Who You Really Are [Mc]

Saw this great video on the Ragamuffin Soul blog. Great for a few reasons.

It's a great follow-up to my previous post about the President. What a wonderful tribute by two who know him best.

It is also thought-provoking for any dad, but especially any dad with a public title. I'm in the ministry, on staff at a church, so I have one of those titles. Pastor. Different than a president, but with some of the same pitfalls. You can forget who you are. You can forget what - and who - are really important. And you can forget that while you try to change the world and try to bring change into your sphere of influence, the greatest purposes are found under your own roof.



That's as introspective as I intend on being for the next couple of days. happy birthday to me. tomorrow.

Oh boy, oh boy!

Doesn't she have that look on her face?

Happy Birthday to my best friend, my partner, my {blush} lover, my wife...the Lovely Trudi celebrates the day the world was blessed with her.

And we celebrate, too.

Number Nine

Happy Birthday, Sawyer Layne!

As I've said before, she's a delight to her family and everyone who knows her. Kind, generous, sweet...okay I'm getting mine in early for our little family tradition. (What family tradition, you ask? I'll blog about it some other time.)

Nine years have gone by quickly.

Happy Birthday, Shae!

Another huge milestone in the McDaniel family. Shaelyn Cherie turns 18 today. Unhappily for us, she's not here with us in North Fort Myers, but away at the University of Florida. (School begins on Monday.) She's only been away for a few days, so we are still trying to adjust to her not being here. I'm sure there will be other birthdays that we won't be able to be with her, but this is the first, so it's a little more difficult.

We're very proud of this little girl of ours, who has grown into a wonderful young lady. We are excited about how God will use her and what He has planned for her.

[And a very happy __st birthday to my OLDER sister, Cherie. Yes, that's where Shae got her middle name.]

She's a Little Lioness

Trying to describe someone can be difficult. It seems like you would need words to describe every moment of their life, because each one is different and reveals something else about them.

Try to describe someone with just one word, and you can come up many words short of really capturing who they are.

I'll try it anyway with our Summer, who turns 12 today. The word I'll pick is energy.

We are mostly a family of phlegmatics, with some melancholy on the side. For those of you who haven't read personality books, like those from Florence Littauer and Tim Lahaye, the phlegmatic personality is most compared to the ox - slow, steady, reliable. The melancholy personality is concerned with detail, precision, and having things just so. They are also liable to be slow.

Summer gives our Phleg-Mel family a push. Although she has some of the same familial traits, she brings zest and power into the mix. When she's happy, you know it. She loves to go full throttle, she loves to do things, she loves to try new things, and she loves to love.

Just look at that bright, energetic smile, and you might know what I mean. Even if I didn't use enough words to fully describe it.

Happy Birthday, Summer!

Getting Older is a Good Alternative

Happy 97th Birthday to my friend, Wayne Hagopian! All kidding aside, R. Wayne is one the smartest people I know and I'm happy to have him as a friend. He's aging well, don't you think?

Add 24

What we do on my birthday.

Scrooge is over, now we're pooped

That title is more literal than you might guess. We finished Scrooge on Monday, with mixed results. The cast and crew got better every night, and Sunday was a great crowd, full and very responsive.

Monday was small and "appreciative". All-in-all, everything went very well.

Now it's over, and I'll be spending most of the rest of the month out of the office. Yesterday was full of several errands and about 30 minutes in the office.

Today is the "pooped" part. Our septic tank at the house has backed up. Barry the plumber - a very nice man from church - is currently trying to determine whether there is a clog or if we need our drainfield redone. ("A drainfield for Christmas for me?! Oh, you shouldn't have!")

In the meantime, I missed the opportunity yesterday to wish my brother-in-law, Terry, a very happy birthday. So, happy late birthday, TS!

It's Even Good to be...

...I won't say how old, even though I don't think she'd really mind. After all, she is still young and beautiful. Happy Birthday to my lovely Trudi. Tonight we're going to let her open her presents, then we'll all go out to eat. At dinner we'll continue with a family tradition - on anyone's birthday or special day everyone takes a turn saying something nice about that person. We always have lots to say about her.

(This pic is from last year's birthday.)