I don't care who you are...that's a cute baby!
Tuesday, September 13, 2011
Monday, September 12, 2011
Move Update
Most of my readers (all six of you) would really like a move update. I'm sorry I haven't been more diligent to keep everyone posted. I figured it was better to wait until something was certain than to post possibilities and have to keep correcting myself. That, and I've gotten sucked into pinterest, so all my computer time is spent pinning ideas for the new house. J's been at a programming conference here in town this weekend, so I've tried to use my time for the greater good and let you all know what is happening.
We have sold our house!! Thank you, God! We close on September 22nd. Many thanks for all the offers of help, but God has provided the finances to pay for movers this time around!! Woo hoo! I am so relieved that we do not have to abuse our friends and family with yet another scorching hot move. The movers will pick up our stuff on September 20th and we'll stay here two nights because somebody-who-shall-remain-nameless managed to have a top-priority-can't-miss-it-or-rearrange-it meeting scheduled at the office for the day before we close. It will be a crazy week.
We have found a new house!! Thank you, God! Looks like we will close on it mid-October. My brother has generously offered to house us for those gap weeks, so we'll be staying there until we can get into the new place. Thanks, T & CA! Our stuff will be in storage and the movers will deliver it the day after we close.
I'm super excited about the new place because of the way God provided for it. We had put an offer in on a different place and that offer had been accepted; we were moving forward. But I just couldn't get that settled peace about it. We went back and looked at it again, and I felt a little better. We estimated the payments and knew we could swing them. But the more we talked about it, the more we realized that we would have to postpone some major family goals if we bought that house. So we walked away. I was actually relieved instead of disappointed. It was a great house, just not the one God had for us.
We picked the winner after narrowing down dozens of choices to our top three. We imagined life now in each of those places....who would sleep where, hosting a small group, having overnight guests, doing school, etc. And life five years from now. The winning house kept coming up with an extra room. What would we do with that much space? It's a foreclosure, so it's a lot of house for a little price. One of us threw out the comment, "We could host an exchange student." We've always wanted to do that! The list of opportunities started rolling and we started getting more and more excited. Even though we had a different neighborhood prioritized, we really feel like God is giving us this house so we can share it with others. I've felt like God planted a seed of hospitality among the gifts He gave me; I enjoy hosting and making folks comfortable. So the idea that He provided a house where I can use that gift for His glory and our budget stays flexible at the same time....I'm overwhelmed by His goodness! And I'm eager to watch His abundance flow through my hands to bless others.
So right now we are just living life as usual. I'll pack up the things we need during the gap weeks, but leave the rest for the movers. I'm going to get my money's worth out of them. I should probably be purging, but I'm just going to wait until we get to the new place and purge as I unpack. Ask me later if that was a good idea or not.
I'll try to write more if more happens. The next ten days are full of last playdates, last visits to parks, a smidgen of school, and hopefully, lots of rest. Thanks for the prayers! Please continue to pray for the rest of the Snoball.com team to sell their homes and find the right one on the other side.
We have sold our house!! Thank you, God! We close on September 22nd. Many thanks for all the offers of help, but God has provided the finances to pay for movers this time around!! Woo hoo! I am so relieved that we do not have to abuse our friends and family with yet another scorching hot move. The movers will pick up our stuff on September 20th and we'll stay here two nights because somebody-who-shall-remain-nameless managed to have a top-priority-can't-miss-it-or-rearrange-it meeting scheduled at the office for the day before we close. It will be a crazy week.
We have found a new house!! Thank you, God! Looks like we will close on it mid-October. My brother has generously offered to house us for those gap weeks, so we'll be staying there until we can get into the new place. Thanks, T & CA! Our stuff will be in storage and the movers will deliver it the day after we close.
I'm super excited about the new place because of the way God provided for it. We had put an offer in on a different place and that offer had been accepted; we were moving forward. But I just couldn't get that settled peace about it. We went back and looked at it again, and I felt a little better. We estimated the payments and knew we could swing them. But the more we talked about it, the more we realized that we would have to postpone some major family goals if we bought that house. So we walked away. I was actually relieved instead of disappointed. It was a great house, just not the one God had for us.
We picked the winner after narrowing down dozens of choices to our top three. We imagined life now in each of those places....who would sleep where, hosting a small group, having overnight guests, doing school, etc. And life five years from now. The winning house kept coming up with an extra room. What would we do with that much space? It's a foreclosure, so it's a lot of house for a little price. One of us threw out the comment, "We could host an exchange student." We've always wanted to do that! The list of opportunities started rolling and we started getting more and more excited. Even though we had a different neighborhood prioritized, we really feel like God is giving us this house so we can share it with others. I've felt like God planted a seed of hospitality among the gifts He gave me; I enjoy hosting and making folks comfortable. So the idea that He provided a house where I can use that gift for His glory and our budget stays flexible at the same time....I'm overwhelmed by His goodness! And I'm eager to watch His abundance flow through my hands to bless others.
So right now we are just living life as usual. I'll pack up the things we need during the gap weeks, but leave the rest for the movers. I'm going to get my money's worth out of them. I should probably be purging, but I'm just going to wait until we get to the new place and purge as I unpack. Ask me later if that was a good idea or not.
I'll try to write more if more happens. The next ten days are full of last playdates, last visits to parks, a smidgen of school, and hopefully, lots of rest. Thanks for the prayers! Please continue to pray for the rest of the Snoball.com team to sell their homes and find the right one on the other side.
Sunday, September 11, 2011
Where Were You?
I was in my parents' car, driving between Houston and Austin. My brother called my dad and told him to turn on the radio, that we might ought to turn around and go home. We turned on the radio and listened in disbelief to the stories being pieced together. We didn't turn around. There was a new baby to meet and we were in need of something happy.
Five days earlier I had flown by myself from Paris to Houston in hopes of saying a final goodbye to my Grandma. She met her Savior face-to-face while I was over the ocean. That same day, my nephew was born. My return ticket allowed time for a quick trip to see my sister's new baby. So we arranged to go a day or so after the funeral. It was September 11, 2001.
When we got to my sister's house, everyone was still in shock. She had a 4-year-old running around and rightly didn't want to expose him much to the news reports, so we took intermittent glances. What does it all mean? I remember the confusion, the disbelief, and the very real panic of what it meant to me, with an ocean separating me from my husband.
J was sitting in a refugee center in Germany having tea with Muslims when the first reports starting coming in. They were all very shocked, just like us, and horrified by the possibilities as well. He went from the refugee center to a nearby electronics store with a wall of televisions. He and a co-worker tuned one of the smaller sets to CNN to hear the details in English. He was so focused on the news that he didn't notice at first the local Germans who were slowly turning off every other television so that the two Americans could hear.
I was anxious to get back to the man I call home. My family was not so eager for me to get on a plane. Neither was the government. I was stuck in Texas for what felt like eternity, calling the airline every day to see if today was the day they would issue me a ticket and a departure date. I don't remember how many weeks I waited, but eventually the planes started flying again and I was able to get on one of them for a very lonely, panicky, yet uneventful flight back to Europe and my beloved.
That day changed the world as a whole and each of us as individuals. Only one thing remained constant--God. He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. As one of our co-workers in Europe would say, "It is September 11, 2011 and God is still on His throne." He has and always will be sovereign, through the inexplicable, the horrific, and the unfathomable. Many pointed to their faith on that day and many were urged to new faith. Faith is trusting in His goodness and His promise of redemption amidst the evil that surrounds us. And as our broken world deteriorates farther from Him, faith cries out, "Come, Lord Jesus, come!" What a day that will be!!
Five days earlier I had flown by myself from Paris to Houston in hopes of saying a final goodbye to my Grandma. She met her Savior face-to-face while I was over the ocean. That same day, my nephew was born. My return ticket allowed time for a quick trip to see my sister's new baby. So we arranged to go a day or so after the funeral. It was September 11, 2001.
When we got to my sister's house, everyone was still in shock. She had a 4-year-old running around and rightly didn't want to expose him much to the news reports, so we took intermittent glances. What does it all mean? I remember the confusion, the disbelief, and the very real panic of what it meant to me, with an ocean separating me from my husband.
J was sitting in a refugee center in Germany having tea with Muslims when the first reports starting coming in. They were all very shocked, just like us, and horrified by the possibilities as well. He went from the refugee center to a nearby electronics store with a wall of televisions. He and a co-worker tuned one of the smaller sets to CNN to hear the details in English. He was so focused on the news that he didn't notice at first the local Germans who were slowly turning off every other television so that the two Americans could hear.
I was anxious to get back to the man I call home. My family was not so eager for me to get on a plane. Neither was the government. I was stuck in Texas for what felt like eternity, calling the airline every day to see if today was the day they would issue me a ticket and a departure date. I don't remember how many weeks I waited, but eventually the planes started flying again and I was able to get on one of them for a very lonely, panicky, yet uneventful flight back to Europe and my beloved.
That day changed the world as a whole and each of us as individuals. Only one thing remained constant--God. He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. As one of our co-workers in Europe would say, "It is September 11, 2011 and God is still on His throne." He has and always will be sovereign, through the inexplicable, the horrific, and the unfathomable. Many pointed to their faith on that day and many were urged to new faith. Faith is trusting in His goodness and His promise of redemption amidst the evil that surrounds us. And as our broken world deteriorates farther from Him, faith cries out, "Come, Lord Jesus, come!" What a day that will be!!
Saturday, September 10, 2011
Three Months Old
Somewhere in the craziness that is relocating a house (and business), Z passed his three-month birthday. He is such a good baby and that is a wonderful blessing right now while we are in transition. In the last few weeks, he has been sleeping really well at night, usually from 8pm-8am, with nary a peep. He does pretty well during the day also, taking at least one big nap a day and a couple of little ones. He's happy when he's awake and only starts to fuss when he's getting sleepy. He's been a real trooper on all of our house-hunting trips, getting in and out of the van a bazillion times, eating on the road, and snatching pieces of naps between red lights.
He is so much bigger already than the girls were at this point. He's already outgrown one of our bouncy seats! Looking back at pics of C, I can tell she was still in that bouncy seat at 6 months! He is so strong and has such good head control, that I've been trying him out in a few different places...
Jumper and stroller, yes; bumbo, not so much. He's also not quite ready for the booster seat. I think little man is used to more of a la-z-boy position than being upright and it will take a little getting used to. He's just so much bigger and stronger than the girls were at three months. I don't think either of them went in the jumper until 5-6 months.
I also know that neither of them slept as well as he does so early. Now that he's found his thumb, I can lay him down in his crib before he's fully asleep and he will soothe himself to sleep. That's huge! Although I find myself wanting to rock and bounce him to sleep now since I don't have to, and he's already so done with rocking and bouncing to sleep. It actually makes him fussier.
His sisters still dote on him when it suits them, but he's a little more commonplace now, so they can also ignore him when they want to. They're going to have a blast as he gets more and more interactive in the next few months. The girls give me daily updates as to his progress in grabbing the toys hanging from his bouncy seat or the noises he is making that sound like words. They're so proud of their little brother.
What manner of grace is this, Lord, that you have lavished on me such an agreeable baby during such a tumultuous transition? Thank you for consistently giving immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine.
He is so much bigger already than the girls were at this point. He's already outgrown one of our bouncy seats! Looking back at pics of C, I can tell she was still in that bouncy seat at 6 months! He is so strong and has such good head control, that I've been trying him out in a few different places...
I also know that neither of them slept as well as he does so early. Now that he's found his thumb, I can lay him down in his crib before he's fully asleep and he will soothe himself to sleep. That's huge! Although I find myself wanting to rock and bounce him to sleep now since I don't have to, and he's already so done with rocking and bouncing to sleep. It actually makes him fussier.
His sisters still dote on him when it suits them, but he's a little more commonplace now, so they can also ignore him when they want to. They're going to have a blast as he gets more and more interactive in the next few months. The girls give me daily updates as to his progress in grabbing the toys hanging from his bouncy seat or the noises he is making that sound like words. They're so proud of their little brother.
What manner of grace is this, Lord, that you have lavished on me such an agreeable baby during such a tumultuous transition? Thank you for consistently giving immeasurably more than I could ask or imagine.
Monday, September 5, 2011
Fuller Lips Overnight
We're going house hunting again today. Yes, we thought we had a house; but it turned out to not be the right one for our family. So we're back to hunting. Just a day trip, but a very long day. So it was important that I get a good night's rest last night.
As I reached to turn off my bedside lamp last night, I saw a mosquito fly through the spotlight. I was up and after him in an instant. I can not stand that awful whining, buzzing in my ear or the thought of being eaten alive in the night. I slapped at him a few times and he disappeared. I told myself I got him.
Around 2:30 am, I awakened from a dream that included me having several mosquito bites on my neck and face. Just the thought made me itch all over. I got up and inspected the itchy spots in the light of the bathroom. No bites, just a dream; go back to sleep.
Nothing doing. I could not fall back asleep. I tossed and turned in that weird half-dream state where you get fragments of sleep and dreams are really bizarre. Until around 4:30 am, when I had a dream that a mosquito bit my lip and it swelled to elephant-size proportions and I had to go house hunting like that.
Only this time, my lip really was throbbing even after I woke up. Throbbing! I was so mad at that mosquito!! The audacity! Biting me on my lip as I slept! Can you believe that?! I went to survey the damage and sure enough, nice puffy upper lip. Have you ever heard of such a thing?! The good news is that you really can't tell just by looking. I just get to have a nice, full, pouty smile for a day or two.
After applying a layer of benadryl cream as chapstick, I burrowed under the covers for the next hour just waiting to hear him coming to strike again. I imagined him biting my ears, my nose, my fingertips clutching to the covers. Of course I never went back to sleep. I finally admitted defeat and went to get ready for the day. Figured I had extra time on my hands to write a blog post about the whole ordeal. Who did I meet in the bathroom? Stinkin' mosquito! I got him this time. Teach you to ruin my sleep before a big day.
As I reached to turn off my bedside lamp last night, I saw a mosquito fly through the spotlight. I was up and after him in an instant. I can not stand that awful whining, buzzing in my ear or the thought of being eaten alive in the night. I slapped at him a few times and he disappeared. I told myself I got him.
Around 2:30 am, I awakened from a dream that included me having several mosquito bites on my neck and face. Just the thought made me itch all over. I got up and inspected the itchy spots in the light of the bathroom. No bites, just a dream; go back to sleep.
Nothing doing. I could not fall back asleep. I tossed and turned in that weird half-dream state where you get fragments of sleep and dreams are really bizarre. Until around 4:30 am, when I had a dream that a mosquito bit my lip and it swelled to elephant-size proportions and I had to go house hunting like that.
Only this time, my lip really was throbbing even after I woke up. Throbbing! I was so mad at that mosquito!! The audacity! Biting me on my lip as I slept! Can you believe that?! I went to survey the damage and sure enough, nice puffy upper lip. Have you ever heard of such a thing?! The good news is that you really can't tell just by looking. I just get to have a nice, full, pouty smile for a day or two.
After applying a layer of benadryl cream as chapstick, I burrowed under the covers for the next hour just waiting to hear him coming to strike again. I imagined him biting my ears, my nose, my fingertips clutching to the covers. Of course I never went back to sleep. I finally admitted defeat and went to get ready for the day. Figured I had extra time on my hands to write a blog post about the whole ordeal. Who did I meet in the bathroom? Stinkin' mosquito! I got him this time. Teach you to ruin my sleep before a big day.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)