We praise Him!

I was just sitting here snuggling our sweet little baby and it just seems so surreal that he is finally here and that everything's okay.  It feels like an eternity that we've waited for him and prayed for him.  Even months before he was born we prayed and prayed that God would give us a healthy pregnancy and were so nervous after the two that we lost.  We are so blessed to have been given such a precious gift.  He's so wonderful!  Made me think of a song that we have just started doing recently at church called "We Praise Him".  I thought I'd share it with you guys since it's very fitting for how we feel about Owen's birth and having him here in our family.  It's a fun one that our kids like to sing and dance around to!

James 1:17 "Whatever is good and perfect comes down to us from God our Father, who created all the lights in the heavens.."

Life.

My sweet girl helping me by bringing down the laundry from upstairs.  She is really starting to act "old".  I know this may seem kinda hilarious to those of you with older kids.  That I would refer to my 4 year old as being "old".  But since she's the first born, I haven't had to watch this transition before from toddler to child.  She wants to know the ins and outs of everything.  She has such a strong opinion of what she wants.  She loves to try and get a rise out of me by saying something she knows is silly.  Every once in awhile she'll look at me the right way and I'll catch a glimpse of that baby face and I'll wonder where my baby went.  I wouldn't trade one second of this time with her though getting "old". ;)

As for the rest of life..

We're just going with the flow these days.  We've had a ton of ups and downs.  Today I just made up my mind that "ups and downs" are just going to be a way of life for us, I suppose!  We have some big hopes for this year.  We "hope" that this year we will make more family time away from the home.  We haven't been good about taking vacations just the four of us.  We usually spend our extra time visiting family.  This year we "hope" to take some time just the four of us.  We "hope" that this year our family will grow  with another baby.  We "hope" that Randy will one day get a full time job leading worship.  We can go on and on with desires of our heart, but I'm thankful we have more then just "hopes and dreams". 

This morning as I was working on a lesson from my ladies Bible study at church, I was reading this verse that I have probably read a gazillion times:

James 1:2-4 Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.  Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything.   

And even though I have read it often, it never gets old.  We can be sad about a situation, but yet joyful because we know that in the end it is going to work out for our benefit and God's glory.  My absolute favorite part of it is the end.  That we will be "mature and complete, not lacking anything."  I can't imagine how many trials, how many lessons-learned-the-hard-way it must take to finally be complete and lacking nothing, but I'm thankful that God is chiseling away at me little by little!

You

Thought I'd share a new song our worship team introduced to the church recently that I just LOVE!  Enjoy!

19 months...and 2 days!!

Soooo..I've always heard that you are more slack with the second child, but it hit me this week as my little Noey turned 19 months that I have barely blogged on any of his milestones, accomplishments, ect.  Poor guy!  We have definitely celebrated them all along the way, it's just very few have actually made it down i writing.  I'm going to try and be better about that agin for both of the kids.  Showing you their big moments again on here more often.

So Noah is 19 months and so wonderful to us! He is running around and climbing on everything.  His most favorite thing to do right now is pretend to play drums.  He has a little music set he got for his Birthday last Sumer and I can't tell you the number fo times during the day he comes running to me and says (like he's so old) "MOM! DRUM!" meaning that he would please like me to get it off the shelf ;).

He has been having a little bit of a stubborn streak. Or maybe just an "I'm so cute that somehow I became completely spoiled rotten and now my mom is back tracking trying to fix it....." streak.  Either way, right now Noah is working on not running away when I ask him to come here and we're also trying to add a "yes mommy" to that.  He's doing better, but he thinks it's so funny to run away and laugh like it's a game.  So I think we'll be working on this one for awhile now.  Also, working on not hitting when he's mad. Yes people, he is a hitter.  Not always us, but he will try to go hit a wall or the table or whatever is closest when he gets mad.  He's a stinker!  But on the positive side, he always uses "peassssss" when asking for a drink which is exciting.  Still loves to eat anything and everything.  Recently found a love for "reading" and being read to which makes me so super happy! He's just a joy.  Using lots of new words just these last few weeks, but the most consistent are "momma, daddy, sissy or ella, school, car, train, truck, peassss, bye bye, eat, drink, help, no, stuck, up, hold me....wow now that I'm writing them, there are way more then I even realized.  Alot of them sound similar, but he's using them in the right time.  I change my mind, I'm not going to sit and list them all lol!

He LOVES to sing, so I thought in honor of his 19 month old post I would share a video of him singing, "Say Say" by Kristian Stanfill.

Here is the original in case you haven't heard the song:



And here is Noah James singing his own version.  And there is a huge disclaimer....he is eating while singing..and I know that's rude and gross...but it's hard to get him to do it for the camera...so I had to. Please forgive me.  The cuteness is totally worth it. Promise. Also, he only knows the chorus.

Guitar Playing Fun!

Randy and his Dad had a great time yesterday playing guitar together. He really enjoyed getting to "jam out" and spend some quality time with his Dad while he's in town. Once Ella woke from her nap, she wanted to join in on the fun. She sat on the couch and watched while she played her Barbie guitar. Too cute!