we do what we can...thanks fred!

thought i'd start to catch up by telling you about fred - our elf. fred came to live with us right after thanksgiving. fred is an elf from the north pole. we could consider him our foreign exchange student. he sat in our house from thanksgiving to christmas and at night flew to the north pole to tell santa if jackson and annie were good that day. our realistic and idealistic disciplinary efforts sometimes are in need of a little creative discipline. fred was that. if jackson started acting up we'd have pretend [out loud] conversations with fred. [a little on the verge of social dysfunction, similar to schizophrenia] they'd sound something along the lines of "oh, what fred? you hear jackson whining?" etc...you get the idea. but it worked! so, now that fred returned home to the north pole we are missing him. oh the whacky-ness we teach our kiddos. oh and yes...fred is kinda freakish when your eyes catch him late at night.