Our Fifth Anniversary

Five whole years!  Five years since our lovely wedding day.  The days between have been filled in ways beyond our imaginations . . . three pregnancies, but only two happy births.  Much more materially than we need, and a burglary to remind us that it's not really ours.  Dozens of road trips to NY, a few to West Virginia, family vacations in Florida, a week in California and three(!!!) trips to Europe!  One Thanksgiving and one Christmas spent at our home on Cottage Lane because of babies being born, and those two holidays were two of my favorites of all time.  Cuddles and kisses and lots of wrestling with our two energetic little girls, and many doctor's visits of varied urgency because we have one child with asthma, and, as we discovered in recent months, another child with a rare genetic condition!

How good our loving Father has been to us.

For posterity's sake, I'd like to share how we celebrated our fifth.  :)  We've always said, "when Jenni gets married, then we'll go to Ireland!" and she finally did meet her husband and got married just a few weeks ago!  So, we spent two weeks on that beloved island celebrating with them and rekindling dear friendships, and since we were returning on July 23, we considered it sort of an anniversary trip, as well.  Still, on our acutal anniversary on the 25th, our friend Becca sweetly offered to babysit for us at the last minute, so we enjoyed our happy tradition of dinner at Outback in my honeymoon dress.  :)  We ended up ordering a handsome print of an old engraving of Rome as a present to ourselves, and plan to get it framed and hang it in our dining room.  And it seems like we just keep celebrating and celebrating, since we still haven't given each other our cards, and plan to this evening!  

Really soon, I want to write the rest of this post . . . maybe tomorrow.  :)  Welcome back, blog!

Easter at Uncle's

A couple of weekends ago, we traveled down to spend the weekend with Derek and Liz.  We had a really great time spending Saturday at a local park, Sunday at their church and just hanging out at their apartment with them!  Predictably, we didn't even think to bring the camera, but caught several memories on the iphone.  And, predictably, most of them are of our girlies!  But, here you go!

We did get one photo of Liz, demonstrating how their pup, Angus, hates to be held.  Angus is just a cute, happy, miniature version of my parents deceased dog, Harvey.  And he has a great "mommy and daddy," too.  

Derek and Liz have a beautiful, big swingset behind their apartment, which is almost more like a playground! This time, Gemma loved the tire swing.  The first time we took her out was on Friday night as dusk was falling, which is why this photo is so dark.  She attempted to go back more than once by herself--she and Angus are both little runaways!  (Thankfully, they were both pretty easy to fetch back home!)

After putting the babies to bed, Derek and John went out to watch the Duke game while Liz and I stayed in and watched Pride and Prejudice (Keira Knightly version).  It was fun to have some girl time.  

After getting up bright and early with the babies, Liz made us a yummy breakfast of eggs, pancakes and fruit and we got ready to head over to a local park for some hotdog roasting and a wee bit of hiking.  Gemma got to try her first smore!

But the highlight of the weekend was really Sunday.  I had been looking forward to visiting their church for a while, because they're attending the the PCA church where Pastor Hughes, my shepherd throughout college, "retired" to as the assistant pastor.

We felt right at home among our presbyterian brethren, and appreciated how welcoming they are of children into the services.  Our girls both did remarkably well, though John took Gemma to the nursery for parts of the sermons.  Everyone was so kind to us, and we really liked their head pastor, as well.  We celebrated communion with them, had a meal together in the afternoon, and came away just being quite encouraged through the preaching by the love of Christ for us.

It was Easter, but Derek had alerted us that this church ignores the holiday more than most do, so I left Gemma's hat at home this year.  It was exciting that she still fits into the little sweater made by Mrs. Kirby, though!  In fact, I think she fit it better this year than last.

When I prepared the girls' dresses before leaving home, I couldn't help but reflect on how kindly and abundantly God has provided for us.  Gemma was in a little Therese jumper and blouse and Ruthie's dress is by Ralph Lauren . . . and both were given to us.  In fact, they were both in hand-made sweaters given to us as well.  And the thing is, we could afford to go out to Target and buy them each a new spring dress . . . but we didn't have to.  Even the tights, shoes, and hair accessories were given to us!

"I'm three months old!"

Family self-portrait . . . not so great . . . Gemma's braids were on top of her head when we left that morning, but they didn't last long that way.  ;)

There's Ruthie's sweater in the background . . . truly precious!  And that was our weekend with Derek and Liz.  Oh, there was also some candy in a basket involved.  ;)  We are conscious of how blessed we are to have them stationed near us, and have to try to soak them up for as long as they are so close!

Have You Seen My New Shoes?

We have been very, very blessed and provided for with baby things.  We've hardly had to buy Gemma anything!  I was kind of excited that we "needed" to buy her some shoes this spring.  :)  We found these at Target.

She loves her new shoes.  :)  And she walks very well in them!  I'm looking forward to introducing Gemma to Shirley Temple when she gets a little bit older.  :)  This song from the movie Heidi keeps circling in my head:

"We'll take a trip wherever we choose

We'll dance and skip in our little wooden shoes!"

(We've also had some fun starting to braid her hair!)

Thankful for my Sweetie

When I was little, I wanted to marry someone who was strong enough to pick me up.  :)  My sister wisely pointed out that she wanted to marry a Christian, and she could just make her husband lift weights.  To this, I replied that I could just make my husband become a Christian!  

Thank you, Lord, for delivering me from the folly of my youth . . .

"Now to Him who is able to do far more abundantly beyond all that we ask or think, according to the power that works within us, to Him be the glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations forever and ever. Amen."
Ephesians 3:20-21

God gave me to John and John to me, and I can do nothing but praise Him for this.  John's personality is exactly complementary to mine. 

I'm thankful that he's smarter than me.  I'm thankful that he is so faithful.  I'm thankful that he's so very wise.  I'm thankful that he can pick me up.  

I'm thankful that he is an excellent daddy. 

 I don't want to know what my life would be like without John in it.  He is the greatest earthly gift I could ever receive without a doubt.  Thank you, Father.  And would it not please You to bless my friends and family as You have so abundantly blessed me?

Thankful for our Little One

Giving thanks is about saying even the things that go without saying, I think.  Our lives were turned upside-down in a good way almost a year ago now by the birth of our little one, and we are beyond grateful for her.

Personally, I'm full of thanksgiving for how beautifully her birth went (story here and here). Anticipating labor was a real anxiety for me, but God showed us how needless my fears were. 

Now, she is over eleven months old, and they have been eleven months filled with joy.  As she gets older and her budding intellect begins to reveal itself, my heart is also filled with a deep sense of stewardship.  We know that this precious child is ours for a time only, that her life comes from, belongs to, and will be directed by God our Father.  And yet, humanly speaking, the decisions we make and the actions we take will tremendously shape her character in the coming years. 

Since it's been quite a while since the last update, perhaps you'd like to hear what she's been doing lately!

• There have been some big changes!  Gemma no longer uses a pacifier (not planned by us) and now sleeps through the night (not without some tears, but thankfully it only lasted one night).  And, yes, those two things are related . . . 
• Army crawling is still her preferred method of motion, though she's also started climbing!
• She's still not pulling herself up to a stand, but she does love it when we stand her up holding onto a piece of furniture.  She'll play with whatever is nearby and practice standing for several minutes!
• What Gemma lacks in gross motor skills, she makes up for in talking!  She's been our little babbler for months, but now she also consistently says, "Buh buh!" for "Bye bye!"  She also knows who "Da da" and "Ma ma" are, and often tries to mimic my words when I'm talking to her.
• She loves to play in the laundry and, in general, take things out of whatever they are in!
• She also loves "reading."  A board book with lots of pictures will keep her busy for a while (it kept her busy for an hour in the car once!).  She flips and flips and "reads" aloud ("oooooh").
• And of course, there are lots of adorable things she does like clapping her hands, wrinkling her nose, and shaking her head!  Sometimes it seems to mean "no," and sometimes we're not sure!  
• When she hit ten months, she suddenly became more interested in food, but she's still very attached to nursing, which makes me profoundly glad.  Some of her favorite finger-foods are Cheerios and beans (black, kidney, it matters not!).

We took Gemma to a bonfire recently, and she looooved it!  She wanted to get in!

There were several more pictures I wanted to share, but for some reason blogger won't let me keep vertically-aligned pictures vertical today.  Perhaps John can help.  What a great guy . . . I'm so thankful for him . . . but I'm getting ahead of myself.  ;-)

Making Thank You's

What's the news in baby-land? Not too much, but our church did have a shower for us this past Saturday! Everyone was so generous and kind, and now we have more material blessings and more thank you notes to write.

My goal is to write 5 thank you's each day. It seems to work best for me that way, because it helps me make significant progress without getting overwhelmed or thoroughly neglecting everything else. The only problem is that I ran out of thank you cards yesterday after writing only 4. So, this afternoon, I could have run to the store and picked some more up. The store is close by, but it was raining, and I'd already been gone all morning . . .

So baby and I stayed in and made some. :-)

No, little girl isn't born yet, and those aren't her real foot prints. Did you know that you can use the side of a curled-up fist to make an impression like a baby foot print? Sometimes Mom would have us stamp brown paper in such a way as kids to make wrapping paper for a shower. They come out looking realistically wrinkled because they're stamped by real skin, and then you add little toes with your pinkie finger.

Back when we ordered our multi-page wedding invitations, each one came with an extra blank 6"x6" piece of cardstock with a hole in the corner. Those extra cards got set aside as we assembled the invitations themselves, and now we're finally using some of them! Somehow, over 100 extra envelopes were also ordered, so each of these little cards is all set. After stamping each one, I threaded some re-used pink ribbon through each hole, because they looked a little funny by themselves. And then I traced a light black square around each set of footprints so they wouldn't look so bare.

Of course it took considerably longer to make these than to run to the store, but it was definitely more fun! And it feels nice to use up some of those extra cards and envelopes!

A Blessing Indeed

My father-in-law is full of wisdom. Years ago when John had gone through a break-up, his dad told him something like, "You can say all you want about getting over it, but you never really will until there's someone else."  John recalled this thought when we were discussing when to try to conceive again after losing our first loved, little one in December at 10 weeks. 

I think it's a true statement in either case.  I've experienced what it is to come to a point where I trust my Father for His timing, even though I don't understand, but until He blesses again, our human arms are still empty. 

We're so, so thankful that He has blessed us again.  I still miss my first baby--I still ache for others who have lost or never conceived--but we have a renewed hope before us.  Surely, our heavenly Father is very kind to us. 

"I went out full, but the LORD has brought me back empty. Why do you call me Naomi, since the LORD has witnessed against me and the Almighty has afflicted me?" Ruth 1:21

"The neighbor women gave him a name, saying, 'A son has been born to Naomi!' So they named him Obed. He is the father of Jesse, the father of David." Ruth 4:17

Florida Filmstrip

Vacation with John's family also kept us from home for part of January.  It was my first time in Orlando.

The whole family

 

I love the princess dress/hoodie combination.  

And I love how much this precious little girl is thrilled to be on her Uncle Johnny's shoulders. :-)

A heron with a fish in his mouth!  He's a bit washed-out, but struck me as funny.

And my parents-in-law are in the background, which also seemed neat. 

 

My favorite blessing.  I told him that this looked like a high school senior picture pose (though definitely not professional quality here.  :-)) 

Lest recent posts cause anyone to think that I'm some sort of spiritual giant, truth be told, when I write such things, I'm preaching to myself.  A month ago, it would have been just too hard even to preach to myself here.  

I've been so blessed in material things that I almost feel embarrassed about it.  I also feel that I have no right to complain about my true griefs.  To be honest, there were many times around Christmas and during vacation when I thought, "I wish I could give up all these things and have my baby back."  I would far rather be poor and still be pregnant.  But we don't get to pick our trials, and, to an extent, we don't get to pick our blessings either.

"Shall we indeed accept good from God and not accept adversity?" Job 2:10b

Little Encouragements and Little Pests

No, these aren't from John.  And, no, they're not from anyone else!  Just listen to the story!

While I was getting ready to leave one of the self-checkout lines at Kroger yesterday, the girl behind the desks asks, "Ma'am, would you like some flowers?"

"Um, excuse me?"

"Would you like some flowers?"

"Would I like some flowers?!" 

"We ordered too many this week and we're giving them away!" 

Wow, that never happens.  Of course I would like flowers, and of course I chose roses.  :-D

The next encouraging thing happened at JC Penney.  Weeks ago I went online and signed up for their mailing list.  Yeah, I do get e-mail ads regularly now, but I was hoping I would also get coupons in the mail like my mom does.  And last week I did, the best being a "$10 off a purchase of $10 or more" coupon.  Nice.

I needed to buy black tights for our CSD concert on Saturday, so I headed to Penney's with my coupon.  Wouldn't you know, there was a "buy one, get one for $1" sale on all hoisery!  Nice.  I found some nice, $10 tights and picked out the most durable pair of regular beige stockings I could find, which happened to be marked $9.  With the sale, the two rang up at a total of $11.  I handed the cashier my coupon, paid my $1.08 and left encouraged. 

God is kind.

Jenni, if you're reading this now, just be glad that you're on the other side of the Atlantic. 

You see, we have a mouse problem.  I've been finding mouse droppings in the kitchen towel drawer and in the napkin basket since we returned from Thanksgiving.  John found a half eaten peanut butter cup in his bag of Reeses.  But, being the laid-back couple that we often are, we dealt with the symptoms and hoped the problem would go away.  Still, I kept finding droppings.  I'd heard that Bounce will keep mice away, so yesterday I also bought some store-brand dryer sheets and tucked one into the towel drawer and one at the bottom of the napkin basket.  Yay, no more droppings!

And yet . . .

And yet, now the little beasts are digging holes into my precious growing herbs!  I'm angry with them now and John agrees that it seems to be trap-time . . . updates to come, with no pictures for the sake of the squeamish.  ;-)

Blessings and Bread

When the doorbell rang on Friday morning, I immediately thought it was going to be a package! We don't get many visitors, especially drop-in visitors during the day, but we have gotten several packages since we've been married, and the doorbell rings every time! (Hopefully I won't go Pavlovian and start drooling when it happens!)


It was indeed a very large package. It was too large to be the latest book I requested from paperbackswap.com (Lasting Love by Allistair Beg). And I didn't think that John had ordered anything recently.

Inside was this lovely thing:

 

It's a rice cooker from my dear cousins and aunt and uncle in Albania, as confirmed by a facebook message which shortly followed.  I had to add it to the list of thank you notes still to write, and as I did, I was reminded of how spoiled/blessed we are. 

 

I don't really like using the word "spoiled," because literally it means, well, ruined!  The word "blessed" is better because every good thing is a gift from the hand of our merciful God, but it almost doesn't cover it, because often blessings aren't exciting, new, or material.  Sometimes they're disguised in trials.  Surely, I'm not going to say that John and I are more blessed than my parents were as newlyweds, even though they only had $17 a week to spend on groceries and never dreamed of owning a kitchenaid or a rice cooker or going on a honeymoon in Italy.  In comparison, we seem spoiled.  And why?  Why is it that life is so easy for us right now?  Surely, surely more difficult times will come.  Hopefully, in the face of future trials, our joy together, with each other, will never once waver.  But I don't want to become complacent, expecting God to continue to bless me with worldly things when He has already blessed me so abundantly with His Son, and now with John. 

 

"Keep deception and lies far from me, Give me neither poverty nor riches; Feed me with the food that is my portion,

That I not be full and deny You and say, "Who is the LORD ?" Or that I not be in want and steal, And profane the name of my God."  Proverbs 30:8-9
 
On another note, I made bread yesterday!  It's Ezekiel bread, from a recipe in Taste of Home.  I thought it was sooo beautiful . . . .
 

But then, when I cut one load open to freeze half of it, I discovered this: 

Does anyone know what would make bread do this?  

Besides that, it's quite delicious, and according to my calculations, approximately $1.83 a loaf, until I can start finding wheat germ, honey, etc. at better prices.  And John likes it too, yay!