Keal Family Letter, September 2005

Hello Family and Friends! The summer is drawing to a close... I guess
that means we'll be getting a heat wave any time now.

We are all doing well. We send you all our best wishes!

Cirdan is now 1 and two months, and walking everywhere, and all the
time. He's having a wonderful time feeling like he's finally a 'big
kid,' somebody who can play "GO, GO, GO" with the rest of the big kids
(two-year-olds). And though he can't keep up with them, and often
gets knocked down by them, he loves waddling after them nonetheless.
He can also walk up stairs (while holding on to the railing), and he
can crawl all the way down stairs. He also loves spinning. He will
walk around in circles until he gets dizzy and falls down... he loves
it! He's still teething occasionally, and can be very clingy at those
times, but for the most part he remains our little bundle of sunshine.

He's actually started talking too, or at least communicating with us.
Yesterday he walked into the living room where I was reading a book.
He came up to me, and once he had eye contact with me, he firmly
pointed behind himself. For some reason if was very clear to me that
he wanted me to follow him. So I got up, and he led me into the
kitchen where he walked over to his high chair and tapped it once,
while looking into my eyes. It couldn't have been more clear than if
he had just said, "Papa, I'm hungry. Feed me."

He has also learned some sign language basics, things like "More,"
"Food," and "Done." But even more cool than that is that he's really
started talking! He says "Up," when he wants to be picked up. He
says "Ut," when he wants to go outside, or wants to get out of his
high-chair. He will point at a light and say "ite." He says "Uss,"
when he wants his juice.

He loves birds! When ever he sees a bird in a picture or in real life,
he start this high pitch "Eeet, eeet, eeet;" it's very cute. Tirah
has started doing "Ugga Mugga" with the kids (apparently that's what
you say when you rub noses with someone.) Cirdan loves it, and he will
say "Ugga," in response.

Then he's got a series of words for some of his favorite things: Book
is "Uk." Truck comes out as a sort of "Uk." When he wants to go on a
walk he says, "Uk." When he sees a duck he says "Uk." And he says
"Uk," when he points at a rock. So you can see that he's got a pretty
diverse vocabulary.

Thea's imagination and intelligence keeps growing every day. She loves
cooking, which she does in her little kitchen, with play-dough and her
little dishes. She also loves washing her dishes. She understands at
least somewhat that Tirah is at work at Jo-Anns, and that she will be
home later. She knows that if we all get in the car, we are either
going to visit Peter and Roxanne, Tamar and Dandridge, or going to
church. She can (at times) show spontaneous signs of charitable
behavior: offering to help Cirdan with a toy, asking if someone is
feeling better (if they had been sick), offering to set the table, help
with laundry, balance the checkbook (just kidding... I wish). She
understands pretty much anything we say to her, and can show us she
understands by explaining it back to us. This, of course has it's
down-sides, as just the other day I heard her singing, to the tune of
Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, these lyrics: "Darn darn Darn darn Darn
darn Daaarn." This little song was inspired by me dropping, and
spilling a whole bottle of apple juice on the floor.

We've started the whole potty training thing, but over the course of
this last month Thea's shown a lot of resistance to it. It's only
within the last couple of days that she's actually started to use her
potty successfully. Yesterday was the first day that she went for a
whole day with a dry diaper, and had used to potty 4 times by the end
of the day!

I love watching our little kids play. It's very true that children are
little scientists. They are constantly fascinated with their
environment and love to experiment with it. I can almost hear what's
going on inside their heads. Cirdan is saying: "Now I wonder what
would happen if I put this handful of sand on my sister's head. Oh!
That was an interesting reaction! I should try that again to make
sure it's consistent. Yes, it is! I must make note of that for my
Thesis on the Effects of Sand on Siblings."

I suppose Thea is more in the artist phase right now. What's going on
inside her head is something like this: "Don't talk to me right now,
I'm working on my Masterpiece! I think I'll call it 'Banana Yogurt All
Over The Table.' Just a little smear here... and... I'm done. Isn't
that beautiful?"

I'm really enjoying being a stay-at-home Papa. I certainly like it a
lot more than doing construction. I've always loved being at home.
I'm enjoying learning a bit more about cooking. And I get a lot more
time to work on music than if I had an out-of-the-home job.

Tirah is still settling into work at Jo-Ann Fabrics. She still has
stuff to learn, but is feeling much more capable every day. The
possibility of the Hawk Mountain job has been put on the back burner.
We were informed that they will attempt to navigate the Fall season
(the busiest time of the year for Hawk Mountain) without a full-time
Book Store Manager. Hopefully they will get to the end of the Fall
and decide that they were insane, and give Tirah a call. Or they will
close the book store entirely. Either way it's on the back burner for
now.

We had our sewer hook-up done this month, which means that our yard is
now a big pile of dirt instead of nice green lawn. While all of us
adults are mourning the loss of lawn, the kids seem to think that
having a huge dirt pile installed is a pretty fair trade. However, we
are looking forward to when we get get it leveled, and plant some new
grass.

My Christmas album is nearing completion. (I know I keep saying that.)
I will be sending the master off to Oasis (the replication house in
Virginia) hopefully today. We successfully raised enough money for
the cost of the replication, thanks to all of you who bought pre-orders
of Advent, and thanks to Peter (my manager/brother-in-law) for the
ingenious idea in the first place. By the way, the last day you can
buy pre-orders of Advent for only $13.00 is September 5th (Labor Day).
After that, you'll have to wait until November when they become
available for $15.00. We're mostly done the graphics for the album.
and that's the last thing we have to do.

That's about it for this month. See you next month.

May the Lord bring peace into your lives.

Love,
- Solomon John, Tirah Marie Echols, Thea Clarity, and
Cirdan Ewan Keal.