule (something fun in the morning, picnic lunch, nap in the afternoon, dinner, something fun before bedtime, 3 kids in the giant tub, then bed)!  Not to mention they share the same joys and struggles with their daughter as we do with our boys (their cute phrases, smiles, laughter compared with their fighting over toys, notsharing, and saying "NO!"  I haven't had any time to do anything with the pics yet and I already have over 500 pics in 5 days, so here's just a preview of what I'll be posting when we return...

The first park we went to was huge, new, and had a fantastic view of the Rockies (though it's hard to make out in this small picture).  Later that night we went to a different park to see the local orchestra perform while we had a picnic lunch on the lawn.

This is the view out the back window of our friends' home.  You can clearly make out the Rockies (even Pike's Peak way off to the south) as well as a sea of homes!  It's amazing how the Denver area is just exploding with new growth!

Another park had a stream running through it that the kids could play in.  This is Maddie (or Madison).  She's 4 months older than Zach, but Zach outweighs her by 5 lbs (doesn't sound like much, but it's 20% of her body weight)!

The boys are having a great time!  It's gonna be hard to come home home to reality on Saturday!

Close Call

We watched as tornadic storms rolled across the northern half of our county this afternoon.  I wish I had a video camera so you could watch these clouds rotate over me. These pictures were taken 2-3 miles north of Loomis.   I might have gotten better pictures if I went closer but I was afraid of getting hit with the hail.   There were reports of this storm producing baseball sized hail before it got to us.  There were numerous tornado warnings but these storms did not touch down until after they passed us.  There are numerous reports of damage in Kearney about 35 miles northwest of us.  For those of you who have watched Storm Chasers on the Discovery channel, I saw 30+ storm chasers go through Loomis including the infamous TIV vehicle.

As they went by the videographer was up in the Turret.   It was really eery watching the storm chasers.  Obviously we were in the center of the action.  The storms have gone by now and we are fine.  In fact it never even rained in town.

A Great Week.

God was at work in Loomis last week.  About 60 kids were challenged to Choose Jesus over everything else.  Each day the children gave an offering.  This year the offering is helping Ralph and Colleen Cole fund VBS in Odessa, Ne.  Every year the Coles offer a VBS to the children of Odessa.   This year, the children of Odessa will be challenged to Choose Jesus through the gifts of the children of Loomis.  How cool is that? 

Family Bible Time...

Recently, we started having a daily family Bible Time after we are done eating breakfast, but still at the table.  Now some of you may be impressed, and some of you may be like, "wow, what took you so long?!"  Nonetheless, thanks to Shawn Bergen, a pastor at our church, for his example and influence to get us started. 

So far, it has been both a joy and a train wreck.  Drew loves it, but doesn't always stay focused.  Tessa is pretty much clueless.  We involve her, and certainly understand that the practice is just as formative for her as it is for Drew.  Tonight, was especially hard.  We have learned the lesson more than once, we have to keep Tessa tied down, oops, I mean strapped in to her high chair if there is any hope of her participating.

What do we do?  3 things...

1.  We read the Bible.  We are using a children's Bible that basically tells a story through a very short story and picture.  After we read, we ask questions of each person to further explain what might be happening.

2.  We pray.  We go around first and ask what each person wants to thank Jesus for or ask Jesus for.  Then we go around and everyone takes a turn to pray.  This was a great idea we learned from someone else.  We find that it helps them think about what they want to tell Jesus, instead of just singing their prayer song from rote memory. 

3.  We sing worship songs.  We sing a song we don't know and a song we do know.  The other night Drew wanted to sing, "The Wheels on the Bus."  I was quick to point out that that song was not a worship Jesus song.  He quickly responded..."yes it is Daddy, because Jesus made the buses!"  We sang the song.  A song that "we" didn't know was "the Doxology".  Even though we sang it for a week, Drew wouldn't sing.  Shy or something?  Last night, I was trying to get Tessa to sing with me because Drew wouldn't, and all of a sudden he announced he knew it.  He sure did, every word.  Amazing how quickly he learns...

Here is a little fruit of our labor...

Rob

Loomis VFD

I thought the kids might like to see these pictures of a house we burned down last night.  

 

Happy Birthday Toby

The State of Nebraska is nuts.  They give learner's permits to 15 year olds.   Actually many of Toby's class mates have been driving alone on a school permit since they turned 14.  Unfortunately for Toby this is only available for those who live more than one mile from the school.  For the next year Toby is stuck driving with an adult.  Or are we stuck?

Very Busy Spring

Soccer began for Christopher - He plays in the township league which has scrimmages every Saturday. The season started cold but is now warming up. Christopher usually plays goalie and really loves it. I was able to capture a few pictures of him playing.




Band Concert for me and Darlene- Each spring the band has a concert with the color guard performing the routine from the fall field show, dancing to some new songs, and a little bit of the routine for next year's field show. They did a wonderful job. It seems like we practiced way too much for only one show, but we had a lot of fun. Due to technical difficulties with our video camera, Tom was not able to video the concert and I was too busy back stage to take pictures. Christopher was able to capture a little video and a few pictures with his camera though.




Darlene's Semi-Formal - Here are a few pictures of her and Bryan.




Darlene's Band trip to California - I was not able to go with the band due to the expense so Tom had a little growing up to do to allow Darlene to go without me. This was her first time on a plane and handled it very well without me being with her. She had to call me from the plane while they were boarding due to confusion of seats. I helped her get over her fear of not knowing what to do and then she was fine. She had a lot fun and to Tom's glee, she came home safe and sound. Here are a few pictures she wants to upload.



Next week is Christopher's band concert and soccer continues until the middle of May. It never stops.

The newest addition to the Thompson Family

Did I get your attention?

Meet Gryff (short for Gryffindor):

We adopted Gryff from the SPCA Tues. (4/15/08). The pound thought that he is about 1 yr. old, although we think that he's a little younger than that. He really moves like a puppy. He loves to play and chew. Although, he's been really good so far about only chewing his toys. He's mostly house trained (yay for adopting!). We've had a lot of fun so far getting to know him, and he seems to feel pretty much at home in our house. Commands are coming along, albeit slowly. He's very good at "come," which is great, becase now we can let him off the leash outside. Sometimes he gets "sit" right away, other times it feels like pulling teeth.

Anyway, we're really happy with him, and we're having a blast. We can't wait for folks to meet him.

Brian