Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - September 11, 2025

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

We’re a year away from the twenty-fifth anniversary of 9/11, and there are sure to be larger events for that commemoration, but it is still a day in history that gets attention at our school and in town.  It is different for all of the kids and teens now since none of us were alive back then, but we are still affected; and we’re aware of how this anniversary impacts all of our favorite adults.  Ehlana and I talked about this with Mom and Dad at breakfast; history was part of our academic adventure today; and our thoughts have been a bit on the serious side all day too.  These feelings shouldn’t be an everyday thing for anyone, and 9/11 was horrific; so we are only going to add that we wish that everyone would think of what happened that day in context to every day right now in Ukraine and Gaza and elsewhere when the daily death tolls and destruction are at least a match for what happened during that infamous terrorist attack.

In other news for us, Tai Chi was by the river and more-somber because of the day and our thoughts; the sentiment continued through our school day; and then we had to focus on football or cheer squad practices after school.  Aaron hosted our dinner and study session between practices and game night at the Inn; and then our entertainment highlight of the day was the gaming fun with family and friends.  Another walk with Silkie to see Naomi and Aiden to their homes after we left the Inn was followed by a Magi lesson with Mom and a bit of charity work in the office; and now we’re pretty much ready for bed while winding down with the computer checks and twin chat.

We’re not going to get into a major world news rant tonight, but need to mention one of the top stories from today – or really from yesterday.  We didn’t comment on this last night because we wanted to wait for some details beyond of the first reports, but political activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated by a sniper at a college event in Utah.  He was only thirty-one, but had already built one of the largest conservative organizations in the country, Turning Points USA, and we will never understand why anyone thinks that this type of violence is okay or justified in any way.  We’re not going to rant on this story, and in some ways it is another distraction compared to the conflict in Ukraine or the horrors in Gaza and elsewhere, but this rise in violence – especially at schools – is a problem that really needs attention too.  We doubt that will happen beyond talking about it or trying to do things that don’t actually fix the true causes of this kind of violence; so we can really only hope for better sometime in the future.

Let’s wrap up with that and call it a night.  It certainly isn’t a happy note or thoughts to end our day with, but even junior Magi Masters have somber moments; so we’ll just go with it and work our way back toward happy again by morning.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - September 10, 2025

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Our top news of the day is that we had our first recording session for Naomi and the Holiday or Haunted Harmonies – and that’s both tonight because we did one song for each version of our little band.  That session was the fun highlight for our day too, but we had fun all day from Tai Chi by the river through school and football or cheer squad practices and on to the musical play time at the Galleria studio.  There was a Pizzeria pizza dinner and homework study session fit in there too; so we were kept busy from waking up this morning to now.  Add in a bit of family business work and a Magi lesson after we got home from the Galleria; and now we’re tired and running out of steam fast.

That’s why we’re speeding through our usual computer checks and this update; since we really need to crash and nap soon.  While we enjoyed all of our academic, sports, and musical adventures, and didn’t get a lot of work done; the office time included work on worthwhile projects and we still managed to help a lot of people even with the comparatively-limited ‘job’ efforts.  We can be sure that what we accomplished is more than we can say for most of our full-time world leaders – unless you count death and destruction as positives for the world.  We aren’t going to get into major ranting or commentary tonight; so let’s settle for covering just a couple of the stories of the day.  On the Ukraine war front, Poland is claiming today that they shot down ‘multiple Russian drones’ over their airspace, but this isn’t the first time that sort of claim has been made without any proof; and we expect that it is much more-likely that Ukraine sent drones into Poland to attempt to draw them into the conflict – and NATO with them; since Poland is a NATO member.  News flash – Russia is winning that conflict; so they are not interested in expanding the war – and NATO shouldn’t want that either when it could easily escalate to nuclear from there if they directly join the fight.

I’m getting wound up and really don’t want to rant about anything when we’re feeling happy tonight.  It would be nice if we could offer a good world news story, but while there are always local feel good stories out there; that just isn’t true for the biggest, most-serious issues – whether that is related to conflicts or problems like starvation and other health challenges.  We’ll still go with a second story – and the continuation of the news about the Israeli strike on Hamas negotiators in Qatar is reinforcing the distrust of the United States and Israel as their diplomatic efforts seem to only be used to facilitate military action against their enemies.  These actions are considered crimes by most of the rest of the world; and that will not end well for ‘our’ side if nobody believes that we cannot be trusted for any diplomacy or negotiations.  We can only hope that our leaders won’t choose total insanity and begin to believe that they can carry out these kinds of assassinations against other nuclear powers like China or Russia; and we also do not understand why other sovereign nations allow these attacks to happen in their cities and countries and do nothing in response.

Okay, that’s enough for tonight.  We need to recharge; so we’re out of here and off to nap time starting right now.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - September 9, 2025

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

This has been another very busy day; it is late and we’re tired; so let’s keep this update on the short side – if possible.

Tai Chi was indoors this morning thanks to some showers in the area; breakfast was standard school day fare; and then our academic adventures were fun and not newsworthy.  Ehlana had her cheer squad practice during our lunch break so that the girls on the squad that are also in the school band could attend that first practice of the year after school.  Yes, I’m in the school band too, but as always; the football players can’t do those band practices during the season.  The rain moved on by lunchtime, so I didn’t get wet during the football practice; and the afternoon high of seventy-seven was good for that workout too.  The band practice went well too and then Ehlana and I went home with Naomi as she hosted dinner and the study session for our usual group of six.  That break was fun, but then so was the teen praise team practice that we all had this evening.  We have lots of time before the holiday weekend services that are the norm around Thanksgiving and Christmas, but we’ll also be helping out with the music for two services between now and Thanksgiving; and we worked on that music tonight.

After our musical fun at the church, Ehlana and I collected Silkie along the way and walked Naomi and Aiden to their homes; and then we worked in the office after that for a few hours – including the time-phased parts of that effort.  We got a lot done – including a Magi lesson with Mom; and now we’re dealing with the usual bedtime chat and computing.  We really do need to get to sleep soon and should skip the world news rant, but there are new stories about bad things happening that we should mention tonight.  At the top of the list, the government has fallen in Nepal – mostly due to protests that turned deadly; and now we have yet another Asian country destabilized and in crisis.  Israel is back in the news too – this time for an attack in Qatar on the Hamas leaders that have been staying in Qatar and, presumably, under their protection.  There doesn’t seem to be anyplace that Israel isn’t willing to bomb or attack; and they are obviously not worried about retaliation from Qatar.  That’s likely to prove true, but we have to wonder how long it will be before Israel goes too far and the people in the countries under attack decide that they’ve had enough and do something about it.  That could happen with our country too; since we’re not exactly earned love and respect from countries like Venezuela right now while we’re threatening and bullying them into doing whatever we tell them to do.  That could be true for Nepal, but then the bullying is happening with most countries in the world right now – even if that is only through tariffs and economic pressure.

Let’s stop there, since we really are tired; and need to get all of the sleep we can before getting back to the daily action again by dawn.  Stay tuned for our next update while we get started on that down time right now.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - September 8, 2025

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Our first full week of the school year hasn’t started out with any major news or excitement, but we’ve had a good day and have kept busy.  The weather has been a bit of a mix of fall and summer after a chilly morning for Tai Chi by the river that was only in the forties followed by a warm-up to an afternoon high that topped eighty.  It has been sunny all day too; so that worked out great for both our academic adventures and the football and cheer squad practices.  Ehlana and I hosted our four best friends for dinner and the evening studying; we took care of the post-dinner clean-up; and in addition to our homework, we did a group Magi lesson with mom and had a music practice for both the school band and our own little band.  Mom had us wrap up the play time at ten o’clock; we took Silkie for a walk while seeing Naomi and Aiden to their homes; and then we did a bit of family business and charity work in the office with some time phasing to help get more done before we wrapped up at eleven-thirty in ‘real’ time.

That’s all added up to a long day, but we are happy as we’re writing this update and doing the usual computer checks and twin chat wrap-up to our day.  While we’ve been enjoying our adventures here at home, the rest of the world has rolled along as normal – meaning that none of the most-serious problems have had any changes for the better.  There is good news out there – just not on ‘our’ side of the major wars or global issues.  For example, China and Russia are very happy with their new deal for a second, larger gas pipeline between their countries that will soon send most of Russia’s natural gas to China instead of Europe – a deal that will pretty much put a long-term end to cheap Russian energy for Europe for the foreseeable future.  News flash for our leaders – that deal gives China an economic advantage for production costs that will make their companies even more competitive than they already are compared to pretty much every ‘western’ country!  Maybe starting an economic war with China and India was a really bad idea; since they seem to be more than willing to lose our business and trade while making stable deals with other countries.

While we’re thinking about China, one of the stories we took note of was about one of their tech companies announcing the successful development of 6-G technology that will, apparently, make high-speed communications and data connectivity even in remote locations.  We continue to claim to be the world leaders in research and development, but is that actually true anymore?  China certainly seems to be ahead of us for a lot of technology advancements; and they are certainly far-ahead of the rest of the world when it comes to things like high-speed trains and other infrastructure capabilities.  Maybe that’s been true for millennia for China – after all; they were once the world-leader for building very large and long walls! ;^)

Moving along, the war in Ukraine is not going well for the Ukrainian army, and while they have little successes here and there; those moments come at high cost; and we expect that their army will eventually either collapse or their allies will need to decide to officially join in and go to war with Russia.  Option two would end badly for the entire world; so we hope that won’t happen.  The Middle East is still a disaster; and we continue to be horrified by what is being done to the Palestinians, Syrians, Lebanese, Yemeni, and everyone else being targeted by Israel and their allies.  That isn’t a popular opinion with our national leaders, but we are definitely on the wrong side of history for both of these conflicts; and we make more enemies every day because of our actions and support for all of the death and destruction.

As if all of that wasn’t bad-enough, we could be in for more trouble closer to home as we target Venezuela and proclaim them the latest bogeyman for the war on drugs that we’ve been waging with no end in sight for more than fifty years.  Here’s a suggestion that our leaders will never consider – stop going after the supply side of the drug trade – focus on helping all of the customers to get clean so they don’t need to buy drugs at all; and that would be the end to the business.  We’d also suggest that the government shut down all businesses that launder all of that drug money, but that would mean going after a lot of banks and major corporations; so that will never happen.  By the way, we’d suggest the same tactic for dealing with the illegal immigration crisis, and in that case; helping to make life bearable in their home countries would end the desire to risk everything to leave their homes for the chance of a better life elsewhere.

All of those stories are far more important than the diversions that take up most of the daily news cycle, so we’re not going to write about the nonsense of the day; we’ve already done enough ranting for one night; and now we’re going to move on and get some sleep.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!

Ethan's and Ehlana's Journals - September 7, 2025

 

Ethan and Ehlana:

Happy 14^th Birthday, Miles!

Since our friend’s special celebration started soon after our latest update; let’s get right into our news of the day from there.

Ehlana and I were in the middle of the pack of party guests by the time we arrived at Miles’ home with Naomi and Aiden, so we got right to work on setting up our tents and gear.  More than half of the tents were raised by then, but then some of them had been brought over earlier in the day by the teens that needed to be elsewhere in the afternoon or for the start of the party.  Miles’ parents had lots of adult help with the barbeque dinner they hosted for family and all of Miles’ teen friends; and they might have been scared at least a bit by the time they fed most of the members of our football team along with the rest of the guests and helpers!  That isn’t a first for us, but it has been a while since we were around feeding the football team; and we had a different perspective during Michael’s high school football career!

That meal was awesome; we helped out with some of the work on either side of the food fun; and then we got started on the evening entertainment that included back yard games through until the campfire started.  Naomi and the Haunted Harmonies were drafted to provide most of the music for the campfire; and our friends appreciated the music, dancing, and co-ed cuddling opportunities that we provided for them.  Most of our breaks were filled with campfire stories fun, but there was canned music for the last hour or so of the campfire as it cooled down and we wanted to join in on the co-ed cuddling to stay warmer.

There are a lot of stories from last night that we could cover for this report, and it really was different to have all of the older teens involved in the adventure; so we should offer at least a couple of those stories that were new to us as new members to the high school teen scene.  There is still a split between the older and younger teens, since four years is a lot at our ages, but we can report that our group of six best friends bridge that gap for several reasons.  Our sports and musical skills help with credibility with the older teens; most of them look at Cassie and Michael as personal heroes; and our parents are among the best-connected and loved by everyone.  We appreciate all of that, but then we were happy to be on the edges of most of the teen drama that Miles was definitely at the center of last night and today.  Part of that included his sister because she’s dating Will Carter while Miles is dating Caroline – though most of the teasing we heard was about which family was getting the better deal with those pairings.  We won’t offer an opinion on that, since Miles has come a long way from the worst of his pre-teen years; and his extrovert nature and fearlessness are things that Caroline loves about him – even when he’s annoying her!  Will and Danielle are the couple that the rest of their friends congregate around, but they get that respect through quiet appreciation and kindness of their friends – and everyone else too.  That is different for them than it was for Cassie and Michael, but we see the similarities too; and it was different to be around them at Miles’ party compared to at school or during football games.

Moving along, we all stayed up late; there were some co-ed tents – including ours; and we managed to get about four hours of sleep as the temperature cooled into the high-forties by morning.  That made Tai Chi a bit chilly, but we got up early for that and had a few spectators mostly watching us from inside tents or the house; and then we needed to get busy as we blasted through breakfast, getting ready for the day, and packing up our tents and gear before we eventually headed to church and dropped off our gear at multiple homes along the way.  The church service and Sunday school were great and there was extra birthday fun for Miles while there; and then we were part of the smaller group of friends that went back to his house for lunch and then to spend the afternoon hanging out with him through until his birthday dinner at the early buffet at the Inn.  Lunch was an easy meal with burgers, hotdogs, and leftover sides from Saturday, and then Miles wanted some video gaming fun for an hour or so until we hit the trails with our bikes for the rest of the afternoon.  We spent more time on the trails at the park where we could play around with jumps and other tricks; and we only left early because the girls insisted on getting clean and dressed up for that dinner at the Inn.  Yes, I got dressed up for Naomi; and don’t expect that anyone noticed compared to how beautiful Naomi looked in the dress she chose to wear today.  Miles still had a few gifts to open after dinner and there was a cake, but by the time we left the Inn; even he was ready to go home and wind down from all of the fun – though his night wasn’t over then; since Caroline did go home with him.  I was tempted to spend more time with Naomi, but Ehlana and I needed to go home and do some work in the office; so we only walked Naomi and Aiden home while multi-tasking a walk with Silkie; and then we got to work with Mom on a Magi lesson and family business and charity projects.  We used time phasing to get more done in less time; and then Mom sent us upstairs for bath or Jacuzzi time by nine-thirty.

We’re now clean; have covered our usual computer checks and a bit of homework wrap-up; and now we’re nearly ready to crash and nap for the rest of the night.  That’s why we’re going to skip a world news report tonight.  We’ve had enough for today; and choose to stay happy tonight as we head off to dreamland.  This first week of school has seemed very busy, but we’re going to get even busier next week as we add in school band and teen praise team practices and also want to fit in the first of several recording sessions at the Galleria studio.  I’m getting tired just thinking about our upcoming schedule, so that’s all for this report; and we’re out of here and heading off to nap time right now.

Until next time, live with love, fellow Magi of the Light!