Christmas songs

We go to the church gym most mornings to work out. One morning Rook and Cannon were singing up a storm. They sang the abc song, Jingle bells, I am a child of God and others. Finally we pulled up to the church and Cannon said, "Mom, I know what a kind and dear has," (he had just finished singing I am a child of God). I said, "really? What?" and Cannon said, "a shiny red nose."
Rook sings in the bathroom, in the car, in the shower...the kid just sings everywhere he goes. He was singing all the Christmas songs that he knew, When I said, won't you be so sad when Christmas is over? He asked why does Christmas get over and I said, Christmas is only celebrated in December and it will be January soon. Rook's face was very solemn and he said with tears in his eyes..Did Janwerary kill Jesus?

Ice Storm

One week ago we had a nice ice storm hit Omaha and the plains. The first picture is part of the aftermath. The picture doesn't do justice, but we had about one third inch of ice over everything. We couldn't hardly take the garbage out without slipping everywhere.

As we were coming in, Rook saw his bike and said, "Ohhhh! My buddy is sooooo chilly!"

Family Home Evening

Monday night is always our family home evening night dedicated to spending quality time together as a family. And I think these next two pictures are the epitome of some serious quality time that two sons have with their dad. As their dad says, nothing like a pillow to the side of the head. Plus, dad has a good arm, a very strong arm with rippling muscles. See how fast the pillow is going?

One cool thing about this picture is that Cannon was standing with Wynn and daring their dad to huck a "plasma grenade" at them. They claimed their Jedi powers would protect them. Dad used the age old trick of "hey, what's that?" and then just what they wanted, dad fired a plasma grenade at them. I guess Cannon's Jedi powers warned him to duck, but Wynn's Jedi powers were no match for dad's mind tricks and that plasma grenade took him out. Of course, the two Jedis recovered quickly enough.

deep thoughts

On Friday nights we trade baby-sitting with some really good friends. One Friday night the kids were with some friends that had a fish tank. One of the Fish was going to have babies. My friend said to Cannon, Look, this fish is going to have babies. She said that Cannon got very quiet and looked into the tank for a while and said, "Laurel, where is the hospital?"

Rook is one of our most picky eaters. He won't eat muffins, he won't eat nuts, he won't eat most things that we all like and he likes too. (once he has decided he doesn't want to eat it, he is dead set that he HATES it and it tastes like garbage.) Well the other day I went and got a rotisserie chicken, took the legs off, and gave one to Wynn and one to Cannon. Rook wanted one and I told him there were only two and he could have something else. I took a piece of breast meat and put it on his plate and he looked at it and said he hated it. I said he had to take a bite. He took a bite of it and spit it out and said, "MOM! I hate it!!! It is got poisen and I don't like to die!"

Halloween pictures

These are pictures from Halloween. Here is Rook, after Teri told him to "look evil."

Two Sith lords.

Ron Weasley

Boba Fett

Trunk-or-Treat Practice

Rook has decided who he will be for Halloween. Darth Maul. He has been practicing "the look" minus the Sith tattoos that cover Darth Maul's body. He even tried it out at the ward trunk-or-treat and was very convincing. Do you see any similarities?





Oh, and Wynn in the background was thinking this: "Holy crap, I think I just saw Darth Maul! Rook, did you see him? You know, the same Maul that was kidnapped from his Jedi training by the Sith Lord Darth Sidious at an early age. I hope he doesn't get loose in our house! Nothing worse than a loose Sith lord in the house eating all the Halloween candy and hogging the xBox."

The Gospel according to a jedi

Rook and Cannon are REALLY into star wars, for those who havn't been around them much, most all their conversations are about who is good, who is bad and who should be dead. They are constantly talking about it and lately I have been talking a lot about Heavenly Father and Jesus and trying to teach them the book of Mormon stories. We were talking about Abinidi and Rook said, does Heavenly Father kill him? And I said no, King Noah did. Rook Said, did Jesus make him dead? And I said, no when bad people do bad things to good people sometimes the good people die and go and live with Jesus. Cannon thought he could explain it better and said. Rookie, Jesus had Abinidi's light saber so the king burned him up so he could go and get it and Kill the king. And Heavenly Father is Abinidi's father so he won't kill him.
All in all I was very proud that he got that Heavenly Father is our Father....or maybe that is a stretch and I should just burn the star wars movies.
-Teri

Crew

Star Wars Contemplation

The way I picture the conversation in the picture above, it went something like this:

Rook: "Cannon, when we have our own sons, we should definitely show them the Star Wars movies in chronological order."

Cannon: "Rook, I disagree. We should show them the Star Wars movies in the order they were released. They will then get them in the same order the rest of the world saw them."

Rook: "No, no, no. Most would agree that episodes 4-6 are better than episodes 1-3, and viewing them in chronological order would allow the viewer to enjoy the superior movies at the end. Of course, to make it to the final episodes, one would have to endure a lot of frontloaded scenes of Jar Jar Binks. As a responsible parent, I would prefer to seek to shelter and protect my sons from extreme amounts of Jar Jar, not subject them to it. I worry that starting my son on this path may sour him on Star Wars altogether. Or worse yet, we’ve all read that it is traumatic childhood events like this that spawn future serial killers and telemarketers."

Cannon: "But, think about this. Some might argue they are meant to be seen in the order released, as this is how George Lucas chose to release the movies. And not to be discounted, this is the order in which I saw the movies, and obviously, things worked out ok for me…"

Wynn the artist

Wynn composed at school a masterpiece of his two Grandpas. For those of you that know the Grandpas, can you guess which one is Grandpa Miskin and which one is Grandpa Keller?

Priesthood blessings

In the Keller family, we learn about our priesthood duties from an early age. Lately, it seems as if Dad has been giving quite a few blessings and Mom and Dad have both been set apart in their new callings. Rook is a very observant kid when it comes to these blessings. He is so observant that Teri and I have seen him several times putting his hands on Crew's head and giving Crew his own "blessing." Rook usually puts his hands on Crew's head, closes his eyes, and moves his lips like he is saying something, even though no words are being said.

Here, during the picture session, Rook convinced all the kids that Crew needed a blessing because Crew was crying too much (see photo in the previous post). Crew isn't crying in this picture, so I guess it worked.

The Keller basketball team

Teri's latest saying is: "I'm a beautician, not a magician!" So, Teri traded her beautician (and magician) skills for photography services (of course from somebody who needed a beautician, not a magician).

This is one of the pictures of all the kids. When taking pictures of the kids, it seems as if there is never a perfect picture with everybody smiling. This one was pretty close, except for Crew. But what do you expect. He can act like a baby if he wants to. If anybody wants a copy, I have a high quality version. Just let me know.

Pre-Halloween dilemma

Halloween season is hard around our house. (I didn't know it was already Halloween season, but Teri informed me that it was.) One of the main dilemmas in the Keller household is what we should be for "All-hallow-even." Nothing like celebrating the sixth most profitable holiday (or one of the liminal times of the year when spirits can make contact with the physical world, and when magic is most potent). Anyways, Teri is gung-ho about Halloween this year and especially what the options are for Crew. So far we have two pretty good options. The first is a cross between Grandpa Keller and Arnold Schwarzenegger back in his Mister Universe days.

"Howdy, ma'am, dawgone it. C'd yo' show me th' way t'th' bunkhouse? ah need t'git me mah spurs an' lasso fo' th' roun'up. Do yo' happen t'knows when they will be servin' th' grub? By th' way ma'am, hyar's a li'l piece of advice: Nevr approach a bull fum th' front, a horse fum th' rear, o' a fool fum enny direckshun."

This next series of pictures is the second costume option. At first I thought that a bee costume was only for sissies. But then I started thinking, bees are pretty tough. You pretty much don't want to mess around with a bee. I guess a bee costume would be okay for Crew to wear (this once).

This is a picture of Crew's face, just after he learned that somebody was "messin' with his hive." You never mess with another man's hive, I guess. His mom even had to hold him back.

And this is when we told Crew that he was exempt from cleaning the toilets, and that it was Jett and Wynn that had toilet duty.

Crew just learned that he can't have honey until he is older than 1 year.

Wynn's "At-Home-Losing-A-Tooth-Surgery"

Wynn has had a tooth that he has been passionately wiggling the past few days in hopes he would have a tooth to present to the tooth fairy this weekend. You remember being a kid, having a tooth seem loose, and wiggling it until it actually was loose. Well, that was Wynn this weekend. He wanted to get that three dollar bill from the tooth fairy. We told him a two dollar bill was the closest he would get, although he might even get a nickel. He was even more excited about the nickel. Finally, today after church, he had wiggled it the the point that it probably was actually loose.

When the loose tooth was confirmed loose by our family dentist, (We'll give her a fictitous name-Teri), Wynn decided he wanted to try the "plier method." It is a method often used by parents to tease their children (and by dentists using methods originating in the Revolutionary War). So we located an old pair of pliers for the occasion. We made sure they were plenty rusty or it wouldn't work just right. (See enlarged picture).

As with most surgeries, large amounts of gauze and blood-soaking material were needed. However, no anesthesia was needed, the tooth came out, and Wynn was as excited as could be.

Now all that was left to do was prepare the tooth for showing to friends by soaking it in a glass of dihydrogen oxide. And smiling for the camera. Thanks for doubling as a dentist, Mom!

Good Times

Once again, Teri exhorted me to post more pictures. Here it goes.

Everytime Rook gets in trouble and cries, he says, with big alligator tears, "I want my Grandma!" So the other day we said fine, we will ship you to your Grandma. We found a box that seemed to work nicely. Every couple of days, Rook liked to climb into the box to "testfit" it to make sure that when the shipping day came, he would still fit. Problem. There was only room for Rook and not a couple days worth of Poptarts. So Cannon, being the good brother that he is, said he would "make that box a little bigger, even if I have to talk dirty to it!" Well, here is Cannon "talking dirty" to that box.

So's dere ah' wuz. At da sweet neighbo'hood bike rally. Slap mah fro! All de cute goats wuz dere t'see mah' sweet ride and check out mah' skills. ah' figured ah' betta' do whut de big boys do t'impress oders, so's I showed dem mah' underwear. Ah be baaad... ah' dink it wo'ked. ah' gots some few rap rod numbers.

A direct quote from Rook: "Holy crap! Sweet Transmogrifer! The most stunning machine made out of one of America’s finest raw materials: corrugated cardboard! With the Transmogrifer we can turn anything into anything else! Even make the Rockies have a real Gold Rush, or even make our water pure, and our air breathable and unpolluted!"

Wynn was trying to help out his mother one day figure out how to get Cannon to quit licking Crew's head. they didn't know why it happened, it just happened. Maybe there was a little maple syrup on it. Maybe he thought that because cats lick themselves for bathing purposes, he was giving Crew a bath. Maybe it was a puppy kiss. Whatever it was, it just wasn't coming to them. Wynn came up with a better idea. "Mom, we should put our heads together!"

Nothing better than a Sunday nap.

Response to Dave's Comment

So, Dave previously posted this comment: "Post some more pics eh...it's been like a week...what are you guys on vacation or, like, tending to your 5 boys or something". Is that even a sentence? Like okay already. It is not like we have only one kid or something.

First of all, I've been working out. But I've been getting these little black hairs all over me and this craving for bananas. Teri describes it this way: Gary eats, shoots, and leaves.

A trip to the zoo is always in order before school starts. Our zoo likes to bronze the dangerous animals, as shown here.

Rook and Cannon have lately been obsessed with hot-rods and mustangs. In this picture, Rook just saw a mustang.

Crew smiling.

Crew being kissed. Our kids love to kiss Crew on the head. In fact, Cannon told me that less than 37 kisses in one setting just doesn't cut it.

Yesterday was the first day of school for Jett and Wynn. Jett will be in the third grade and Wynn will be in the first grade. Rook and Cannon are heading off to school next week, but of course had to join Jett and Wynn.

For the new school year, Jett and Wynn received new backpacks embroidered with their names on the back. Kids nowdays sure are spoiled. I was lucky to get a brown paper sack from Waremart in which to carry my books.

This is the final neighborhood bike rally before school started. Teri wanted to label this as "Cannon is the man."

Other Important Life Skills

Other life skills, besides diving in the previous post, include vacuuming, mowing the lawn, and synthetic cheese cutting. Wynn has recently developed the excellent skill of using his armpit to synthetically cut the cheese. I'm not sure where he learned his new-found skill, but I am not complaining. I like it much better than the alternative because there are no side effects, such as gas pains, embarassing sounds, and probably most important, unpleasant odors.

On a happier note, here is a pretty good picture of Crew smiling.

Passive Babe Trolling

This is the epitome of passive babe trolling. Hanging out at the pool by your mom and brothers, acting like you're not interested in anyone, and showing off your tanned, muscley body. But making sure everybody knows you have skills, evidenced by the diving mask. Nothing better than being able to dive for stuff. The good life.

Another good technique, not quite as passive, is grabbing your infant brother and displaying him. It is a proven technique in attracting babes (grown-up babes).

And here is Wynn and Jett at the Hanscom park swimming pool practicing those life skills discussed earlier. Like diving for clams and pearls and diamonds on the sea floor.

The Waterskiing resurrection

Teri has been "patiently encouraging" me to post these pictures of our waterskiing outing this past weekend. A friend of ours recently bought a house south of Omaha in a private community with lakefront houses. They invited us to go waterskiing for the evening on Friday. Here is the "barometer of fun" - Wynn's smile. (And the matted hair.)

Here is another "barometer of fun" - self portraits. As always, there must be a self portrait. It is a good one isn't it?

Jett acted as the flagger. He wasn't kept very busy until I tried to ski, which is in the next picture.

I can waterski on two skis really well. And I can drop one ski. But I have never been able to get up on one ski and slalom. But I tried and succeeded. But this isn't the time I succeeded. Here, I was in the process of going down into a watery grave.

But the next time, I came up out of the water and finally got up. It was like a "waterskiing resurrection."

And here I am crossing the wake and cutting some sweet roostertails. Well, at least crossing the wake.

Here is Teri and Rook being happy as always.

And Cannon with his wind-swept hair and his beach-bum-blond hair.

Towards the end of the evening, everybody jumped in the boat and went for a ride - even Crew. I think he had a blast because he didn't cry once.