The Wonder of the Season

How are you enjoying your holiday season? As Christmas is upon us, are you remembering to take time every day to worship the Lord of the season? The One who loved us and sent His Son to die for us? The One who came as a humble baby, knowing He would grow and accomplish the greatest Plan put into place from eternity past? The One who was sent in Jesus' name, who was given to us, to teach us all things, His Holy Spirit? May the wonder of this season never fade from our hearts and minds, and may we live each day to bring Him glory in all we do!

It's a cozy, wet day outside, with snow in the forecast over the next couple of days - a great day to be inside and enjoy fall-ish kinds of things, like laundry and cooking and exercise. Oh wait, those are normal everyday things, no matter the season. Oh well, did someone forgot to tell me that? But to balance those everyday things, we turned on the radio to the Christmas station and are listening to songs galore! I love when Zoe joins in and sings...one song came on recently and she asked, "Is that Nature and Sing?" Out of the mouths of babes!

Tomorrow is David's birthday, so Zoe and I wrapped his presents today. We laughed, trying to find a place to hide the wrapped presents, then realized he can't see what they are anyways, so we put them on what we call the "tv table" in the living room. It will be such fun to watch him unwrap them tomorrow. David is a great husband and a wonderful father and we are indeed super-blessed to have him in our lives. 

Zoe is painting with watercolors on the floor behind me right now, saying she's giving a picture to Daddy tomorrow. However, she is sad because the water is making holes in the paint squares (I know,  hard to picture without a picture ha!). She'll survive this and rise again to paint once more, I'm sure.

Time to go check the laundry and put another load in the washer. Hope to be on here more often. Check back soon!

Garage Sale

I had a thought this morning as I was cleaning some items I am getting ready for a garage sale this weekend. Jesus told the young ruler to sell all he had and follow Him.  Now I know I may be stretching my idea a little far... but every time I collect a bunch of stuff to get rid of, I always have the thought wouldn't it be nice to try to sell it first and see if we can at least collect a few dollars for it?  Now, I know the story of the rich young ruler is trying to show the cost of following Jesus and what it means to be a true disciple of His...but the idea I had this morning was Jesus didn't tell the ruler to "get rid of" his stuff, He told him to "sell" it. So maybe it's not such a bad idea after all not to just donate our stuff but to try to get money for it...

Just food for thought...

Relationships

It's already been a week since I posted...crazy how fast time flies. This morning, I spent some time getting ready for my lesson tonight with my group of 8th grade girls at church.  Had some good thoughts to pass along to them...they are going to be reading a lot of Scripture this year, I can already tell! :) We are learning about Relationships this year - how first of all, the most important relationship we will ever have is with God through His Son, Jesus Christ, and then how when we have that relationship in order, all other relationships will be in order, as well.  It's going to be a good year with them. So excited for tonight...

Okay, I think I found it...

So I think after all this time that I finally figured out how to post a new blog on here. So we'll take it from here and see how it goes! :)

Praying

My mom called earlier and alerted me to the fact that there are multiple tornadoes in north Texas, where we used to live. I'm watching live tv online and praying for you all who live there.

Weather

Today there were some pretty awesome clouds associated with the flood warning in the mountains. Thought I'd share the picture.

No way!

No way it has been seven months since I last posted! My sister laughed and said, "Still potty training?!" Well, actually, yes! I took off a few months to give Zoe a little bit longer to "grow up," and have started it again just recently.

A little over two years old now, Zoe is talking in complete sentences, responding well to commands, and growing so big! We are weaning her off of her "passis" (i.e., pacifier), and she is doing alright with potty training. We enrolled her in the library reading program two weeks before it finished, so we read three more books than we would have, and she received two prizes (a toy train and a new Scholastic book). She was pretty excited to go with her cousin to do that. Next year, I'll sign her up at the beginning of the summer. She's becoming familiar with her ABC's and can count to ten forwards and backwards quite well. She likes watching PBS in the mornings and loves finding movies in our room and opening them up to show me the disc inside. She is such an adorable little girl and our lives are so blessed to have her in them!

We have been living with David's mom and stepdad since the end of March while we waited for our tenants to move out of our duplex, and we have been spending three months cleaning it up and getting ready to move back in. We should be ready to move by the end of next week. Having all three of us living together in one room has given me a new perspective on just how little we need to get by and survive (rather happily, I add!), so I plan to go through our stuff and have a garage sale so that I can start out fresh in our "new" place and not worry about all the time and effort it takes to keep things cleaned and organized. Like Ecclesiastes says, what good are things we accumulate except to look at them? (Okay, that was a paraphrase. lol)

So I hope to post more often and keep this updated a little more often than every seven months. lol! See y'all later!

Potty Training

So it is now Day Two of our big adventure (for the first time around?)... potty training our nearly 21 month old daughter! Such fun! Okay, to be honest... it's a little discouraging, but everything I read says not to give up and to keep a sense of humor. She has only gone once in the "big girl toilet" in two days, so when I'm mopping up yet another mess in the kitchen tile or on the living room carpet, I remember that if I keep at it and keep reminding her to "go in the toilet," she will eventually catch on and be a big girl. :) She is so excited about those M&M's sitting in the red plastic heart on the sink... maybe that will be the motivation she needs to go. More posts to come...

July Update

Wow - April, huh? My last post was about three months ago. How time flies! Summer is in full swing here, even though the last couple of days have been rainy and cooler than normal. We picked four huge bowls of apricots off our tree on Sunday, and spent about an hour washing and cutting and freezing them. Now I have 14 Ziplocs of frozen apricots in my freezer, and I must figure out what to do with them. I can't plan to eat them too fast over the winter, because I already found out that too many at one time makes the eyes turn yellowish-orange. LOL! Apricot recipes, here I come!

Zoe is growing so fast.. she will be 15 months old on August 1, and will have her 15 month check up on Tuesday. We'll find out how much she weighs and how tall she is at that appointment. It's always fun for me to find out how much she's growing. She has consistently stayed in the 10th percentile for weight and 25th percentile for height, so I'm not expecting this check up to be much different. LOL. Because her pediatrician is completely booked for the next three weeks, and has 100 people on his waitlist (that's literally what the lady told me!), I scheduled her for another doctor. She has been to this other office once before, when she had a reaction to the antibiotics she was on for what turned out to be a non-existent ear infection. The nice doctor at this other office told me to take her off the antibiotic, and her rash went away right away! (Wow, that was a mouthful - "went away right away!") Anyways, Zoe has been walking for 5 months now, she has 9 teeth including some of her molars, she signs "please," "more," and "thank you," and she has a vocabulary of "daddy," "mama," "doggy" (everything is a doggy right now!), "please," and basic gibberish. She is starting to mimic more of what we say, and it won't be long now before we start having conversations. :) She is learning what it means when Mama says "no" to certain things around the house... and she is just a bundle of fun at all times! We are so blessed to have her in our lives!

What blessings God pours out upon His children, and we are so grateful for each new day to spend learning about Him and His purpose for our lives. What an honor to bring Him glory in all we do. May this day find you and yours rejoicing in His constant and faithful love to you, and may all the blessings of God be upon you!

Zoe :)

Two more weeks and she'll be one year old! :)

Playtime!

Here is Zoe, being just as cute as a button, falling into and tearing down the blanket covering her playpen. Okay, I know she's technically supposed to be taking a nap, but once she discovered she could do this....... well, bye-bye nap time! :) lol

Short version:



Long version:

Zoe is a Walker! :)

Big day! Zoe took her first "official" steps!!!!! Yay! She is growing so fast, even as she gets over croup and RSV. She's 10 months old, and just as cute as can be! LOL

Zoe Pics

Hello all! My baby is going to be 10 months old on Monday, so I thought I'd better post some pictures of her while she's still in her 9th month. :)

Zoe's Walking Toy from Grandma and Grandpa

Today

Today the sun is shining bright.
Today the windows bring in light.
Today it's high my sights
Are set.

Well, anyway, it's not a very good poem, but I am trying to get some cleaning done and enjoy this beautiful spring-like weather we are having. The sun streaming in the windows does good for the soul... couldn't help but peek outside and see if the trees are beginning to bud. Lots of organizing and throwing stuff away from a winter of "put that aside until later." It is so nice to begin to see the fruits of my labor as the house is looking a little bit cleaner than it was this morning. :)

Guess I should get back to work. *wink

Almost 9 months old...

Wow! A reminder from my mom made me look at the last post date - Dec 14!! Sheesh - that's like 6 weeks ago! Well, a lot has happened in that time - the holidays and Christmas break, some time off of work for David, a family trip to San Francisco, the start of my last semester, and of course - Zoe-oe-oe. :)

She will be 9 months old on Monday, already! She is scooting herself all around the floor, pulling herself up to standing, and has just started standing herself without support (not for long, but still!). She claps her hands and smiles, dances and bounces to music (especially techno), jibbers and babbles and laughs at herself, loves to play Peek-a-Boo, and lights up Daddy's world when he comes home. She loves sitting with us and playing in our laps; she hates it when we walk out of the room or leave her in her crib for naptime. She's sleeping at night pretty well - this last week, she has been sleeping 9 or 10 hour stretches again. We'll get her 9 month check up on Monday, and see how much she weighs and how tall she is. She has been having teething pains since she was almost 3 months old, but no teeth have broken through yet. She sucks on her fingers a lot, though. We are also waiting for some nice dark curly hair to sprout out on her head - still lots of "peach fuzz" up there right now. lol. Zoe is so precious, indeed, and we are blessed to be enjoying her.

We welcomed a new niece into the family on Monday (Jan 25). Little Kenzie is soooo precious. We went last night to officially meet her (man! did Zoe look HUGE compared to the tiny baby!). Such preciousness these little babies are!

Hopefully, I'll be posting on here more often, so check back again soon. :)

Today

Zoe is now officially not only crawling, but pulling herself up to standing using certain large and sturdy objects. Her favorites are the boxes we have out ready to be wrapped for Christmas presents. She pulls herself up and then looks around for us to notice her standing. :) She loves crawling, and is getting faster and better every day. Her favorite things to play with are not, as one might think, the fun and colorful rattles and noisy toys. Alas, her favorites are cell phones and television remotes! When David found Zoe's spit up in his work iPhone, we figured it was time to start saying no to these most precious of toys. We are also starting the "no" phase for certain un-kid-friendly things around the house, such as the Christmas tree, the dining room blinds, and the cords to my laptop and other electronic devices. Currently, Zoe just crawled from the living room to her new favorite perch under the dining room table. She had her first booboo today when she hit her head on the table leg. A quick hug and kiss from Mommy and a few apple cinnamon Puffs made the pain diminish very quickly. :) She is happily occupied under the table looking up at me while I type this post. She laughs a lot and is starting to respond to us calling her name. All in all, she is turning into quite the social butterfly.

Here are a couple of pictures from this past weekend. Enjoy!

Zoe is 7 months old

As of yesterday, our little bundle of joy is 7 months old. She is absolutely adorable - officially crawling, making more effort at her sounds, and smiling all the time. :)

School is almost over - just another oh, two weeks or so. I think my last final goes away (it's online) on the 17th, so I am almost there. Then just four more months in the spring, and I'll have my associates. Just a piece of paper, I know. lol :) :)

David is in the kitchen right now making himself some dinner, and Zoe is crawling around on the floor here next to me - starting to fuss like she's almost ready for bedtime, so I'd better scoot and give her some food. :) Thought I'd post a couple pictures, too. Hope you enjoy!

Of Croup and Colds...

So little Zoe has croup this week. :( She is coughing and sounds pretty wheezy, but this is her fourth day and she is starting to get better. David and I have colds, and we will be getting better any day now. At least we all got sick at the same time, so we can be done and over soon. :) :)