National Treasure: Book Of Secrets is a great sequel to National Treasure. I wasn't expecting much from this movie. The previews came off as a bit cheesy and silly. I'm also not a huge Nicolas Cage fan. I generally don't appreciate his style of acting. But despite these things I was pleasantly surprised with National Treasure: Book Of Secrets. All of the same characters were back -- at least the good guys -- and they have been developed a bit more. The story is involved and fun. There's enough puzzling and problem solving to keep the viewers' interest. There is also quite a bit of intense action in the movie. The balancing platform scene was particularly innovative.

Ticket To Ride is probably our favorite game right now. We got it a year ago and have played it more than any other board game since then. The basic idea with this game is simple. Each player attempts to build as many train routes as possible across a map of the United States and Southern Canada. Points are awarded for the routes built. The player with the most points at the end of the game wins.

It sounds easy (and it is) but you have to watch out for the other players. Inevitably someone will build a route where you need to go and you'll be stuck in an impossible situation. That can be very frustrating but a creative mind can oftentimes work around it.

The Iron Lance is Stephen Lawhead's first book in the Crusades Trilogy. Starting off the northern coast of Scottland Murdo's father and brothers begin their quest to join in the crusades to rescue Jerusalem from it's captors. Leaving the young boy in charge the men expect to be back within the year. Due to incredible abuse of power and exploitation Murdo soon finds himself and the women in his care without land or home. Murdo follows after his father and brothers in the hopes that they will return and restore the land that was taken. Eventually, and against his will, Murdo ends up joining the crusades to retake Jerusalem. Befriended by a group of monks from the Cele De and finding himself disillusioned by all that occurred in the name of God, Murdo only wants to return home. When he find his father and brothers he is able to complete his business and return back home. Through the difficulties of the two year journey Murdo has become a man and returns home as a man.

Cities is the most recent release by Anberlin. This is the first full-length Anberlin CD I've heard. The few of their singles have made their way onto my iPod through some of the various-artist CDs just never did much for me so I didn't pursue them further. But recently I had an opportunity to get a CD and so on a whim I picked up Cities. I'm glad I did. It is very good. Every song on the CD is solid and interesting.

The first thing that struck me with the CD was the exceptional vocals. Stephen Christian's clear voice portrays the passion of what he's singing equally well with solid rockers (Adelaide) and pensive ballads (Inevitable). The rest of the music provides the perfect setting for the song.

A few weeks ago our friends decided to record a Christmas CD. The wife was going to sing and the husband was going to play the drums and do all of the CD production. Since they needed a bass player they asked me if I wouldn't help out. I did and it was fun. The result was the CD you see here. It is available for order online (just click on the picture) from cdbaby.com. I believe you can order a hard copy of the CD or order all the tracks for download.

Of the six songs on the CD four of them are done in a traditional style but with the other two we took some liberties. The first track is a rock version of "Oh Come Oh Come Emmanuel". In retrospect I'm not sure that should have been the lead off track since the rest of the CD doesn't have that same sort of feel. But oh well. The other uncommon song is our version of "Silent Night". It is done with a slow southern gospel feel. I works well, I think.

The Settlers of Catan was the first German-style board game I played and I was totally blown away by it. I heard about the game through one of those silly internet surveys. A mailing list that I'm on passed around a survey asking all sorts of things, including what was your favorite board game. I was amazed when several people on the list all mentioned this game, The Settlers of Catan, that I had never heard of. Considering the rave reviews by those on the list I decided to buy it for the family without ever playing it. It was a risk but it was worth it. We all loved it.

I found a great website online (actually, a friend sent me a link to it). With just a little bit of photo editing you can set up your own little family full of dancing elves. I put each of my kids in this festive holiday scene. Click here to watch it.