pics taken today (12-23-05)

Heading to the playground with Grandma.

At the school playground.

At the playground.

Spiderman?

Our latest Mega Blocks creation - a skyscraper.

Here we are again.

Sunday at church.

Monday night after the play.

Success!

I guess I shouldn't have had doubts, because these things always seem to fall together when the time comes (it must be a God thing). Despite a few unavoidable glitches, all audience members that I heard from absolutely loved the play. The humor came through big time, the cuteness factor was present, the music was great as always, and the ultimate message shone forth.

I initially thought it was overly ambitious to pack so many diverse elements into this thing (the kids, the youth, etc.), but the vision of the director (and all the assistants) paid off.

Most of the people involved are stressed out by the time this is done and happy that it's over, but not me. I get tired of the practices of course, but I enjoy doing it. Each time I have done one of these (this was my third Winter Wonderland), the performance (especially the first night) is an adrenaline rush for me. I would compare it to playing in a championship sports game. Sure, there's a bit of nervousness involved but you're thrilled to be there playing. When the performance finishes and you find out that the audience loved it, it's like you won the championship. I even have trouble going to sleep that first night because I'm so pumped up. That may sound silly, but that's OK because I'm a silly guy.


My wife was "deranged" after a long day of shopping.

Our daughter helped us remember the true meaning of Christmas.

You can see all our pics from the play here:
First night (the camera batteries died before it was over):
http://www.flickr.com/photos/trasksmith/sets/1633380/

Second night:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/trasksmith/sets/1632939/

upcoming play

I'm busy all week with play practice for our annual Winter Wonderland event. I probably won't post anything else until it's over. If you'd like to come, you have two performances to choose from: Sunday the 18th, or Monday the 19th - both at 7:00 pm. My part is fairly small, but not too bad. It's always an honor to be involved. Hopefully everyone will get their parts down over the next week so that we will have a good showing. There should be plenty of good music and a mix of silliness and seriousness. It's not my favorite of all the plays we've done, but maybe I'll have a different opinion once it's over. Amanda has a large role in this one. Dennis was going to be in it, but changed his mind due to his work schedule. I'd like to think that my acting is improving each time I do one of these (although I know I'm nowhere near being any kind of a legitimate actor - but this is just a small town church play afterall. Given that, hopefully I come off as being OK.)

Roll Call

I've bound to of had one or two new people check this site after we sent out our Christmas cards. I'd like to know who all comes here (even if it's not a regular stop for you). Please either post a comment and let me know who you are, or send me an email (you can "view my complete profile" in the upper right corner to find a link to my email address). If you'd like to keep seeing new pics (and maybe my occasional writings as well), please let me know that you are out there checking from time to time.

pics from the past week

Aubree before church last week.

Hayden before church last week.

Hayden went to Amanda's band concert on Thursday.

Aubree went to Megan's school program on Thursday.

Dennis & Amanda.

We decorated a gingerbread house on Saturday.

Ho Ho Ho.

Merry Christmas.

And to all a good night.

At church this week.

At church.

In the front yard.

In the yard with Ho Ho.

O, star of wonder, star of might, star with royal beauty bright.

It’s been a busy week, and next week will be too. I’m sure many of you are experiencing the same thing this time of year. Every night, we’ve had either something we’ve had to do or wanted to do. I won’t bore you with all of it, but I’m going to talk about what Kimberly and I did on Wednesday.

If you were reading the old “Cavern” web site this time last year, you may remember that I posted a link to a website called “Star of Bethlehem”. http://bethlehemstar.net/index.htm

My cousin Tyron emailed that link to me several years ago. The site’s creator was doing a presentation in Tyron’s area and he was thinking about attending. He must have thought it was interesting because he sent the link to me, but I don’t think he made it to the presentation. At any rate, I was absolutely fascinated by information in the site. I think that I’ve read the entire site every year at Christmas time since then, and I usually email the link to others. Earlier this week I had finally posted my old news stories from the Cavern to this site. I ran across last year’s post about the Star website which prompted me to visit the site again. Upon checking the “presentation times and places” I noticed that for the first time since I began this yearly tradition, the presentation was actually coming to a location where it would be reasonably convenient for us to attend. I had luckily seen about two days in advance that the presenter, Rick Larson, was going to be at Friendswood Community Church on Wednesday. On Tuesday, I told Kimberly about it and she agreed to go.

A quick summary of what the presentation and the website are about is this: The biblical “star” and all of the tidbits relating to it were actual astronomic events that can be scientifically proven. The extent to which these events (and also astronomic events at the Crucifixion) match up precisely with several biblical accounts (both Old and New Testaments) is nothing short of awe inspiring and humbling. I could go into much greater explanation, but this blog would get far too lengthy so I might as well just tell you to go read the website for yourself - all of it. I know that many of you don’t like reading anything long, and you don’t like reading anything historical or scientific. If that’s the case, I feel sorry for you because you’re missing out. If you can’t understand the significance of what you’re reading on that site, then you need to attend the presentation if ever possible.

Maybe I’m in the minority, but I absolutely love to learn about these types of things – actual evidence (be it scientific, historical, archeological, or whatever) that prove (or at least make a very compelling case) that the Bible is true. That’s why I love the “Case” books by Lee Strobel (The Case for Christ, The Case for Faith, and The Case for a Creator). Don’t get me wrong, my faith is extremely strong but I still love to learn about all of this supporting evidence. I think that God put these “fingerprints” in place because he wants people to find them.

Most of what Mr. Larson had in his presentation can be found on the website. In fact, the website contains a lot more data than the presentation due to time constraints. But I was glad to have gone to the presentation (even though I had already read the site) for four reasons. One reason is that he was funny at times. He had some jokes that you just can’t write into the website because the proper delivery wouldn’t come across there. Another reason is that I was more convinced than ever that his conclusions are the real deal. As he himself mentioned, there are tons of “kook” explanations about what the star was. He said that if you do a Google search on it, you’ll find his website as well as all the “kook” ones. Because of the glut of all of the “kook” type stuff out there, we really have to be skeptical when we run across things like this. We’ve all seen bible based emails that bring up amazing facts (like the one about the “missing day”), but many of these are completely bogus. They sound great, but if research them you find out that the author was just making things up to support his position. Therefore, even though I’ve loved the information in Mr. Larson’s website, I’ve always hoped that he wasn’t one of these scam artists. Attending his presentation left me confidant this his research and findings are legitimate. I say this for many reasons, but his biggest support is that anyone can go out and get the astronomy software and see these events for themselves. You may not come to the same conclusions that he did, but his conclusions are based on indisputable astronomical events that really happened. A third reason that I liked the presentation is that he showed us the computer models of these astronomical events. The web site doesn’t do that - it only describes them. The fourth reason is that he cleared up the main stumbling block that I had in my mind about his findings. That stumbling block concerned the date of Christmas.

I had always read that Christmas was celebrated on Dec. 25th solely because it was established to take the place of the pagan Winter Solstice holiday, which was in December. After all, the Bible never mentions the actual date of Christ’s birth. Many have theorized that He probably was not born during the winter because the shepherds probably wouldn’t have been out in the fields at that time (although I never took that as a compelling argument because even if it was rare, why wouldn’t they sometimes be out on a winter night?). Based on Mr. Larson’s findings, dates can be established for Christ’s birth and death. The crucifixion can confidently be dated to April 3rd, 33 AD (and therefore the resurrection would have been April 5th). However, the birth is more open to interpretation. The star actually “performed” three significant events. Mr. Larson’s beliefs (he doesn’t have this on the website) are that the first event, which began in September of 3 BC, happened at his conception (when the angel visited Mary), the second event, which occurred in June of 2 BC, happened at his birth (this just so happens to be nine months later), and the third event, which occurred on December 25th of 2 BC, happened when the Magi were traveling to Bethlehem. When I read the date of December 25th on the website, it worried me that this whole thing was bogus since we’ve always been told that Christ’s birth wasn’t actually on December 25th. This seemed too convenient to me – like he was trying to force this to fit. But after hearing the presentation, I realize that Larson isn’t saying that Christ was born on that day – in fact he places the birth at the 2nd event, which was in June. Dec. 25th is simply the day that the Magi saw the star “stop” over Bethlehem. The computer model proves that this is actually the day that the star “stopped” (you’ll have to read the website for the explanation of how a star can “stop”). Larson wasn’t looking to place this on Dec. 25th - that just happens to be the date that it actually occurred. So what does that mean as far as the Christmas celebration is concerned? Larson claims that Winter Solstice was never celebrated as late in December as the 25th. His theory is that Dec. 25th had long been celebrated as Christmas, even before the holiday was adopted and made mainstream by the Romans. True, they may have wanted it to take the place of the pagan holiday, but the date of Christmas was already on the 25th and it was just convenient for them that it was so close to the Winter Solstice. The misunderstanding, however, was that Dec. 25th was Christ’s birthday. The birth was probably in June, but December 25th would have been when the Magi showed up to give him gifts (which actually makes that date fit as the first Christmas celebration). That also holds true to the accepted understanding that the Magi weren’t actually present at the birth, but showed up later. (I know common tradition leads people to believe that they were at the birth, but the actual scriptures never said that).

Since I’ve made many references to these 3 astronomical events surrounding the birth, I’ll briefly go over them for those of you who will still refuse to read the whole website. In ancient times, the planets were known as “wandering stars” (they wander around, unlike the other stars which do appear to travel in relation to Earth’s rotation, but otherwise remain in “fixed” positions). The Christmas star was actually the planet Jupiter. In September of 3 BC, Jupiter and the star known as Regulus started a triple conjunction, or a coronation. This triple pass would have been rare and significant to the Magi, who were astronomers. For many key (and compelling) reasons (which I won’t explain here) this was taken as a sign by them of kingship, birth, and the Jewish Messiah. In June of 2 BC, Jupiter and Venus came so close that their outlines were barely touching (like a figure 8); both were combining their full brightness together – thereby producing the brightest star that these Magi had ever seen in their lifetimes. This conjunction of Jupiter and Venus is so awesome that this event is often recreated in planetariums around the world today, even by astronomers who don’t connect it with any biblical significance. These events compelled the Magi (who Larson theorizes were in Babylon) to travel to Jerusalem. They had already connected the first event to the birth of the Jewish king. The second event (the ultra-bright star) occurred over Israel from their viewpoint. After they went to Jerusalem, and then headed to Bethlehem, the star (Jupiter) was indeed ahead of them as they traveled the short distance South to the town. The third event (Jupiter seemingly “stopping” over Bethlehem) occurred, as mentioned, on Dec. 25^th.

As a side note, if Jesus was born in 2 BC, and died in 33 AD, don’t wrongly assume like I did that he would therefore have been 35 years old. The first error in that assumption is that there is no year zero; it goes from 1 BC to 1 AD. The second error is that I didn’t account for the fact that since he died in April, his birthday hadn’t come around yet for that year. So, as commonly believed, he was indeed 33 years old when he died.

Larson also shows that a full lunar eclipse is proven to have occurred precisely at the time that Christ died on the cross. And, there’s much much more to pique your mind that you should read about. The bottom line is this (quoted from the website):

…if the Star wasn't magic or a special miracle from outside of the natural order, then it was something even more startling. It was a Clockwork Star. And that is overwhelming. The movement of the heavenly bodies is regular, like a great clock. The Clockwork Star finally means that from the very instant at which God flung the universe into existence, he also knew the moment he would enter human history in the person of Jesus of Nazareth. He marked it in the stars. And from before the beginning of time as we experience it, God knew the very moment when Messiah would breath his last on the cross.

Jesus is "the Lamb that was slain from the creation of the world."
Revelation 13:8

http://bethlehemstar.net/index.htm

more trip pics (May 2005) - Petra, Jordan

It's been so long since I've posted any of my trip pics. I meant to do it often, but I have so little free time when the kids aren't hanging all over me.

These are some of my pics from Petra. Petra is an ancient Nabatean city which is located in modern day Jordan. It was literally carved out of the rocks. There was one entrance into the city - a long narrow opening in the mountain called a siq (pronounced "seek"). After the time of the Nabateans, the city remained hidden for many years. There's much more I could say about it, but instead of taking the time here, just do an internet search and read about it yourself. You may remember it from "Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade." The siq and the Treasury were used at the end of the movie. If you've read most of the "Left Behind" novels, you should be quite familiar with Petra.

Some tombs outside the siq entrance.

The beginning of the siq.

Walking through the siq.

After a long walk, the siq suddelny ends as it opens up to a spectacular view of the structure known as the Treasury.

Closer view of the Treasury from the siq.

Upper part of the Treasury.

The Treasury is the best carved building in Petra. The details of the carvings aren't as sharp as they were in ancient days, but it's still quite striking. Imagine how long it took to carve this using only ancient tools. (A couple of the pillars were broken over the years and have been restored.)

Me in front of the Treasury.

Other parts of Petra.

More carvings - rooms and tombs.

The remains of the theatre.

I climbed pretty high up this structure.

Way up high.

Riding a donkey back to the Treasury.

Riding a horse from the siq entrance back to the visitors' center.

Petra is so big that it's impossible to see it all in one day, so there's plenty that I didn't get to see. It was very beautiful though. I certainly recommend it if you're so inclined to go that direction.

I still have tons of pics of Israel to post, and some from Istanbul, Turkey as well. I could also post lots of pics of Baghdad, many of which I've never posted before. Maybe I won't wait so long before I post travel pics again.

decorating

Today I did most of the outdoor lights and decorations. There's still a few more things I can do out there, but it's mostly done. I've had most of the indoor decorations done for a long time now. There's still a couple of things I need to do inside though. Maybe tomorrow I'll get around to it. I had a major boo boo on Thursday night. Kimberly, Grandma, and the kids went to Amanda's choir concert (I was supposed to be at play practice, but it ended up being canceled). Anyway, I was doing some work around the house and decided to move the Christmas tree. We had it in a corner, but we decided that it would look better up against the front window. I thought I'd surprise the family and get it moved by myself. It was already fully put-together and decorated. It's heavy and hard to get a handle on because of all the branches. I stupidly decided to grab the bottom of the trunk and drag it across the carpet. The cheap plastic stand didn't take kindly to the trip and cracked apart. The tree promptly fell over causing many ornaments to fall off and many branches to get bent out of shape. I tried to repair the stand and put it back up - which worked at first. At that point, it still needed to be moved a couple of more feet. This time I reached into the middle of the trunk and lifted it. I grabbed higher than I should have and the trunk came apart causing much more damage to the poor tree. By the time I could locate the lower part of the trunk through all of the branches and get it all back together, the stand ended up snapping apart worse than before. I ended up leaning it against the wall. Fortunately, Kimberly was able to stop and buy a new stand on her way home and we got it back together that night. I still haven't completely fixed all the branches or hung all the fallen ornaments back on, but for the most part it looks normal again. And we were right, it does look much better in its new location against the front window. It fits the room much nicer there. I'll have to take pics of our inside and outside decorations sometime soon. They don't come close to Dad's (or many others of you), but we like them.

I was just telling Kimberly the other day about all of our Christmas decorations we had while growing up, and I had to mention the mirror ball. The next day or so we read on Kelly's site that her and Lorne have one. Too cool. We need to get one someday. The only question is, do we buy one (which I'm sure would have square mirrors all the same size), or do we make one like Dad did (which of course had broken mirror pieces that produced a variety of unique lights in all different shapes and patterns)? For those that don't know, the lights moving around the room represented snow. As a kid, it was one of the coolest things you could imagine. Dad was always so awesome like that. Many of our decorations were home made back then, but they were the best. We had some sort of plastic cup contraptions hanging from strings on both sides of our fake fireplace. We had a painted Santa Claus head with a cotton beard on the wall. So many great things to remember. I just hope we can make it as special for our kids in the years to come as it always was for us.

The kids on Dec. 1st

old news stories from the Cavern

Well I had added my old blogs to this site a long time ago, but I had never gotten around to adding the "front page" news stories until now. None of my old stuff is on the main page here because it takes up too much room. If you want to see it, you'll have to look under the "Archives" section. The Iraq news stories and blogs are listed under April 2005, and the post-Iraq blogs (before I started using this site), are listed under September 2005. The only old stuff missing now is a couple of writings that got censored because Darve's old boss didn't like the subject matter and was always worried that someone in that company would stumble across the site and be offended. Fortunately those writings still exist on paper because Kimberly printed them out, but if I ever get around to adding them here I'll have to retype them by hand (one of them was quite lengthy).

The Smith Zone

Time for a name change. I've been meaning to do this for a long time, I just couldn't thing of anything good. The old site name was of course "The Frodis Room" which was an obscure reference to an old episode of the Monkees. Probably the only people I know who would know that are Darve, Shawn, Tyron, Lorne, Eric, & Boog. For the most part, it was just the type of name I was looking for, but unfortunately if you did an internet search on it you would discover that Frodis was actually Mickey Dolenz's code word for marijuana. In the episode, the Frodis was actually a space alien - but the allusions to it's other meaning were there. I certainly don't want anyone to think I'm trying to make a drug reference, so the name had to go. Since Kimberly has listed this website on the back of our Christmas cards, I might get some visitors who would have no idea what the name meant. They may do a search and think the worst. For the record, I've never in my life used illegal drugs and I've never wanted to. Hopefully I'll come up with another goofy name for the site, but for now it'll be The Smith Zone.