General News And Updates

Things are going fairly well. Sylvia is still feeling very good and is still walking and taking very good care of herself. She's not sleeping too well though. Mostly because she is just in that uncomfortable stage where no matter what, she is just uncomfortable. Last night was the first time I got the feeling she is getting close. She's not there yet (she's not nesting yet) but she is definitely getting closer. I'm ready for this to be over and the baby to get here. In some ways it has gone by very fast. In others not so much. A lot has happened over the course of this pregnancy. The miscarriage scare back in May, the whole shock of her just being pregnant in the first place, leaving one church and finding another, friends moving away, re-connecting with my old friend Darin in New Hampshire for his 40th birthday party (definitely one of the years highlights), Down to Earth starting, finding out who our real friends are... just to name a few. It's been a crazy year so far and probably won't let up very much with the holidays so close. A very large portion of Sylvia's family from Georgia are coming down in a few weeks for Thanksgiving. It'll be nuts for a few days I'm sure. Hopefully the baby will be here before all of them get here. I'm not sure dinner and a show is on the agenda. Then there's Christmas. Enough said.

The other 3 kids are doing fine. Tyler was on the basketball team this year at his new middle school and had an undefeated season. He's doing well in school, as usual. He, on average, always has straight A's. Rachel is doing the best she has ever done in school! Just before school got out last summer we took her off of sugar. The school thought she had ADD and very strongly suggested that we medicate her. Sylvia and I both said no way! Rachel can focus on the things she wants to just fine. We took her to the Dr., as recommended by the school, and at his suggestion we took her off of sugar and all artificial sweeteners. It has made a drastic improvement in her. She was never a behavior problem, she was just always in her own little world. Kind of like her father. The apple, truly, didn't fall very far. Liam is, well, Liam. He's a mess. A very typical third born. Everything is funny to him. I can always count on him to make me laugh. He's the same way in class so he misses a lot the first or even second time around.

Down to Earth is on the move and going great. We are up to almost 850 hits on the my space site in less than a month. We have 3 new songs in the works plus the 3 that Tony, our producer, is mixing. One of the new tune James just wrote this past Sunday. The other 2 are songs that I composed the music and did the arrangement to. James is handling the lyrical parts. Good stuff is coming! The only major hurdle we have to get over is in the bass player area. We have no bass player. I'm confident that that spot will be filled with the right person very soon. It's been very cool to watch how God has weeded out the people who aren't supposed to be here and has put the right people where they are supposed to be. It's been a cool ride.

2007 is not over yet but it looks like, for the Ellison's it's going out with a bang and not a whimper.

Ciao,
Mark.