{"id":4726,"date":"2010-11-18T05:31:00","date_gmt":"2010-11-18T05:31:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=4726"},"modified":"2026-10-02T01:36:27","modified_gmt":"2026-10-02T01:36:27","slug":"day-11-dive-sticks-sell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/?p=4726","title":{"rendered":"Day 11 &#8211; Dive Sticks (Sell)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">At the end of each pool season over the last few years that we&#8217;ve been in this house I&#8217;ve looked for some clearance-priced water toy\u00a0to set back for the next summer.\u00a0\u00a0So\u00a0a\u00a0couple of months ago I picked up some fish-shaped dive sticks.\u00a0 They are still in the original package.\u00a0 I brought them in tonight from the garage because Melissa is trying to get some toys and books together to sell at a big community garage sale this weekend and I&#8217;m hoping we&#8217;ll have no need for dive sticks when next June rolls around since our pool will\u00a0&#8211; God willing &#8211;\u00a0belong to someone else! Melissa and I\u00a0encouraged the kids to\u00a0each scour their rooms tonight\u00a0to find toys to put in the sale or to place in the shoeboxes our small group will be sending to Operation Christmas Child.\u00a0 We said this would be a good time to start downsizing since we won&#8217;t be able to take much with us when we move.\u00a0 As far as\u00a0our kids were concerned, this idea went over like Fred Phelps at a funeral.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/01\/013-4.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\">Squeeze Me!<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Eventually, Dats (age 9) and Ida (age 7) reluctantly sorted\u00a0through a crate of toy cars they hadn&#8217;t touched\u00a0but maybe once in the last year\u00a0and there they found about five of the 150 or so cars to be suitable for donation.\u00a0 The Drama Queen (age 8) caught me sneaking a small, pink gorilla from\u00a0its forgotten shelf in the\u00a0laundry room (where it had perched for\u00a0nearly five months) to the give-away pile and burst forth\u00a0into tears:\u00a0 &#8220;That&#8217;s mine!&#8221;\u00a0 (I can\u00a0understand the attraction &#8211; it has the words &#8220;Squeeze Me&#8221; on its chest and when you do, it gives a little catcall whistle.\u00a0 Very classy. Plus, it&#8217;s wearing sunglasses.)\u00a0 Of all the kids, only the Princess (age 3)\u00a0seemed willing to\u00a0throw\u00a0multiple toys on the pile \u00a0&#8230;\u00a0 commendable, except\u00a0for the fact that most of the\u00a0toys she threw didn&#8217;t actually belong to her.  I&#8217;ve already said that the kids are excited about the prospect of moving to Haiti, and they are.\u00a0 But I&#8217;m smart enough to know that the hard reality of sacrifices, both big and small,\u00a0is going to hit every member of this family &#8230; repeatedly&#8230; in the coming months and years.\u00a0 I would very much appreciate your prayers for wisdom and strength for Melissa and me in preparation for that hard reality&#8217;s arrival.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>At the end of each pool season over the last few years that we&#8217;ve been in this house I&#8217;ve looked for some clearance-priced water toy\u00a0to set back for the next summer.\u00a0\u00a0So\u00a0a\u00a0couple of months ago I picked up some fish-shaped dive sticks.\u00a0 They are still in the original package.\u00a0 I brought them in tonight from the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1654,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4726","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4726"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4726\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4727,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4726\/revisions\/4727"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/1654"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4726"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4726"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/stevegrossblog.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4726"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}