Being A Dad

Check this out.. while watching some TV last night I was channal surfing and came across this video.. This is pretty cool.. the words are sort of right on the money.. I look at my three boys and I can't help to think of all the things my dad told me.. and low and behold, I am saying them now!!

It is amazing how three boys can totaly change your life and have you put your priorites in line..

Next week is Brady's spring break and Cathy and I are taking ten days off to hang out with the boys.. I am looking forward to this journey called "being the dad of three boys"..

It should be a wild ride.. like the song says..

"From watching him learn how to crawl
To skinned up knees from skateboard falls
To praying he'd get through football alive
From hearing his first words spoken
The first time his heart got broken
And knowing soon he'll spread his wings and fly
I guess I didn't know what a Daddy goes thru
Til I was a Daddy too"

Thanks dad.. You always knew what to say.. even when I am a daddy too, you still know what to say.. Love you..

I Love It When A Plan Comes Together.....

Monday is my typical day off, so I thought I would jump in and start the laundry for the week, and boy will my wife be so "happy and surprised"!!!...

(We interrupted this story for a message from the Emergency Broadcast System)

Today is Tuesday and I just got off the phone with my darling quiet wife. She informed me that,and I quote.. "You are NOT allowed to wash cloths ever- ever- ever- again"!!.. It seems that she "noticed" that I washed her new pink sweater with some white and brown cloths and they have this "spotted pink" look to them..

Again, she said I was never ever ever ever to wash cloths again....

Tonight I am putting a shelf up in the bathroom.. I hope she didn't noticed the holes in the wall from where I tried to put it up on Monday and the holes were off centered... (4 times)

It Is Finished.. Upward 2008

This Saturday is our Upward Closing program, a celebration to end a tremendous successful ministry season. So many people put so much time and effort into seeing that the children of this community would have a place to play and cheer and learn about the love of a Father..

My main prayer is that the mothers and fathers of those children will be responsible enough for the watering and the caring of the seeds that were planted.

Till next season..

The Boys

Well.. it has been awhile since I last blogg.. I am working on my message for the Upward closing program.. as I sit in my office.. I can hear the rain beat along the metal roof of the Family Life Center.. Oh my it is rainning so hard out there...!!

Anyway quick update on the boys.. Brady - Landon - Alexander..

Brady.. has been doing pretty good.. he has a "freind" that he spends hours with on the phone.. he is doing much better when we ask him to do somthing..(going through teen hormone days)

Landon - OMG.... Landon is killing us.. He takes his pants down.. shows his bottom and does a Veggie tales song and dance.. he is learning some new songs at church and at mommie's "MOPP Classes".. he still needs daddy to lay down with him when he goes to bed...You know what.. Daddy needs it too!!!

Alexander - Alexander.. or Lex is doing amazingly well.. he whistles.. I am serious. he will whistle and actual sound wil come out..

over all the boys are doing pretty good.. I am blessed to have them

Team Hoyt

Dick and Rick Hoyt are a father-and-son team from Massachusetts who together compete just about continuously in marathon races. And if they’re not in a marathon they are in a triathlon — that daunting, almost superhuman, combination of 26.2 miles of running, 112 miles of bicycling, and 2.4 miles of swimming. Together they have climbed mountains, and once trekked 3,735 miles across America.
It’s a remarkable record of exertion — all the more so when you consider that Rick can't walk or talk.
For the past twenty five years or more Dick, who is 65, has pushed and pulled his son across the country and over hundreds of finish lines. When Dick runs, Rick is in a wheelchair that Dick is pushing. When Dick cycles, Rick is in the seat-pod from his wheelchair, attached to the front of the bike. When Dick swims, Rick is in a small but heavy, firmly stabilized boat being pulled by Dick.
At Rick’s birth in 1962 the umbilical cord coiled around his neck and cut off oxygen to his brain. Dick and his wife, Judy, were told that there would be no hope for their child’s development.
"It’s been a story of exclusion ever since he was born," Dick told me. "When he was eight months old the doctors told us we should just put him away — he’d be a vegetable all his life, that sort of thing. Well those doctors are not alive any more, but I would like them to be able to see Rick now."
The couple brought their son home determined to raise him as "normally" as possible. Within five years, Rick had two younger brothers, and the Hoyts were convinced Rick was just as intelligent as his siblings. Dick remembers the struggle to get the local school authorities to agree: "Because he couldn’t talk they thought he wouldn’t be able to understand, but that wasn’t true." The dedicated parents taught Rick the alphabet. "We always wanted Rick included in everything," Dick said. "That’s why we wanted to get him into public school."
A group of Tufts University engineers came to the rescue, once they had seen some clear, empirical evidence of Rick’s comprehension skills. "They told him a joke," said Dick. "Rick just cracked up. They knew then that he could communicate!" The engineers went on to build — using $5,000 the family managed to raise in 1972 - an interactive computer that would allow Rick to write out his thoughts using the slight head-movements that he could manage. Rick came to call it "my communicator." A cursor would move across a screen filled with rows of letters, and when the cursor highlighted a letter that Rick wanted, he would click a switch with the side of his head.
When the computer was originally brought home, Rick surprised his family with his first "spoken" words. They had expected perhaps "Hi, Mom" or "Hi, Dad." But on the screen Rick wrote "Go Bruins." The Boston Bruins were in the Stanley Cup finals that season, and his family realized he had been following the hockey games along with everyone else. "So we learned then that Rick loved sports," said Dick.
In 1975, Rick was finally admitted into a public school. Two years later, he told his father he wanted to participate in a five-mile benefit run for a local lacrosse player who had been paralyzed in an accident. Dick, far from being a long-distance runner, agreed to push Rick in his wheelchair. They finished next to last, but they felt they had achieved a triumph. That night, Dick remembers, "Rick told us he just didn’t feel handicapped when we were competing."
Rick’s realization turned into a whole new set of horizons that opened up for him and his family, as "Team Hoyt" began to compete in more and more events. Rick reflected on the transformation process for me, using his now-familiar but ever-painstaking technique of picking out letters of the alphabet:
" What I mean when I say I feel like I am not handicapped when competing is that I am just like the other athletes, and I think most of the athletes feel the same way. In the beginning nobody would come up to me. However, after a few races some athletes came around and they began to talk to me. During the early days one runner, Pete Wisnewski had a bet with me at every race on who would beat who. The loser had to hang the winner’s number in his bedroom until the next race. Now many athletes will come up to me before the race or triathlon to wish me luck."
It is hard to imagine now the resistance which the Hoyts encountered early on, but attitudes did begin to change when they entered the Boston Marathon in 1981, and finished in the top quarter of the field. Dick recalls the earlier, less tolerant days with more sadness than anger:
"Nobody wanted Rick in a road race. Everybody looked at us, nobody talked to us, nobody wanted to have anything to do with us. But you can’t really blame them - people often are not educated, and they’d never seen anyone like us. As time went on, though, they could see he was a person — he has a great sense of humor, for instance. That made a big difference."
After 4 years of marathons, Team Hoyt attempted their first triathlon — and for this Dick had to learn to swim. "I sank like a stone at first" Dick recalled with a laugh "and I hadn’t been on a bike since I was six years old."
With a newly-built bike (adapted to carry Rick in front) and a boat tied to Dick’s waist as he swam, the Hoyts came in second-to-last in the competition held on Father’s Day 1985.
"We chuckle to think about that as my Father’s Day present from Rick, " said Dick.
They have been competing ever since, at home and increasingly abroad. Generally they manage to improve their finishing times. "Rick is the one who inspires and motivates me, the way he just loves sports and competing," Dick said.
And the business of inspiring evidently works as a two-way street. Rick typed out this testimony:
"Dad is one of my role models. Once he sets out to do something, Dad sticks to it whatever it is, until it is done. For example once we decided to really get into triathlons, dad worked out, up to five hours a day, five times a week, even when he was working."
The Hoyts’ mutual inspiration for each other seems to embrace others too — many spectators and fellow-competitors have adopted Team Hoyt as a powerful example of determination. "It’s been funny," said Dick "Some people have turned out, some in good shape, some really out of shape, and they say ‘we want to thank you, because we’re here because of you’."
Rick too has taken full note of their effect on fellow-competitors while racing:
"Whenever we are passed (usually on the bike) the athlete will say "Go for it!" or "Rick, help your Dad!" When we pass people (usually on the run) they’ll say "Go Team Hoyt!" or "If not for you, we would not be out here doing this."
Most of all, perhaps, the Hoyts can see an impact from their efforts in the area of the handicapped, and on public attitudes toward the physically and mentally challenged.
"That’s the big thing," said Dick. "People just need to be educated. Rick is helping many other families coping with disabilities in their struggle to be included."
That is not to say that all obstacles are now overcome for the Hoyts. Dick is "still bothered," he says, by people who are discomforted because Rick cannot fully control his tongue while eating. "In restaurants - and it’s only older people mostly - they’ll see Rick’s food being pushed out of his mouth and they’ll leave, or change their table. But I have to say that kind of intolerance is gradually being defeated."
Rick’s own accomplishments, quite apart from the duo’s continuing athletic success, have included his moving on from high school to Boston University, where he graduated in 1993 with a degree in special education. That was followed a few weeks later by another entry in the Boston Marathon. As he fondly pictured it: "On the day of the marathon from Hopkinton to Boston people all over the course were wishing me luck, and they had signs up which read `congratulations on your graduation!’"
Rick now works at Boston College’s computer laboratory helping to develop a system codenamed "Eagle Eyes," through which mechanical aids (like for instance a powered wheelchair) could be controlled by a paralyzed person’s eye-movements, when linked-up to a computer.
Together the Hoyts don’t only compete athletically; they also go on motivational speaking tours, spreading the Hoyt brand of inspiration to all kinds of audiences, sporting and non-sporting, across the country.
Rick himself is confident that his visibility — and his father’s dedication — perform a forceful, valuable purpose in a world that is too often divisive and exclusionary. He typed a simple parting thought:

"The message of Team Hoyt is that everybody should be included in everyday life."

Birthday

Well last week I turned the big "38"... yea can you belive that.. but it was pretty cool.. I got an awesome gift.. a new day planner that is really impressive and Cathy took me out to O Chuck's for dinner and I got to go to Big Lots...

My computer has been down so I haven't been able to blogg much.. Upward is going very well.. Three more weeks.. hard to belive..

well see you all in the funny papers

Move It..You Got To Move It..

Ever since Landon saw this movie.. he has been running around the house singing.."You got to move it.. move it..."

I Don't Feel Good

Well it is that time of year again, Landon has been conjested all week and had a nasty sounding cough.. But the doctor gave him some meds and he is doing much better.. Upward is starting it's third week this Saturday and things are going pretty good.. We have a total of 152 kids involved.. I am excited about that...

"Diaper Dandy Baby"...

Oh I have a birthday comming up in about 13 days and 5 hours... so if any one wants to get me a gift and really dont know what to get me.. I take all kinds of CASH!!!

Been To Long

Hey .. Well it has been awhile since my last post.. honestly I been really busy with Upward Ministries.. last weekend was our first game.. I don't know I think it went pretty good.....

Remember When....

I remember I used to watch The Rock.. Back when the WWF was fun.. Now it seems I am to busy to watch any TV..

But I have to say.. It was an AWESOME ride!!!

Blessing

Hey everyone...
Again I have to brag on someone.. Her name is Whitnay... or whom I like to call Whit-Ney... She is one of our students and she is also one of my Upward Cheer coaches.. Now, the reason I am bragging on her is not that she is a super cool teen who watches my 2 young boys some of the, most of the time.. and that she is my "honorary" daughter"..

But the fact that she wrote this letter to all her Upward Cheer parents.. It truly showed the heart of a teen who is trying to make a difference..

So it just goes to show you.. you can't judge all teens by what the news reports.. There are alot of AWESOME teens out there..

Here is a thought... why don't you take time out to talk to one.. you might just be suprised...

PS... this picture is a Christian pop group called Hawk Nelson.. her favorite...

Whay to go Whitnay!!!...."Remember who you are, And what you stand for".. I am prould of you girl!!!

"Daddy.. I Got To Go Poopie!!!"

I am so excited!!!
Landon came to me this morning and said he had to poopie.. I was so happy for him.. He got on his stool.. (not that kind of "stool") and sat there.... and sat there.. and sat there.. then he made the cooliest face, and "plop"!! out it came!!!!

He jumped up and said..."Look daddy, it is poopie"!!!

I said "Yea!!!"

The he finished and we went and got a "scooby-snack" and watch TV..

Upward

Well.. Upward Basketball and Cheerleading has started this year.. I am sort of excited about this.. I think this might be one of our best years.. I have alot of new coaches who are excited about being a mentor to alot of deserving young kids.

I am very excited that we got a lot of new kids this year.. I am thrilled that we have so many returning families..

I am looking forward to see what God has planned this year!!!

Smallville.....

Hero

Yet Another Cool Video

Superman Rocks!!

Pretty Cool

This was a pretty cool video

Above The Clouds

This is pretty cool..
The other day Landon came to me and we were talking and he made this pretty awesome statement.
He said “Daddy, can I fly thru the clouds with you?”...As I answered “You sure can!”
As he walked out of the room smiling he then asked...”You my friend daddy?”…

And I answered “I am your best friend.” Then he went to bed.

Movies

Friday November 30th.

Well today I didn't make it into my office until around 12:00. I wasn't feeling to good yesterday when I got home from Falmouth. So what I did was take some meds and the meds made me very sleepy..

I think I still had it in my system 'cause when I got up this morning I was still feeling droggy..anyway.. This brings back memories of last night when I was watching TV..

You see I love the Hallmark Channel.. and they been having some good movies I might add. I watched one Wednesday night called the "Christmas Visitor" and was pretty good..

And then last night I watched a movie called "The Christmas Card" or somthihg.. but it was another pretty good romantic comedy.

have a good day

The Little Drummer Boy

This is a pretty cool video of an classic song.Calvary Chapel in Fort Lauderdale did this version of Drummer boy with a stompin surprise!!!