Wednesday, December 22, 2010

Now Starring Dietrich Lewis in " I Am Three Years Old!!"

Dietrich turned 3 on Monday. We kept the celebration low-key since he will have a party at each set of grandparents over our Christmas vacation and another one with friends in January.


p.s. What is strange about this picture?

or this one?




Isn't this an awesome reaction?  Un-staged.


This proves that even if all you have to decorate a cake is two-year old squeeze tubes from Cub that won't come out right so give up and can only write "Happy Dietrich" in scrawling psycho writing, it will still be a birthday cake and everyone will still enjoy eating the cake. Ha! (Especially when you see the kind of cakes my brother Jonathan or sister-in-law Lindsey makes.)





The After-Party...




I love you so very much, Dietrich -- my intense, thinking boy.



Best way to end Deke's birthday day -- naked, playing with his best friend...

Hi!



Saturday, December 18, 2010

Warm Little Ears

Last week my mom sent this hat she made for Thea.


Angelina!

My dear friend Angelina Fernandez moved back to California this week. We were roommates when Brad and I were dating. I feel like all the ways we are completely different and all the differences in how we grew up were somehow not that big of a deal. We were meant to be friends. I love her perspective on things. I love the way I always learn things when I talk with her -- about anything or nothing. I love the flair she has for being a woman -- just something about the way she throws her hair up or wears it wild or throws on crazy shoes or a red cardigan cut just right. I am thankful, so thankful God brought her out to the Midwest and let us meet. I pray she heals and continues to grow back home with her family. I pray she finishes college and finds a career meant for her. I pray she presses in close to God, and that it would please Him to bring her a husband who loves her deeply, selflessly, steadfastly, creatively -- simply, the way Christ loves her.
 

Snow!






 

Just Stuff...

I have always been painfully aware of how fast life is. When I was a little girl I remember many times hiding out behind the White Machine Shed crying because life was too fast and I was afraid of growing up. My dad always had this saying, "You begin dying the moment you are conceived, basically, you begin dying the instant you begin living." I think he meant it to be a reminder to make the most of every second because earthly life is quick and uncertain and "fraught with heavy import" -- yes, I thought phrases like that as a kid (is it any wonder I lived in some weird other-world in my head?). This year, this Christmas I see my four children here, seeing our family complete in terms of the characters on the stage -- they all have entered "stage left" and are now, in number, finite. These last 5 years were a heady, swirly "rush" and now I am here. Brad and I are irrevocably changed in ways that we don't fully understand, in ways that we "sort of" anticipated but, in retrospect, had no idea what we were "in for". And now I am middle aged. 36. 36. In only a few months I will be 37. It's okay but I wish my grandma was here...I wish we had more older friends for that wisdom, for that perspective, for that kind of "ballast"? "levity"? "assurance"? We need more old people in our lives.
****

Angelina Fernandez was my roommate while Brad and I dated (dated in our own horrible way and eventually married for a marriage far better and more satisfying and healthy than any of us would have guessed). Thursday Angelina moved back to California, without her husband, to live with her mom, 6 aunts and 37 cousins. She moved back to heal and be taken care of and finally get to go to college. I will miss her. I have so many things full in my heart for her -- I am so grateful I got to spend a number of very wonderful hours (thank you, Super-dad Brad!) with her the week before she left -- talking together and laughing and listening and praying. 

****

Brad had a hard week at work. He is a very good engineer. He is very good at diffusing tense situations and coming up with satisfactory solutions for various enigmas and glitches. He gets yelled at by contractors. He sits in angry meetings. Not always, but enough that I am wildly thankful he "goes out there" and works for us and that it is me here with our sometimes cranky and cantankerous kids. At least they're OUR cranky and cantankerous kids. And people seldom yell at me on the phone -- unless it's my sister -- right, Bekah? (She doesn't do that much anymore, really, and I probably somehow brought it on anyway....)

****

I don't know what this post is. Thea was finally napping in my arms and I didn't want to wake her up. Now it is 2:16 pm and the two older boys are awake from their "long" half hour nap -- oh well, a half hour is a half hour and at least Lincoln is still sleeping. Thankful. AND I drank most of my coffee while it was still warm!

Monday, December 13, 2010

A Thea-Fix for Those Who Love Her Far Away


  
The hat my mom just made and sent Thea Belle



Happy Birthday. Jonathan!!

My brother Jonathan, my sister-in-law Robyn and Felicity & Clark!!
 

Thanksgiving Visit to My Folks

 

My niece Felicity, my mom, and Thea Belle
 


Brad & our niece Felicity
 

Felicity the Birthday Girl

My sister-in-law Robyn & my brother Jonathan
My nephew Clark's Picture Face
Working on Felicity's Birthday Cake was a group effort though my brother did all the decorating (-:
My sister making the frosting with the helper boys...

My Little Pony cake -- right from my Brother's Heart...Aww(-:


My sister doing out to help my dad do something to her car.
 
My husband, the Danish (Russian?) poet...

Always movies at my folks...I like the swords ready just in case.


Sleep always goes a bit wonky when we go on these visits -- Lincoln fell asleep in the middle of the floor -- in the morning. Poor kid.





Brad gets a haircut -- mostly because I needed a change and I don't cut my hair...Still, he looks good both ways, I think (-:


 
Happy First Birthday, Felicity!

Party at Robyn's parents' farm -- there are like a dozen grandkids all around 8 years old and under...and this was only part of the crew. I guess that happens when there are eight kids all married having children. Poor Felicity reached out to touch her birthday candle right as everyone started singing to her. Her hand was okay, but still, rough way to start out her celebration.



Jonathan smiling at Felicity -- hoping her fingers are okay...

Bekah entertaining Dietrich


Opening gifts (beginning with Felicity falling off her chair onto her head...poor kid)...

Neat advent calendar my mom lovingly made for the kids -- had to be put away for now after one of the kids (?) began dis-assembling all the little ornaments...But am looking forward to using it when the kids are ready to be responsible with it.  Thank you, Mom!