Oh Quinn

Oh Quinn, you are becoming just like momma :)

You LOVE lotion and chap stick.  You know how to put chap stick on and blot your lips together and are obsessed with getting lotion anytime I use it.  In the mornings, when I put on my face lotion, you like to put some on your face too.  SO cute.  You also started pulling out the chair that covers the heater vent in the dining room and sitting on it while the heat is on which is something I always do because I hate being cold and I love sitting by the heater vent, even when I was a kid I would do that.  You are a sweet and funny girl, giving lots of hugs and kisses, but sometimes you get a little too excited and also bite, which your friends do not like, so we are working on that.

Earlier today we finally dug our way out of the snow and got out of the house.  We went to visit Jude.  You were so excited to see him.  You gave him so many hugs and kisses and he would just smile at you, so sweet.  You shared some Cheerios and did "Ring Around the Rosie" several times.  Then you jumped in the crib together and played.

You are 19 months old now.  You love blackberries, blueberries, grapefruit, bananas, peanut butter, cereal, and crackers.  You are very good at communicating- you ask for help, tell me what you want to eat, tell me if you want to go outside or downstairs, etc.  You are also getting good at following directions like bringing me shoes or a book or throwing a tissue in the trashcan.  You love Bosco and Ozark and LOVE to give them their treats each time we leave the house.  Yesterday you even got to fill up their food bowls.  Your fine motor skills are amazing when it comes to getting into things you want to explore.  You can unscrew (and sometimes re-screw on) tiny lotion bottle caps, open chap stick, and even unzip my makeup bag.

I love you sooooo much!  You will be a wonderful and loving big sister and teach that baby so much.

Oh baby

Oh little baby, you are making me so sick :(  I've wanted to blog but I mostly lay in bed every chance I get because I've been so nauseous all day long.  This is especially hard when you are snowed in for several days with a toddler whose full of energy.  I know I had this all day morning sickness with Quinn as well, so hopefully it will be over in a few (5.5) weeks when I start the second trimester.  That seems so far away but I've started taking some medicine that helps a bit and we will have to get through it the best we can. 

I am very excited for my 1st midwife appointment on March 12th.  I hope that we get to hear your heartbeat!  Okay, enough for now, I am wiped out, time for bed.  I love you sweet tiny baby and my sweet Quinn.

Snow day!

Even all day morning sickness can't keep me from enjoying a snowy day with my little Snow Angel! Quinn was having so much fun, I had to bribe her with the promise of a warm bubble bath to get her to come inside. :)

hello little baby

Hello little baby, I am your momma.  You are the size of a poppy seed and I just found out about you this morning.  So you can imagine that I am in a bit of shock.  I don't even know why I took the pregnancy test, I really didn't think it would be positive, I'm not even late yet.  It certainly doesn't feel real and Daddy doesn't even know yet.  I'm going to tell him when he gets back in town on Thursday, which just happens to be Valentine's Day.  What a perfect gift you are.  I am in shock, but I wanted to say hi.  I thank God for you my baby, my love.  I already feel my heart starting to expand.  Your big sister will be so excited to meet you. 

A Girl and Her Dog

A Girl and Her Dog
(Oh my you are a cutie.)

A Girl and Her Daddy
(A love how Jeff is doing all the coloring and Quinn is playing with the marker cap on her finger.)

 

Warm Days in February

This past weekend Aunt Chrissy came to visit!  You had so much fun with her that you even wanted her to read you your book before nap instead of me!  It was the sweetest thing when you would reach out to her and say "Chrissy".  We also went to Kaleidoscope and Funville, the new and awesome exhibit at Crown Center.

We went back to Funville yesterday with Josie, Caleb, and Abby.  Then, after nap, we spend the afternoon in the back yard, just you and me, and made "bubble dough".  Bubble Dough is just liquid dish soap mixed with corn starch (that stuff is amazing!) and it made a great dough that was stretchy and squishy.  You played with it for a long time.  We rolled it into balls and threw them and rolled them down the slide, we stretched it and watched it break, we squished it and smashed it, you even tasted it (of course).  It felt sooooo good to get outside on a warm sunny day in February and get messy and creative.

Then we ate some cherry tomatoes which reminded me of our summer/fall days filled with you standing by the garden where we grew our cherry tomatoes, reaching up to the chicken wire, and signing "more" for me to pick some for you to eat or to lift you up to pick your own off the tall branches.  Yesterday I loved watching your sweet little hands holding and rolling the tomatoes before popping them in your mouth.

So God Made a Mother

It's only Tuesday, and it's been mess, after mess, after mess, this week.  And on top of that, emotions from several different broken areas of life are bubbling up inside me and overflowing through tears and outbursts and impatience.  And for that I am sorry.  I am not perfect and I need grace.  This has been a hard week, and it's only Tuesday.  But the Lord provides if I just stop and listen.  I just read this refreshment for my soul from A Holy Experience.

...God had said –
I need someone to get up at midnight and scoop the most fragile of humanity close to her warmth and rock though she can hardly stand and nourish though she’s mostly sleep-starved and change the diaper and the sheets and the leaked on, leaked through, and leaked down clothes though she’ll have to change them in the morning and next week and that won’t change for years.
So God made a Mother.

That God had said I need somebody with a strong heart.
Strong enough for toddler tantrums and teenage testing, yet broken enough to fall on her knees and pray, pray, pray.
Someone who knows that in every hard place is exactly where you extend grace, who looks a hopeful child in the eye and says yes, even though she knows every yes means a mess but this is how you bless, who has the courage to keep letting go because she’s holding on to Me.
So God made a mother.

God said I need somebody who can shape a soul and find shoes on Sunday mornings and get grass stains out of Levis.
And make dinner out of nothing and do it again 79, 678 times, and keep kids off the road and out of the toilet and in clean underwear and mainly alive though she’s mainly losing her mind and will put in an 80 hour week by Wednesday night and just do one more load of laundry.
And one more sink of crusted burnt pots.
And keep on going another eighty hours because raising generations matters and weaving families matters and tying heart strings matters and these people here matter.
So God made a mother…

It had to be somebody who could comb back pigtails and tie up skates just-right tight.
Who could pretend she remembered algebra and how to get home from here and that really, she was just fine, that it must just be the silly onions.
Somebody who would run for the catch, jump on a trampoline and play one fierce game of soccer and not give a thought to all those labors and her weak pelvic floor. Somebody who’d stay up late with a science project that never ends, who’d get up early for the game in the rain, somebody who’d wave at the door until the taillights were out of sight and still be smiling brave.
So God made a mother.

It had to be somebody willing to keep loving when it made no sense because that’s what love does.
Somebody who knew that patience is a willingness to suffer.
That joy is always possible because there is always, always something to be thankful for.
And that life is not an emergency but a gift — so just. slow. down. There are children at play here and we don’t want anyone to get hurt and the hurry makes us hurt.
Somebody willing to feed and lead, lay down her life and pick up her cross, give of her time because they have her heart. Someone who knows that we all blow it — and what matters is what we then do after.
Someone who could humble herself into the tender sorry that covers a multitude of sins.
And who’d bow her head at night over the girl asleep with the doll in the crook of her arm — and thank her Father for this hidden life that’s the turning gear for the a whole spinning world.
So God made a mother. . . .