all she wants for christmas...

...is not her two front teeth, but to lose some teeth.

wish granted...

and thank the Lord for that! mommy was getting tired of answering questions like 'when will i lose my tooth?', 'why did grace lose her teeth and i don't lose my teeth?', and 'gwen lost her tooth, why don't i lose my tooth?'...ad nauseum.

happy christmas!

Send your own ElfYourself eCards

welcome to the world!

there's a new DiBernardo in town.

weighing in at 6 pounds, 14 ounces and an un-DiBernardo lengthiness of 21 inches, i'm pleased to announce the birth of my new niece,
Sophia Marie DiBernardo.

born on november 26 to my little brother mario & his wife adrianne.

baby, mommy and daddy are all doing fine.

don't you just love that little bow in her hair!

you say it doesn't taste like lime, eh?

"I'm ready for school, Mom!"

so, you like dressing your kids up all cute and stuff...just wait, your time is coming. eventually they'll wanna dress themselves.

huh...glasses really do make you look smarter

and really good looking!

give thanks

i recently read somewhere that it doesn't make sense to just give thanks to no one. that without a recipient for your thanks, you can't really be thankful.

thankfulness requires two things: the one who gives thanks and the one who receives them.

it's nice to know that no matter what's happening in our world today, we can rejoice that our own Thanksgiving holiday, conceived on November 1, 1782, reflects that Truth as evidenced in the Congressional Proclamation establishing said holiday.

"IT being the indispensable duty of all Nations, not only to offer up their supplications to ALMIGHTY GOD, the giver of all good, for his gracious assistance in a time of distress, but also in a solemn and public manner to give him praise for his goodness in general, and especially for great and signal interpositions of his providence in their behalf: Therefore the United States in Congress assembled, taking into their consideration the many instances of divine goodness to these States, in the course of the important conflict in which they have been so long engaged; the present happy and promising state of public affairs; and the events of the war, in the course of the year now drawing to a close; particularly the harmony of the public Councils, which is so necessary to the success of the public cause; the perfect union and good understanding which has hitherto subsisted between them and their Allies, notwithstanding the artful and unwearied attempts of the common enemy to divide them; the success of the arms of the United States, and those of their Allies, and the acknowledgment of their independence by another European power, whose friendship and commerce must be of great and lasting advantage to these States:...Do hereby recommend to the inhabitants of these States in general, to observe, and request the several States to interpose their authority in appointing and commanding the observation of THURSDAY the twenty-eight day of NOVEMBER next, as a day of solemn THANKSGIVING to GOD for all his mercies: and they do further recommend to all ranks, to testify to their gratitude to GOD for his goodness, by a cheerful obedience of his laws, and by promoting, each in his station, and by his influence, the practice of true and undefiled religion, which is the great foundation of public prosperity and national happiness."
http://www.history.com/minisite.do?content_type=Minisite_Generic&content_type_id=875&display_order=8&mini_id=1083

happy thanksgiving, dear reader & friend.

you can pick your friends, and you can pick your pumpkins...

...but you can't pick your friends' pumpkins.

OK, maybe you can.

here at the U-pick pumpkin patch though, it's every grammy, mommy and cousin for himself.

ella, caleb & gracie off to find the perfect pumpkins

perfect pumpkin number 1

perfect pumpkin number 2

perfect pumpkins numbers 3-5...someone's getting a little greedy

oh, wait...perfect pumpkin number 4 is for josiah. nevermind then.
and i just love this one. the girls off doing girl stuff
and faithful caleb hanging around with his grammy.

superella and her trusty sidekick dragonboy

every superhero needs a super sidekick. superella is no exception.

oh, and they also need a super pose. that is perhaps more important than the super sidekick.

Veteran's Day

I just wanted to take a moment to acknowledge today's holiday and say that I am truly thankful for all of the people who choose to serve in our country's military. I know, not only from my own experience, that it's a great sacrifice to serve. You miss important days and an incalculable number of everyday moments because you feel committed to freedom and called to protect the rest of us.

So, thank you. And God bless you.

just look at those cute Veterans!
John, US Navy; Dad, US Army; Mario, US Army; Mario, USMC
baby caleb, ???

food for thought...

sorry dear reader...nothing to entertain today. just some food for thought:

"The church is safe from vicious persecution at the hands of the secularist, as educated people finished with stake burning circuses and torture racks. No martyr’s blood is shed in the secular west. So long as the church knows her place and remains quietly at peace on her modern reservation, let the babes pray and sing and read their Bibles, continuing steadfastly in their intellectual retardation: the church’s extinction will not come by sword or pillory, but by the quiet death of irrelevance [emphasis mine]. But let the church step off the reservation, let her penetrate once more the culture of the day and the face of secularism will change from a benign smile to a savage snarl."

-R.C. Sproul, John Gerstner, and Arthur Lindsley

stay tuned, i've got wagner family pics & info to share!

riding in daddy's truck

when mommy and ella were at the star trek exhibition with grammy (see post http://thissurereallife.blogspot.com/2008/10/split-infinitive.html below), daddy and josiah had a "men's day" of beer brewing and getting dirty.

the day began with a ride in daddy's chevy. i couldn't believe how tickled he was just to be sitting in the seat. it was pretty cute.

crazy baby

someone didn't get a very good nap because grammy is SO exciting to spend time with. that same someone pretty much lost it at chili's...although it might have had something to do with the molten lava cake we fed him.

p.s. he pulled his shirt over his head like that all by himself...

the split infinitive

to boldly go where no man has gone before. well, not necessarily boldly and not necessarily where no man has gone before. ella, grammy and i went to the san diego air & space museum for the star trek exhibition.

yes, friends, we are trekkies. ok, ella and i are just novice trekkies...but grammy?!? grammy is like the prime minister of trekistan. seriously. she LOVES star trek.

so, we ventured out to balboa park to see what star trek had to offer. it was impressive, even for someone who knows little about star trek. i don't really know which was more fun, seeing all the cool costumes; sitting on the bridge of the o.g. uss enterprise; getting beamed up, scottie; or listening to my mom rattle off more details than the museum itself.

it was awesome.

the awesome-ness also included glimpses of the teenager my daughter will become in a few years. she totally thought her mom and grammy were RIDICULOUS. and i realized that i won't always care if my daughter thinks i'm the "coolest" person in the world...as long as she's willing to be a geek with me when i ask her to. note the look on the five year old's face as grammy and mommy feign fright at the thought of de-molecularizing in the transporter.

a little off the top

that's right faithful reader, josiah got his golden locks chopped. much to my surprise he actually enjoyed the clippers- they must have tickled.

it's unclear to me though who the real star of the show is?!?...

i miss the way his hair combed over into that "little boy haircut."

he does, however, look completely awesome with a buzz- even with a face full of pesto!

well done, daddy...

rad, period.

this comes your way via john, who saw something on our friend jonathan pope's website, which led him to click something which brought up a page that had a picture on it, which he clicked and led him here.

so, without any further ado


one completely satisfied viewer, eviltella, had this to say about the guitarist Jim Durham:
"Filmed a short while after his conversion you can still see the Irish Punk attitude that first endeared him to Elvis Costello. Jim had captured the imagination of a group of parishioners, who frankly wouldn't have known "cool" if it had descended from Heaven on a golden calf, and organized their Thursday night choir practice into this gem of early eighties new wave...."

I guess that about sums it up.

the newest wildcat

well, folks we've reached yet another milestone.

ella is now an official kindergartner. as of tuesday, august 19th, ella is a sundance elementary school wildcat. her teacher is a very sweet lady named ms. scattareggia- ms. scatt for short.

incidentally, ella is attending the same elementary school that aunt michele did...many, many, many years ago :-).

ella's enjoying school, i think mostly because she gets to carry her very own hello kitty lunch box (complete with hello kitty thermos and hello kitty insulated food container). if only i could get her to eat all of the food i pack into the hello kitty goods...

did you know they make you buy those separately now?!?! what a crock.

now a week into kindergarten, ella is a seasoned veteran. it's so fun to see her socialize and be her very own person.

well, that is until i realize that my little teeny girl is growing up. then mommy puts on her sunglasses and sheds a few silent tears of joy with just a pinch of sadness.

without further ado, here's our girl. so precious. i just love her.

little brother seems to enjoy the idea of kindergarten too. although, he does bellow "ella" throughout the day, so maybe he's not quite caught on yet...

waiting in line to go to class after the morning bell.

ella's new favorite "photo" face. it's been a real fun development.

japanese invasion

is that too un-p.c. a title?!?!

lucky for us, the navy decided that the USS kitty hawk needed to retire and at the same time japan decided that it would be OK to have a nuclear (not nu-cu-lar) aircraft carrier stationed in atsugi, japan. so, the kitty hawk got traded in on a new model- the USS george washington.

why are we lucky, you ask? well, because the navy decided that the change over would happen in san diego.

our three good friends- josh thompson, logan ridley and caleb mcdow, who were stationed on the kitty hawk, got to come to SD for a while. so, we didn't have literal japanese visitors, but we did have three japanese residents come to visit.

it was great. these three guys and their wives (minus logan who remains single, girls ;-)) were great friends of ours in pensacola. logan went through OCS with john, we met caleb and his wife our very first sunday at covenant OPC church, and we met josh & sabine soon after moving to p'cola through another good friend matt (now of matt & alayna).

one thing that i loved about p'cola (among many, many things) was the AMAZING friends we made. have you ever had a time in your life where you just felt so good and so blessed to meet and spend time with an amazing group of people? well, for us pensacola was like that. maybe it's the fact that we were all away from home and were all new to the navy thing but it was so wonderful. and though in some cases we only got to spend less than a year with these friends- they are so special. i couldn't gush enough about how much all of them meant to us.

not that i don't like you, dear reader, if you are not one of the p'cola buddies. but you know i love you, because i've known you for so looong.

anyway, we only got to see josh for an evening- when he graciously agreed to attend a squadron function with us. unfortunately we don't have any pictures of us together, because we both forgot our cameras. i know that is probably killing sabine as much as not getting to be there for the mini reunion.

logan and caleb spent the weekend with us (josh got to go and see his sister- who of course outranks friends).

since we're homeless (to be discussed in a future post), the guys stayed with us at john's dad's house. it was so much fun.

we really love these guys.

one small complaint. we never get to see their wives!!!

apparently, this is MUCH more comfortable than a "rack."

and this is much more comfortable than a bed.

and caleb is way more fun than mommy.

and a 5 year old and a naval aviator may be an even match at checkers
(at least at this point in the game).

and sitting between logan and caleb is dreamy when you're five.

not a big shocker, but john's son enjoys beer.

and the claim jumper remains a fun place to bring visitors.

it's fun being one!

as you may have noticed- unless i'm writing this blog and no one is reading it- i haven't managed any posts in a while.

yeah, it's been a bit busy.

i won't go into any of the details of all of that...i've got to leave something for future posts.

this morning, i'd like to talk about our youngest- who is getting older every day and has hit a landmark.

josiah is one.

it seems such a short time ago that i heard his first pitious little cry from the delivery room and this bundle of mucky baby was brought over for my inspection and instant overwhelming love.

i guess it's only fair to include a shot of daddy's first meeting, 6 weeks later.

and of course, big sister's too. well, not their first meeting, but one with fewer tubes and things so she could actually get to see a bit of him.
actually, josiah turned one on july 16th. mommy isn't very on top of things, so josiah's birthday party wasn't until august 21st. i don't even know if you'd call it a "party," it was really just an opportunity to get his picture taken with a face full of cake.

note the speculative sideways glance that says, 'oh, hmmm, what is this?!?!'

followed by a tentative examination

a careful tasting, 'ah...i taste a hint of something sweet. yes, yes, there's also a good deal of fat in there. hmm, interesting i think i like this.'

'oh, by jove, yes. i do like this. quite a lot actually.'

'delicious, mother, really. you've really outdone yourself with the box cupcake recipe.'

'if...i...could...just...reach...that...crumb...there...ah, yes there it is.'

'i LOVE you mommy (not quite as much as i love cake, but you don't need to know that), thank you!'

and, it's bath time.

well, happy birthday little boy. we sure do love this guy, and man is he good looking (got a lot of DiBernardo in that boy!)