First Day of Preschool

She was so excited, we could hardly get her to eat her breakfast.

Here she is all ready to go.

Going in.

Going up the stairs.  This is where she told me she needed a break from all the pictures.  :)

Waiting to go in.

She was the first one in the door!

Heading to class...finally!

Arriving at her classroom.

Going in.  A little tired of being asked to wait so we could take pictures.

Her very own spot for her things.

Giving Mommy big hugs before going in.

She was so excited, and had a wonderful time. I have never seen a child so ready to go to school. I miss her company, but I am so happy for her to finally get to go to school.

Replace or Redo?

We got a new washing machine yesterday, and as I was putting the laundry room back together, I discovered that the hampers I had previously used no longer fit with the new washer and dryer. My first thought was, “what can I get to replace these that would work better.” I immediately thought of a set of hampers we recently purchased for our closet. They would work perfect. I went and got one out of the closet to try it out. As I was making my new plan, I realized that the old hampers were still useful. I did not need to completely replace them with something else. I simply needed to restructure them to make them fit the new arrangement. I did some measuring, made a plan, and got to work. I took the hamper apart, shortened each piece as needed, and then put it all back together. Just like that, I had a completely functional hamper without having to go find something new and waste what I already had.


You may be thinking, “here comes another go green environmentalist message.” No, not this time.  So, why am sharing this silly story about my laundry hamper? Well, as I finished resizing my hamper and put it back in the laundry room, I felt like God started speaking to me about it in relation to our lives. Sometimes, we think we hear something from God or maybe even feel like we have discovered a gift/talent He has given to us, but when we go to act on it, the results are disappointing. Things don’t happen the way we envisioned. Maybe nothing happens at all, or worse, maybe things go terribly wrong. I think many times at that point, we assume we didn’t hear God, and it is not a “fit” for us. We decide to scrap it completely and find something new to replace it. I am wondering today if maybe sometimes God is asking us, not to throw those things away, but instead reassess and see if there might be some way to restructure them and try again.


For example, for us, we really felt God tell us to begin pursuing adoption about two years ago. We began working with a wonderful, Christian agency in November 2008 pursuing domestic adoption. We completed the process in April 2009 and began to wait. We heard nothing for months, but God had continued to burden our hearts concerning orphans and children in need. We kept waiting. At the end of October we felt sure we were supposed to adopt, but nothing had happened. Over the months we waited, God began restructuring our vision. We knew we were called to adopt, and we felt like we were doing everything we could to obey, but nothing was happening. We began to reconsider what we had heard and where we were. God challenged us a little at a time to revamp our picture of adoption and begin pursuing a different path to adopt…foster care. Yeah, I know, “I could never do that.” We said that too, but God changed our hearts and our motives. We began, as selfish as it sounds, pursuing adoption to add to our family. We are now seeking to be a home for His children…not just find a child for our home.

When we committed to pursue adoption, we stepped out in obedience; yet, we felt like we hit a wall.  We could have given up. It was tempting at times to think we had missed God. We could have looked at adoption like my old laundry hamper. It looked good at one time, but just didn’t seem to fit anymore. Thankfully, God showed us how to refit our vision with His. We are still headed toward adoption. We are just going a different way to get there.

More on that later…

Happy Birthday, Sweet Ashlynn Kate!

1 day old

3 months old

1 year old

2 years old

3 years old!

Our world is so much brighter, happier, louder, and more fun with you!

I thank my God upon every remembrence of you.

Phillippians 1:3

"Earrings"

This morning Ashlynn was coloring and making a sticker page and asked me if these stickers were earrings.  I said, "no, but you can wear them like earrings for fun."  I put them on her ears and she said, "now I look like a Mommy."  Here she is with her "earrings."

More Fun in the Snow

We had a blast playing in the snow this morning.  It is so deep in our yard, Ashlynn could hardly walk.

Snowman...or a Hippo??

It has snowed all day here.  We have never seen anything like it.  Tonight when Austin got home, we all went out to play and build a snowman.  We had so much fun playing together in the snow.  When we finished, we showed Ashlynn the snowman and she said, "no, it's a hippo."  When she decides something, it is hard to convince her otherwise, so she when she was on the phone with Juju tonight, she told her about her hippo in the snow.  Too funny.  Here are some pictures.  The last one is my favorite.  :)

Getting Bundled Up

Ready to go out in the snow

Getting Started

Playing in all the snow

Daddy putting on the finishing touches

Our Snowman/Hippo

PRESENTING...Our Little Dancer

The fact that she is dancing is not by any means new. Ashlynn has practically been dancing since she entered this world. She loves music and has never been able to sit still when she hears it, especially when it comes to worship. She has expressed such an interest and excitement in dance lately, that we have decided to put in her dance class. She will start her first class this week where she will learn Ballet, Tap, and Tumbling. She is beyond excited. Here she is showing off some of her new dance clothes and tap
shoes.




 

                              

A Few of Her Favorite Things Lately

Babies

Legos (and more babies)!

And, as always, being cute!

A Christmas to Remember

This will definitely be a Christmas to remember for us - the joy, the snow, the fun times with family - it has been amazing.  There is something about experiencing Christmas through the eyes of a little one that is life changing in the best of ways.  Little things become big and some unnecessarily big things seem small amidst the incredible hope and anticipation found within a child's heart.

We have made so many memories this year with Ashlynn being just the right age to begin to understand and participate in all the joys of the holidays.  We have baked together, shopped together, wrapped together, sung Christmas carols together, admired all the pretty lights together, and most importantly we've begun to unwrap the incredible gift of Jesus together.  It is so small at this age, and yet so very significant.

One of my favorite memories from this year is Ashlynn getting her very own nativity set.  We bought one and put it out on a table where she could see and touch it.  We wanted her to experience the story of Christmas in whatever way she could as a two year old.  Well, I kept finding an empty manger.  Jesus was constantly disappearing.  Then, one day I asked Ashlynn to show me where she kept putting baby Jesus.  She took me to a small red gift box, opened it up, and there he lay.  Later, I realized there was no better place for Jesus to be than wrapped in a beautiful gift box, waiting to be opened...the story of Christmas illustrated best by a two year old.

This year, I hope to present my Jesus, as the gift He is, to all those around us.  Happy New Year!