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*Hey Dad,*

Thought I’d give you just a quick synopsis of our family trip to Hawaii (and point out a few tricks that worked or didn’t work for us). If you think about it, it really is a terrifying thing to take eight children on a 6000-mile journey to paradise. Not that I was afraid of the paradise part, but I was sure the plane trip would be hellish. But it wasn’t.

In fact, outside of being a long, tiring flight, everyone did great. I’m sure it was in part because so many dads and moms prayed for us and because we scheduled the flight so that we arrived in Hawaii at bedtime and left Hawaii at bedtime, giving us some big chunks of sleeping in flight.

*Hey Dad,*
Thought I’d give you a little run down on what we’ll be doing and where we’ll be doing it for the next couple weeks. First of all, we’ve been asked to speak at the 2009 Hawaii State Homeschool Convention.

At first we talked about making it a husband/wife mini-vacation, but the more we talked, we decided it was an opportunity to take the whole family. I know it sounds crazy to the average sane person to take 10 people (most of them children) on a 6,000 mile trip. But hey, that’s what having kids does to sane people. If we had wanted easy, we wouldn’t have had children to begin with.

So, after some resourceful hunting by my wife, we found “Malaekahana Campgrounds”:http://www.campingfriend.com/FriendsofMalaekahana/ on the beautiful North Shore of Oahu. Not only is it reasonably priced for a family of ten, but it offers rustic island housing (read not-hotel), also known as indoor camping. I mean, who wants to go to Hawaii and stay in a hotel that could just as easily be in Chicago…with palm trees?

Hey Dad,

First of all, let me just tell you how much I appreciate being on the Familyman Team. I’ve always wanted to create a forum where dads could encourage dads. I’d encourage and challenge you and you’d encourage and challenge me. Well, I’ve succeeded.

After last week’s Familyman Weekly, I was swamped by dads and moms who were concerned. Some wanted clarification; some wanted a retraction. Others wanted to skin me alive and feed my heart to the sharks. As I sent out the email, I was just sure someone would comment on my use of the word ‘wedgie’ but never dreamed my comments concerning President Obama would unleash such a firestorm of criticism.

19 JAN 09
Hello Prayer partners….

I just had to share this little blessing with you!!! My oldest son Gary showed an interest in football for the FIRST time a few days ago and said he wanted to watch the Steelers (my favorite team) in the AFC Championship game. I said it was OK with me if mom said it was ok and she did. IT started at 0030 Germany time…0230 my time….(They had no school today for MLK day of courseÅ )

Well Michelle also set up the Mac in the living room so I could see Gary and he could see me while we “watched the game together’ he on the TV there, and me on the TV here. I also was too far away from my TV here to listen to the sound (my roommate was asleep!) so I just had Gary turn up the TV there and listened to it via Skype!!!

Hey Dad,
We’ve got ourselves a winner for the ‘no-more-goofy-t-shirts-for dad” contest. Out of the 50 t-shirt ideas and designs, Brent Welborn’s design embodies the tough, don’t mess with my family attitude that I was looking for. A special mention (and a FREE shirt) goes to Jeremy Hamilton who proposed the initial idea.

Now, you get to benefit from Brent’s design talents and get your very own “Leader of the Pack” very cool dad T. We’re even offering this T in big sizes for Big Dads.

Q: Should I have a baby after 35?
A: No, 35 children is more than enough.

Q: I’m two months pregnant now. When will my baby move?
A: With any luck, right after he finishes college.

Where I live, we get to enjoy a lengthy holiday season, decorated houses and yards colorfully lit up at night, the sending and receiving of Christmas cards, fantastic Christ-focused music playing in the stores, delicious food with family and friends, and extended downtime from work to spend with our family.

Andy Williams’ song indeed says it best… “It’s the most wonderful time of the year.”

But there’s something else I like that is unique to December…

Merry Christmas from the Wilson house!! Instead of the usual rundown on each child, I’ve decided to give you a little glimpse of our home right now. In fact, if you were a little mouse, this is what you would see:

This is the time of year when we think back to the very first Christmas, when the Three Wise Men went to see the baby Jesus and, according to the Book of Matthew, “presented unto Him gifts; gold, frankincense, and myrrh.”

These are simple words, but if we analyze them carefully, we discover an important, yet often overlooked, theological fact
there is no mention of wrapping paper.

Dads,

We all know how the economy is going nowadays, and probably most of us, if not all, are concerned about the near future, our jobs, and praying hard about it.

Yesterday at church I saw a good buddy of mine, and he was not looking good. So I took him aside and asked him what was going on ( we are accountability partners, and we often go straight to the point, no “how are you ?” between us )

He told me that at his workplace “pink slips” were flying all around him, personnel reduction was the “word of the month”, and he was very worried about his job. He works in IT and was studying madly to get a *very* hard IT certification to make his position harder to get rid of. I understood, since I share his same concern, and I am in the ‘same boat’ so to speak.