1. Blame it on your kids. You can totally roll your eyes when you tell people you are heading to Comic Con and make a big deal about the things you do to make your kids happy. You are under no obligation to share that you think seeing the real superman, one of the heart throbs from old favorite 90210, the man behind Kung Fu panda’s Mr. Ping, and the nerdy kid from Sixteen Candles and The Breakfast Club would be a little bit cool.

2. Do not bring a stroller. Don’t even think about it. If you have one young enough not to be able to walk around all day (or one crazy enough to bolt and try to join the circus), strap that kid to you. Maybe you can get creative and make that child wearing part of some superhero get up. I tried (picture wristbands and a cape on the hip carrier). Mark said I looked ridiculous. I wore the wristbands for most of the day regardless. I’m so on the in.

3. Do bring a camera. And, prepare yourself to take pretty much the same picture of your children over and over again with different characters–most of whom are just normal people coming for the convention who love having their picture taken.

3. Ask before taking a picture. Minimize risk by trying to make sure that the person you are asking is actually wearing a costume.

4. Hang out near the bathrooms and exits. Seeing Captain America coming out of using the facilities or a villain texting can provide a good bit of amusement for children and adults alike.

5. Prepare yourself for a lot of “What’s that?” questions. Over and over and over again.

9. Be prepared to lose someone. Comic Con can be a long day. By the afternoon, we think a stormblaster got her.

10. Go home thankful. 

We made some super Valentines this weekend.

Yesterday, I went grocery shopping and somehow managed to get what we needed despite being nasally oppressed by roses and having to face the humungous Valentine robot guard at the door surrounded by a gazillion other helium balloons.

Lydia and I partied with a kindergarten class this morning.

So, in between popping chocolates into your mouth tonight from your hubs, why don’t you consider talking a bit more deeply about what love looks like as couple and as a family.

That’s my plan.

And, then head over here and consider something super romantic–taking a parenting purity pledge.

When the rest of the country is all ga ga about romantic love, take some time to read what makes up a “parenting purity pledge” and maybe even look up the Scripture referenced there together as a couple. Consider if you can really commit to the things laid out there.

I know I’m challenged by them.

Like seriously challenged.

But, I know I want that for my family and for us as parents. And, reading through those commitments are just what I need right now as we work on developing a mission and vision for our family.

And, you get a little reward if you take that pledge too–a free download from Seeds Family Worship from their new purity cd released today and a free digital devotional from Family Life. Warning – be prepared to buy the whole album because just the one song is only a teaser which will leave you wanting to download the rest of the collection here. And, as a little bonus for you, enter the code SPARROW for 20% off any or all of their CDs. That’s in honor of The Sparrow Fund, folks. Thank them over at Seeds Family Worship for that.

Happy Valentine’s Day, folks. May it be one that leads you to some conversation about true love…and maybe some crazy balloons and roses to boot. Who knows.

Have you heard of Edward Lorenz? During WWII, he served as a weather forecaster for the U.S. Army Air Corps. When he came home from the war, he decided to study meteorology. He studied at MIT where, in the early 60s, he set out to construct a mathematical model of the weather. He managed to narrow all weather down to a set of 12 differential equations.

On one particular day, Lorenz wanted to re-examine a sequence of data from his model. Instead of starting at the very beginning, he decided to save time and restart the run in the middle. He entered the conditions at some point near the middle of the previous run and restarted his calculations. The data from the second run should have exactly matched the data from the first run. But, that’s not what happened. They matched at first; but, then, the runs eventually began to diverge and not just slightly but dramatically. The further the data progressed, the less resemblance between them until they were nothing at all alike. They looked a bit like this:

At first, Lorenz thought something had gone wrong with his computer. Then, he realized that when he started the second run, he had used numbers rounded off to three digits, assuming that anything beyond that was inconsequential. But, his computer used six digits, not three. And, apparently even .000001 is far from inconsequential.

He concluded that long-term weather forecasting was impossible and pioneered the phenomenon known as “sensitive dependence on initial conditions,” meaning that the slightest difference in initial conditions, even ones beyond human ability to measure, made prediction of past or future outcomes impossible. He proclaimed, “a single flap of a single seagull’s wings would be enough to change the course of all future weather systems on the earth.” The seagull was changed to the more poetic sounding butterfly and the theory became well known as the butterfly effect, causing quite a stir in modern science. After all, this theory violated the basic conventions of physics. Science teaches that small initial changes lead to small changes in behavior. Every high school student knows well that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. But, Lorenz’s findings showed something different. Even the very smallest disturbance, even the very smallest action, one perhaps no one would ever notice, could cause major change and have a dramatic future effect on the world around it.

So, what is your .000001?

I’m reading Linda Dillow’s book Creative Counterpart right now. I’m doing it with a group of about a dozen women which is both fun and challenging. I know that when they come over to discuss the book and the study questions, I am going to have to give thoughtful answers! So, one of the questions for tonight was: Why pray? 

I started to look around to see what I could find on the topic online and found a few poignant quotes that I thought were helpful.

1. “prayer draws us closer together in the presence of the Holy Spirit.” – from Compassion by Henri Nouwen

2. “If I had to answer the question ‘Why pray?’ in one sentence, it would be, ‘Because Jesus did.’” -Philip Yancey

3. “We need to pray to show what really matters to us. Clarify our priorities. This is an answer to those who ask, “Since God knows not only what we need already, but even all our thoughts, why should we pray at all?” Prayer forces us to sort out our real priorities and concerns; it shows God how fervent we are about the things around us. “Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.” –Luke 18:1 Prayer often serves to remind us that we have an ally, a friend, a helper, when we are in danger of forgetting. God won’t forget our needs, but we may forget God’s deliverance, unless we pray. – from www.virtualsalt.com

4. Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection, in The Practice of the Presence of God, said that we should “establish ourselves in the presence of God, talking always with him” to “give ourselves entirely to God, whether in temporal or spiritual concerns.” He said that we “ought to act very simply towards God, speaking frankly to Him, and asking His help in things as they occurred.” In other words, we should enter into God’s presence and keep in it, as we would be in the presence of a friend at our side all day long, to whom we can talk in brief conversations throughout the day. (If I only could learn to approach my heavenly father with every little thing as my children who are basically with me all day approach me…) Brother Lawrence goes on to say, “We need only to realize that God is close to us and to turn to Him at every moment, to ask for His help to learn His will in doubtful things, and to do gladly those which we clearly perceive He requires of us, offering them to Him before we begin, and giving Him thanks when they have been finished for His honour.”

5. From How To Pray by R. A. Torrey: “In much of our prayer there is little thought of God. Our mind is not taken up with the thought of the mighty and loving Father. We are occupied neither with the need nor with the one to whom we are praying , but our mind is wandering here and there throughout the world. When we really come into God’s presence, really meet Him face to face in the place of prayer, really seek the things that we desire from Him, then there is power.”