Trace's first haircut

I wanted to let Trace's hair grow out indefinitely, but I finally decided the 4-inch feathers around his ears had to go. He looks so handsome, but less like a baby. Sigh. He's 20 months old.

Thanksgiving in First Grade

I got to join both Talmage and Cole's classes celebrate Thanksgiving. In Talmage's class (I have no pictures) they made apple turkeys. They stuck toothpicks into the apple and piled up candies on the toothpicks to look like feathers, then marshmallows for the head, neck and feet. Very yummy. They all enjoyed it. Talmage went with a spotted cow motif for his turkey--always original.
Cole's 1st grade rotated between all 7 classrooms (can you believe what a big school that is)! Each of the teachers had an Indian or Pilgram craft. Cole's favorite was shaking the cream in the baby jars to make butter. Cole also loved his costume: white shirt with a black belted vest, rolled up jeans, long socks and church shoes.

Christmas Eve 2009

T'was the night before Christmas and all through the Cresap house....Many creatures were stirring. We had the honorable Hales: Joey, Katie and Luke, the great 'rents: Papa and Grammy, and guest stars Sarah and Max Meacham join us for our dinner and Christmas Eve program. We had Chinese food for dinner, because it's easy and delicious: Kung Pao chicken from the box and Joey and Katie's fabulous Asian Chicken salad. Our program involved the Zarahemla Christmas skit, which was really fun to do because this year Tal and Cole can read. It was also really rough because they are still very new readers, but next year will be even more fun! Then Cap and Pam did the Zacharias and Elizabeth skit, complete with buffalo robe, because if you've got one, you've just got to wear it whenever you can. Then Clint read Luke 2, we watched Luke 2, which is always the most touching part, and finally we sang "Silent Night." Then the boys got PJs and books which they are modeling and reading below.

Luney the Luna Moth

Our family has been here-to-fore quite anti-pet so the boys (including Clint) get really excited about any kind of animal life that crosses our path. What you see above was the product of a cocoon that was in the bottom of a toilet seat box we got from Lowes. Since the toilet seat was made in China, Clint was sure we had an imported visitor. The cocoon was about 3-inches long and an inch wide. About 1/3 from the bottom were these creases so that the bottom could hinge up to 45 degrees from the top 2/3. Every time the bottom was poked it jerked to the opposite side. It was kind of a trip. It was in the cocoon for at least 2 months, so long we were sure it was dead, but then, when we poked it, it still moved. One day we found the cocoon empty and a bit later we discovered this moth on the windowsill. We think the color was such a lovely lime green and the antennae are so pretty. I'm not sure if you can see it in the photograph. Clint looked it up and it is a Luna Moth and it is North American. It hung around for a couple of weeks before it died, not having found a mate. We appreciated its visit.

Service, Please

Jack, with our food drive haul

There is nothing like Christmas to make you want to bite off more than you can chew. So, this December I decided I'd try to do one service project each week with the boys. We did manage to get one done the first week. I wanted to take goodies to the neighbors (but I was a little embarrassed to do it so early), and I also wanted to help Tal collect canned food for the cub scout food drive. Tal came up with the idea to trade "cookies for cans." I thought that was a brilliant idea. So we made up about 7 plates of cookies and took them to friends in our neighborhood and Joey and Katie's neighborhood. It was great fun to visit our friend's homes and the boys got to see how generous people can be.
After that our December got extra crazy with birthdays on the 9th and 10th, the Hale family calendar project and visits to Tal, Cole and Jack's classrooms. So, I decided it made more sense to do it when the kids got out of school and we needed to keep them busy anyway. So our first holiday Monday I took the boys to the store and they helped pick out treats and gifts for a soldier care package to send to Clint's old squadron in Iraq. I knew it'd be late, so I planned it to be a New Year's Package. The nice thing about gifts is that late is always better than never. I told the boys as we got out of the car that they'd be writing thank you cards to go in the package. Cole said, "Mom, that's embarrassing." I said, "What do you mean?" Cole said, "I don't want to do that in the store!" I explained we'd be doing it later, at home. The boys did o.k. in the store although they kept wanting the toys and candy to be for themselves. I kept reminding them that we were supposed to be thinking about the soldiers who were away from their families at Christmas, not about ourselves. We went home and as I was loading the items into the box I noticed Cole take a tightly folded piece of paper and slip it into the box, like he didn't want me to see. I remembered he'd said this kind of thing is embarrassing. I took the box in my room to read the note. I was so curious. It said, "If you don't like anything in this box, send it back." Ha! Later we did write some actual thank you notes and I explained to them about 9/11 and what the soldiers were doing over there to defeat Al Queda. Talmage wrote on his note, "Give the enemy a knuckle sandwich from Clint Cresap's son."
I wanted to take the boys to a rest home to sing carols but eliminated that idea because of 1) lack of time 2) the boys don't sing Christmas Carols and 3) the boys would probably run around and touch people's things and stress the old folks out. Discretion being the better part of valor, we passed. We'll do it later, maybe with one boy at a time.
So finally, we whipped up more cookies (since my hips need frequent injections of my favorite mint chocolate cookie recipe) and took them to more friends and neighbors. And we took one plate and a loaf of pumpkin bread to the fire station. I expected to see a table of goodies, but there wasn't a thing. Just a dozen fit and bored firemen looking very excited to see treats. They were so grateful and thanked Talmage and Jack so enthusiastically I was really taken aback. Talmage and Jack were really impressed that they'd done something nice. Have you ever observed that a grateful recipient often does far greater good than any service offered?
I'm glad this Christmas season got the ball rolling for us in the service department. I'm hoping to do projects on a monthly basis this year. But I'm really low on non-holiday service ideas. Could you share any ideas you have for service projects?

Clint's Actual Birthday

Clint's actual birthday fell about 4 days after his big surprise in Nashville. We still had a few celebrations here. I wrote him a card with his 40 contributions to the world. I have to say it was pretty easy to come up with 40. He's a man of many talents and tends to polish everything he sets his mind to. His main gift was his wardrobe overhaul we picked up on our first trip to Nashville. He also got an Airhog helicopter--these never seem to get old. And we feasted on ice-cream, upon which were only 4 candles. The boys had to pull out their 10's times tables for the event.

Overdue report on Grandma and Grandpa Hale's visit

We were thrilled to have a visit from Grandma and Grandpa Hale two times this winter. We hadn't seen them for 2 1/2 years--since summer 2007, except through wonderful Skype. This was partly because they were on their 3rd 18-month mission to Villa Hermosa Mexico, and partly because we only get to Utah about yearly and we didn't make it out to Utah this past summer when they returned. My parents did a cross-country trip visiting all their kids, friends and geneology sites. They showed up on our doorstep just in time for dinner on Saturday, November 14th. We had them for 3 nights and then they stayed over at Joey and Katy's house. Mostly we did a lot of great chatting. The biggest topic of conversation was where and when to do the family cruise for my parents 50th anniversary next year. They came to church with us and met lots of great people and made a great impression. They kept on asking my Dad to relate his opinion as he'd been a mission president--he never had been, but somehow they got that idea. On Monday night for Family Home Evening they shared a lot of pictures from Mexico. Talmage was really desperate for him to show a picture of a snake, but alas, he only had pictures of a 4-foot iguana that they found hanging out in their dryer vent. Katie and I took my Mom to the Pink Palace museum, it was not that great of a museum. But it was fun to drive Mom through mid-town and see all the beautiful old mansions, and through a ghetto part of town that had Harvard, Yale and Hale streets.
They stopped by again the first week of December on their way back West on the 40. This visit was less chaotic because we had them all to ourselves (Joey and Katie enjoyed their time alone with them too). It was the first Family Home Evening after Thanksgiving and they helped us decorate for Christmas. We made them breakfast in the morning and sent them on their way. The boys really enjoyed the time with them. This was my parents first time meeting our Trace. We were excited for them to meet him because he's such a cheery little guy. My Dad said, "He's always smiling."

Two Goofies

Merry Christmas! Please excuse the crazy long intro!

Make a Smilebox greeting

Dictation

Last Friday Talmage came home from school early with an earache that ceased to bother him the moment he crossed the threshold. From now on I'm taking Motrin to school and sending him back to class. But anyway, he and Jack started in on a craft, which involved sticking Christmas-themed foam shapes onto a foam sheet. This kept them thoroughly engrossed for a good hour. When the masterpieces were complete Talmage offerred to write Jack's name on Jack's project. So Jack spelled his name out for Tal, letter by letter and Tal wrote it on Jack's project. This tickled me no end. First it's hilarious that Talmage, age 8, could not be bothered to waste brain cells on figuring out how to spell Jack's name. But it's also so exciting that he'd volunteer to write anything, as writing is right next to waterboarding as far as Talmage's favorite things to do. And it's so sweet that he'd want to help out his little brother like that. The other hilarious thing is that Jack can totally write his own name, but he seemed totally jazzed that his big brother was helping him out. And he seemed so proud that he could coach his big brother on how to spell his name. The whole exchange made my week.

Cole Turned 7

About two months before Cole's birthday it began. "Mom, what did you get me for my birthday?" (50x) "Mom just give me a hint." (50x) "Mom, where did you hide my presents?" (50x) "Mom, you have to come here and see on the computer what I REALLY want for my birthday!" (1000 x) And finally, after black friday: "Mom, could you stay up all night again and get me this present, instead?" (1 amazing x) If there's one thing we Cresaps do well, it's obsess! And boy, that Cole sure was excited about his birthday! I finally told Cole 2 days before his birthday that if he asked me where I hid his presents one more time, he wouldn't get his presents until the afternoon of his birthday, instead of the morning when he woke up. Horror of horrors. That produced an amazing amount of self-control in Cole and, still not able to think about anything else, he was remarkably speechless for a couple of days. But the day finally came, and after all that build up, I hope it didn't disappoint too much. We started with his favorite breakfast, cinnamon rolls and hot chocolate, then we did some present opening: Indiana Jones Legos, a leapster and games and a Ben 10 movie.
Later I went to his school class. His teacher, Mrs. Rios met me at the door and said, "I just love Cole! He's like a little man, so mature! And he's so funny! (Under her breath) I wish all the kids could be like him." I said, "I kind of like him, too." I read the class a book, my cousin Nate Hale's (check out his amazing blog here) The Dinosaurs Before Christmas. Then we made a little treat, brownie trees with green frosting, candy for ornaments and preztel sticks for the trunks. It was a big hit.
On the weekend we had a friend's party at Incredible Pizza, kind of like a Chuck E. Cheese without the cute characters and with things older kids enjoy like a roller coaster simulator, a go-cart race track and bumper cars. It's the kind of place kids love and I can't wait to leave! But the kids had a blast and so we'll call it a success. The friends who came were Ethan Pate, Ethan Sterbis, Ethan Welch, Brandon Wery and David Wery.
Happy Birthday to Cole!

A Note from Clint: The Best Birthday Ever

Clint here: I don't blog, and I don't know that I've heard many 40th birthdays described in glowing terms before. But I guess there are exceptions to most rules, and my entry to the world of the middle-aged would be one...

So Sarah and I had talked about going somewhere memorable for the occasion. At one point Cabo was bandied about, but I didn't want to spend the effort and time to travel to to Cabo San Lucas and not dive (Sarah's ear drums are broke and out of warranty). Navy life with 4 boys under the age of 8 being what it is, we'd settled (I thought) on leaving our children at home and doing a combined 15th Anniversary/40th B-day trip to Nashville to see the CMA's in November. Which was a blast. In the meantime, however, Sarah and sis-in-law Katie (in on the plot) stated they wanted to take the kids to Nashville to see the Opry Hotel lights and other assorted Christmas sights, so they planned a joint Cresap/Hale Nashville excursion for this past weekend, and rented a house in support of said plan.

Now, I'll be the first person to admit to being less-than-sensitive to wifely non-verbal signals (especially the sneaky ones that aren't intended to send a signal) but it was obvious she had something planned. So when she announced on Thursday night that the Hales weren't going, (which Katie confirmed with a dramatic "I'm eight months pregnant and too tired, so I'll stay here and watch your kids" - which makes zero sense) it just confirmed for me that something was up. But there was no way I was going to complain about getting another no-kids weekend away, and I certainly didn't see any benefit to prying into her "plan", which, incidentally, suffered from a serious lack of details, so I kept quiet. And off we went early Friday afternoon, with "dinner reservations" in Nashville at 5:00pm.

We made good time, and pulled into the parking garage in downtown Nashville at 4:40. As I turned into the entrance, I got a quick glance at a red-haired woman, facing away from me, on the corner. More than a passing resemblance to Jessica, but this is Nashville, she's in Arizona, and I just had the one glance. So I didn't think much of it. I parked and we walked down to the long line outside the restauarant, and as we did so, Tyler called me. And proceeded with a very bizarre series of questions about AK-47's. I noticed that as soon as Tyler called, Sarah got a call as well. At this point I got a little suspicious... especially as Sarah left me in the line to go "check" on our reservation, from which she returned and announced that it had been lost and they'd recommended another place down the street.

As suggested, we walked down 2nd Ave to the Riverside Grill, and as we walked in I immediately noticed someone that looked like Robyn standing next to the pool table in the corner. However, when the person that looked like Robyn (Robyn being in Colorado, so this couldn't be her) saw me glance at her and then giggled and ducked behind the corner, I realized that it really WAS Robyn. And that meant it actually was Jessica standing on the street corner, and that the awkward telephonic distraction of Tyler's meant he was in on it too. And that it was probably too much coincidence that the people who looked just like Ike and Chris and Kristen standing around the corner with the Tyler, Jessica and Robyn look-alikes weren't actually Ike, Chris, Kristen, Tyler, Jessica and Robyn. I mean, what would the chances of that be???

So for my 40th Birthday, the greatest group of friends in the world rearranged their hectic December schedules, pawned off their children, and flew from Colorado, Utah and Arizona to Nashville to surprise me and spend 48 hours sitting around talking. True, there was some eating out, and a Civil War battlefield in there somewhere, and an aborted attempt to get within walking distance of the Opryland Hotel, but mostly it was just a bunch of friends sitting around talking. It is a rare gift to be possessed of a friend with whom, even after years of living in different states and separate lives, there is no distance; with whom, when you are reunited, the relationship returns as strongly and effortlessly as it ever was when you first became acquainted. It is a rare gift to find one, and I've been blessed with six. Thanks, guys, for giving me the best 40th Birthday anyone ever had. This one was a keeper.

-Clint

PS - Enjoy the sentiment while it lasts. This took about a decade of emotional sensitivity out of me. Not sure where I found it but there ain't any left where it came from.

PPS- The tissues are on the side table, Ike.

PPPS - If you are arranging a surprise trip for someone, and they say "No, Cabo would be too hard for just a weekend", and the alternative is Tennessee in December, you ASK AGAIN!