Encouragment

We have been receiving great encouragement lately. It began with e-mails and phone calls that would lift our spirits. Letting us know that we are not alone and greatly loved. Then we got a wonderful bouquet of flowers delivered to us from some great friends. We had been out for the day doing some errands and felt quite beat up from the events of the week last week. When we returned home from the grocery store ... on our front step was a beautiful arrangement of flowers with a great verse attached to them ... Luke 12: 22-34 ... specifically v.27 "Consider how the lilies grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you, not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these." Praise God for great encourager's! You have blessed our lives in ways you do not know.

God is continuing to bless our hearts and give us a peace as we wait on him. Being still and waiting I think is one of the hardest things to do in our walks with God. Especially in the tough times when you want to fix everything yourselves. However, we trust in a mighty God ... one we know will provide for and meet our every need, far better than we could ever do alone. For what should we worry? Nothing! At the end of this we want HIM to receive all the Glory!

We cant wait to see what lies ahead! It's going to be great!

Where we are ...

Psalm 130: 5 I wait for the LORD, my soul waits, And in His word I do hope. 6 My soul waits for the Lord, More than those who watch for the morning— Yes, more than those who watch for the morning (NKJV)

This is where we are. Waiting on the LORD. We do not know what the future holds but the one thing we do ... We will wait on the LORD.

I love a new worship song that has come out recently called "Everlasting God" By Chris Tomlin .. See the Morning CD ... We are waiting on the one who does not faint nor grow weary.

Here are the Lyrics ....

Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord
We will wait upon the Lord
We will wait upon the Lord

Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord
We will wait upon the Lord
We will wait upon the Lord

Our God, You reign forever
Our hope, our Strong Deliverer
You are the everlasting God
The everlasting God
You do not faint
You won't grow weary

Fun at the Park

The weather has been beautiful for the past few days. We have been making daily morning trips to the park. Today I took the camera ... enjoy. Daddy even got to go with us today!

Life

Life comes at you fast! Our two boys are growing so fast! Ryan loves Pace and is sometimes a little rougher with him than we would like. I'm sure this is only the beginning of brotherly "love".

On another note ... we are in need of prayer. Just lift us up if you will ... The Lord knows why. If you don't know and need to know ... shoot us an e-mail or phone call and we will let you know what's going on in our lives.

Sweet days ...

We have been having some GREAT days recently! Ryan still doesn't want to eat his veggies but is learning to be patient and sit quietly instead of throwing a tantrum.

Recently his Jojo (Jer's mom) has been sick. He will hear us call his Poppa and check on her quite frequently these past few weeks. Today we were playing in the playroom and Ryan picked up his pretend phone ... the conversation went something like this ... "Hi Poppa. How's Jojo feeling? Is she ok?" Kids really are sponges. Ryan has such a soft heart and wants everyone to be ok! Here's a picture of him reading one of his favorite books ... "My Grandma and I"

Pace's attempt to crawl

Here is a video of Pace's attempt to crawl. As you can tell he still has a ways to go! Enjoy!

Play Date

Tonight Ryan and Pace had their First play date at our house. The guys at our church had an Iron Works meeting so we got together with some friends. Here is a picture of Ryan with Abby and Felicia. Thanks for coming over guys!

More teeth on the way ...

Pace is getting more teeth ... we think. The ones on the top look and feel like they might be close. He is also trying hard to crawl and he loves to pull up using our fingers to do so. However, once he is standing he DOES NOT like to sit down. Don't even try it or you will get the pout face and soon after that a full out cry. It is quite comical to see how he will try to pull your heart strings to get what he wants.

What fun!

Today at church Jeremy picked Ryan up after the main service was over. The teacher stopped Jeremy to tell him what a great kid Ryan was and more specifically what a great sharer he was. We have been working on sharing recently - specifically with his brother. Sometimes seeing little progress. It is always great to hear compliments on your kids especially when you have a few tough moments with them throughout the week. Sometimes those tough moments seem to take center stage and your loose sight of the good times you have with them. We have had a tough week with Ryan and his attempt to make his own choices about the food that he eats. This has led to several meal times where he only had his milk and a tantrum. Now he has give up slightly on the tantrum and has learned to say no mommy to whatever he may be having. He will sit there semi-quietly while the rest of us have our meal. Those moments have seemed to take forefront this week. How nice it was to hear someone talk about my kid in such a positive light! Of course I can brag on him all day long but in the tough moments I think I can forget about all the good things he does on a daily moment out of frustration surrounding meal time. At the end of such a hard week it was great to hear someone else brag on my son and a good reminder for Jer and I to know that he's going through a phase and will not always be characterized by the tantrums we see behind closed doors and sometimes out in public ... how I cringe when those public times come!

St. Patricks Day

Today was a rather fun day! We did "family" stuff. Which means mostly running errands, washing clothes, folding clothes, dusting, vacuuming, etc. So should you choose to come visit this week ... you get a clean house! Haha! Those that know us well know we stay clean 98% of the time!

We found the Super Target today! How fun! Did some Easter shopping for the boys ... now we need to find the resurrection Eggs so Ryan will be able to enjoy the real reason for Easter besides being another day we set aside for toys and candy.


We also went to Chuckie Cheese to spend some leftover birthday tokens and have some lunch. When we pulled into the parking lot, Ryan went bonkers. CHUCKIE CHEESE YAY! You would have thought he had been there 1000 times before. He hasn't. Only 3 times before today has he ever set foot inside the place...but he remembers it well and had a blast!

Speaking of Laundry ... Ryan LOVES to help with Laundry. You drop it (on purpose of course) he picks it up and either puts it in the right place to be folded or if it's wet inside the dryer. And if you don't let him help you ... well you wouldn't want to do that ... would you?

On another note ... I thought we had conquered the food problem. He still will only eat the foods he wants to eat. I'm hoping that this is just a phase as he is discovering that he does have control over what he puts in his mouth. Or else my child will be come a skinny child soon! Just kidding of course. I'm not going to starve him but I need the boy to eat his veggies! Any ideas ... send them my way!

Hope everyone had a great St. Pattys day. To all my Dublin friends ... hope that Main Street Munchies and all the other 100 events that you guys have to go to was great fun!

Better week

Things are going much better in the temper tantrum arena. I think Ryan is starting to understand that tantrums do not work to get what he wants. He is also beginning to realize that he needs to eat what is placed before him. It's so hard to understand how to help when they are throwing such an amazing fit. It's also so embarrassing when you are out in public. It is easy to see how so many parents get wrapped up in bribing their kids to get them to calm down or just giving in to their fits. I can see that hard work will one day pay off ... hopefully! :)

On another note Ryan has learned a Bible Verse ... Psalm 150 Verse 6 ... "Let Everything that Has Breath, Praise the Lord." It is so fun to hear him say his verse. He hasn't learned to say where in the Bible it's found but he can recite the verse. Time to teach him another one. Kids are such sponges at this age!

Temper Trantums?

We are having some problems with Ryan and temper trantums. If he has to wait for anything he will throw a fit. Talking to him only seems to make matters worse. Trying to explain why he is having to wait will make him get even MORE upset. If anyone has any grand ideas that helped them ... we would love to hear from you. We need some advice! Thanks!

Pace Says Hello

Ryan says hello

Trying something new

Many of you old time bloggers have learned this already ... I'm still new to this and we have been playing around with YouTube and video. Video will make it more interesting for the grandparents and other family and friends to actually see the boys in full form. Hope you enjoy our first attempt at this!

10 Months old!

It is hard to believe our little Pace is 10 months old already. Time sure does fly! He is not yet crawling ... mom doesn't much mind this fact. He'll stay put for the most part when I put him down :) He does roll all over the place now and thinks he's hot stuff because he can. I wonder what he will think once he can crawl then walk? He loves Ryan and will just watch him as he plays, Ryan can get the best laughs out of Pace. As hard as we may try we can't even compare with the giggles Ryan can get. It's super fun to see those 2 boys interact together.

What a week!

This has been a crazy week! I got home on Sunday night to a sick baby boy. Monday we went to the Dr with Pace and spent the rest of the day with him attached to my hip. Tuesday was much of the same although the meds seemed to be working. We even made it to Bible study at church and Pace made it through the study right there with me in his stroller or in my arms. Tuesday afternoon is when it all started. Jeremy had a car accident - he was rear ended just a couple miles from the house. He wound up going by ambulance to the hospital. I fed the boys really quickly and made it there with him. The boys didn't much like being in the ER so we had to leave. Thankfully, one of the pastors was able to drop by and sit with Jeremy, he also picked him up and brought him home ... Thanks Mark! Jeremy is stiff and having bad headaches! (say a prayer for him) Wednesday he came home and both he and Ryan were sick. We were up all night with both of them. Thursday Ryan and Jer spent the whole day in bed together watching March Maddness ... By the way ... Basketball is my least favorite sport!

Today both seem to be doing much better and I seem to have been spared this round of sickness ... at least I hope so! I am hoping for a much better week next week.

Ryan is missing all his GA friends ... and Maya too! He still asks if he can see them when we go to church. We often find him on his phone talking to one of them ... mostly Christopher. So know that you are not out of his thoughts! We love and miss you all!

Pace is trying to crawl ... he just hasn't figured out that the legs are essential in the process. He will push up on his hands and then proceed backwards. It is fun to watch him try to learn. He is also trying to pull up ... right now he will only do it holding on to our hands but I know he's not far from pulling up on everything else ... my world is about to change drastically!

After ...

A whirlwind trip to GA Friday through Sunday, I am now home! I came home though to a sick almost 10 month old little boy. Jeremy was grocery shopping when I got into town and called to say that Pace was SCREAMING throughout the grocery shopping process. He and Ryan were inside the car which is under the cart we put grocery's in. Jeremy couldn't see if Ryan had done anything to provoke this screaming fit or not. He said he asked Ryan and he got a blank stare.

So we packed up this morning and went to a new pediatrician ... nothing like Dr. Mularoni! How we miss her. However, he was a good DR. Pace has a sinus infection. I didn't even think babies could get those but apparently they can! He's on an antibiotic and hopefully in a few days will be doing better. For now he is milking being held and if you should decide to put him down for any reason whatsoever ... be prepared for a fake cry to start with and then he has perfected his "I'm angry at you" cry with REAL tears! Amazing how these little ones know how to pull our strings.

Ryan is absolutely hilarious when this happens. He will gingerly walk up to Pace and squat in front of him and say "You're OK Pacer" then move on to what he is doing. Pace continues to scream for any of you wondering if Ryan's moment of sympathy worked! Ryan will then start singing to Pace letting him know that he is OK ... over and over again like a broken record.

They really are a riot together!

It was good to see some of you GA folks this past weekend. Keep my grandmother and family in your prayers!

Sick boys ...

Both boys are sick! It has been a FUN day of many diaper changes already! I'll let your immagination tell you why! :) Pace has been battling a cold for what seems like weeks. At first I thought it was just congestion from teething and it very well may have been then. However, it has progressed and is now a cold with other fun things as well! He has passed this lovely gift on to Ryan too! Hopefully, Jeremy and I can stay away from this round of sickness!