Terribly Poetic

These are the things I would choose from to buy a gift for my husband on Father’s Day or just because he is awesome.

1. Tippmann 98 Custom

This gift is for the man who likes to get his gun off, run around and hit other people with flying paint. I mean, who doesn’t want their very own paintball gun. And with a gun like this, people will take you seriously when you pull out this at the range. With the optional long barrel, your man will make people pay on the field.

www.tippmann.com for more details. Priced around $200-250+

2. Zippo Lighter Gift Set

Every man, whether they smoke or not, really ought to have their own engraved Zippo. If your man really is manly, then he needs to light things on fire from time to time, after all, he lights your fire, so why not give him the best most sophisticated lighter out there. And getting it engraved just adds a nice personal touch. There are plenty of gift sets out there to choose from as well, so why not pair it with a flask for a truly manly gift.

www.thingsengraved.ca for more info on this set. Priced around $25-50

3. Aeropress Coffee Maker

This gift is for the true coffee lover. Renowned for making coffee like its come from a $6000 coffee machine. This coffee maker will brew a single cup of coffee in 30 seconds. Coffee aficionados all praise the smooth, rich flavour of this amazing coffee maker. If your man is concerned with having the best tasting coffee and already uses a French Press, then this coffee maker will take it to the next level.

Visit Aerobie for more info. Can be bought from Transcend Coffee, a Canadian Based company. Priced around $40

4. Traxxas E-Revo Brushless Edition

This next gift is all about speed. What man doesn’t love speed. This gift is perfect to give to our husbands as we are constantly telling them to slow down when their drive, but with this gift, they will be in control of the speed at all times. This little RC wonder will top out at 70mph right out of the box. While its the most pricey of all the gifts, it will provide hours of fun for your man.

www.traxxas.com for info, Priced around $799

5. Poetic Industries Longboard

Nothing says fun like cruising the streets on a longboard. This gift is for those men that can’t seem to get enough sports in. Why not choose today to start them off on their next adventure. Sure they might not be young and you don’t live in California, but who’s man doesn’t look hot cruisin’ the streets on a longboard. It’ll knock off a few years of your man, plus a few pounds too! And what better deck than a Poetic Industries one, its beautiful design is sure to catch an eye.

www.poeticindustries.com for info, Priced around $50

Purchase from here

That does it for my Father’s Day Gift Guide. Anyone else have any other suggestions?

I can hardly believe that my beautiful daughter is three years old today! We love her so much. She is becoming our little Princess although sometimes she pretends not to be one. Oh, how she has grown up so much and is becoming our little girl, even though she will always be our baby. Here is just a few pics of her, and we will have to add some pics from her birthday party when that’s over.

[View with PicLens]

So I need to apologize as I have been fairly absent from this blog when it comes to actual writing. Blog meme’s, reposting, and videos have taken over and I need to get back to real writing. The real reason is actually Twitter. If you aren’t on it and don’t get it, that’s too bad. Follow me here

Okay so now comes the real difficult task of actually writing. Seems like so many things have been on my mind lately. Must things related to my new job as spring is a busy time preparing for camp. With long TO-DO lists for the camp, and many projects on the go or needing to start yet before the summer, it seems my mind is constantly scheming, dreaming and thinking up new ideas. So narrowing down something to write about specifically is hard. So for today I will pick…. men…. huh? Is what you are thinking now.

Over the past few months, (largely my new job and our church) I have been witness to ministries being very direct in targeting “men” and “boys” in their respective areas. At Ranger Lake, we have been trying to do more things to reach out to boys, with activities such as RC Trucks, Riflery, and our boys only paintball camps (called D.I.R.T. camp; which means Direct intentional Recreational Training) we are trying to get boys to come to camp, so we can train them to be Men of God. Also at our church, our pastor just shared his vision for the church, one part of the vision is to be intentional in reaching out to men. I have to say that I love this and hope to see more places return to bring manliness back to our boys and churches. As someone who grew up going to “boys club” and learning boys things, like building campfires, shooting, making shelters, etc, etc, I learnt alot from the Godly examples of what it means to be a Man of God. I am extremely grateful for being raised in an environment like this. However, I see many boys, growing up without this example, and (sorry ladies) I see many co-ed environments that are largely led by women (such as kids clubs, worship teams, etc, etc) that aren’t helping to raise men. Young boys in today’s society no longer have a ‘right of passage’ into manhood, and grow up sitting infront of their TVs, internet, and video games, without learning to be a man. It is largely this reason why we see so many ‘men’ in our society that are so childish. It also makes me angry to see how the roles of men and women are so blurred. Sure I am all for equality and do believe in it, but I also believe that God created men and women different for a very good reason. We all know very well the example of a great mother, and how she cares for us, and is there for us when we are little, etc, etc, all those good motherly things. However, how clear are we when it comes to the father, the dad’s? In our society, (take pop culture, like, “The Simpsons” as an example) dad’s are the bumbling idiots, who are dead beats, who never listen, always forget to take out the trash, and are only good for drinking beer and getting into trouble. This is the sentiment that we as a Church need to stand up against. And we don’t all the time. Take the upcoming Father’s Day for example, how many of you have been to a Father’s Day service at church that plays right into society and joins in the “bashing” of dumb Fathers? I have. And I don’t like it. It’s time we as a Church returned to building up men. Tough Men of God. Men who stand for what’s right. Men who look after their familes. Men who aren’t babies and complainers. Men who teach, and train their children. Men who lead their familes. Men who provide. Men who love their wives. Men who are honest and trustworthy. Men who aren’t afraid to get tough when they need too. Real Men of God.

Who’s with me?

Images and design are not often thought of being combined with faith and values. However, for a Christian to design images and be involved in these types of things without thinking about culture, and what they value and relating it to their faith is a serious error. Design and images are critically related to what our culture values and what we as Christians believe. These things cannot and should not be separated, but in contrast they need to be closely linked and combined. Images and design display what a culture values and what they hold to in tradition. In our modern church image and design display these attributes combined with faith, and sometimes design displays cultural values that do not reflect true faith.

In my study of images and design I want to be able to display my faith as well as my values, making them culturally relevant without displaying values that I do not agree with. I draw most of my philosophy of images from H.R. Rookmaaker, who states that a Christian artist is free to make art that is relevant to our day, through understanding our culture and studying it, however, he continues to say that the Christian artist is not purposelessly free, but he is free to praise God and love his neighbours. As a Christian artist we are to work to create art that has a meaning and a purpose in our culture, one that displays our values, our faith, not “Art for art’s” sake as Rookmaaker puts it.

Images and design display our cultures values and traditions. John Heskett displays this concept by his example of toothpicks. While the Norwegian toothpick represented a value of efficiency through its design, the Japanese toothpick displays a cultural value that was long established through tradition. Therefore, design must be thought of in terms of values, culture, and tradition. As a Christian artist, there is not a real Christian tradition in the arts today, but a Christian artist has to do something that establishes a new tradition, this can only happen if they understand their work and task of understanding their world and all its values. As a Christian then, we must be critical by what we design, are we displaying cultural values and traditions of the world with our faith, which would in turn lessen our faith. Or are we using these values and traditions to heighten the impact of our faith in a positive light. Values, culture, and faith are so connected with design and images that we must be very careful what we design.

As Neil Postman points out, our technology, which is part of our cultural values, affects the design of images, and how culture will understand our values and faith. Just as he talks about the symbol drain so we must remember that this does apply to the design and images that we as a Church are trying to use to communicate its message. As much as the church tries to do everything like popular culture, we must also remember that the culture has a particular value associated with those symbols already, and we need to ask whether that is the value that we want to communicate our faith.

Well, I just wanted to tell everyone about the great place I get to work at here at Ranger. You don’t want to miss this.

A Swell Place from Ranger Lake on Vimeo.