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American Girl Classroom Creation

I have several nieces. One of them has a birthday tomorrow and she loves to play with her American Girl dolls. I adore the dolls and all things girly, (especially since I have four boys), so I totally encourage this habit. 

A while back, I started looking for ways to make things to go with their dolls and extra-large doll houses their dad made for Christmas. I decided to paint little dressers with them when I had them for a long weekend.  

My next project was to make a small classroom for them. 

I found these little student size desks on Walmart.com. 

I bought a tri-fold foam board (think science projects), some cork board tape, print and solid color  border paper, and other accessories. I printed off the Dr. Seuss quote, crayon border, blank clock and other items. I laminated most of them so they can write on there with dry erase markers or crayons. 

I found these cute, doll-size clipboards at Michaels along with the circle garland I still need to make. 

The large pink board is a chalkboard, also from Michaels. 

I am so excited to give this to her tomorrow!!

My next project is to make a ballet/gymnastics studio. I already have the supplies to make a rail and some 

Snow days

Who doesn't love a good snow day?

As a principal, I have to decide if we will have a delay, go to school or cancel for inclement weather. Not only do I answer to my board and parents, faculty and students, I also have four little people in my home that have their own ideas about what I should and should not decide!

Today, it worked in their favor, although they were asleep and not consulted!

GeoTrax......All Aboard

We are on day four of snow and being home. This mom had to pull out an old faithful for entertainment.

We have had Geotrax trains for twelve years. For my oldest son's first Christmas, my mother-in-law gave him a starter set with a train, tracks and a few extra pieces. Each Christmas she added to it so that each of the boys have a starter set.  We also bought mountains, bridges, elevated sets, a city block, the train terminal and other extra pieces. Jake even got a Christmas set complete with a Santa train and presents.

For years, these trains have entertained the boys. More than that, they've plotted and planned and designed tracks and cities. When they were smaller, we left a huge set up put together in the basement  and they played with them all the time. I remember building the set with Blake during Noah and Andy's nap time and having to tweak it several times until we got it "just right". When Jake was just big enough to sit up and hold the remote, we put a small set in his room. He was mesmerized by the train going 'round and 'round.

We haven't bought any new pieces recently.  In fact, I don't know that Fischer Price even makes them anymore.   They are all sorted in bins in the basement: trains, straight track, people and signs, elevated pieces and buildings. We don't play with them every day, but when we do get them out and assemble a set, it is still a big hit with all the boys! We may not keep many toys once our boys are grown, but Geotrax trains will be waiting for the grandchildren we hope to have someday!

Getting Ready for Christmas 2016

It is December 31, 2015. Did I really say getting ready for Christmas 2016?

YES!!

I have learned to do a few intentional things to make getting ready for next year much easier.  The Thanksgiving holiday is usually very busy with family and activities. Then we move right into the hustle and bustle of Christmas. I try to do a few tasks now that help me not do as much next year. 

1- Wrap up all the Christmas books-  Each year my boys unwrap a different Christmas book from Dec 1-25. The first few years, I would be wrapping them all November 30. I decided to start wrapping them all before I put them up and it made a huge difference for me. Now, the tradition can continue with zero stress on Mommy. 

2- Purchase Christmas wrap and accessories at sale prices- I try to buy paper (my favorite is the Hallmark brand double sided paper in a huge roll from Sam's) on sale. I get tissue paper, boxes, tape and bows at 50% off or less.  I put it all together in a tub ready to pull out to wrap next year. 

3- Pack up ornaments and decor by tree- certain ornaments go on specific trees at our home. I started packing up all the ornaments from our family room tree together in ornament boxes. I put the boys' individual ornaments in different containers so they can easily decorate their trees in their rooms right after Thanksgiving. 

4- Organize decor by subject - I put all my Santas together, all the snowmen together, all the nativity related decor together, etc. This makes it easier for me to decorate as I can do one box at a time and feel I have accomplished something.  

5- Prepare your outdoor decor for next year - Do any wreaths need new bows? Do you need new lights? We purchased new lights after Christmas at 50% off.  The boys have also gotten very excited about putting up outdoor lights and decor the past two years. We added an inflatable snowman this year and large tree of lights. For next year, we have purchased icicle lights to run the length of our roofline. This allows us to add a little each year without breaking the bank!

These may seem like they wouldn't be a huge deal, but they greatly relieve my stress!

Happy New Year to you!

Celebrating Christmas

Merry Christmas from our home to yours!

Life with Boys

Our power is temporarily out. 

Conversation between boys:

A: Do we have hot water?

G: Yes, it is gas, not electric 

A: What is gas?

B: The stuff that comes out your butt..

Me: No. That is not right. 

N: Yes!!  That IS natural gas. 

Everyone laughing. 

I give up!

Read - Learn- Live

This week is Read Across America week.  In honor of that, I hope to write multiple posts supporting and promoting reading.

As a young child, I was an avid reader.  I was reading on my own before kindergarten.  I remember in first grade receiving our reading textbook.  The teacher assigned a few stories as homework.  I came back the next day and told her I had read the entire book.  At first, she didn't believe me.  She asked me questions about random stories and I answered them.  Fortunately, she went next door and asked the second grade teacher for her reading textbook and pushed me ahead.  I am forever grateful for that.  I read voraciously. 

My mother, my grandmother and great-aunt all supported this habit.  For birthdays and Christmas gifts I would receive books.  As a young child, I had the little red record player with a case.  All the books came with a small record and the bell would ding when it was time to turn the page.  I would sit for hours in my room listening to the different fairy tales and Disney stories as I read along with the books. 

My mom enrolled me in a Weekly Reader (anyone remember those?) books of the month club.  Each month I would receive a package with 4-5 books in it.  I devoured classics like titles by Louisa May Alcott and Jesse Stuart.  I remember loving Black Beauty, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm, The Secret Garden, The Little Princess and Heidi.  I devoured the entire set of Little House on the Prairie Books by Laura Ingalls Wilder.  Then it was all the Beverly Cleary titles - Ramona, Dear Mr. Henshaw, Ramona and Beezus and more.  I read Judy Blume, Choose Your Own Adventure titles and The Babysitter's Club. 

One of my most favorite series of books was Anne of Green Gables.  Once I read through the entire series, I was in love with Anne, the red-headed girl and her bosom friend, Diana.  I could just picture Gilbert and the Cuthberts.  P.E. Island was an enchanting place in my mind.  I read through that series many times as a child and young adult.  In sixth grade, I read it again as part of my class and we watched the movies.  Megan Follows was the perfect Anne!

I remember my fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Kuster, doing a contest to encourage reading.  For every book we read, we added an ice cream scoop to our cone.  I remember reading every spare minute to add as many scoops as I could.  In fifth grade, Mr. Hopkins was my teacher.  He did a whole focus on Newbery Award books.  I read Anpao, Island of the Blue Dolphin, Julie of the Wolves, Bridge to Terabithia, My Brother Sam is Dead, and Mrs. Frisby and the Rats of NIMH.

In high school, I had Mrs.Price for English I and II.  We read novels, short stories, essays, poetry and wrote a great deal of our own.  She read with emphasis and voice and inflection.  She opened our eyes to so many ideas and encouraged us to truly dig deep and think for ourselves.  I devoured Jane Austen's Pride and Prejudice (still a favorite), Harper Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, Tess of the D'Urbervilles, The Fountainhead, Cat's Cradle, The Great Gatsby, Of Mice and Men, The Grapes of Wrath, Fahrenheit 451, The Red Badge of Courage, and A Separate Peace.  We read Shakespeare, Browning, Dunne, Keats, Tennyson and more.  We argued, dissected, and debated opinions.  We wrote poetry, read our short stories and she read us her own writing. 

In college, I had two English Literature courses as well as several History courses.  We read books I liked and some I hated.  One of my favorite courses was Recent America, taught by Dr. Apple.  We read Going After Cacciato (Vietnam), The Feminie Mystique (Feminisim), books about World War II and the Korean conflict.  We used literature to examine America's history since the 1940s.

Through my entire life, I have enjoyed reading as an escape.  I love immersing myself in the setting of the book, feeling the emotion of the characters, exploring new ideas and understanding past events.  I love reading God's word and knowing it is alive and applicable today as it was thousands of years ago.

Books are powerful.

Books are life-changing.

Reading transforms lives.

I am so thankful so many in my life pointed me to books.  It truly has shaped and molded who I am today.  If you can read - thank your teachers, parents and librarians.  Pass a love of reading onto your children!

Bouncy Ball Obsession

All of my boys have gone through different obsessions. 

Blake loved Bob the Builder, matchbox cars, Geotrax trains  and legos. Noah LOVED Veggie Tales, little people and Toy Story. Andy played with trains and loved Thomas the Train megabloks sets. 

Jake currently loves cars, Geotrax trains and lately-- bouncy balls. 

One of his Valentine treats for his preschool classmates were bouncy balls. 

He has a basket he has been walking around with a basket full of bouncy balls. He always knows how many are in the basket. He knows what colors he has. Blake had a stash for a long time and gave Jake all of them (sweet big brother

moment!).

It is really cute. He has a stash at my office at school to play with also. Every time we have left the house in the past couple of weeks, he wants a ball to take in his pocket. 

I love this boy and all of his quirky habits!

Chapel Day

Anyone who attended Georgetown College knows that Chapel Day was/is a big deal!  At Georgetown, they have deferred recruitment for sororities and fraternities.  That means instead of coming to school a few weeks before the fall semester of your freshman year, going through recruitment and jumping in headfirst to a group, you have an entire semester to get to know people. You see them interact in the caf, in classes, at parties and see how they treat you. They had informal rush parties where they did skits and some groups hosted weekly devotions in their lobby. 

When I left for Christmas break after the first semester, I had no intention of going through Rush. I had met several nice girls, in several sororities. My RA was a Sigma Kappa and I had tried out for a singing group through the Baptist Student Unioncalled Manna and been selected to join that group. The other girls in that group were also Sigmas. 

Randomly, over break, several events occurred that led me to change my mind. I decided I might not pledge, but I would consider going through rush. I had a very vivid dream over break and several girls were in it. I was going through rush and met this girl I had not really met before. Her name was Monica. 

When I came back from break, several of my friends and hall mates all decided to go through rush together. We had so much fun!!  Each night we were divided into rush groups. We went from house to house meeting girls, watching skits, learning about their philanthropies and more. The first night was Open House. The second night was Philanthropy night and the last night was Prefence party. 

I had become close to a girl that was in a different sorority and she had taken me around at her house. Then I got to the Sigma house and I knew I wanted to be there. I told my friends I needed to take a walk and went around the quad and across campus by myself. I didn't want to hurt my friend's feelings. She had even mentioned wanting to make me her little sis. I remember praying and asking God to show me what to do. 

I went back to my room and my roommate and friends were all ready to make our sweatshirts for running out of the chapel. The next day, we all got notes in our mailboxes saying our bid had been matched. None of us went "suicide", so we didn't know which sorority we had been matched to exactly. 

We went back to our room and waited anxiously for the time to go to the chapel. We met in the room with our rush group. One by one, she passed out our bid cards. The next few minutes were a huge blur. I remember seeing Sigma Kappa and squealing with friends. We put on our homemade sweatshirts. We got with our hall mates to go out together. When they threw open the chapel doors, we ran out and there was just a sea of girls. Each sorority was chanting and cheering and squealing!!  We walked out backwards and then turned around and everyone was jumping up and down and screaming. We ran down the steps into the mob of Sigma girls!  They gave us the famous "red sweatshirt" that I still love and wear. 

After everyone ran out of the chapel, we did circle up and then pictures on the steps of Giddings Hall. They took us back to the sorority house for pizza and fun. We found out who our big sis was and crazy enough, it was Monica!!  She was so sweet to me. 

I had 38 other girls in my pledge class. They were from different places, different backgrounds and we didn't all do everything together. There were cliques and groups within the larger group, but I LOVED every single minute of my time as a Sigma Kappa. Some of my dearest and most treasured friends are still those girls. 

Last night, I went to dinner with 10 of them. We realized that it was the 20th anniversary of our Chapel Day for most of us -- how in the world???  It seems like yesterday. I can hear the sounds of people laughing on the hallway. I remember pranks and phone calls, late night pizza orders, watching Friends every Thursday night, going out on weekends, pledge parties, Watermelon Bust, Greek Games, Grub fest, formals, rush week, Initiation and SongFest. 

Those truly were some of the best days of my life. Those girls got me through some of the worst times. I will never forget that or them. 

1 Heart 1 Way!!!

Commiting to Memory

I am participating in a challenge on Beth Moore's blog where you memorize two scriptures per month for the next year. 

Here is my first one:

The LORD will fight for you, and you shall hold your peace.” (Exodus 14:14 NKJV)

It is my hope that each verse will speak wisdom and truth into where I am and where God wants me to be this year. 

If you are interested in participating, check out the blog here:

http://blog.lproof.org/2015/01/siesta-scripture-memory-team-2015-verse-1.html/comment-page-135#comments

Teaching STEM and Robotics

It is so exciting to see kids learn and explore new ideas. Each week, I get to teach the 6th grade Step Up class at school. We have been learning the engineering process, exploring STEM projects and pushing kids to think out of the box. 

We took the 6-8th grade students to the Science Center for a Robotics workshop right before Christmas and it was so much fun. 

They used Robotix materials complete with motors and tried to complete four different challenges. They had to work in teams and then would move to the next challenge and try to build upon what the other group did to improve the product. 

The students really enjoyed the class!

We also explored the exhibits in the science center and had a great time doing that. 

Christmas Programs

We were blessed with two different Christmas programs this year. The first one was the k-5th grade one at school. Andy's class played the bells and our PE teacher, Mr. Weldy, accompanied them on the trumpet. 

Andy was excited to play his song. 

Noah's class did skits/commercials in between each other act. They were pretending to be reporters/anchormen telling about the Christmas story. Noah and his pal, Ethan, were actually meteorologists. They interviewed Mary and Joseph. 

They were really cute and funny!

Jake's program was for all the preschool students. He was a cow and he was adorable!

He knew all the words. His motions to the songs were always a second or two delayed, but it was cute!

They rang bells when they sang their last two song and Jake rang with gusto!

What a blessing to hear my kids sing about Jesus and his birth!

A little shoebox goes a long way

Today we did our shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child. I love doing these with the kids. 

We went and purchased several items to fill three boxes. Blake has already done one with his homeroom class. 

Andy and Jake helped cram stuff in their boxes. We did two for boys and one for a girl. 

They were packed to the brim and we go them shut with the rubber bands around them holding them closed. 

I paid for our shipping and got a label we can track online. We've done this before and it is exciting for the boys to know where our boxes end up in the world. I pray whatever child receives them will feel our prayers and love for them. 

Noah asked me tonight why we do this for people we don't even know. My reply-- "God asks us to love everyone and this is one way we show that". 

Thank you, Samaritan's Purse for all you do around the world!

Trick or Treat

Another year has come and a cold night of costumes and candy has passed. 

Unbelievably, Blake chose to not dress up this year and stayed home with Greg to pass out candy. How did he get this big???  Seeing Jake in the monkey costume Blake wore at 3 just made the difference in their ages even more noticeable tonight. 

Jake seemed so big and walked almost the whole way. He walked up to our neighbors' door and said "please" and  "thank you".

I wish I could stop time, or at least slow it down significantly. 

We had a great night with friends hanging out and walking the neighborhood. 

Two of my boys...

Hope you enjoyed your night!  Stay warm-- it looks like we may wake up to a little light snow. 

They TOTALLY dig this!!

I was on Pinterest last night. 

I'm sure you are thinking..."uh, oh". 

Yep- a project was born. The good news is that it wasn't too hard to put together. The boys helped and they were so excited to play with the finished products. 

We made a run to the Dollar Tree, Joann's and Walmart for our supplies in between soccer and football games. We bought the following:

Small rocks and pebbles

Assorted colored sand

Large and small Craft sticks

Glass rocks

Pipe cleaners

Colanders

Sifting tools, cups, tongs, scoops

Assorted colored Pony beads

Pieces of "driftwood"

We are also using construction vehicles, farm toys, ocean animals, army men and large stacking tubs. 

The construction site was the first kit assembled. Jake immediately claimed this one and set to work building and scooping rocks. 

Andy was with me today and we decided to make a kit for his army men. He loved playing with these and setting up bases. He had black and tan sand, driftwood and large craft sticks. He set to work building a fort and sifting sand. 

Then we dumped a ton of pony beads in a container. He had a mini whisk, tongs, mini cups for sorting and scoops. Andy switched to this box and Noah jumped in on the army men. Andy sorted and sifted and played.  At one point, he dumped half the container over accidentally. Everyone helped pick them up, so he was back to playing in minutes. 

We found all sorts of cool digging and sifting and sorting tools today at the dollar tree. 

The last kit we made tonight was an ocean/beach kit. We had sand, glass rocks (our ocean water), large pebbles, driftwood and marine animals. Jake had a blast with this one and used the tongs to pick up the glass pebbles. He sifted the sand and moved the big pieces around. 

We got over two hours of play in with these kits tonight. My goal was some new activities that would be educational and fun. I also want Jake to work on fine motor skills!  The results surpassed my expectations and definitely deterred any screen time tonight!!

We have another kit to assemble with farm items, one with fall sensory items and one with puff balls, pipe cleaners and colanders. I am looking forward to a lazy Sunday afternoon of play!

Crazy busy

Do you ever have one of those weekends??

I look forward to the weekend. I savor sleeping in on Saturday and Sunday morning, even if just for an extra 30-60 minutes. Sunday afternoons are typically relaxed and casual at our house. We play games, read books, watch a movie, or even nap!

This weekend was non-stop. 

I don't mind having fun and enjoying activities with my family. But I have also learned that when we don't have any "down-time" over the weekend, the whole next week I seem to grow increasingly weary. 

This weekend, we had a drive-in movie event at our school. I arrived at school at 7:30 am on Friday and didn't leave until 10:30 pm. The event was fun and we had a huge turnout. However, I literally dropped into the bed when we got home. 

Saturday, we had a soccer game for Andy- he got to play goalie and was SO excited.  That was followed by Noah's first flag football game - he caught an interception!  Blake had a soccer game right after that. We did laundry, tidied up around the house and went to purchase a new ceiling fan. 

Today, we had church, lunch, brought our nephew home to play, drove to Willisburg for Greg to pick up a large army truck and water containers for the Capital City River Dash next weekend and came home. Greg spent the afternoon working on the River dash. I did more laundry, took down shower curtains and liners, took all pieces of clothing out of my closet, reorganized, got rid of some, swapped out some articles for seasons and replaced them all in closet.  I put away all the boys' clean laundry, fixed dinner for all the boys plus my two nieces that arrived at 6:30. I then took all seven children to the park at a local school two blocks from our house. We came home and all the boys got haircuts and showers. I picked out clothes for everyone for tomorrow, went through Friday folders and signed papers for school, got backpacks andlunchboxes ready for tomorrow, signed agenda books with reading and math logs, re-hung shower curtains and did more laundry. We made soup for tomorrow's dinner. At 10:30 pm, I collapsed on the couch to watch the taped premiere of my favorite show and I am finally going to bed. 

I'd love to say that I feel well rested and ready to greet tomorrow, but sadly, I am tired. 

I'd also love to say that this week is a slow one. But it is not. We have four boys' with sports practices, picture day at school, and parent teacher conferences this week, I have a board meeting for a local non-profit, we have family coming in to town and the River dash this weekend. 

Our pastor spoke today about how the busy-ness of life often blinds us from God's work in and around us. It is often good things that keep us busy and our ears are not given the time to be trained to hear His voice and His leading. I am praying for opportunities to say NO this week. I am praying for moments where God leads me to quiet, still waters, even for just 15 minutes at a time to rest in his presence. I am also praying for God's provision of rest, energy and patience. It will be in high demand this week. I am also praying for moments to be intentional with my kids. I sat and played cars and Legos with Jake last night when I needed to be doing laundry. I took them to the park today, despite the work waiting at home.   I want to take notice of the important moments to just be present with my kids this week and seize them!

In what ways do you feel busy?  Can you identify with this feeling? How do you balance it all and stay sane?.

And they're off.......

Do you ever feel that you are in a race?

Life, and all the many opportunities and challenges that come with it, sometimes exhilarate me.  Other times, all those "opportunities" flat out exhaust me. It feels like I am running in place on an extremely steep hill. 

This weekend, we came to Greg's parents house for the Labor Day holiday. We brought life jackets, swim paraphernalia, outdoor toys and scooters to ride. We haven't done one of those things yet. It has been raining or extremely wet since we arrived. 

Guess what??  I am totally fine with it!

I read a book last night. In its entirety. I can't tell you the last time I have done that. 

400+ pages of The Hurricane Sisters by Dorothea Benton Frank and I was enthralled. I read off and on while breaking up disagreements, playing memory and Jenga and eating some good BBQ. Then, I read for hours after all my little people were in bed. It was divine. 

Today, we have lounged around, played a few games, watched some cartoons and read some more. The forecast is calling for more of the same. 

I know the boys are a little disappointed, but I am not. 

When we return we have soccer practices, football practices, meetings, church, home projects and work. For three solid days, we have nothing we "have" to do and I am soaking every second of that up while I can. 

Cherishing Him

On our way home from vacation today we stopped at a Chick-Fil-A for lunch. It was rather congested. A group of about 25 people came in, obviously together. They sat around us and I overhead snippets of conversations. They were all family and were headed to the beach. I am a people watcher and truly love to observe how families interact with one another. 

One of the daughters or perhaps, daughters-in-law, seemed very unhappy. She didn't eat. She didn't really converse with anyone.( I told Greg she looked familiar to me and I know I know her from somewhere. He said I was crazy- we were hours from home. Guess what?  They were parked right beside us and had KY plates!). She seemed irritated with the children and the whole situation. I heard her murmur to the person I assumed to be her husband that "this is why she wasn't excited to go to the beach". 

There was one young man, obviously a go-getter, who was trying to orchestrate everyone getting a seat, passing out meals and drinks and keeping te peace. He was up and down the whole time, checking on kids in the play area and getting things others needed. 

Then there was the "grandmother". She came and sat down at the table of the non-enthusiastic daughter-in-law. She was chatting with two grandkids and possibly her son. Her husband walks up, a giant smile on his face, hands full of food/drinks and triumphantly hands her a cup. 

She looks up and says, "what is this?"  

He says, "it is your shake". 

She immediately shakes her head adamantly and says, " I didn't order a shake. I ordered a yogurt parfait. Why in heavens would you think I'd ever order a shake?!" Her demeanor does not scream "no problem, I'll drink it anyway" but says, "why do I let him do anything?  If I want it done right, I should do it myself!"

He hangs his head, his shoulders now stooped and the triumphant grin now gone from his face. Dejectedly, he turns with the shake in his hand. 

A moment later, she appears to have realized what she's done and attempts to go get him saying she'd take care of it. It's too late. The damage was already done. 

I was thinking over this situation after we got back in our car and a few things have stuck out to me. 

1- Our words are powerful. Her snarkiness instantly changed him. 

2- He was obviously trying to serve her. She obviously didn't see that. 

3- How often do we let an act of kindness be overlooked because it wasn't exactly what we wanted?  So what if it was a milkshake.  Mistakes happen and how we respond says a lot about who we are!  Sometimes it really just is true-- it is the thought that counts. 

4- I need to be more grateful for my husband who does nice things for me all the time and not concentrate on the things that are undone. 

5- If I was able to see how unhappy that young daughter in law was as a complete stranger, I'd say the family members were more than aware of her mood. I pray she finds happiness this week in spite of whatever was going on today. 

6- Chick-Fil-A is insanely busy. 

7- I LOVE them for having a play area. 

8- We ( ahem, I) need to do a better job of embracing moments as they happen. Smile more. Play more. Let go a little more. Our kids (&spouses) will remember that no matter how "perfect" any moment, trip, birthday, or holiday turns out, we were there and we were PRESENT. 

Cherish them. Cherish him (or her). 

Unbroken

I've been on vacation and finally had time to catch up on a few books I've wanted to read for some time. One of those books was Unbroken by Laura Hillenbrand. A colleague loaned it to me recently and I wanted to be able to return it after our vacation. 

In case you haven't read it, but would like to, I won't share everything that happens.  I was moved so deeply by all the insurmountable scenarios Louis Zamperini (main character) overcame in his life. I cannot fathom being lost at sea, shot at by enemy aircraft, laying in a ditch as bombs were dropped all around me on an island, surviving on a raft adrift at sea for almost two months and then facing unbelievable types of torture and degradation as a POW. So many men and women in uniform sacrificed so much for our country and our freedoms.  

This book was specifically about World War II so of course some particular battles come to mind: Normandy, Battle of the Bulge, Midway, Pearl Harbor, Iwo Jima and Saipan.  But other battles were just as important along the way. Some times it was a small island in the middle of the Pacific that could serve as a runway or refueling spot. Other times it was a small village takeover edging Americans and Alllied forces ever closer to pushing the atrocities of Hitler's regime to a standstill. Each step along the way was important.  In Zamperini's case, he had just survived an amazing air battle and a bombing on Funafeti. His plane was practically destroyed. He and others were tasked to go find a missing plane that was suspected to have gone down. It was on this reconnaissance mission that his plane crashed and not in battle. 

As I read this book, I couldn't help but think of my grandfather. Knowing my Pappaw was a Marine in this war has always made me want to learn more about it. One of the things he mentioned in his stories was eating the best steak of his life in Hawaii with his Lieutenant. He was driving him around the island that day and he said, "Hey Fats-  (evidently one of his nicknames- but he was far from fat!) get cleaned up and we will go get a steak."

Mr. Zamperini talked about getting one of the best steaks of his life at a PY Chong's in Honolulu. I found myself wondering if Pappaw went there. Pappaw also talked about the amazing pineapple. He loved walking up and cutting one down and eating it right there on the spot. 

Mr. Zamperini suffered unbelievable atrocities and I am thankful Pappaw wasn't captured. But Pappaw was at Iwo Jima. He was on a boat and came in behind the first wave of infantry.  He helped build an airstrip, unarm landmines and defend the beach against Japanese. 

He talked about Mt. Suribachi and how they had a gun that came out from inside the mountain. It took them a while to figure that out because they'd open a hole, roll it out and shoot down US servicemen. They'd roll it back inside before anyone could figure out what happened. He also watched as the soldiers placed the American flag on the top of Mt. Suribachi- the iconic photo we've all seen many times. 

He told me about spending nights in a foxhole he dug out defending the beach and how they'd get so excited to have fruit cocktail in a can with their meal. His friend helped with food rations and would give him an extra one and that was a real treat. 

He was at Iwo Jima for almost a month. They sent his group back to Hawaii. Then they went to Nagasaki. He was there within 8-9 days of the bomb being dropped. He wouldn't say much about it to us. He told my mom that he saw bodies or the outline of them still on the concrete where they'd been vaporized. He saw many people that were severely injured. 

It made me think of Mr. Zamperini's description of going back through Japan when the ear was over and seeing so much destroyed, burned out or charred. He also mentioned seeing small children drilling like infantry and large machines in people's homes making items for the war. The people of Japan had been programmed to believe in the Imperial Empire and retreat or surrender wasn't an option. 

Pappaw spent 9.5 months in "Occupied Japan" after the war, cleaning up from the bombs, dismantling landmines and helping build shelters. He then came home and found a job, married my Mammaw and had a family.  He stayed in touch with many of the men he served with in the war. They got together every other year or so in different places. They wrote and called. My mom talked to te only two still living when Pappaw passed away almost two years ago. Their bond was sealed forever by the experiences they had shared. 

He rarely discussed the war and never did so with bombastic pleasure. He was always quiet and thoughtful, almost reverent in his discussion. He never brought it up but would occasionally answer questions in his last few years with us. He volunteered for the service and was a humble man. 

I asked him one time if he ever shot anyone. He said he fired his gun, but never knew that he shot anyone. He had prayed he didn't. But he said they certainly would've shot him. He saw people die in front of him. He saw the horrific destruction after the bombs. He was forever changed and impacted by that time. But he, like Zamperini, remained unbroken in spirit. 

Their stories need to be told. Our sons and daughters need to learn from this "greatest generation" and embrace our heritage and move us forward with a renewed sense of purpose and passion serving first God and then country. 

I am grateful to authors like Laura Hillenbrand for investing their time and talents into researching and telling these stories. May we never forget them or their sacrifice!