The Hinckley Challenge

I received and email from a friend this afternoon suggesting that LDS people around the world should take the opportunity to honor President Hinckley by reading the Book of Mormon in 97 days. (One day for each year of his age.) The official challenge started on Monday so I'm starting off a few days (and pages) behind but it does seem like a thoughtful way to honor the man who encouraged us so frequently to study the Book of Mormon and learn from its teachings. Anyone out there up to the challenge? (Friends and lurkers welcome.)

www.hinckleychallenge.com

I'm adding a graphic on the sidebar so you can see how I'm progressing.

Many are called, but few are Frozen.....

Polar Bear Plunge 2008 - Team Ngata

Am I crazy? Well, yes... sometimes... though most would not guess that a 34 year old man (yes, this is Matt instead of Amanda), who has just finished his Masters degree in Software Engineering, would purposefully plan to put on his swim suit in the middle of January (when its 36 degrees outside) to jump into 37 degree water by the Bay Bridge, with 15 of his friends.

(Even worse, this is my second year, so I knew what I was getting myself into... and still did it!)

Polar Bear Plunge 2007 with Super Plunger Clark Hartley

I would like to say that I did it all for the Special Olympics...however, like many of the others, the honest answer is "I was looking for the bragging rights to say that I did it." With my new found perspective on life, I've discovered that there are sometimes things that you just need to do to prove that you can, so that you don't miss out on opportunities. There are also things that you do just for the sake of extending your comfort zone and getting a different perspective on what you already know... the rest is just gaining opportunities to learn life lessons about yourself and the boudaries that you "think you have" and finding ways to prove that they are just that... boundaries, and not walls, as I often find myself doing. On the less serious side, there are some things that are done because "A man's gotta do, what a man's gotta do".

Our group (Thanks mostly to Clark Hartley) did raise over $8,000 for the cause. We were Team Ngata. Haloti Ngata is #92 from the Baltimore Ravens and a member of the Hampstead ward. Ed Mulitalo (formerly a Raven, but now a Detroit Lion) also came back and participated with us.

It was an incredible experience and we all survived. After jumping in, taking pictures, stopping for a warm meal with the guys, and getting home to a nice warm shower... I am now thawed and ready to take on the challenge next year... maybe with Amanda going in as well....
(or maybe not... I don't think she's ready to recieve a new perspective on life in quite this fashion)

Matt

Yeah so...

No sooner had I posted that last post about traditions when it happened...sickness set in! Over the course of a week, I had Mitchell to the doctor with a sinus infection and Anna in with a nasty ear infection. The next day the stomach flu set in....and carried on with different members of our family up until Christmas Eve. Some of those regular traditions got scrapped--others modified greatly, but all in all, Christmas still turned out pretty nice. I'm going to try to post some pictures over the next few days.

Tradition

Tonight at Enrichment, our Bishop talked about Christmas traditions. He told us about some of the things his family does and asked us to reflect on some of the things that we have as holiday traditions. Emphasizing that we should make sure we incorporate Christ into our Christmas traditions. Here are a few of the things that our family does: (random order of course)

1. Visit the DC Temple Festival of Lights
2. Read Luke 2 while setting up the nativity (I traditionally spend this experience praying that we can get through it without fighting over who gets to hold the baby Jesus.)
3. Take the kids to pick out Angel Tree gifts (They pick names off the trees of kids that are similar in age to each of them and then help me shop for those kids.)
4. 24 Days of Christmas Book--read a scripture and Christmas story with a Christmas song each night of December.
5. Deliver cookies to friends and neighbors.
6. Attend Christmas parties with our extended family members whenever possible. (The weather is looking sketchy for this Sunday Clauser family.)
7. Drive around town a few times each week to look at the Christmas lights.

What are some things that you do as Christmas traditions? I'm always looking for new ideas.

Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree

Unfortunately, our camera was acting up the night we decorated our tree so we didn't get a lot of clear photos of the whole operation but suffice it to say, there was a lot of Rockin' Around the Christmas Tree. As is customary, the Osmond Christmas album played the majority of the night so Kassie and Mitchell enjoyed a lengthy--and I assure you quite giggly--dance around the room prior to beginning the task which as you can see...some took more seriously (Anna) than others (Mitchell.) As we drew near the bottom of our ornament boxes, the kids located a miniature Disney character train that my mom gave us a few years ago. When I say miniature, I mean each of the five cars is smaller than a golf ball, but size is not an issue with my kids. They insisted on crawling under the tree to place the tiny train around the tree stand. (At one point Kassie even stuck her head under to supervise the project.) The following day, Bing was greeted by cheers as he made his appearance. We spent several days rocking out to 'White Christmas' and 'Santa Claus is Coming to Town' before I insisted that he spend a few days at Matt's office...actually suggesting a joint custody agreement in which we care for Bing on the weekends and the office staff gets to revel in his company Monday through Friday. (It's incomprehensible to me, but the people that Matt works with love this thing and occasionally request it in the middle of summer.)

Oh by the way....

The picture of Anna sporting her new haircut below is actually a picture of SUPER ANNA! Ever since Mitchell spent so much time flexing at Halloween, Anna now puts her hands on her hips and yells, "SUPER ANNA!"

BOB

Most babies have their big day well before their second birthday but not mine! Anna has never wanted her hair cut and I've never had a desire to cut it until tonight. All the stars were in alignment and we took the plunge. After cutting Mitchell's hair, I offered Anna a trim and she sat relatively still while I trimmed her hair so that it is a shoulder-length bob...so cute! (I love the little flip in the end!) Lexi--who cried elephant tears and begged me to let her hair grow long when I took the kids for back-to-school trims--decided she didn't want to be left out of the action so she got the last trim of the night. Mom by day... hair stylist by night? I think not.

WOW! 26.2!

26.2 miles is a long way to run! On October 28th, I completed the Marine Corp Marathon in Washington, DC.






My time was just over 5 hours and with the support of so many friends and family, I raised over $2500 for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. Beth, Tyler and Maggie cheered me on at several locations along the course and then took me to their house for a while before I returned to the Team in Training Victory Party with my teammates: Greg, Sue and Marie.

Happy Halloween

Not much to say but lots of pictures to see... the kids all had a fun Halloween even though (much to Mitchell's dismay) they had school all day on Halloween. Anna insisted on being Tigger which is a costume that I made for Kassie years ago. Lexi opted to wear a favorite princess costume. Mitchell planned to wear his Superman pajamas but when a friend offered this fancy version of Superman including a muscle shirt, the pajamas were toast and he spent the holiday flexing! Kassie decided to spend Halloween as a hippy and thanks to Michelle and Sam she had some really styling pants to match!


Pumpkin carving was a hoot! As usual, Mitchell and Lexi protested about gutting the pumpkins by themselves but Anna dove right in!

Therapy

Although I know that it may sound slightly silly to some, I find the autumn foliage incredible therapeutic so I packed up the kids and headed north to spend the weekend in western PA a few weeks ago. It was getting close to dusk by the time we made it to Bear Town Rocks but the sight of bright reds, oranges, and yellows for as far as your eye can see is incredibly relaxing.

Unfortunately, the enormous rocks that the kids loved climbing made Beth, Kari and I all nervous after the view!