A better than expected Friday

Today is Good Friday. It is a celebration of Christ's death. I'm not usually one to get up and blog, tweet, or facebook about this, but today was something extraordinary.

Grace left this morning -- after we watched the sun come up on our porch -- for Chicago. Nate, her dad, has been up there working for about 7 months or so now. Grace's sister, Trinity, goes to North Park University in Chicago. And now her mom and youngest sister, Hope, are preparing to move up and join Nate. This weekend they are looking at houses, so Grace hopped in the car and took the weekend.

I was left here with Jude. Not that that is any sort of problem, it's just the first time in our married life that we've been apart for a few days and nights.

It's weird.

Today has been weird. Today felt just odd and out of place.

I read on a friend's facebook about a Good Friday service at our church -- I hesitate to say our because we are so incredibly inconsistent with going. But, I made the decision to go quite last minute (around 5:20 for a 6:00 service). Surprisingly, I was able to feed Jude, change him, dress him, take him outside for an Easter photo opp, get myself bathed and dressed, and still made it!

I arrived at church and walked into a very somber environment. I was given a nail from a can and told to quietly sit down. There was no frill. No mess. Just a pretty simple PowerPoint presentation with music behind it. The topic: the final 7 sayings of Christ at His death. It was a moving piece. What stuck out most to me was the part on Christ saying to the Father: "Why have You forsaken me?"

Christ felt forsaken because he had experienced 33 years of continual communion with God. And at that moment, He was just like the rest of us. It was such a sobering moment. I have heard this statement or type of statement before, but seeing it here really resonated. Just like I am frustrated to no end with my job, just like I am lonely without Grace, just like I am upset with living paycheck to paycheck, Christ has felt this, too. He has felt these same feelings of strain and crying out to God. It was just a surreal moment. We then proceeded to take communion, and on the way up, we each nailed our nail to a cross. The sound of nails being hammered into the wood really shook everyone up. The pastor and his wife went up first, and the echo was so great. Then it was incessant pounding for about 25 minutes (until the several hundred had finished).

What a moment.

What a God we have.

Might I also mention today is our 6 year anniversary of being together. Whoa.

{californ-i-a}

On January 13, we all (yes, we took Jude) went to San Diego for my cousin's wedding! It was an absolute blast. We spent Wednesday-Saturday in sunny San Diego, then drove upstate to visit Grace's family (all the way to St. Helena/Napa Valley, stopping in Arroyo Grande). San Diego was perfect - 68 and sunny each day. Then, we pretty much became one with that terrible California storm. We drove through the rain, lived in the rain, were blown around in the rain, and thought our plane was going to go down in the rain (we flew San Fran to LA then to Nashville). People were going everywhere, as were their lunches.
It felt like the scene in LOST's premiere.

Here is a taste of our experience.

One of the first things we did upon arrival was to take our little man to the beach.
We drove over to Coronado Island. This is his first view of the ocean.

A video:

He walked.

Played in the water



.Hung out with mom.



Played in the sand.



Ate the sand.



Realized he didn't like the sand.



And was a little damp the rest of the day.

He loved it.

The next day we went to the San Diego Zoo.
This was Jude's favorite part. Seriously.

He cried when we took him away from it.

Jude and dad trying to get a picture in front of the camels.
We blocked the camels, and Jude didn't look.



Jude chatting with the birds
or "boyds" as he likes to call them.

Later, we went to Mission Bay to enjoy some In N Out Burgers.

Jude L-O-V-E-S pushing this around

He loved romping around on the grass.

Our little flower child.

The fam.

My beautiful wife.

Our goofy pictures.

We left San Diego on Sunday morning and drove upstate to San Francisco.

Here we are on the 101 (like in the Phantom Planet song)
crusin' along.

But, the weather turned quick.



It got windy.



And rainy.




Here we are Santa Clara at Grace's childhood home.
I wonder if the guy inside wonders why we took about 15 pictures
from our car...





This is the park she played at just down the street.



This is the shop her parents owned.

Finally, we made it to San Francisco.

Where Jude learned to brush his teeth.





We crossed that.

We took the bridge to Sausolita,
a quaint fisherman's town north of San Francisco.
You see the city in the background.

Jude kept cozy... it was chilly in San Fran.

Well, that was pretty much our trip.
Hope you enjoyed.

Winter Wonderland

{January 9, 2010 - for real}

First snow in Nashville in like 7 years.

Jude's first snow ever.



We started the day off with some art.

Jude has been LOVING coloring. He's quite good at it.




Should we go out?




The first few steps in the snow!




Whoa.








The boots were a bit too big.



It's very windy.




My two faves.

Enjoy the snow! We sure have.

j

Jude at 13 months

Some miscellaneous pictures of Jude from the past couple of weeks
(yes, we are back to real time, now!)



He loves playing with dad's hat.




And his belly.

All you have to do is simply ask,
"Where's Jude's belly?"





Grace's mom made this adorable vest for Jude.

He's been wearing it the past few days in this bitter,
18 degree cold we've had here.