Ugliest Ronald McDonald Ever


Ugliest Ronald McDonald, originally uploaded by Troy And Naomi.

Quite possibly the ugliest Ronald McDonald statue ever. The disproportionate body parts.. the huge butt..

This used to be outside the McDonalds in Edmundston, New Brunswick, Canada, but I think it caused too many nightmares for the kids and they have since removed it.

Kathy-June and I discovered this monstrosity several years ago. If I ever wanted to creep her out I would remind her of this.. thing.. and her face would contort as if she had just had a shot of Buckley’s Mixture. So Kathy-June, this one is for you!

Ugliest Ronald McDonald

Lightning


Tuesday night we had a couple intense thunderstorms sweep through our area. One passed over about 3:30 AM and woke both Naomi and I up, as the thunder was literally shaking the house. I might have been able to go back to sleep if it wasn’t for something falling off the wall that made me realize how close the storm was.

The next day I realized it was very close indeed! It probably hit a couple places on campus, as we lost at least one campus phone and our tower which connects us to the internet. Apparently we are not alone as many others in the area suffered lightning strikes. We sometimes get about 2 minutes of connection to quickly get something done online. Since we don’t have our TV hooked up to anything, the internet is this news junkie’s main source of what is happening out there.

Stories of the Sisters


Sisters
Originally uploaded by JohnstoneKids

The door to Ellie’s room is directly across from the bathroom door. Yesterday I was was washing my hands in the washroom after changing yet another diaper when I looked and saw Ellie trying to climb up the handles of her dresser. I sternly told her not to do that or she might hurt herself. She was not in the least upset at this rebuke. Instead she cheerfully walked over to me. I thought maybe she was going to give me a hug for watching out for her best interests. Instead she said, “Close the door,” and did just that.

Now with the bathroom door closed, I waited about ten seconds before opening it to catch her trying to climb up the dresser again.

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Hold on to your ears!

Super-ah-docious – the short Ellie version of Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious. The current favorite move of the week is Mary Poppins and Ellie will sometimes run around the house singing some of the songs. “Let’s Go Fly a Kite,” and “Spoonful of Sugar” are also heard around the house. Of course, the words aren’t always right..

Hold on to your ears!

The other day I came home from work and Naomi was busy preparing supper. She popped in Mary Poppins to keep Ellie out of trouble and I found Ellie holding on to Adelaine’s ears. I didn’t think the language in that movie was that bad..

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The distance between 1 and 10 keeps getting shorter. A month ago Ellie would always count “1, 2, 6, 7 …” Then she started skipping to eight (1, 2, 8, 9, 10) and has now dropped it. Now there are only the single digit numbers, 1, 2, and 9.

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An Adelaine Smile
Adelaine has taken her first steps towards her first steps. Last week Naomi laid her on the floor while visiting a friend and was surprised to discover her a minute later on her stomach! Her first time flipping over, and we didn’t even see it.

Adelaine. Rolls and all.

Adelaine is growing very fast. Average growth for her age is roughly half an ounce a day. Adelaine has been growing at twice that rate.. Look out Ellie, she will be bigger than you soon.

We suspect that Adelaine will be more social than Ellie. She behaves like that puppy in the window at the pet store.. doesn’t do much until someone walks by and then she is all coos and smiles in hopes of someone picking her up.

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Projected growth: The old saying is that you take a child’s height at two years old and double it and that is how tall they will be as an adult. Ellie was 34 inches tall, making her 5’6″! Her mom is 4’11”, me 5’9″.

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Today we moved Ellie from her crib to a mattress on the floor. She was very excited about her “big girl bed” when we brought it in the house.. she made it difficult to make the bed as she wanted to lay on it and squirm.

We were wondering if we would be able to get her to nap on it this afternoon when we noticed that the house was quiet.. I investigated to make sure there wasn’t any trouble brewing and discovered that Ellie had already drifted off to sleep on her new bed.

Awhile ago Naomi bought twin size sheets for a different purpose. When we dug them out to put on Ellie’s bed we realized that they are the exact same colour as the walls! Just so you know that it wasn’t done on purpose..


Daddy tucking her in for the first time on a real bed

Saying evening prayers

New Book :: By This Name


After several years of research, writing and re-writing, GoodSeed has recently published their latest book, By This Name. This is just one of many tools they produce to share the Gospel with friends, neighbors or strangers.

“The ideal book to help explain the message of the Bible to our post-modern, post-Christian, & secular society. Written for those in a culture influenced by Pantheism, Polytheism and Animism, “By This Name” peels the religion off the sacred book, the Bible, and lets the ancient story speak for itself. In the process, a message of hope snaps into focus. It is a must read.”

Buy Online | Preview

The Future is Free

It has been a good couple of weeks for Ubuntu Linux. Every six months Ubuntu comes out with a new version and in mid April, Ubuntu 7.04, the Feisty Fawn, was successfully released. It did take me awhile to actually download it the day it was released. There was so much more world-wide demand than anticipated that it kept knocking their servers out!

I was able to quickly and easily install it on the three machines I use (dual boot on my home and office computers [meaning I can run either Windoze or Linux], and the only OS on my 6 year old laptop) and have been loving the improvements that have been made. It has been receiving many good reviews since its launch and is regarded the best one yet.

The other good news for Linux in general and Ubuntu in particular was that Dell computers is going to offer Ubuntu preinstalled on some of their computers.

This is a major endorsement for open source software, Linux and the world’s most popular Linux distro, Ubuntu.

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While I am posting about free open-source software, I thought I would throw in this commercial. The video isn’t new, but is an interesting collection of both famous and obscure people sharing their knowledge..

Sylvia Nasar, author of “A Beautiful Mind” advises young Linux that “One little thing can solve an incredibly complex problem.” Muhammad Ali instructs him to “Speak your mind. Don’t back down.” John Wooden, the greatest basketball coach of all time, tells him “A player who makes a team great is more valuable than a great player. Losing yourself in the group, for the good of the group, that’s teamwork.”
http://business.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=03/09/08/1210233

For another video in this series, click here.