Owen at 11 Months

Some time in the near future (hopefully) I will write a Meet Selah/Meet Owen post...but tonight I will give you a little glimpse at my little guy, Owen, who happens to be 11 months today, along with a little somethin' about the Selah girl.  

It's weird to think Owen is only a month away from being one...and I know everyone says this, but time really does go by so quickly, even more so this second time!  I didn't even realize we hit the 11 month mark until 30 minutes ago while doing the dishes (alot of things don on me while doing the dishes!) which was totally opposite of how I was with Selah... I was very vigilant in recording every single little milestone with Selah, like when she breathed differently, made a goofy new sound, did something cute with her pinky finger on her right hand, and blinked half a second longer than usual (okay, maybe some of these are a bit exaggerated, but only a little, honestly, I was a little obsessed with my baby girl) but I just haven't been with Owen...his blinking and breathing patterns tend to go unnoticed.

I think there is something in our human nature (or maybe it's just me) where we loose our excitement about things we've already experienced, including giving birth and raising children.  Don't get me wrong, when Owen was born I was PLLLLENTY excited and when he learns something new, like how to walk, I'm still amazed and proud, but the extent of it, or how it looks and feels is just different, maybe not less, just different.  Part of me feels guilty and sad about this, like I want to make myself equally as enthusiastic about the new way he selects toys from the bin or the way he manages to twist his paci the correct way in his mouth, like I would have been with Selah; I want to force the same reaction to drop everything I'm doing, grab a camera and/or pen and paper to record every movement, but I just can't...that same zeal is just not there, it's close but just not the same, and sometimes it's just not realistic with what all else is going on around me.  It's just weird, and on my mind...but anyway, here are some fun pictures of the moments I HAVE captured today!  Enjoy! :)

You can usually find Owen with a long, stick-like object in hand...
like this paintbrush,

that he is now trying to eat, also very usual behavior.

Just trying to measure stuff mom...

like the distance from my mouth to my hand! 

And, just for fun, here's a couple funny Selah quotes from today (also something I wish I was better at capturing)...

At lunch Owen started spitting his applesauce out at me (which is usually my cue he's done!), and Selah chimes in, "Owen, no spitting your food, Owen, because, God cares about us." -- not sure how these two statements relate, but she sure thinks they do...

Daniel had to work later than usual so while he was eating dinner and we were playing in the living room Selah asks, "What are you doing Daddy?" 

pause: this always makes me laugh, these questions with obvious answers, I mean, Daniel was clearly sitting at the table with a plate of food in front of him and chowing down on leftover steak... so silly, but super cute, most the time! 

resume: 
Daniel responds, "Eating in peace."
I overhear her say, "Oh, peas, those are good for you!"
And she comes running to me to relay the information she's uncovered, "Mommy, Daddy's eating peas!!" She's clearly really proud of him for eating so healthy.

Then, Daniel corrects her, "No, IN peace, I'm eating in peace."
Selah, giving more proof that English is a tough, tough language, responds "Oh, you're eating in pees? or in poops?" -- I really wonder what she thought about daddy eating in pee?? 

We eventually, after laughing, explained that "peace" means quiet, calm...anything BUT the dinner Daniel was experiencing! 

Here's a not-so short video of our evening...I didn't feel like cutting it, soooo enjoy if you so desire.  Thanks for reading!

        Happy Eleven Months Owen!! 

We love you VERY, VERY much...

even if my lack of documentation shows otherwise!

  

Impromptu Splash Day

We got invited to go to a splash pad with some friends last minute this afternoon, and I wasn't sure if we should go because I am so not prepared for summer...as in I had no idea where swimsuits were (if we had swimsuits that fit!) or sunscreen or towels or swim diapers or whatever else you need for water activities like this, BUT I scrounged up what I could (including fresh mango chunks for snack... YUM!!) because I didn't want to miss this opportunity! I knew Selah would have a blast...wasn't sure if Owen would enjoy it or not but he loves the outdoors so I knew I had to give it a go.  Ended up being the perfect way to embrace summer and the undoubtedly hot days to come!! Here's what went down...

Doing what little brothers do best...Selah's such a good sport!
Although, she's pretty good at doing what big sisters do best too (just keep reading)
so she may deserve a tap on the head with a shovel every now and again :)

These fountains are so much better than baths, Mom!!

Splish Splash, Splish Splash!

Look at those tiny, wet baby footprints!!!
You can even make out the chub of those sweet feet!

He picked a perfect time to start full on walking!!
He padded all over those puddles! 

A fun little video...and if you make it to the end you will see what I mean by Selah fulfilling her big sister role... :)  

That grab/hug/pull/tackle full of love there at the end

 happens alllll the time.  Poor guy.  He rarely complains though *shrugs*...  

These are common phrases said throughout the day when I see this occurring:

"Selah, please don't hold your brother like that."

"Selah! No! Let go!"

"Selah, Seeeeelah, SELAH! Stop! He is not a doll!"

Oy vey!

I wonder if I did this to my little brother?? I need to find this out. 

After our fun in the sun we came home and ate dinner...

which was apparently bowl-licking good, 

even though it was just leftovers.

I have a feeling this is going to be a typical day during the next couple months!! Bring on the cool, refreshing water!!!!

Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star...

I really do wonder what you are!!

Space is very fascinating.   

In forth grade, we did this space exploration simulation unit that involved working in groups and watching brief episodes on the TV that gave us all specific jobs to accomplish some overall task dealing with the planets and what-not, that's as many details as I remember, but what I do remember is that I absolutely LOVED it!!! I generally hated science throughout school, but not during this unit!! I looked forward to it every day!  No other space lessons stick out in my mind throughout my school years...that couldn't have possibly been it?? I don't know...  

But, fast forward to last year when the third graders I was student teaching were doing a unit on space.  At this point in time I hadn't taken on the responsibilities of teaching science (thank God! for me and my students' sake!), so, as my cooperating teacher led all the lessons, I sat in amazement;  absorbing all that was being taught, as if learning it all for the first time.  Did you know that our sun is a star?!?!  I feel like everyone knows this but me...and I aced everything in school, my whole life...I feel, well, I don't know how I feel...but it seems like this is information I should know.  Thank goodness we have our whole lives to keep learning!  Anyway, every time science rolled around I was just awe-struck at our big, BIG universe!!    

Then, while preparing to teach the ST blend for Selah's preschool, and thinking maybe I would do something on stars, I stumbled across some books at the library on the subject.  I was reading through one of them with Selah and the very last line really stood out to me, and I've been pondering on it ever since.  I don't remember the exact quote, and the book has already been returned, but it was talking about the stars and how our sun is a star, and how there is a possibility that one of the stars that we see at night could possibly be a sun to another planet similar to ours and that someone out in the universe could be looking at our sun and seeing a tiny star... just let that sink in a bit... 

Isn't that incredible to think about?!?! 

Sure brings new meaning to that silly little song I sing daily!  We know so very little, or at least I do, about what all is out there in our universe.  It is mind-blowing to think that one of those itty-bitty stars, "up above the world so high, like a diamond in the sky", could be a life-sustaining sun to another solar system.  

Well then my thoughts got really outta control crazy...

What about God?? How does He fit into it all? I believe Him to be the Lord of the universe and to be the Father of Jesus Christ who came to Earth to die on a cross to save humanity from sin, I do...but if there are other forms of life out there...did God create them and their planets as well?? Did He send Jesus to all of their broken worlds, if they are broken, as well??  Has Jesus been bouncing around, planet to planet, saving souls all over space...in the same way??

These thoughts cannot completely be out of the realm of possibility right?  And these questions cannot be completely ludicrous, right?! Maybe it isn't very likely, but surely there is a chance, maybe there is more of a chance than we would like to believe.  I mean, there are very popular movies out there about this very subject (eh-hem, Star Wars...Star-Trek), so I'm not the only one who has thought these thoughts. 

Thinking about the vastness of our world doesn't make me feel small and insignificant though, which seems like maybe it should.  It actually makes me feel very honored and grateful to be apart of it all...whatever “ALL” is.  I am very appreciative of the life I have been given.  It also makes me very curious.  And it makes life exciting…to know that there is so much that is unknown; that there is still so much left to discover and learn.  I like the anticipation of maybe being able to understand it all one day, when I get to Heaven, if that's how that works.  So weird to think about, and also so fun!! I'm sure there isn't an appropriate adjective to describe how incredible it will be!

What are yall's thoughts on space?? Does it just blow your mind like it does me??

                         

ST Week at Preschool

Selah and I joined a preschool co-op this March, which means, every 4 weeks I have two adorable little girls come over to my place and I get to stretch my teaching skills.  For those that may not know, I graduated last May with a teaching degree... I just haven't used it yet, well, used it to make money at least.  When this opportunity came up I had to jump at it, and I'm having a blast!! 

This past week it was my turn to teach and I covered the blend ST.  Here is a run down of what we did:

Day 1

To start the morning, I had the girls work on a star puzzle.

  

I added the extra lines on the yellow star to make it a little easier.

After the puzzle, we did a word sort.  I printed and cut out pictures of words that started with S, SH, and ST.  Each girl got one picture of each type (so 9 total pictures), then I would ask them to each find the picture they thought started with S.  Then, they each got a turn to stick it onto a pre-taped piece of paper in the correct column.  We did this for SH and ST words as well (but, obviously, by the last picture it was easy to determine which column it went into, but that was okay since S and SH were already covered, and ST was a new letter combo, worked pretty well).

Next, we talked about an animal that looks like a star...a starfish!! Who knew they were such neat creatures!! We read this awesome book, 

Star of the Sea: A Day in the Life of a Starfish by Janet Halfmann.

(We later glanced at the pictures in the book pictured on the right during our craft.)

After we read the book, we headed to the table for a starfish craft.

I pre-cut the starfish shape and had the girls glue them onto their blue pieces of paper.  Then I gave them a container of cheerios and let them go to town.  We talked about how the Cheerios were the starfish's sticky tube feet that helped them move around (mentioned in the story).  

Later, I handed them each a little booklet with fun starfish facts on them (again, covered in the story) and they glued them to the bottom of their papers.  We read the following facts together:

• Starfish can be many colors, sizes, and shapes.
• Starfish are also called "sea stars".
• Starfish have tiny tube feet to help them move.
• Starfish have two stomachs. (who knew??)
• Starfish eat mussels, clams, and oysters. (I had no clue!)
• Starfish can grow new rays if one is lost. (Aren't starfish the coolest!?!?!) 

Our last activity for the day was to put as many fun star-shaped stickers on a piece of paper, and then later we figured out how many stars were put on to practice counting.

We also found this contraption: 

Daniel found this somewhere for super cheap and thought Selah would like it, but we have never really used it...until now! We all went into the dark bathroom, turned this sucker on, and found ourselves surrounded by pretty, multi-colored stars spinning around us. The girls thought it was pretty incredible and kept trying to "catch" the stars! So fun!

We wrapped up our day by singing Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star... of course! :)

Day 2

This day was filled with a hodgepodge of ST related activities (stirring, starting/stopping, stretching, stripes...random!). 

We started by dancing around and getting our wiggles out with these streamers (I later helped guide them to the discovery that streamers starts with ST).

It was impossible to get a clear picture with all the dancing going on!!

 To make these streamers I just cut two strips of each color, wrapped them around a craft stick twice, and taped it on...easy peasy!

Next, we calmed ourselves down by reading A Bad Case of Stripes by David Shannon...

great book about remaining true to yourself...and a great segway into our art project, painting stripes!

Using a piece of plain white card stock paper, I put lines of masking tape about every inch doing down.  Then, I let the girls paint any way they wanted, but I told them they had to cover all the white with paint.  

  

Once the paint dried, I peeled off the tape and...

 behold! Our beautiful striped masterpieces! If I did this again, I would have cut/ripped the masking tape in half so that the colored stripes were larger than the white stripes...buuuut, ya live and learn, and I still think these turned out great!! 

Next, we ate trailmix for snack, and I had the girls help me stir (get it, STir) the ingredients together :)  

We all counted to 20 together during each person's turn to get a little more practice in, and, of course, to make sure everyone's stir-time was totally, completely, without-a-doubt, fair. They're three...

During playtime we all headed out back for a version of Red Light, Green Light. One child went to one end of the yard with me (and Owen), while the other two stayed behind (well, I should pause and make sure to mention that we STretched before participating in this game, gotta keep it safe!).  The child with me was the caller and she yelled out "STOP" or "START", and the other two followed her directions until they both made it to the other side.  Lots of giggling going on during this one!! 

Our last activity involved animals of the striped sort...back to those stripes!! I gave each girl a baggie of 8 cut out pictures of animals (5 striped, 3 not), and they picked out the ones with stripes and glued them onto a piece of construction paper. 

Finding striped animals
that young ones would know really well
proved to be more challenging than I thought...

We ended our busy day with a couple more dance moves with our streamers!

It was a STupendous (I just couldn't help myself!) week!! :D 

**All of these ideas were my own, except for the cute starfish idea with Cheerios...that I found here! 

Oofta, My Grandma's Awesome

Do you know someone who suffers from cancer??

So do I.

My grandma.

She's beautiful!! 

My considerate, loving, generous (oh, so generous!), thoughtful, hard working, brilliant, brave (even if she won’t admit it, she is…so very brave), patient, selfless, confident, family-oriented, gracious, all-around awesome, grandma.

She has this uncanny ability to make you feel like you and all the small details of your life are equally as important to her as they are to you…every single time you talk to her.  It’s unreal and makes this granddaughter feel very loved.  I don’t know how she does it…

She’s one-of-a-kind.

If my grandma had lived in France during the medieval times she would have made her living as a jongleur, I’m sure of it.  I never tire of sitting and listening to her eloquently retell stories from the past or simply read from a storybook.  My fondest memories are lying in her bed before bedtime and listening to her read from classics like The Mitten by Jan Brett or Love You Forever by Robert Munsch…two of my favorites.

Another one of her specialties is gift-giving.  She makes the best handmade cards for all kinds of special occasions!  

I can just feel the love oozing out of these cards!!

She will also go out of her way to make a special "just because" gift.  Like the time she printed off several pictures of our vacation and put them in an album, or all the times she sends toys and coloring books for the kids.

I didn’t get to see my grandma very often; in fact, throughout my childhood we were separated by a vast countryside and a 2-day road trip.  But, by golly, my courageous mother braved the trip to make sure my brother and I got to see this lovely lady (and her wonderful husband, my grandpa) every single summer, at least.  Since our times together were few and far between, my grandma made every moment extra special.  The times she took me shopping to spoil me rotten and then convince me to put on a fashion show to showoff all the loot; the times she put out art supplies like rubber cement, stickers, and rubber stamps with ink (I loved that stuff!!!) and let me create to my heart’s content for hours; the times she would patiently teach me how to type on a computer and play Kid Pix or Reader Rabbit; the times she would pour me a bowl of cereal (ya know, that sugar-saturated cereal not allowed at home…thanks mom for keeping me healthy! thanks grandma for the occasional treat!) for a late night snack and just chat the night away; the times she would make a fancy meal and invite guests to fill her home with love and laughter; the times she would take me onto her porch laden with sweet-scented flowers for a bagel breakfast; the times we would form a “game plan” for the following day together (I always looked forward to our game plans!!); and the times we would venture to their trailer on the lake to swim, play volleyball, go on picnics, ride the pontoon, make S’mores next to a crackling fire, and lounge in the sun with a good book in hand; all these times will forever be etched in my heart, never to be forgotten.

Now, the cancer… that yucky, yucky cancer, back for a third time.  Phooey!

This past week I was able to go on a mini vacation and stay with my grandparents for a few days.  Her strength blew me away.  She fights through all the yuckiness and never complains.  Like, ever. 

I have this problem, whenever problems arise.  I tend to just avoid them.  I push them from my thoughts, and I try to pretend the difficulties of life just don’t exist or I minimize just how hard it really is, especially when the difficulties affect the ones I love.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t actually avoid my grandma, I just don’t like to dwell on the ideas of cancer and what it is doing to her body.  Believe me, a day doesn’t go by without a prayer for healing, and Selah never forgets to lift up a sweet prayer for great-grandma Phyllis.  But, for whatever reason, I just can’t get my mind to really understand what she is going through.

It was a little difficult to avoid when it was staring me in the face though.  And it was a good thing for me to see.  It was important for me to get an idea of what my grandma means when she says her counts are low, and now I can visualize and sympathize a bit better when she says she’s been at the clinic for a transfusion all day.

Not pleasant…

But you know what my grandma does when she’s feeling low?  She hums; she hums a happy little tune while she keeps herself busy with this and that.  She puts on music and belts it out loud.  She cares for others.  She never misses a birthday or special occasion like Easter, an anniversary, or retirement celebration.  Remember how I said she was generous?? While at the hospital from sun up to sun down one day, you know how my grandma kept herself busy?? She rummaged through the hospital gift shops to find three perfect gifts for three special people… so thoughtful!! 

She has every right to grumble and sulk, but she doesn’t!  If anybody knows how to live a life sunny side up, it’s her!  I love her so much; I don’t think I could ever express how much she really means to me!  She encourages me and inspires me…she’s awesome.  Please keep her in your prayers!  She’s gonna beat this thing once and for all, I just know it!!   

Love you Grandma!!