eternally chaotic

Right about the time we settled in for the night Carol noticed a few missed calls on her phone, each kind enough to leave a message – or well a warning – about the impending doom that should befall us all later this very night.  According to some Nature was about to play some cruel joke on us all and give the ill equipped and even less prepared South a taste of snow.  With recent changes in our home entertainment we no longer receive the nightly news in a manner that is useful so we checked online – sure enough.  Ok…well, lets be honest – the reports showed a bunch of people in lines at the store with cart loads of groceries, now while that is certainly news, in the South it could mean an number of arbitrary things were on sale and was certainly not indicative of impending doom in the form of uniquely frozen miniatures ice cubes from the sky.

Lo and behold.  We were finishing up a few things before heading off to bed and Carol took a peep out the window and couldn’t believe what she saw.  Our entire deck was covered in a thick layer of snow.  The sky was indeed falling and it was falling fast.  I headed out to grab some extra firewood to stack in the garage while Carol on the other hand thought it was completely necessary to torment me with snow balls while I performed this selfless act in the name of the safety and warmth of our dear family…  All is well though in Love and War.  She didn’t realize I was taking video and not pictures during her escapades in the snow!!!  Love You Hunny!

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It only took most of the summer, all of the fall and the early part of winter but we finally made it out to meet the newest member of the family, Hunter Brian Scheckles. Best of all we got to do this over Thanksgiving and were able to see not only Hunter but also Dad and Mom…oh yeah and those other three people as well.  

The trip over from Atlanta to the middle of nowhere was much quicker than expected once we were well out of Atlanta (the leaving Atlanta part took two of the ten hours to travel the required 600 miles).  Carol loaded up my new shiny work laptop as well as our family one (not so shiny or new) and a pile of movies.  She put the movies in and played the sound over the car speakers and until dark I think for the most part I kept my eyes mostly on the road – after dark I am not so sure but we did arrive unscathed.  I did get to see the majority of one of our favorite movies, Phantom of the Opera as well as some of the Love Actually and Avatar.  We had just started National Lampoons Christmas Vacation when we pulled up.

Hunter was adorable to see.  He was still tiny and little but cute and full of coos and slobber.  We got to see him play a bit, mainly by eating his hands or a few different toys, roll over, which we heard was something new, and generally be happy – all the things babies do that are cute…and the absolute best part – well other than getting to see the happiness that Hunter has brought to Brian and Kim –  was being on the visiting end instead of the mommy or daddy end…sorry Sis but it was great to sit back and let you take care of feeding and diapers and all that other “fun” stuff that comes along with the cuteness..especially the morning parts where we got to sleep in…I should stop now while I am ahead.

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Fall and Halloween are now a touch behind us but I still wanted to share a few moments we had together at Jaemore Farms in Alto, GA in early October.  It was a perfect day for picking up pumpkins, taking a hay ride, playing some festival games and generally enjoying the perfect weather.  The games were pretty cool.  Our favorite two were the Apple Sling Shot where Isaac made a bullseye and won a free pumpkin (that got to be my pumpkin) and the duck race where you had to pump a well handle to make the water flow as fast as you could so that your duck would get to the big pond on the other side the fastest – the CoTC loved this and did not want to leave.

After a day in the car the kiddos were revved up to get out and burn some energy.  I think they would have been happy doing anything but we decided that a good dip in the ocean would do them all some good.  It takes a while to get us all lathered up in sunblock and out to the sand but we eventually made it right around the time the sun was a massive ball of fire directly overhead.

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We had a great time this past weekend spending some time cooling off at the Duluth Town Center Fountain.  The Sun was blisteringly hot and the air might as well have been dripping water, but the water coming from the fountain was refreshing and cool.  We grabbed some Chick-Fil-A along the way, ate on the curb, and headed in.  Once they all got used to the water they had a great time.  Isaac didn’t need any warming up and was racing in circles as fast as he could swallow his chicken and fries.  Piper was on his tail but needed her hand held for the first few minutes – that was until she got wet and started play.  Violet needed a bit more prodding and she wasn’t having anything to do with me taking her through.  Carol grabbed them all took them on a few laps to get them all good and soaked – that’s all it took to get Violet all revved up as well.

I am not normally a nervous person.  I speak well in front of people, rarely with a slip of the tongue or bead of sweat.  I remember ideas instead of lines to get my point across more on the fly, rolling with any punches that might get in the way, than by recalling words from memory.  I can ramble with the best of them to keep a conversation going while I figure out what point it was I was trying to make…this list can go on and on but I might start to get an ego, and regardless of how inflated my ego might get, not a one of these traits, trained or otherwise learned over the years, helped me one bit on a very special night in November of 2009.

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Halloween has come and gone.  The loot has been categorized into various zip lock bags and put into deep freeze for behavior based distribution.  The kids had a month of various Halloween activities: Netflix provided movies, Carol provided the arts and crafts and I provided labor for scooping out pumpkin guts.  Costume selection happened about a month ago and the kids are already planning what they want to be for next year.  The costumes were fun.  Jacob was Ninja, Isaac was a Special Ops Soldier, Piper was Silvermist and Violet was Ariel.  The all looked great and the got to pick their own costumes – thank you Internet Gods for not making us drive all over creation looking for the perfect costume.

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Our household is down to one vehicle following an accident in the Xterra.  Thankfully nobody was severely injured.  Carol took the brunt of the impact with the airbag, seat belt and steering wheel.  Jacob and Violet had seat belt burns and indentations but where otherwise unhurt – well maybe emotionally scarred a bit. Jacob was shaken up a bit as was Violet but neither had any significant injuries that weren’t healed within a day or two.  Whenever we mention the truck now it is funny to listen to Violet tell us that it is broken – “truck go boom boom daddy, truck goes boom!!!”

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It has been a while since I have posted on Princess Hell.  For good reason as well.  Much has been being sorted out and there have been a lot of changes to the family and household in the past months.  The princesses now have two castles to call home.  They also have two princes that are slowly becoming siblings – or at best, gallant knights to defend against Decepticons, Cobra Commander or flights of angry dragons.  All this following a divorce of Missy and myself.

I recently sent out a letter to various family and friends both telling of the divorce and introducing some new family members.  Below is that same message to all of you that weren’t on the mailing list. (more…)