James T Gibson

In 1981, after another severe stroke, my great grandfather (William Osba Gibson; 91 years old) decided he wanted to assign his Bibles to his only great grandchildren. He attempted to hand write a note in each but his writing was very difficult to read, so Auntie sat by him to transcribe on a separate piece of paper, to also keep for her thorough documentation. It was soon after his passing that Auntie, my great aunt Helen presented each of us with the Bibles.

His thinking was that he wanted to give the youngest great grandchild his oldest Bible and then he continued the pattern in gifting the rest of his Bibles for my brothers. The Bible I was gifted was his father's, James T Gibson's. Its copyrighted 1907 and it was noted in the Bible that my great, great grandmother Sarah E. Sovine Gibson purchased the Bible from a Jef Roberts in 1908 as a gift for her husband.

James T Gibson passed in 1923. (Here's his family picture with him as the patriarch, in a post from August 2010.) My great grandfather's mother, Sarah then gave the Bible to him on June 8, 1927. He took amazing care of it. When he gifted it to me, the binding was somewhat broken and you could see it hanging on by threads, literally. I treasured the Bible and have taken pretty good care of it. Upon opening it around 2000, the top cover broke off, but I keep the pieces together, torn as to what I should do to preserve it. Until the last couple of years, before pulling it out of a keepsake cabinet that belonged to my grandfather Gerald Lumbard to place on our mantle, I resisted opening it, hoping to keep it safe.

It's funny how the meaning of the gift has transformed and developed over my years. W.O. Gibson's notes to me have different meaning to me than they did when I was 6 or so.

To me:

"To Vicky, This was your great great grandfather Gibson's bible. Please accept this as a guide for your life."

This was the same great grandfather that would play tricks on me by distracting me and then placing money in trinkets and furniture of mine, to discover later. I found $10 in a trinket box once. Another time I found $20 in a top drawer of my chest of drawers. I was able to track the $10 back to him but never ever able to prove the other surprises from him. Some would consider the money the most awesome gifts passed on, and perhaps I would have if I considered it at a younger age, but can I tell you that having his father's Bible has proven to be the most valued gift I received from him, beyond his unconditional love. I hope he knows that.

Here are his notes to my brothers and the Bibles he passed on to them.

"To Jeff, This was given to me by your grandmother Evelyn Lumbard in 1980. I hope this bible will mean as much to you as it has to me."

"To Danny, I have completely worn out 3 bibles and the Bible has been a great help to me all thru my life."

"To Philip, I hope you will cherish and live by it as much as I have."

Fancy Nancy Clancy

A couple of weeks ago Vanessa was to dress as a storybook character. She really wanted to dress as Meg from Magic Tree House but we don't see many illustrations of Meg and the ones we do, she looks pretty average, so I asked Vanessa if she wanted to explain herself all day and she said no. Vanessa went through a very brief Fancy Nancy phase when she was a preschooler and since has read a couple of Nancy Clancy Super Sleuth chapter books, and so it was somewhat easy to convince her to go as Nancy.

Although her hair is full of curls, we opted to pin curl her hair to get big and full curls. We then clipped and pinned with her fancy hair clips. Most recognized her dress up immediately. As soon as she walked in her music class, Mrs. Rittberger identified her first thing. Mrs. Rittberger even emailed me at home wondering if I would consider taking Vanessa to CCT performance of Nancy Fancy. Vanessa loves music class and Mrs. R, and often teaches Zane all the things she learns.

After school that day, Vanessa came home anxious to super sleuth an idea Grandma shared -- color ice balls. The kids loved ripping off the balloons and then as they melted a tad, the kids grew extra excited by the unintentional rainbow they created on the porch.  We then moved the balls to the snow to watch over the course of a couple of days. It was fun to see the color each left in the snow too.

Z&Z

"Those fish have a really huge room to swim in! I wish I could go in that room."

"The shark is my favorite but I really like the unicorn fish too."

"Where is the alligator? He probably needs to put a coat on to come outside."

Zane packed our lunches all by himself -- juice boxes, string cheese, and granola bars.

"She probably wants to be left alone to nap."

"This is his nostril?"

"Oh. . . that's so cute."

"Good one, monks!"

"Why are we coming to a stop? It's already over?"

"This one can be a boar the smaller ones over there are piggies."

"I like dragons but I don't really like dragons. Let's stay away from dragons."

"How can I stop it?"

"I think the cheetah. . . I mean the leopard likes me."

Zanisms

I'm not sure why Zane calls his butt "booty butt" but it's cute.

He'll say, "Now I need to restart all over."

"Vanessa, you're not the parent!"

Then he makes imaginary play comments like "Do you want to see me die from my death?  While running into the couch . . . ?"

After using the word and when asked if he knows what a demon is he answered, "When you are really mean and bad and don't listen to your mom." Um...sure...? (;-/

UPDATE (3.23.15):
While playing with toy figures and Hot Wheel tracks, "Hey! Watch me plummet to my death!"

UPDATE (3.28.15):
While changing clothes, "My butt is free! It's finally free!"

And because I can't remember if I noted it when it started about a year ago -- Zane had a thing for requesting a drink in a particular cup or to help pour the beverage into the container by saying something like "Can I spill it in?" Or, "I want to spill! Let me spill it in!" Perhaps the few spills he experienced influenced his understanding. :-)

Wild Coyote

Did you think this post would be about my children and their wild energy?! Wrong. :-) This is about a startling reality!

So we went on our first after winter snows bike ride a couple of days ago. Just moments after this picture was taken, Vanessa raced further ahead and I kind of jogged behind Zane in case he needed me. Before the white building ahead, though, I noticed a coyote charging in our direction from a field off to the left. I was processing how I could get to Zane without freaking anyone or the coyote out. The coyote continued running and crossed between me and Zane, racing across the road and in front of a car to the fairgrounds, where it continued to run at a very fast speed. For fear the coyote would turn around and come back, I told the kids we needed to go back home.

Zane asked if we needed to tell the coyote's people looking for him. We discussed why the coyote doesn't have people. I pointed out to the kids that the coyote would typically be too scared to come around so many people, houses and cars, so he must be hungry to come so close.  The kids responded really well to the experience. I'm a bit freaked out by the wild thought that not only do we have to worry about raccoons in the "city", we have to worry about coyotes!