Actions speak louder then words

I'm running like crazy around here...studying (I am half way through the class from H*LL and I have an A!!!); baking 4 dozen cupcakes for Fall Festival; teaching 3 year olds about cowboys, rattlesnakes and prairie dogs; raising a 10 year old boy who wants to shower all the time, an 8 year old boy who likes to tell me my breath stinks when I kiss him good night, and a soon to be 3 year old "princess" who threw my first ever experienced Wal-Mart Holy Terror Tantrum (as in..."I want a BARBEEEEE" all the way through Wally World out to the van and continuing to our house 15 minutes later where I finally let out my breath and beat...I mean taught sister girl that Momma Don't Put Up With That Kind Of Mess!) I am smiling now don't worry about me...

But amongst all of this we in the Callender household have learned a very real lesson in life and love and compassion---



My husband shaved his wonderful head of hair because of this sweet little ten year old boy, Preston. Preston is on Nate's soccer team and he is fighting Hodgkin's Lymphoma. He is currently going through chemo but yet still wants to play soccer each Saturday. And when his hair started to fall out and his mother told Nate about Preston's anxiety over being around the other boys on the team well you know what my husband said.

It was the night before the game when Preston would show up with his shaved head (because in deed his hair was starting to fall out) and Nate went out into the back yard and started buzzing it off. I joined him with a mirror and some extra batteries and we had fun making Mohawks and taking pictures before it all came off.

The boys were a little shocked to say the least but Sister Girl thought it was hilarious. Preston walked up to Nate the next morning and said, "You look funny!" And then the next week he had made (yes, sewn himself) Nate a soccer hat. (He's sewing them for other cancer patients that are in the hospital!)

This has taught our family a lot about compassion - it's not always enough to use words but at times actions speak a lot louder. Preston's dad died last year of cancer...Nate's actions have spoken pretty loud and clear. We are all praying for this sweet little boy with a heart of gold and the will power of a super hero!