Happy 9 Months Rayah!

My little baby girl is already 9 months old and she’s not so little any more!  She weighed in at 23 lb. 12 oz. and is around 29 3/4 inches long.  She officially outgrew her infant carseat, so we purchased one of these combo infant-child-booster seats that can still be used rear-facing for now and which she can grow into as well.  She is a chunky-monkey and I love her chubby rolls – she is so squishable and loveable in all her soft, mushy goodness! 

She has also been teething pretty much all month and has four teeth on the top to show for it!  This has also allowed her to start eating some new foods & loves chomping on rice crackers or a baby carrot or apple slice or french fries.   She often cries while we’re feeding her if we don’t go fast enough or when she’s done her bottle, because she’s so sad it’s over!  Here she is showing off her teeth in her classic under-bite smile.    Oh, and don’t you just love the little curl of hair she has in the  front – so cute!

She loves standing while we hold her hands and it makes her very happy to be standing, which is quite different from Justice, who would just go limp if we tried to hold his hands and have him stand or walk.  She’s also trying to crawl and will desperately try to move forwards toward a toy or something, but inevitably ends up pushing herself backwards into a corner.    However, she can scootch quite a distance acoss the floor while sitting on her bum!

Video – Bouncing

She’s responding to her name and laughing more and has added “mamamama” and “baba” to her extensive vocabulary of “dada”, “gaga” and “yaya”.    The videos below the pictures show her growling noises that she sometimes makes while eating that just crack me up (skip to about 0:35), as well as some funny noises she was making one day during her bath.

Video – Growly Eater

Video – Noisy Bather

She’s sleeping unswaddled on her stomach at night, but I’ve still been swaddling her for her naps, just because it seems to help her sleep better and longer.  She’s also learning how to open drawers and cupboard doors, except that most of them are already babyproofed, much to her frustration.

She loves sitting and playing in the water at the splash park and we’ve really been enjoying going there as a family once or twice a week!

Lastly, I’ve really been noticing several differences this month between Rayah and Justice as her unique personality is really becoming apparent.  She is more serious, more sensitive, more delicate, and more of a mama’s girl (“plays strange” with a lot of people and doesn’t like it if mommy leaves the room) while Justice is always laughing, is tough as nails most times, and loves people!  She’s also really funny – making Justice and Joe and I laugh a lot, determined, curious, and simply beautiful.

Justice – 2 years 4 months

I suppose it’s time to give an update on Justice, since I don’t think I’ve written much about him since his second birthday!

1.  Big Boy Bed. Shortly after he turned 2, Justice officially transitioned from his crib to his big boy bed!  He loves his sports bedding, jumping on his bed, climbing on his bed, rolling around on his bed, etc.  He also LOVES snuggling and every nap and night he asks, “Snuggle with mommy/daddy?”  It’s very sweet.

2.  Terrible Twos?  He started throwing some pretty epic tantrums, falling to the floor, yelling, crying, etc., but thankfully these did not occur too often in public.  Mostly it was at home, happening in respones to any occassion where he did not get his way.   He also learned the joy of saying, “NO!” repeatedly and began to hit, kick, swat, bite, and headbutt!  While it drove me a little batty for a couple months, with some consistent and firm discipline, along with much prayer and supplication, things have improved dramatically and he is learning to be much more obedient.  I think our biggest struggle at this time is getting him to come to us when we call him – all he ever does is run away from us!

3.  Singing Songs.  Justice has developed a real love for songs and will often request his favorites, one of which is “Happy Birthday”, ever since his birthday party.   He also loves the ”Bob the Builder” song, “Jesus Loves Me”, “Jesus Loves the Little Children”, “Father Abraham”, “Jesus is Alive”, etc.  I love listening to him try to sing songs on his own and how he loves listening to the worship music from the prayer room!  In addition to singing, Justice also loves instruments – whether it’s Daddy’s guitar, Mommy’s piano, or anything that you can hit with a stick and it’ll make a noise.

 
(Video of Justice playing drums)

4.  Dancing!  Justice has developed quite the unique dancing skills!  His signature move is jumping up and down while pointing up to the ceiling with his hands, alternating between the left and right, while throwing in the occassional hip twist motion – it’s quite entertaining and tiring to watch!   He loves to dance whenever he hears music or even just a good beat.  He has endless amounts of energy and has dubbed his signature move the “hotdog dance” after the one he watches on Mickey Mouse Playhouse.

(Video of Justice dancing)

5.  Running!  “RUN!  CHASE!!  GET YOU!!!”  These are the repeated commands we hear shouted with much enthusiasm multiple times every day!  Usually this is followed by the name of whoever he wants to chase him, such as “RUN!!  MOMMY!!  RUN!!  DADDY!!  RUN!!  RAYAH!!”  His favorite is when Rayah “chases” him, as we hold in our arms and run after him.   He could run all day long and nothing makes him happier than to have somebody run after him.  But it’s really only fun if we also catch him.  If he finds he’s been running too long, he’ll stop so we can catch him and inevitably tickle him like crazy!

6.  “TRUCKS!!! MOTORBIKES!!! ECHOVATORS!!!”  Justice has an obsessive passion for pretty much any type of motor vehicle of any kind and loves to yell them out very enthusiastically every time he sees them.  It makes for very interesting drives as he has to point out each one – and he knows them all!    Truck, big rig, echovator (excavator), backhoe loader, tractor, car, motorbike, bike, combine, skidsteer, cement mixer, dump truck, ambulance, fire truck, garbage truck, etc. etc.  He loves it when we go driving by construction sites and also had a great time visiting a local fire station with his Uncle who is a volunteer fireman!  (Click on the photo to see the full-size version & his great expression!)

7.  Escape Artist.  Justice has escaped the house on several occassions – one time we found him on the neighbor’s yard barefoot in his pajamas.  Another time he ran outside naked after his bath!  Another time he was in his pajamas and has the foresight to put on his rubber boots to go out in the rain.   We have had to be much more diligent about locking our main entrance doors and making sure the fence gate is always closed!

8.  Mud & Water.  Justice loves playing with dirt, water, and consquently mud!  He’s eaten his share of mud pies already this spring and will often get completely drenched after playing with his water table.  For his love of water though, he doesn’t seem to enjoy being wet, as he will then come inside and tell me, “Too wet! Very wet! Change?” 

9.  Big Brother.  Justice is learning to be a very good big brother!   He loves it when he can make her smile or laugh and one time, he said to her, “C’mere Rayah!” while stretching out his arms to her.  So I sat him down and put Rayah in his lap so he could hold her, and then he said, “Back and forth, love you forever” from the popular children’s book by Robert Munsch where the mother rocks her baby “back and forth” and sings the song I’ll Love You Forever.  It was so sweet!  He will often bring her toys to play with, which can be very helpful!  Unfortunately, in the pictures below, he also decided to share his muddy shovel with her.

  

10.  Athletic!  Justice not only loves running and dancing, but he loves anything athletic!  He has learned how to do somersaults, likes to buck like a horse, loves to kick and throw any type of ball, can do a one-handed dunk with his little basketball into the hoop, loves to climb anything and everything, and basically keeps us on our toes at all times!

11.  Funny!  With his extensive vocabulary that just keeps growing and growing, he is often saying funny things that make us laugh.  Most of his sayings probably come from books we read him, movies he watches, or things he hears us saying, but they sound so comical coming from him.   Like the time he put the phone to his ear and said, “Very interesting!  Are you kidding?” or the time he randomly said, “Sky falling! Holy smokes! So smart!” or my personal favorite, when he said, “Don’t hit JESUS!” while swatting vigorously at the air!    He often asks, “What happened? What’s the matter?  Why you do dat?  Where’s ____ (Daddy, Rayah, Gramma, Grandpa, etc.)?  Sound like fun?  Go for ride in the van?  Try some?  Pwwwwweeeeese?”  Some of his other favorite sayings are, “Sure!  Oh my goodness!  Yes I can!  Apologize!  Oh jeepers!  I think so!  Woohoo!”  And lastly, since we are often having to tell him to stop hitting, or stop whining, or stop kicking or whatever, he has taken to telling others what he wants them to stop doing, like to Rayah, “Stop crying!” or to the birds, “Stop chirping!  Stop flying!” – hahaha!

12.  Potty Training!  We have been in the throes of potty training for the past two weeks, and while there have been times of utter frustration, we seem to be making great progress and I am very proud of him!  I will probably write an entire post about our potty training adventures, but so far I think it’s going really good and we’ve had several accident-free days!

What else can I say other than “I love this kid!”

Happy 8 Months Rayah!

Two days ago, Rayah turned 8 months old!  While I would like to do these updates every month, I seem to only get to them every 2 months, so here goes…

Eating/Drinking – Rayah is eating a good variety of solid foods and has liked everything I’ve given her so far.   Also, as of June 8th, she is officially weaned from breastfeeding and loves drinking her bottles of formula.  She looks so cute holding it all by herself!  She has eaten some rice cracker by herself too. Along with be weaned, I cut out all night-time feedings – hooray!

  

Health – in May she got a bad yeast infection on her bum that just didn’t want to go away, so that was a bit of a battle and meant that we needed to used disposable diapers so that we could use cream on her bum.  Since then, we haven’t gone back to her cloth diapers and probably won’t go back.  The same thing happened with Justice and once you switch to disposable diapers, it’s hard to be motivated to do cloth again.   It seems like she’s also been teething for 3 months straight with nothing to show for it, but FINALLY it looks like another tooth is about to break through any day now on the top!  Also, I’m not sure how much she weighs – I need to go find out – but she is a big, fat, cute, heavy, chubby muffin! 

Firsts – Rayah went swimming and swinging for the first time!  She looks so adorable in her little pink tankini.  

She visited Auntie Nicole’s house for the first time.  She had her first nights away from mommy & daddy so that we could attend a conference that our house of prayer put on.  She did good with Grandma, but unfortunately she decided to play strange with Grandpa and would just wail and cry whenever he tried to hold her!    She also got a bumbo chair, which she has mixed feelings about, but which is super handy!

Sleeping – Rayah now goes to bed at 7:30pm and sleeps until 6:30am, which is soooo wonderful!  Her napping has fluctuated in consistency, but she has been doing really good lately.  We cut out her evening nap, so now she only has 2 naps every day at 9am and 1pm and she usually naps from 1 1/2 – 2 hours, sometimes more.  She definitely sleeps much better than Justice did and most of the time I can just swaddle her and lay her down and she falls asleep on her own, which Justice never did until MUCH later!  She has rolled onto her stomach in the night while still in her swaddle, which she hasn’t been too happy about, but has then eventually fallen asleep again.  I tried to put her to sleep unswaddled for her naps, which she was okay with one day, but then raged at me when I tried it again the next day, so I will keep on swaddling her for a bit longer.

Development – Rayah has mastered sitting on her own, which has also made life much easier!  It’s so great to be able to sit her down with some toys around her and have her sit and play contentedly.  I love watching her play with her toys and discover new things! 

 

She has also laughed a couple times with a new chuckle at something Justice has done that she thought was funny.  She tends to be more serious than Justice and it takes more to get her to laugh, so I’m always trying to pay attention to what she finds amusing – mostly she just likes getting tickled!   She likes to clap her feet together and can stand on her own for a short time while holding onto a couch. 

She has played strange with a few more people, but not everybody, so I’m not sure why she picks certain people that she doesn’t like.  She is definitely a mama’s girl and hates it when I leave her sight and will wail and cry – sigh – this is something I never really had to deal with with Justice, since he always loved all people.   Lastly, in addition to gurgling and blowing spit bubbles, she has a vast vocabulary consisting of “dada, yaya, gaga”!

Other – We had our dedication service for Rayah where we took time to dedicate her to the Lord and have friends and family bless and pray over her, for her future and destiny, and for us as her parents, that He would give us everything we need to raise her well, for His glory!

  

Book Review: Sacred Parenting by Gary Thomas

A friend of mine lent me their copy of Gary Thomas’s book Sacred Parenting several months ago and I finally finished it!  It didn’t take me this long to read because it was unenjoyable - on the contrary, it was so full of depth and rich words that I needed the extra time to chew on what he wrote.  In fact, now that I’m done, I think I’m going to read it again and perhaps write some further posts on how this book spoke to me personally on the subject of “How Raising Children Shapes Our Souls”.  Seriously, if you have ever thought that you might want to have children, if you are married and considering having kids, if you are currently pregnant, or if you already have children, I would absolutely and totally recommend this book!  In fact, go out and buy it right now – for real!  This book has really encouraged and challenged me as a mother and many of the author’s points struck home for me.  I’m now asking myself a lot of questions…

How is God making me holy through parenting?

Am I allowing my kids to experience challenges and pain for their own spiritual good?

How do I deal with mommy guilt and my failures as a parent?

Am I listening to the Holy Spirit for His guidance as I mother my kids?  How can I take advantage of the benefits of prayer as well as enter into my responsibility and calling to pray for my kids? 

Do I find great joy in parenting my kids?  How can I enter into greater levels of joy as a mom?

God, how do I deal with anger when my kids are driving me to the point of boiling, burning rage?

How can I look past the mundane, the puke and poop, the temper tantrums, and see the eternal glory and rewards on the other side?

How can I learn to embrace the challenges and trials of parenting, knowing that it is producing in me great perseverance? 

What truly matters in the things I give myself to daily?  What kind of spiritual inheritance am I leaving for my kids?

What characteristics, good and bad, am I reproducing in my kids?  What areas do I want to change so that my kids don’t have to suffer from the same character flaws that I do?

What am I willing to sacrifice for my children’s benefit?  And can I sacrifice these things joyfully, without holding it against them? 

Can I trust God with my children’s lives?  Can I trust God with their next breath, with their future, their destiny, and even the possibilty of my own death?

Wow.  I know that’s a lot.  There’s a lot to think about and pray about.  I can get a little overwhelmed at times, feeling like I am so inadequate as a mom and like there are SO many areas that God needs to work on in me, but in the end, I am left feeling encouraged that God knows exactly what He is doing and that He has designed my parenting journey perfectly, just for me!  My kids have been handpicked by God and lovingly placed into our family so that we can be made holy.  As the author says to close his book, “Being a parent is a sacred calling”.

Family Fun

Yesterday, Joe and I went to take out our new double stroller for a walk with the kids to have a picnic lunch at a nearby park.  It was a cool spring afternoon, so we needed to bundle up a bit, but we were looking forward to going out for some fresh air and to let Justice run around and play.  However, it’s not unusual for things to get a little chaotic when trying to prepare for a family outing and we were both getting a little frazzled.  As we were walking down our driveway, Joe was getting frustrated with something and sort of snapped at me, so in response, both to express my frustration and to also try and lighten the mood a little, I growled loudly, “WE’RE TRYING TO HAVE SOME FAMILY FUN, FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!”  Now, I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a similar situation – I wasn’t really angry, I just wanted to vent in an overly exaggerated way to bring attention to the fact that we were being silly to get so uptight.  Before I did though, I did briefly look around and saw that there was nobody in sight, as I didn’t exactly want to throw a fit in the public eye.  But not a few seconds after my little vent, we heard a chuckle and saw our next door neighbor sitting on his front step talking on his phone and we knew that he had heard me.  I couldn’t help laughing and thought it was terribly funny and it kept me laughing throughout our little excursion.  Just a little reminder that there is always someone watching and to be careful what you say and do!   But we did have a good time with the kids and enjoyed our family fun time together.

 

A Pleasing Offering – Part 3

A continuation… (Read Part 1 and Part 2)

In Romans 13:8, 9, Paul writes that all of the commandments in the law are fulfilled if we will just love one another and that all of the commandments could be summed up by the command, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”. While the Scriptures themselves command me to be a woman of the Word and to meditate on it daily and to pray unceasingly, if I do those things and neglect to love my children, I have missed it! Matthew 23:23 has Jesus rebuking the religious leaders saying, “Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you pay tithe of mint and anise and cumin, and have neglected the weightier matters of the law: justice and mercy and faith. These you ought to have done without leaving the others undone.” It is a religious spirit that causes us to get so focused on performing the duties of being a Christian that we forget what truly matters – justice, mercy, faith and love. They were offering to God what was required by the law, but they had missed what He truly desired to receive from them.

For me, while this new revelation has deeply impacted my heart, it is still difficult to put into action. I have found it difficult to lay down my desires for how I want to worship God and what I want to offer Him in order to seek what He wants. While I may be fixated upon getting time to read my Bible or pray, if I were to stop and ask Him, “What offering do you want from me, God?” perhaps His answer would be, “Play with your son” or “Rest your body” or “Go for a walk with your husband” or “Call your friend and pray for her need” or “Sing a song to me” or “Hold your daughter while she cries” or any number of things that I previously wouldn’t have considered as being a valid offering of worship unto God. Somewhere along the line, I forgot that I am actually loving God when I love people! I think there will also be times when He would ask of me to read my Bible or pray, but the point is that I don’t assume what He wants and that I am willing to give up my way of doing things for His way. To have a broken and contrite spirit like David wrote about in Psalm 51:16-17 requires that I submit my will to God and set aside my own selfish desires – not an easy thing to do!

As Romans 12:1 says, “…present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God…”

A Pleasing Offering – Part 2

A continuation… (Read Part 1 here)

My husband gave me a word from the Lord, “You want to give an offering to God your way instead of His way.”

I immediately was convicted by the truth of his statement and realized that though my initial desire to spend time in the Word and in prayer was good and honorable, that I had never bothered to ask the Lord what kind of offering He desired! And perhaps that was the problem with Cain in Genesis 4. Perhaps he saw that Abel was giving an offering to God and in his own desire to please God, he strove to present something to God out of his own strength, instead of first asking the Lord what type of offering would please Him? I have done this countless times – I see what someone else is able to offer to God, by spending hours in Bible study or intercession, and then I feel that I want to do the same, regardless of whether or not that is what the Lord is asking of me. I so easily feel pressured by what the apparent standard is for being a “good Christian” and I strive to please God by checking off chapters on a Bible-reading plan or logging the hours I’ve put in through prayer. Only, I’m usually left feeling like it is never enough and that I can never attain to this elusive super-Christian status. I want to give God an offering my way, based on my desires and my strength, and I just set myself up for failure.

Why has it never occurred to me before to ask God what type of offering or worship He would like from me?? Yet this is the very same trap that the Israelites fell into several times. King Saul is a prime example, for when he was commanded by God to kill every person and animal in a particular tribe, he kept the best of the animals to present as an offering to God instead. And was God impressed by this extravagant gift? Not at all. In 1 Samuel 15:22-23, the Lord says this,

“Has the Lord as great delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obey is better than sacrifice…”

Saul had his own idea of what would please God, but completely disregarded what the Lord had commanded him to do and in so doing, missed out on what He truly desired. As a result of this act of disobedience, Saul was rejected as king of Israel and the Lord began to seek for a man who was truly after His own heart. This brings me to David, who was perhaps one of the few who really sought God’s heart and sought to discover what He delighted in. In Psalm 51:16-17, he writes this,

“For You do not desire sacrifice, or else I would give it; You do not delight in burnt offering. The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit, a broken and contrite heart – these, O God, You will not despise.”

It seems strange, that the very sacrifices and offerings that God commanded His people to offer Him were the very things that they would get tripped up on, thinking that these outward signs of worship were what He desired, when what He really wanted was their hearts. In Isaiah 1:11-17, the Lord rebukes Israel, saying that He has come to despise their sacrifices and that their incense has become an abomination to Him because of the sinful lives they were living. If I put myself into this story, I might be looking for God’s approval after reading for an hour in my Bible, only for Him to find it an unacceptable offering, since it was given at the cost of treating my children without love.

To be continued…

A Pleasing Offering – Part 1

Perhaps you are familiar with this feeling – you have a hunger and a desire to spend time with the Lord and when other responsibilities, events, or people get in the way, it’s almost as though they become your enemy. This is a good feeling to have when the things that hinder you from loving God are sinful or fruitless activities or relationships, since we need to be tenacious and violent in our pursuit of God and willing to forsake our other “lovers”. However, what do you do when the thing that’s getting in your way is your own flesh and blood – a screaming toddler or a hungry baby?

This was where I found myself the other day – longing and aching to fulfill that desire to spend long hours reading my Bible and communing with Jesus, only to be continuously thwarted at every turn by my own dear children. It didn’t take long before there was a pent-up ball of fiery rage burning on the inside of me and I just wanted to scream and cry and yell at the unfairness of it all (and in fact, I did scream and cry some). This is the paradox of parenting – how this little human being whom you love so deeply also seems to bring out the worst in you by exposing all your selfish motives!

But this is not what I wanted to share with you – it is just how the story begins. That evening, as I was ready to fall apart at the seams and break down once again, my dear husband turned in his Bible to Genesis 4, which tells the story of Cain and Abel. I’m sure you are familiar with this famous tale of the very first murder, but it begins with what appears to be a sincere offering to God on Cain’s part. He brought an offering of his crops to the Lord, while his brother Abel brought the firstborn of his flock. The Lord accepted Abel’s offering, but not Cain’s. At this, Cain became very angry and the Lord asks him, “Why are you angry? And why has your countenance fallen? If you do well, will you not be accepted? And if you do not do well, sin lies at the door. And its desire is for you, but you should rule over it.”

To be completely honest, when reading this, it is tempting to side with Cain and wonder why the Lord was so hard on him? What was wrong with Cain’s offering? Why wasn’t it good enough? Wouldn’t you be angry and upset too? Must we strive to gain God’s approval and acceptance? Like Cain, I had an offering I desired to give to the Lord – I wanted to offer Him my time and focused devotion – and when that didn’t work out for me, I became angry and began to take it out on my own family members, even as Cain took out his anger on his brother Abel.

Now was there anything wrong with my desire? Was there anything wrong with wanting to spend time reading my Bible or praying? Of course not! But, here is where it hit home for me when my husband said to me, by the Holy Spirit’s prophetic inspiration,

“You want to give an offering to God your way instead of His way.”

Ouch!

To be continued…

Justice – 21 months, Rayah – 6 weeks

Time for the monthly update on the kids!  In November, we had the opportunity to fly with our kids to Alberta to visit Joe’s family for a week.  This was the first flight for both of them and they both did really great!  Rayah slept for both flights and Justice was pretty good at keeping entertained with daddy for the flight there & then he also slept for the flight back.  Since we both had the kids on our laps and there are only 4 oxygen masks per row, we had to be separated and I sat in front of Joe, but it was all okay, seeing as it was only a 2 hour flight and perhaps it was better that way anyways, since Rayah would probably have been a distraction to Justice.

Our week there was really great and it was awesome to see Joe’s parents, sisters, one brother-in-law and his nieces and nephews!  None of them had met Justice yet (besides Joe’s parents) and of course none of them had met Rayah yet, so that was really nice.  While we were there, Justice got to do lots of fun things with daddy, like going swimming with his Auntie and cousins, going on his first (of many) quad ride, going to a tractor show, going on the trampoline and swing, and playing with the many dogs, cats and horses on the farm.  I was inside most of the time with Rayah, but I got to go out a bit too to play with Justice and go on what may have been my first quad ride and go for a fun walk in the bush with Grandma, Joe & Justice.  A funny thing on that walk was that Justice touched a live electric fence wire a couple times, but I guess the current isn’t flowing consistently but rather goes in pulses and he was just lucky enough to touch it when it wasn’t shocking!  There were also lots of fun new toys to discover and play with and a new house to explore and get into trouble, so Justice had a great time!    Rayah was having some gas issues while we were there, but it was fantastic to have so many willing hands to help out and I got lots of breaks, which was really nice!  They even took care of both kids for us for an evening, giving Rayah her very first bottle (expressed milk), so that Joe and I could go on a date.

And now for the regular update on the kids – and even though most of you probably don’t really care about all the little details that I record here, I’m still doing it for me so that I can remember them!  If you’d like to see recent videos of the kids, you can visit my youtube channel.

Justice

Cute and funny things:

• We’ve noticed that he sings when we are driving in the van and one time, Rayah was crying in her car seat and I looked back and saw Justice singing with his fingers in his ears – lol!
• One day when I was having a really rough day, I had a moment of frustration where I covered my face with my hands and was on the verge of tears, when Justice came up to me with his arms reaching up and said “hug?”  It was so sweet!  Then, later that same day, I was sitting on the floor having a cry and he was in my lap and he gave me a kiss on the nose – it was exactly what I needed and made me smile.
• He throws EVERYTHING!  He has a new fascination with throwing things high up in the air.  He’ll also throw all his many balls that he has in the basement (tennis balls, basketball, volleyball, and football) and he’ll throw them at the walls, so sometimes they come back and hit him.
• He claps and says “happy” when I dress him to go outside.
• It was probably only funny to me, but we had a moment where I was trying to put him down for his nap and he kept turning his soother around so that it was upside-down and I couldn’t help but laugh and then he started giggling and we were both laughing and I couldn’t stop!  I tried to sing him his bedtime lullaby, but I kept giggling and we both had a good laugh together.

New things:

• First plane ride – loved looking out the window at the city lights.
• First quad ride.
• First time visiting a church nursery – it didn’t go so well and he ended up crying for his mommy.
• First visit to his Grandma & Grandpa Engbrecht’s and first time meeting his aunts, an uncle, and his cousins.

Eating and drinking:

• Eating time is still quite messy and he is constantly getting his clothes dirty and food all over himself and the floor!
• He is now showing signs that he understands hunger and thirst as he has started saying his words “munch”, “eat”, “food”, “drink”, “mo” (more – with the hand sign), etc.  He will run upstairs when I say it’s time for a snack and he often asks for more food “peeze” (with the hand sign as well).

Talking and comprehension:

• He can now talk in a whisper which is terribly adorable!
• Of all his new words below, you can pretty much replace every “r” or “l” with a “w” or sometimes he just doesn’t say them at all :)
• Things: “shoe”, “bunk”, “phone”, “farm”, “stick”, “bucket”, “jacket”, “blanket”, “onesie”, “hockey”, “chiangle” (triangle), “circle”, “plane”, “flashlight”, “football”, “bump”, “buckle”, “laundry”, “vee” (the letter), “zuppo” (zipper), “tree”, “nap”, “towel”, “name”, “spanking”, “job”, “cookie”, “cracker”, “side” (outside), “muffin”, “mitts”, “brush”, “mess”, “broom”, “bike”, “hammer”, “jammies”
• Animals: “panda”, “sheep”, “hen”, “bunny”, “horsie”
• Body parts: “foot”, “cheek”, “chin”, “mouth”, “back”, “eye”, “toe”, “ow” (ear), “nose” (that’s his favorite one to point to on everyone)
• Numbers: “one”, “two”, “fo”, “fi”, “sick”, “eight”, “ni”
• Colors: “red”, “yellow”, “green”, “orange”
• Bathroom words: “poop”, “pooping” (appears to be saying this as he actually pees or poops in his diaper), “change”, “diaper”, “dowty” (dirty), “clean”, “showee” (shower), “potty”
• Eating words: “drink”, “juice”, “cheese”, “mink/mook” (milk), “food”, “chew”
• People: “Jake/Jacob” (cousin), “Angie” (auntie), “Cole” (auntie Nicole), “Chloe” (cousin), “Justice” (yay – he can finally say his own name!), “Jesus” (so sweet when he said this for the first time as we prayed for his lunch), “me”
• Verbs, Adjectives & Other words: “windy”, “peeze” (please), “run”, “kick”, “nummy” (yummy), “gone”, “funny” (inevitably what he thinks is funny is not something I think is funny!), “careful”, “gentle”, “crying” (says this about Rayah a lot), “welcome”, “come”, “mo” (more), “whining”, “good”, “fluffy”, “bounce” (says this about balls), “sleep”, “in”
• Phrases: “cheese peeze”, “drink milk”, “baby Rayah”, “hockey stick”, “thank you”, “ni-night”, “munch eat food”, “wake up!”, “come on!” (our personal favorite), and any combination of the words “bum poop stinky”!

Development:

• He can open any door in our house now, including our outside door, which we now have to dead bolt to keep him from taking off!  I also some times keep the bathroom and our bedroom doors locked so that he thinks they are always locked and inaccessible.  Since he has seen me using a kitchen knife to unlock these doors from the outside, he has attempted to open them with his play screwdrivers – lol!
• He has temper tantrums daily – whether it’s just whining and crying or full-on thrashing on the floor screaming until he dry heaves!  We are learning of different ways to handle these outbursts and meltdowns, but it is definitely challenging to keep your cool when he’s freaking out!
• We’ve noticed that he learns a lot of things by just observing us – for one, putting on hand lotion – he’ll play with the lotion bottle and then rub his hands together – very cute!
• He is learning the concept of putting things back where they belong, but thinks that it’s a game.  So he will constantly pull clothing and diapers, etc. out of Rayah’s dresser and then sometimes he’ll put them back on his own, or we have to go and make him put them back.  He’ll also close the drawers and doors when asked (not usually on the first request though).
• He is learning how to do other things we ask of him, like finding an object and bringing it to us.
• He’s still doing awesome at playing on his own while I’m busy and he’ll even let me take a nap on the couch in the basement while he plays with his toys, which is really nice!
• He’s learning how to go down the stairs forwards!  He’ll try to hold onto the wall or onto the steps and sort of go down on his bum, but mostly actually stepping down on his own!

Health:

• He’s had lots of injuries as of late, all of them involving falling!  He fell into the corner of a wall at our house, leaving a line on his cheek and a bloody cut on his chin.  He fell forwards, hitting his gums on the corner of a guitar case – this one bled A LOT and looked pretty nasty for a couple days, but healed up well.  He fell into a doorway at our house, hitting his nose and causing it to bleed.  He fell into a laundry basket and somehow cut two of his fingers on the plastic – more blood!  Jeepers!!

Brotherhood:

• He accidentally dropped a metal pot lid on Rayah’s face, giving her a small cut under her eye.
• He likes to pretend to kick Rayah in the head when she’s lying on the floor.  I don’t doubt that he’d actually do it if we weren’t paying attention, but I don’t think it’s out of malice – it’s more like he finds the idea funny and maybe thinks her head looks like a ball that’s nice for kicking.
• Still loves to give Rayah LOTS of hugs and kisses!
• In addition to constantly taking Rayah’s soother, he will also attempt to put her soother in her mouth for her.
• He constantly wants to rock Rayah’s bassinet when she’s in it, but his rocking is way too exuberant!

Rayah

• She still nurses about every three hours, but she’s had several great nights where she slept for 5-6 1/2 hours in between feedings, which was glorious for me!!
• She is still quite the pooper, but doesn’t poop with every single feeding any more.  Still, she likes to push out her poops and today she had a diaper blowout that went all the way up her back, almost to her neck!!
• She’s getting better at nursing and generally nurses for about 15 minutes, plus the time it takes to burp, change her diaper, etc.
• She has been having some gas issues, so once again I am trying to not have any dairy or caffeine to see if that helps.  I’m not entirely convinced that it’s the issue, but it does seem like she’s maybe a bit better since I’ve been off those things, so we’ll see.
• She spits up ALL THE TIME!  She spits up multiple times on herself, on her change mat, in her crib, in the bassinet, on me, on the floor, on the couch – everywhere!  And large quantities too!
• She had her first plane ride, first visit to Grandma & Grandpa Engbrecht’s and meeting her aunts, uncle & cousins.
• She had her first visit to Grandma & Grandpa Thiessen’s house.
• She had her first bottle (expressed milk) and has had formula as well – so far, so good!  She’s just getting the hang of it and has drank 2 oz.  Hopefully giving her the bottle on a regular basis now will help make the adjustment easier later on.
• She has been having gas issues, much like Justice did, but thankfully not as bad.  I’ve been trying to not have dairy or caffeine to see if that helps, but it’s really hard to tell what causes her gas pains. 
• I had her on her stomach one day and she was NOT happy about it and before she was even a month old, she managed to roll over onto her back!
• She has given us quite a few really big smiles that are so adorable and is also beginning to coo and gurgle and “talk” to us – so cute!
• She’s also a little porker just like her brother and has chubby cheeks and lots of rolls!

Brain Dump #1

Sometimes I just need to dump out the various things swirling around in my mind and heart, so I now give you my first “Brain Dump” and perhaps it will become the first of many – we’ll see.

His mercies are new every morning
Rayah’s had a lot of gas issues lately and cries A LOT.  This can really wear a person down.  I had my first meltdown of tears yesterday since I became a mommy of two.  I was frustrated by my circumstances, but also feeling like a failure as a mom for all the anger and terrible thoughts I had inside.  Thank God that His mercies are new every morning and that He sees the sincere desires of my heart to be a lover of God and a better mom to my children.  I’m also glad that all the expectations I put on myself to be a “supermom” are not ones that God places on me – His yoke is easy and His burden is light!

Hosting the Holy Spirit
In light of the spiritual awakening happening at the International House of Prayer (check it out here), I have begun to read the book “Hosting the Holy Spirit”, written by twelve different authors including Ché Ahn, Lou Engle, John Arnott, Cindy Jacobs and several other ministers who have been blessed with visitations of the Spirit in their churches.  I really enjoyed the first chapter by John Arnott about valuing the anointing.  I must confess that since I had participated in a spiritual renewal when I was a teenager, that I somehow reached a place where I was taking the anointing and touches of the Spirit for granted and I would sometimes hold back from really entering in because I thought I had moved beyond that stuff.  I thought I would just sit back and observe and let others experience His anointing who perhaps hadn’t experienced it before.  Perhaps I thought I was too mature or didn’t really need it or made other excuses for not entering in.  But I want to value and honor the moving of the Spirit in our midst and have a hunger and desperation and realization of my need for more of Him.  I want to be open to receiving His touch any time, all the time, every time!

More of His Love
Along similar lines, I was watching the webstream of the IHOPU Student Awakening when one of their leaders David Sliker shared his testimony of what the Lord had done in him.  He shared about how he had made peace with his barrenness and become content with not having God’s touch on his heart.  He also shared about how in his attempt to put aside childishness, he had also put aside childlikeness and lost that innocent joy, but how God had restored to him the joy of his salvation.  As I was identifying with his testimony and praying about this, the worship team began to sing a prophetic song about receiving the love of God.  The Lord then began to speak to me about this, since I seem to struggle with asking Him for more of His love.  I’ve had really amazing experiences in the past where I’ve felt the love of my Bridegroom Jesus and my Father God, but I think I was believing a lie that I needed to live off of those experiences and that I should just be grateful for them and not ask for more.  But then I thought about my relationship with my earthly husband and how I need to know and feel his love for me on a daily basis, whether it’s through a word or action or touch, and he does not begrudge me those things and gladly shows me his love every day.  So why would Jesus be any different?  Does He not long to show me His love and want me to ask Him for more?  It’s simply doesn’t seem right for me to not feel the love of my eternal Bridegroom every day.  Not once a week, not once a month, not once a year – I cannot live on yesterday’s experience!  It would seem ridiculous for Joe to say to me that him telling me he loved me once a year was good enough, yet that’s the lie I was believing about God!  The same goes for the love of the Father – it would be terrible if Joe said to our kids that they should be content with feeling his love only every once and a while!  It’s the exact opposite – Joe really loves to show our kids how much he loves them and I believe it to be the same with our Heavenly Father.  So, while I may have known this to some extent already, it was still a new revelation for me and touched my heart in a way that I needed, which was awesome!

The Father’s Love
Along the lines of the Father’s love – lately our son Justice has become very affectionate, always asking for hugs, which is terribly sweet and cute!  But he has also started asking for hugs during mealtime when he is inevitably covered with food.  Of course, our instinct is to say to him that he needs to be cleaned up first before he can have a hug, but doesn’t that sound horrible?  What if God said to us that we needed to get cleaned up before He would show us His love?  What if the prodigal son’s father had made his son have a bath first before he was willing to embrace him?  I’m so glad the Father is not like that!!  Joe was a great father and let Justice give him a hug, getting food all over his own clothing as Justice patted his back.   I was a little more reluctant and cleaned him up first – lol.

Freedom From Self-Hatred
And one more testimony from what God has been doing in me as I’ve been watching the IHOPU Student Awakening webstream.  Last night, a girl was giving her testimony about how God set her free from self-hatred and rage that had come as a result of being molested as a little girl.  Now, they’ve had several ministry times regarding self-hatred in the last couple weeks, but I’ve been reluctant to engage my heart and have had walls up.  But finally, something broke and what she was sharing caused my defenses to fall as I recalled wounds from my own past.  Then Wes Hall, the person who was facilitating the meeting, had a word of knowledge about a wife who had never told her husband about what she was going through and I knew I needed to tell Joe some things and have him pray for me.  So, I shared with Joe about some things that happened when I was a pre-teen and early teen, where I felt violated by a man and objectified by my male peers.  These were things I had never told him and I don’t even know why I had kept them hidden, but it felt really good to get them out in the open.  We then prayed together and I felt the Lord touch my heart with revelation about how He feels about me and I broke off the the bondage of self-hatred and my agreement with the lies of the enemy regarding my appearance and my body.  One of the things the girl sharing her testimony had said that really touched me was when she said that she realized that her body had not been made for man, but for God.  This was totally freeing for me and I felt life in the revelation that my body had been made by God to be a bearer of His image and a vessel for His Spirit and that it doesn’t matter what people might think!  So, I feel like there was a breakthrough and that I received freedom and healing in this area – praise Jesus!

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