Pathetic

It is now almost Friday (late Thursday night) and sadly I have no new pictures to share. The camera has sat....sorry! As for updates - still no signs that Barney had any friends - hooray! I think I will cry if I find any new signs of mice anywhere. As for the call - nope we still have no idea (or more accurately - Mark doesn't know) which way we will go. We have been very blessed here, and are not taking that for granted. We are just praying and seeking God's will for our lives and for the lives of the people in the 4 churches involved (3 here, 1 there). He is hoping to make a decision mid-February. Thanks for all the prayers, we are sure learning a lot going through this process.

Who's Up for Some Good News?!

Okay, so for all practical purposes I had the WORST week of my life last week. I can't even begin to say how stressful it was. BUT the GREAT NEWS is that so far these past 2 days have been AWESOME making up for some of the worst parts of last week. Whew! We needed that. So I will try to focus on all the good news of the past couple days and leave the junk from last week to your imagination (or to those of you that had to listen to me whine, save you the trouble of hearing it again!).
Sunday: caught Barney, got a raise (and a lot of other positive things happening at the annual meeting) and got my first test back with a 98%.
Monday: finally found my wii that was promised by santa - woohoo!
And some great news is that all the girls are healthy!!!!!

So other than a couple things that will carry into next month our stress was taken care of and a bonus of a fun new game! I will put some new picture on later tonight or tomorrow. Thanks for checking in on us.

Moving Machine

I'm a bit slow about getting a video of Rachel's crawling up, but I found this one on the camera, better late than never...

Just Like Them

Rachel is starting the age-old quest to be just like her big sisters. She is an old pro @ crawling and now is trying to walk. She is constantly crawling after them, pulling herself up and trying to keep up with them by cruising around holding onto things. She's still very shakey @ the cruising thing, but I'm sure it's just a matter of time before she'll be running around with them. Gabie has been talking up a storm lately, she's definetly living up to her name! Mark did receive a call to Mount Olive Lutheran Church in Lockport, NY. He will probably get the call papers in the mail tomorrow, so we'll begin the process of seeking God's will for our lives at this time.

Snack Time

Gabie was being such a sweet sister this afternoon. She went and got Rachel a snack and sat down to share it with her.

So Sleepy

Gabie was having a snack and we were chatting back and forth when she stopped talking all of the sudden - I turned to look and this is what I found.

Mouse Hunt

Someday soon (I hope!) I will have a saga to write about a little mouse, I've decided to name him Barney. But until the saga is complete I will just content you with the mental picture of how I go around my house nowadays singing a rendition of Kill the rabbit, kill the rabbit - only with mousey words - and carrying a meat tenderizer ready to strike!

Thank you Claudia!

Rachel is snuggled up after her bath in her new personal baby towel that we got in the mail a couple of days ago. My friend Claudia makes these towels - and they are THE BEST! I think she should go into business :0) We now have 3, and they are the only towels the girls use. Thanks Claudia - you rock!!!

Swimming Pool

Swimming, swimming in a swimming pool, when days are hot and days are cold (like -4!) in a swimming pool I think of that song each time I get creative on a really cold day and do this. We bring in the wading pool, fill it with warm water and let the kids go swimming. They love it! I highly recommend it for chasing away the winter blues and a fun easy activity. If the biggest mess of the day is water...than I'm a happy mom. Barb, Bryce and Brenden came over to play, so it seemed like a great day to go for a plunge.

A Gut Full of Giggles

sorry about the wiggles of the camera, I was trying to hold it and tickle her at the same time.

Little Helpers

We had 3 busy little helpers in the kitchen last night. Rachel wanted to help make the food and Elie and Gabie wanted to help clean up.

Mashed Potatoes

I better check out this new blob of stuff mom and dad put in front of me, I bet I can make a big mess with this.


Hey, this stuff is stuck to my hands


The big taste...


This is pretty good stuff!

Ducky Bath

Gabie's Hair

or should I say lack there-of?



Okay, so I had one of my "I've had it!" moments tonight. Gabie LOVES twirling her hair... LOVES it so much that she does it ALL THE TIME. Which is fine (she gets it from her dad :0) But what's not so fine is that it gets these terrible knots in it that take FOREVER to get out. I'm not exaggerating here, I have literally tried soaking her hair in baby oil to try to ease it out to no avail. So after her bath tonight as I was fighting through the knots and she was screaming her screams I decided I had had it! So I cut it off! It's actually quite cute, a little bob cut that we will get fixed in the next couple of days - it really does look fine, but I'm sure it's not quite even or shaped quite right so we'll get it fixed up a bit by someone that actually cuts hair for a living. :0)

Spitting Food

Rachel's at this really fun (um, I'm sure there's a better word for it...) age that she loves to get a mouth full of food and then blow rasperberry's all over herself and the person feeding her ~ it's called the "laundry age", not because she helps clean the clothes, but makes sure that everytime she eats, anyone near her has to have their clothes washed at the end of the feeding.

Stroller Time

I did a double take when i thought Elie and Gabie were pushing their dolls around in their stroller. I decided to actually strap her in, and they pushed her around for a good 15 mintues :0)

Look what Rachel found

Moon Sand

moon-sand - a substance somewhere between sand and play-dough that keeps children occupied for more than 5 mintues at a time (so mom can get some reading done!) and is easy to clean up. Yay!

8 months old

Rachel is 8 months old today!

not this again mom...



Okay, I'll be cute.


This may be the start of few and far between on updates to the blog for the next 6-7 weeks. I have to take a class to keep my teaching certificate active, so I will be doubly busy for the next few weeks. For anyone curious about the reference to New York over new years, the church there is having their call meeting on the 20th, when we will find out if Mark is getting a call. If they do call him we will have a few weeks to pray and decide where God is calling us to serve - here in Gettysburg or in Lockport, NY. Please say extra prayers for our family during this time. We will update as the information comes in. Thanks!

Mom's Night Out

A lady from our church had an ephiphany party this evening. She also had an Esther party early this past spring as we were studying Esther in Bible study on Sunday morning. It was a lot of fun to get together with a great group of ladies from our church and eat laugh and have a great time.

Naptime

Eliya and Kirstie had a lot of fun together the past couple of days as Kirstie came over yesterday morning and left this afternoon. These two never seem to tire of each other!

Dresser Drawers

Rachel crawled over to Elie's dresser this evening and wanted so badly to open the drawer. She seemed to grasp that you needed to hold both handles at the same time, but couldn't seem to get her hands to cooperate with her. It was very fun to watch her concentration though! She worked on it for a good five minutes before giving up and rolling around and crawling back over to her sisters to play with them.

Growing

The girls aren't the only ones growing in our house...the first thing Eliya noticed when we got home is home much our "devotion plant" (as she calls it) had grown!