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Please remember Alli Claire Smith and her parents in your prayers. She was moved to the NICU yesterday afternoon, after having some difficulty breathing.

Update: Alli Claire’s doing better, but is still in the NICU. For more details, Ed and Sallie Lawrence are keeping a running status update on their website.

Allison Claire Smith was born this morning at 7:40 am. Mom’s great, Dad’s great, and Big Sister Graisi’s excited.

Alli Claire, you’ve just been born into a wonderful family. Welcome!!

The Lord bless you and keep you;
The Lord make his face shine upon you and be gracious to you;
The Lord turn his face toward you and give you peace.
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Well, at least that’s what the Slogan Generator says you should do.

So, what’s been going on with our clan, you ask? Well, last week:

- Caleb attended day-camp at Church.
- I celebrated a birthday. Thanks to all of you who sent emails and left messages (thanks, Billy! I haven’t forgotten to call you back!). Special thanks to those who sent large amounts of cash and smart-@ss emails (Wes, you know which one you are).
- It rained!!! Almost an entire inch of rain.
- We ordered new living room furniture, with lots of help from Amanda’s Mom.

This week:

- We’ve got to finish planning our Disney trip.
- Brandon’s attending day-camp for Cub Scouts. I hope the camp’s better than how it got started this morning (Our bus driver didn’t show up).
- Work, work, work for me.

My youth died this afternoon, from 3:00 - 4:00.

When I was a teenager, Petra was my all-time favorite band. I went to about 4 of their concerts, including one where I sat front row, dead center.

Time marches on, and after 30+ years, Petra called it quits last year. They recorded a farewell concert on DVD, which I found on sale about a month ago. I watched it this afternoon, and realized that as the band walked off the stage, a part of my youth died.

Great thoughts to have on the week of your Birthday, eh?
On a side note, though… Man! Those guys have some great toupees!

My friend Jodey called today to tell me that, at his house, 2 molecules of hydrogen collided with 1 molecule of oxygen. This caused some strange liquid to begin falling from the sky. I hear that some people even call it ‘rain’. I feel like Noah - everyone’s talking about rain, but I’ve never seen any.

On another note, we took the boys to see Cars Friday night. Best animated movie that I’ve seen in a long, long time. And, like most Pixar movies, the best bits are in the credits.

(This post is made possible courtesy of Symantec’s Norton Ghost, which kept me from losing any data in my recent hard drive crash!!)

Another note about the World’s Worst Mystery Dinner Theater that Amanda and I visited on our anniversary: Red flags should have started waving when they sat us at the ‘Dolly Parton Table’…

I’m looking up because, well, I sure didn’t want to look down.

The hard drive on my laptop is dying.

Nothing kills your work day like trying to salvage your data. Yesterday stunk, and I think that today will be worse.

See How Fast You Can Type - I scored 93.59 wpm (420 cpm), with 1 mistake. I thought that was pretty decent.

Sue Hartley, I love you.

The Good:

Staying with my family at Mom & Dad’s Cabin.
Kettle-Korn from Dollywood.
The boys being able to swim for 7 days in a row.
7 days away from work.
Mini-Golf, Go-Karts, and the Dixie Stampeeeeeeeeeeeeeede.
Visiting some friends who moved to Maryville.

The Bad:

Missing a chance to hike with some friends from Alabama.
Amanda and I celebrating our Anniversary at the world’s worst mystery Dinner Theater.
Having to come home.

Check out some random pictures by clicking the picture above.