Merry Christmas!

Our wish to all our friends and family is for you to have a blessed celebration of our Savior's birth, and high hopes for a happy new year.

Blessed

Here is a photo of the girls with Lisa (Jackson) Randolph, my dear sister in Christ who came by for a visit in the hospital. Those of you who go back as far as my Kirksville days will no doubt remember her. (She attended Mid-County briefly as well.) We left a day earlier from the hospital than had been reported, so we hope nobody came up empty looking for us.

Thank you, everyone, for your comments and replies to my e-mail inviting you to see this blog. We're doing quite well under the circumstances, although Isabelle is having to overcome quite a bit. Healing from abdominal surgery is no picnic, nor is breaking in a ravenous newborn in terms of nursing.

Today, I managed to get around to some Christmas shopping. We thought we'd have plenty of time after Chloe came sometime around December 3. So we lost about two weeks there. Before any one spends any money on any newborn or infant toys or other paraphernalia, I recommend Once Upon A Child across from Walmart and Target in Kirkwood. I got all kinds of toys and books for less than the price of one item that was tempting me at Target.

Another bit of news I have is that Isabelle's sister Medge's husband was able to get a visa to visit the US, and he is due to arrive on Friday. Thank you all for your prayers for him. Something else also, in terms of prayers for me, is that it turned out that my hip condition was some kind of muscular-skeletal tweak that just needs some recovery time. We're mighty glad I'm not headed for hernia surgery as we had been told, here in the early days with Chloe and during Isabelle's recovery from surgery.

I feel a rant coming on, so stay tuned...

Chloe Pix

When Julia arrived, we had signed up for Yahoo! photos just prior, and so we could upload and make public every last photo that we took. We took so many and so many similar that people wondered if something was wrong with Yahoo! photos because it appeared to be showing duplicate photos. It was faster and easier to upload everything than to wade through it all. Since Yahoo! photos has closed up shop, we now have to pick and choose what we want to show. We'll do our best to pick some good ones so far. We have something on the order of one-third as many photos with Chloe as with Julia.

Speaking of Julia, here is a photo of the sisters. Julia has been working hard on all the concepts and vocabulary that come with her latest new role in life. She figured out somewhere along the way that Chloe was only in Mommy's tummy and not also in her own tummy. And she was saying "sister" with great sincerity, but little indication if she knew what it meant exactly. On the other hand, Julia has taken to saying, "Rosie, too!" which is a common quote from the television show "Caillou" that we let her watch almost daily. Caillou is a four year old boy and Rosie is his two-year old sister. So we think this is a good sign that she's getting some idea of what's happening.

Meet Chloe!

Here is Chloe in one of the happier minutes of her first hour or so. She came out ready for action, crying, flailing about, and pooping. She measured 21" and weight 7 lb, 14 oz, but we figure she could easily have lost the 4 oz. she needed to match Julia by failing to wait until after the official weigh-in to poop.

Dad appreciates the numerical convenience of having a daughter born on 12-14-07 who weighs 7 pounds and 14 ounces and is 21 inches long. Having multiples of seven only in the stats was plenty, Dad being a football fan as well, but then matching those up to the date with only the transposition of the month and the length was cool.

Here She Is!

Chloe Michelle Burkholder is here! She came via C-section at 6:30 pm and was 7 pounds 14 ounces and 21 inches long.

We are in room 2119 at St. Joseph's Hospital in Kirkwood. Chloe is nursing like a champ already and favors Julia quite a bit. Check with us Saturday before visiting. We'll probably be here until Tuesday they tell us.

Thank you for all your prayers! Please continue to pray for Isabelle's recovery. Our girls just haven't wanted to keep their heads down.

Holding Our Horses

Yes, it's Thursday. But it's not necessarily big, we decided. Julia came on her own five days after the estimated due date. Isabelle is feeling good, and so, three days after Chloe's estimated due date, we agreed that we could wait some more.

Stay tuned!

Big Thursday

December 6 looms large. We had an appointment with Isabelle's doctor today, and decided to schedule Isabelle to be induced early Thursday morning. Of course another possibility is that baby Chloe may arrive before then (her due date is Monday). And today we were disappointed to learn that she seems to have turned since last week and is now breach. So we may be heading for a C-section again. Please pray for us.

Thankfulness

How can we learn to really appreciate what we have? How easy it is to fall into the trap that the Pharisee did in the parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector.

Isabelle's and Medge's brothers and Medge's husband now find themselves unemployed indefinitely from their profession as pig farmers due to the arrival in Mauritius of African Swine Fever. I still have my job.

Some friends of ours who used to go to church with us have a precious son who suffers from a multitude of food allergies which prevent even the occasional experience of normalcy that most of us enjoy. Julia caught a bug and threw up before bedtime Monday night, and although Isabelle had to get up with her once an hour that night, by the time I got back home Tuesday she was her adorable old self.

My cousins' cousins, two out of the three boys in their family, find themselves forever changed due to a car accident that left the younger one paralyzed from the waist down, and the middle one learning to swallow, talk and eat again after having brain surgery to remove a tumor. Their ages added together amount to my age, and I can't even imagine their plight.

A long-time friend of mine, at this time last year, suffered a miscarriage in the ninth month of her pregnancy. We await Chloe, with great anticipation, having been told by our doctor that Isabelle's pregnancy so far, is "perfect."

Another long-time friend of mine nearly died due to a heart defect combined with a virus that attacked his heart. I remain in sloppy shape, relying on walking to the bus and back after ten years of relying mainly on walking my dog a mile each night before bedtime.

Earlier this year, we bid a final farewell to a husband and father in our congregation who succumbed to colon cancer, after two years of fighting and living like he was dying. His wife and four children somehow continue to endure. Her neighbor and sister in Christ and three young children lost their husband and father to a psychotic meltdown almost five years ago. She ministers to the new widow and her new husband ministers to those who are addicted to anything or anyone besides Jesus.

Oh yeah. I almost forgot. I am thanking when I should be confessing. Please forgive me.

Weekend to Remember

Hi from our fifth year of a wonderful marriage, the ninth month of an arduous but exemplary pregnancy, and the last day of our daughter Julia's 7th quarter of life. Yes, I was a math major, and my father was an English professor.

Isabelle and I just spent a great weekend at a Weekend to Remember conference held at the Frontenac Hilton just a little ways from our house. It took me a little time to wind down from a hectic week of work, but gladly we had Friday evening, Saturday morning and afternoon, and Sunday morning and afternoon to hear some excellent speakers providing good guidance for our most important relationship here on Earth. Thanks to my dear wife Isabelle for talking me into it, and for our friends Jim and Freddie G who recommended it to us.

Also, we must pay homage to Isabelle's sister Medge, who did us a huge favor by taking good care of Julia for our weekend. Not only does she help raise our child, but she also rakes leaves and clears brush! And she has been staining our rather lengthy, shadow-box style wood fence out back in her spare time.

This trip has been a roller coaster for Medge, having learned not long after she arrived that Mauritius had been visited by African Swine Fever, and all pork processing had to be stopped. This is the livelihood of Medge's husband Jacques, and her and Isabelle's brothers Jean-Marc and Denis, and their mother, Marie-Josée. And then, with all that going on, we just found out that Medge's tourist visa for Canada was denied. We had made plans for her to visit her aunt Monique in Quebec City.

We're thankful that she is with us. We'll try to find a way to show her some sites in the southern US before she has to leave us.

Fargo

It was a big day in Fargo, with the hometown Bison trampling the Big 10 (11)'s Golden Gophers of Minnesota. I'd rather think about this game than my team's game today, another in a string of humiliating and arguably emasculating losses by the Nebraska Cornhuskers, to the likes of Missouri, Oklahoma State, and Texas A&M. If it were Texas, Oklahoma, and Colorado, that's one thing, but these guys? Nebraska can only take pride in still being in today's game at halftime, being down by a score of 16-14. Then the second half played out like their prior two entire games, as they ultimately lost 36-14. Against Oklahoma State, with venerable three-time national championship coach Tom Osborne and his 1997 champs looking on for homecoming, the Cornhuskers returned to their status as Bug-Eaters (their original designation) as Oklahoma State utterly skunked them and led at halftime, 38-0. For forty years (longer than I can remember), something like this was unthinkable. I read in the ESPN article about North Dakota State's victory today that Craig Bohl is their head coach. He is mentioned as a candidate for Nebraska's opening as Bill Callahan's seat is on fire it's so hot. However, if memory servers, Coach Bohl was on hand as defensive coordinator for an infamous 62-36 loss at Colorado in which not even Eric Crouch in his Heisman prime could save us from a complete defensive collapse. That year they still somehow backed into the BCS National Title Game but that 37-14 defeat by Miami was the beginning of the end. I was thinking Coach Callahan had reversed Nebraska's obvious inability to recruit that first surfaced under Coach Frank Solich, post-Tom Osborne, but now it looks like we are stuck in a combined recruiting and coaching vacuum.

So, why am I paying attention to college football in Fargo, anyway? Well, utlimately it's because I owe a promised post to my dear aunt, uncle and cousin who call Fargo home. We got to spend a lovely weekend with them during our trip this past summer, just at the beginning of July, which is the time to visit. Fargo has been known to dip into the 30s in the winter. The MINUS 30s, that is.

Here is a picture of me with Julia and my cousin Matthew, aunt Vel Rae, and uncle Keith. Currently, Vel Rae is recuperating from bypass surgery, and Keith from cataract surgery, while Matthew is a recent cancer survivor. Matthew is an active and excellent actor and director in community theater, while Vel Rae is a retired Food and Nutritions professor. and Keith is the retired City Planner for the city of Fargo. He was on TV plenty back during the Red River flood of 1997.

GA Alumni

GAAlumni is short for General American alumni, which is a site for us refugees from there to keep up with each other. I worked at General American from 1989-2003, which is when MetLife, after acquiring GA in 2000, decided to close down our operation in St. Louis.

Yesterday I had lunch with a couple of other refugees, Steve D and Susan K. Steve has been working at AT&T for several years now, and Susan is contracting in our group at Bank Of America. She was just let go from MetLife early this year.

The old General American NHQ (National Headquarters) is right across the street from where Susan and I work. That's where I started in 1989. And, there's a photograph on the wall in my department of part of this unusual building. For me this is very weird. The NHQ is vacant with for sale signs up, and Steve said he heard it was cheap.

On The Bus

I'm on the bus, on the way home, here on what may turn out to be the last day of Indian summer in St. Louis, 2007. Over the weekend, they removed the Jefferson Avenue bridge over Highway 64/40. The mornings are already getting a bit more congested, but this afternoon we made it out fine. In January, the powers that be are going to close Highway 64/40 from Ballas, near 270, to 170. I don't think any of us can quite imagine it.

Metro St. Louis has responded with increases in numbers and frequency of the express bus I take to and from work downtown at 8th and Market. At the end of November, we will go from buses for two hours every half hour in the morning and evening, to buses for three hours every twenty minutes. I may be out for paternity leave once that kicks in, but it will be nice to know it's there when I get back. To those of you who know St. Louis, this bus will start and end at Clarkson and Chesterfield Parkway, finding its way along New Ballwin, and then along Big Bend all the way between its western endpoint and Elm. I get it in Crestwood, which usually works out to a ride between 25 and 40 minutes in length. I can barely park and walk in that amount of time when I drive my car down.

Additional news for us right now is that ma belle-soeur (sister-in-law, techincally, or beautiful sister, literally) will be arriving to spend several months with us on next Monday, October 15. We are very excited for her to be able to come and spend this special season with us.

October 17: FORTY!

My dear wife created this startling image and message which shows how much a person can change in 35 years. Most of it actually occurred between age 10 and age 14. At 10, blond, just over 5 feet tall, and often mistaken for a girl (with a name like Chris) if my hair was too long. At 14, 6' 3", dark, wavy hair, and never considered the slightest bit feminine or even a minor again. But somehow, while I was creeping into my 30s, at least the Mauritians all thought I was 28.

Anyone care to guess what the most famous event to take place on my birthday was? Check out wikipedia...it involved baseball...

Time, Gadgets

Finally finding time to post here...speaking of which...

Time is beginning to fly by for us. In two weeks, Isabelle's sister Medgeé will arrive to be with us until February. Two weeks after she arrives, she'll visit Aunt Monique and her clan in Quebec for about two weeks. Then, after she's back with us for about two weeks, we are expecting Chloe to arrive. My dad will join us for Thanksgiving, and my mom, who will be newly retired as of November 1, will join us for Christmas and probably more than that.

And now for some truth about a time saver that also has wasted plenty of time along the way...

Last night, one of our most interesting gadgets, our robot vacuum, cleaned our living and dining room floors. When I first got this guy, a Roomba made by iRobot, I expected them to take over the world. But by now I have learned why they haven't. What's the opposite of a perfect storm? Conditions have to be just right for our Roomba to succeed. Maybe it's a little like flying a blimp. Isabelle can't understand how I can have enough patience to put up with all the little gotchas we've discovered. In order to have a successful vacuuming, we must have charged the Roomba no less than about 36 hours, and no more than about 72 hours. If we're outside this window, then, irrespective of the green light battery indicator, we will find that the battery becomes suddenly depleted. Also, we have to clean the long hairs and debris out of the brushes. Battery operation requires that brushing rather than suction be the primary source of collecting dust and debris. The latest discovery we made was that sometimes the Roomba would suddenly act like the battery wasn't there even when it was. So our final requirement is that we have to remove the battery, hold the power button for 20 seconds to recycle the battery charging mechanism, and place the Roomba upside down and on an incline to insure that the battery gets charged fully.

There are also periodic mechanical cleanings that have been necessary. I found out from iRobot that now that I'm outside the warranty, about all they offer is a discount on my next Roomba. I have had to blow forced air so the cliff sensors don't constantly go off and cause the Roomba to start, jerk backward, stop, start, jerk backward, stop, start, etc. I also had to open up the whole case and clean the leftover beagle hair out of everywhere. The dimensions of the filter and collection compartment seem to have been designed without pet hair on the radar.

However, there is nothing quite like having a robot do our chores for us. We set it to work in a room every couple of days, and it cleans every inch, including under the bed and certain other low riding furniture.

Home For The Duration

Life remains rather uneventful here in St. Louis. Isabelle continues to do well in her pregnancy, now fully into the third tri-mester. She amazed me on Monday by somehow putting three coats on the walls in the living room that we decided should be orange, with no help from anyone, and with Julia running around. We had just gotten the paint on Sunday, and I figured we'd get to it whenever I could keep Julia occupied while Isabelle painted. Painting is her talent, not mine, by the way. It has been pointed out that this is probably Isabelle's nesting instinct kicking in.

Today we stopped by a semi-annual sale at our district's high school, Lindbergh (Go Flyers!), of second hand baby stuff with twins as the theme. Isabelle picked up a whole pile of clothes for our new, bigger Julia for the winter, but we didn't find the ideal travel stroller for two for sale, although we saw one in the parking lot. Second hand sales are not part of the culture in Mauritius. Does anyone know if they are strictly American, or do they occur in Europe, or Asia, or anywhere else? Alisa, are you reading? Florine? How about Australia? We like them.

Here is a photo from our recent visit to Nebraska. This was the first time that Isabelle, Julia and I have been with my mom, dad and sister at once.

Happy Daddy

Happy Father's Day came and went but I am one of the happiest fathers around with my wonderful wife Isabelle, our wonderful daughter Julia, and another on the way in Chloe.

This is a photo of us while we were with Courtney on the Oregon coast, near Haceta Head lighthouse.

Vacationing Again

So here we are again on vacation with my sister. Here is a photo from our visit back in June at her house in Cottage Grove, Oregon.

This time, she decided and then we decided to visit our parents in Lincoln, Nebraska. We are having great weather--just a bit cooler than St. Louis, I understand.

Today, we went to the Lincoln Children's Zoo, and later my dad and I will go watch Nebraska open their college football season against Nevada.

I'm a Cincinnati Reds fan, and a St. Louis Rams fan, and a St. Louis Blues fan, but I'm a Nebraska Cornhuskers fanatic. For five years, back in the 90s, Nebraska won three national championships, and lost only three times. I was at two of those three losses: to Florida State, in the Orange Bowl, and to Texas, in the Big 12 championship game, in St. Louis. I missed the one at Arizona State. And I also saw plenty of victories in Lincoln, and one famous one at Missouri in double overtime.

Go Big Red!

Yard Work

First, how do you like the flags? They're a bit too in-your-face, I know, but I wanted to get to this post so that's how they'll be for now.

We had a St. Louis summer wind storm again yesterday. It seems like we're having a lot more of these recently. One knocked out our power a week ago Monday as well. And last year you probably heard that over half a million residences had their power knocked out just as we entered a heat wave with temperatures at 100.

This year, we've been having temperatures from 95-105 for the past two or three weeks. So yesterday, while I was at work, Isabelle called and said that a tree had come down on our fence. We watched outside as the sky got black, and the centerfield giant video screen at Busch Stadium lost its feed and provided a bizarre green source of light in the dark skies.

This provided the impetus we needed to buy a chain saw last night at our neighborhood Sears. So this morning I spent three or so hours clearing the mess. And I didn't injure myself. I sure could have, but I guess my combination of standing in the V of the tree ready to lean back, and poking my head, shoulders, and arms through the hole in the fence were a good enough strategy.

The Minnesota Giants

Actually, from our perspective, these are the Minnesota Second Cousins (of Julia). And they are brothers but not twins. They are the sons of my first cousin Anne Byrne, who lives in the Minneapolis suburbs. We were able to visit them during our recent trip.

Michael, on the right, is 6'10" and studying engineering (we forget what kind) at the University of Michigan. Matthew is 6'6" and stockier that Michael, and he has just entered Duke University as a freshman.

Their dad Pat has decorated their rec room half in Michigan's colors and paraphernalia, and the other half in Duke. Home Depot carries school colors, in case you were wondering.

So, let me fill in some details on our recent trip so it starts to make some sense. We had three weeks, so we decided to take a train across the northern US, since many from my family live on the route of the Empire Builder. We flew to Portland, Oregon, and visited my sister who lives in Cottage Grove. Then we took the train to Williston, North Dakota, to visit my grandmother, aunt, uncle and cousin. Then we continued and visited my aunt and uncle in Fargo, ND, and cousin Anne in MSP, and then finally we visited friends in Detroit, before flying home from there.

Anne knew how to play a lively pattycake which kept Julia enthralled.

Posting: How Often and How Much

OK, so here I go for another posting. I am sure that one per day will not be our long term pace. As I watch my friends' blogs, I know the usual pace is about 1-5 per week. Here are some friends' blogs:

• Alisa & Frederic
• Lee & Stephanie
• Joe & Laura

These are also at the bottom of our church web site, which will soon be going through a renaissance as our current provider is closing up shop.

We also have some photos out on flickr but I haven't figured out how to manage all of those yet. To those of you who saw our photos when they were on Yahoo, sorry! Flickr doesn't just let you make all your photos public.

We welcome your musings! Please feel free to post a reply.

Tea Time

It's another Sunday afternoon, and I don't have praise team practice today at 4 like I usually do. So we're getting ready for tea and biscuits, or rather tea/iced tea/milk and biscuits/bagels/Oreos. Mauritians don't have any trouble convincing us Americans whether to have a snack at 5 pm or so, but what to snack on is a different story. Even in their African summer, sans air conditioning, hot tea with milk and sugar comes around every morning and afternoon like clockwork. With the tea, you'll have bread in the morning, and crisp, barely sweet crackers in the afternoon. Or crepes if you're lucky. :-)

On another topic, here are some scanned images of some professionally produced photographs taken and edited by my uncle Glenn. We visited them during our recent trek across the northern US.

Chloe Michelle's Profile

Welcome! It's a girl!

Yeah, we know we should have been blogging before now. Now let's see if we can set a reasonable pace...

Last Tuesday, our delivery doctor gave us another in a series of good reports on Isabelle's pregnancy. The new due date is December 3, based on the ultrasound we got the Wednesday before that.

At our church, Mid-County Church in St. Louis, baby girls are everywhere. One couple, after adopting a girl and a boy, just had a boy. But aside from him, the last six or eight arrivals have been girls. Good friends of ours with two girls are due a few weeks before us, and they refuse to try to find out ahead of time. Other good friends with one girl are due a few weeks after us.

Having majored in statistics, and having observed that half the world is girls, I know that the odds against all three of us having girls were 8 to 1. Now that we know we will, the odds against the other two having girls are 4 to 1. In other words, it's still unlikely. Try telling that to all the other families that have two or three kids of the same gender.

God must be smiling on us, protecting our sanity. Sure we want a boy, but we certainly feel blessed that Joey-Chloe turned out to be a girl. Julia needs a sister. She will be Chloe Michelle, Lord willing.

Later!
-Chris