doing the Dunes

We met up with some great friends, up at the Warren Dunes in Michigan, from our old small group back in Fort Wayne. I have known Grabers for quite a long time, pre-Larry even. Knew them from the Harlan Christian Youth Center, where we volunteered. I babysat for their kids, and the oldest one, who was the flower girl in our wedding, is 12, she could watch our girls now! I didn't break out my camera till then end, when it was starting to rain and we were packing up to head home. Maria had a good time with their kids, especially burying one in the sand. Thanks for inviting us to hang with you for the day! We had a great time.

We have plenty to praise God for; friends with history!

sacrifice

As a new parent it started to become evident that life would, in fact, never be quite the same for us. It seems like this is advice you hear, but can't fully understand or grasp until it becomes a reality. Not that we would ever change the fact that we are now parents, but it does cause you to reflect on what your focus in life has now become.

When I was single I was able to do what I wanted, when I wanted ans avoid those things which I didn't care to do. Getting married brings a loving spouse you now desire to please and care for into the mix, and you do some things that maybe before you wouldn't have done, but for their sake. I know I have made my fair share of foodstuffs that I don't necessarily care for, but seeing as my helpmate does, I carry on...okra, eggplant, olives...and in his defense he has also eaten his portion of hominy and I am sure other morsels that he wouldn't choose on his own.
Anyway, all that to say that your selfish single attitude is slowly changed to become more of a servant, sacrificing your comfort or pleasure at times for the benefit of your spouse.

The change to becoming a parent has made me realize all the more that we are selfish by nature, we do strive to care for ourselves and rightly so. However, when you bring forth a helpless child, you realize that selflessness is essential to their nurturing. Selflessness to a point though. I know that if I feel too emptied and drained I am no good to my husband or my children. I can only give so much of myself before I physically, emotionally, spiritually can't give any more, especially if I want to feel "healthy" in all these areas.

I do see ways that my sacrifice can benefit me, and my family, at the same time. For example, giving up my idea of what the week should look like as far as accomplishments and schedule, can be helpful to my daughter as she needs to be able to get her rest in the best way possible. So if that means that this week I am not able to go walking with friends when I had planned, all so she can nap in her bed at the time she wants and needs, then I sacrificed a little to gain her the rest she needs. I guess this is more of an affirmation to myself that this sacrifice will pay off in the future as I have a well-adjusted, healthy child that sleeps well. I know that these are not permanent sacrifices. There will be many challenges and sacrifices as a parent, but knowing that I only have one time to raise my children, and wanting to make the best choices for them, causes me to sacrifice some of what I want to give them what they need.

I was reminded of a couple verses as I was muddling through these thoughts today. Romans 8:18 "I consider that our present sufferings are not worth comparing with the glory that will be revealed in us."
2 Cor. 4:17 "For our light and momentary troubles are achieving for us an eternal glory that far outweighs them all."
Okay, okay I know that these verses are talking about bigger and better things than what I am talking about with sacrifices...but a good reminder that our sacrifices now will reveal wonderful things for us later on, these troubles show us that things are temporary and imperfect, and leads us to look for the perfect and permanent in the eternal glory of Christ.

We have plenty to praise God for; A sacrifice has been made on my behalf by my Savior, Jesus Christ. I can't even begin to compare my sacrifices to His one ultimate sacrifice.

Grissom

Well, we have been having some issues with our computer...so here is part of the pictures from a little outing last Friday. Emily, Larry's sister called and asked if we wanted to meet her at the Grissom Air Museum in Peru, Indiana. She is due to return to work shortly from her maternity leave(like the pun?) and wanted to do something together before then. So we met there and the kids, Maria and Joshua anyway, had a great time. Anna and Zach were not as excited with the airplanes and such being just a couple months old! After checking out the places, helicopters and other cool things, we had a nice picnic lunch there. It was a wonderful day and we enjoyed seeing the nephews and Emily.





We have plenty to praise God for; a memorable time with family.

observations

Some random observations of the girls lately.

Anna:

~really into chewing/sucking on her fist/hand/fingers, any part she can keep in her mouth, which causes us to think she is hungry when she really isn't.

~Has been making these strange sounds, as I told my sister-in-law, she kind of sounds like a cat in heat calling late at night? random? yes!

~She is a super sleeper. Going to bed most nights between 8 and 8:30 and not getting up till about 7:30. I feed and change her when I go to bed around 11.

~Naps are never long, but we'll take the hour we can get any day.

~She tracks people as they move around the room, especially big sister.

Maria:

~"What is that? (dryer just buzzed) Oh, the laundry, I bet."

~"Strawberry shortcake, strawberry shortcake, dormez vous, dormez vous..." She made these lyrics up to Frere Jacques while waiting for Larry to bring some for dessert.

~"Mommy, Daddy is going to work again." (as he left in the morning one day)

~While she was in the tub a few nights ago and had some gas, I asked "What was that?" She replied "Oh, it's just a toot." Just the way she says toot cracks me up!

~She was talking about her friends at dinner one night, and said that she had to go wake Hoonie up, and I asked her what her other friends names were she said "Teeny, Puti, Tunahani, Boobie, Tani and Amy(who is an actual live friend)." We're pretty sure she came up with Boobie all on her own, can't think of where she would have heard it used referring to the female body part. She is often heard walking around the house calling "Boobie, where are you?" "Come here Boobie." Or saying, "I'm going to Boobie's house."

~Lately she has started understanding when we tease her. I'll ask her something that is pretty obviously not true or is silly like "Do you want to eat some grass?, Can Anna walk/talk/eat some pancake?" and she says "no, you're teasing me."

~We were listening to a nursery rhymes CD and in "Goosey, Goosey, Gander" the last line is "I took him by the left leg and threw him down the stairs." She told us, "oh, no, we don't throw people down the stairs." I told her, "no, that's mean" She kept repeating, "that's mean."

~She is loving on Anna more and more each day. She will comfort her when she is crying by saying the things she has heard us say. She likes to cover her up with her beloved "blankie" too, and you know if she is sharing that, she must like you.

~ She is a very compassionate little girl. When she hears someone crying she has to investigate and see what she can do to make them feel better, or just wants to know why they are crying and that it's okay. If we are reading a book she picks up on the emotions of the characters and likes to talk about why they are feeling that way.

We have plenty to praise God for; the everyday is exciting with a 2 month old and a 2 year old.

sunflowers

Yep, these are the gigantic sunflowers...so beautiful.

We have plenty to praise God for; such a variety of beautiful flowers, from the very delicate small to the sturdy large, we can enjoy so many.

new threads for our bed

My mom made us another quilt for our bed. We love the way it goes with the sheets and curtains we already have and it's so colorful. Thanks mom for using your talent to make such a beautiful quilt for us. We love it.

We have plenty to praise God for; a generous talented mom.

a pound heavier

playing in the bushes

eating

some picking

"please I can eat this one?" (She must have said that about 300 times...at least she asked and did so politely!)

a bit of picking

eating

more eating

getting ready to eat

picking out the green ones before eating

eating(grandma is actually picking!)

more eating and yes, grandma is still picking

I think she was actually picking here!...must have been early on!

proof of some actual picking

The few years that we lived over in DeMotte, we had the great fortune to be close to at least 8 or 9 blueberry farms...they like the sandy soil there. Since we had just moved last year, and didn't have a deep freeze, I missed a year of picking blueberries. So, this year since we have the deep freeze and little girl who loves fruit to help us eat them up, we ventured out to the blueberry farm last Saturday. Grandma came along to help us. Maria had a great time picking, I mean picking and eating, the blueberries. She did have her bucket covered on the very bottom at one point. She dumped them into the larger bucket and from that point on basically just ate blueberries. It's a good thing they didn't weigh her before and after picking, we're sure she ate at least a pound.

It had rained in the morning, and by the time we got there it was done, but the bushes were very wet. You had to be careful or you would end up soaked as you reached into the bush to get the nice, big, juicy, ripe berries. In total we ended up with just over 19 and 1/2 pounds.

It was a fun day!

a 4-H winner for sure

Yep, these sunflowers have grown like crazy, and they were the ones we started from seed not seedlings like the other ones in the flower bed that are maybe 4 feet tall. Grandpa was helping Maria try to reach to the top. She was almost there, and considering my dad is about 6'4" that is one tall sunflower! Maybe we should join 4-H.

We have plenty to praise God for; amazingly beautiful flowers.

mom

2 months

Wow, sure seems like time is going quicker the second time around.

Anna weighs in at 12 lb 14oz, 90% and is 24" long, 95%.

Doctor said she looked excellent, and is gaining well. She is a great eater. Usually about 6 feeds during the day. She still takes several short naps during the day. She isn't big on long naps on most days, and then will surprise me with a 4 hour nap some random days. Maria was never a super long napper till later on. Anna does, however, sleep awesome at night. She will usually go down just after Maria about about 8:30 or 9. I go in just before I go to bed around 11 and feed her again. Most times I can change her diaper and feed her and she never wakes up. Good thing I can't eat in my sleep and not know it, I might weigh 500 pounds! She will then sleep most nights till about 7 in the morning. Ahhhh, we love our sleep. How blessed we are to have two girls who are great sleepers.

Anna is starting to be awake more so we are able to interact with her. She has a sweet, calm spirit and loves to smile at us. Doesn't cry much except when she is tired or hungry...hmmm, just like me! She really likes her big sister and looks toward her voice when she talks. We love to hear the coos and babbles she is starting to make. She also received the first of her immunizations today and seems to be a bit fussy, but no major reactions.

We have plenty to praise God for; our healthy 2 month old.

unusual sleeping arrangements

She came into the kitchen and said "my babies are sleeping." She wanted me to come and look. This is the sight I saw. All lined up on the stairs...how cute is that. She loves to put her dolls to bed all over the place, but this is by far the strangest place she has come up with.

We have plenty to praise God for; Maria's imagination.

conjoined squash

Don't you love that we have conjoined twin summer squash. Can you guess what the vegetable of the week is at our house...let's see how many different ways you can eat squash. Actually my favorite is to slice and cook with a little butter and brown sugar. YUM, YUM...sounds good enough to go snack on.

I am going to try and start a little tally system of all the garden produce we get. I have had several people comment that they don't think a garden is worth their time. I am curious what we find out. The time and money we put into it and the results we get out of it.

We have plenty to praise God for; such a yummy variety of good things to eat...imagine just having manna.

take two

How about these two pictures. Which one is which girl? This is kind of fun!

(Mindy now you can't tell by the clothes!)

stir-fry

We enjoyed stir fry tonight that was almost completely from the garden; peas, beans, carrots, squash, zucchini, kohlrabi, peppers. We also had celery and chicken, which aren't from our garden :)

I also had enough veggies to make a stir fry mix and freeze it for later. I froze two gallon size bags of beans and one of peas too. And this is just the beginning of the beans.

We have plenty to praise God for; this garden is going strong.

more bars in more places...

from the big and beautiful to the baby bite size...Bugs Bunny would be jealous.

We have plenty to praise God for; beautiful rains to nourish our garden.

who does she look like?

That is a common question for Anna...you decide. Do you think she and Maria look alike. Can you tell which is which? There are about the same age, wearing almost the same outfit, lying on the same playmat.

at the fair

We visited the local 4-H fair yesterday. We have some friends from church whose kids were showing some sheep, so we wanted to visit them. Maria wasn't super into petting anything, although she did keep insisting that we go look at the roosters...and of course the barn was being judged so it was closed for a while. Larry did manage to sneak on the side between two buildings to let her get her look.

She did pet some goats, and seemed to like the baby ones.

Maria and her pigtails in honor of the pigs, which she doesn't really like. She prefers the stuffed variety.

Feeling the super soft bunnies.

We also got some yummy 4-H ice cream. While I was taking a break to feed Anna, Larry took Maria to look at the rides, which weren't going. We think she was more interested in the carousel horses than anything real!

It was a fun, cheap way to spend our Monday afternoon.

smiles

Those first few smiles are hard to capture, but oh so precious.

imagination

What a fun stage to watch Maria go through. She is constantly making up words, stories, songs...you name it. She doesn't have that fear that we develop as adults that someone will laugh at what we have imagined. Such innocence.

Here is a video of her playing with the Connect 4 game...no idea how to play, but making up her own way, and that's totally fine with her, she doesn't care about the "correct" way, nor should she.

At the end of the video I was asking her how old she is, which she normally answers correctly, and where she lives...Culver, Indiana is there but very run together.

It is quite amusing to us when we are out and about to have people comment on how quiet she is, because at home she is very good at narrating and jabbering about things.

Things overhead:

"Bolt, Bolt where are you"(we watched an animated movie about a dog named Bolt) She then was seen running around with a belt that was her dog's leash, she said she was walking her dog.

"the big bad wolf is going to get me" (She really liked that story too)

"I baby bear" (Then she goes on to say that daddy is papa bear and I am mama bear)

summer fun at the beach

My friend Dorte with her little boy Jonas in the floatie car, the two girls belong to my friend Kim. (There were 3 other moms and there also...I just didn't take very many pictures)

Yes, we have a beach here in Culver...yes, we know you are probably jealous. It's on Lake Maxinkuckee...that is a mouthful huh? I just wish I really enjoyed the beach. I have never really liked the sand. At least this is freshwater. I really don't like salt water. Good thing I wasn't born near the ocean. Perhaps I would love it then huh? Anyway. We had an impromptu get together with a bunch of other moms and their kids on Monday. Maria was more interested in the sand than the water, which was good considering Anna was more interested in eating than anything else!

We have plenty to praise God for; a nearby beach to help cool us off this summer.