I am sorry that I have not put any messages on for a while. I don't seem to be able to construct the time and energy at the same time in order to get postings done. Maybe tomorrow.

Halloween Rememberings

Here is a little peek at Lylah's Halloween costumes from her first and second Halloween. The top one is a hat and bib my Mom sent for her. She was very cute as a little black cat. The second few are of the costume I had planned for her first Halloween before she was born. i made the whole thing and loved it. It had sweet tulle wings on the back to. I loved the hat the most because I was able to get the antenna to stand up and the little flowers were just right. She was about 5 months old in these.
The third group is from last year. She was almost a year and a half in these. I made her and owl costume by pinning the wings, front, back, and head piece on a brown sweater. She wore her brown shoes and brown leggings with it too. The real topper was the glasses which I thought made the "owl-ish"part. I colored the beak on her nose with a washable marker. (You should click on the one of her sitting on the steps to see it bigger and get the full cuteness of her expression.) It was fun to make and she loved wearing it, but maybe it did not look as much like an owl as I would have wanted. Several people saw her and not one said Owl. They said several other birds: turkey, rooster, chicken...no owl. But she was cute in the suit even if she was not totally recognizable as an owl.
This year I have grandiose Ideas of making her into a Woodland Fairy/Gnome with a mushroom hat. But then I second guess that and think she would be cute as many a different thing. Whatever the case, I have not started and time is a tickin' Help me!!! Any ideas? I am trying to keep clear of "princess anything" since I am sure we have a few years of self chosen princess costumes around the corner.

Pudding Patrole

I thought I would add a couple of pictures of Lylah and I making pudding form scratch. She was VERY eager to help make the pudding and even more eager to eat it. She ran to get her apron and hat she got for Christmas last year and stirred away at the ingredients in her bowl. When Glen got home, she ran to him and told him what we had been up to. She was so excited by it that she was almost screaming. It had to set up in the fridge for a couple of hours before it was ready, so for those 2 hours she did everything she was asked with gusto because of anticipating the pudding.

She loves to help in the kitchen so much and I hope she will continue to do so. I enjoy cooking and would love to impart that joy to her too. Someone else will have to impart the joy of cleaning up the kitchen afterward. I cannot seem to make myself do that piece. But I guess the key will be MAKING myself do it anyway. I mean who LIKES to clean the kitchen ( other than my mom and grandma--they seem to LIVE for it.)

Pudding was tolerable. I think I like instant where you just stir in the milk best. Maybe because that is what I am used to. Glen and Lylah loved the homemade kind. I will have t make it one more time to test the buds on the flavor again. I am feel a batch of cookies coming on for the weekend though...

Pumpkin Patch Adventures

Pumpkin patch day was so fun and SOOOOO cold. It was windy and a little misty at times and only 34 outside. We only stayed at Red Barn Farm for about 30 to 40 minutes. It took us that long to get there! But we did have fun and Lylah loved selecting her pumpkins. There were tons of varieties to choose from and they were all so lovely. You know, when Glen and I bought our house we were silly enough to name it just like the Manor Houses in Little Women and Pride and Prejudice. Well ...maybe I named the house and Glen humored me. Whatver the case, we both agree that we love Autumn. It's lovely. The leaves here right now are amazing! All up and down our tree-lined streets the colors are on fire. It's an explosion of reds and oranges and yellows and, my favorite, leaves with all three at once. I love the leaves in transition. (I could draw life parallels here, but I will spare you and I both.) Oh, I forgot, You are wondering what the house is named...The House of Perpetual October. Totally corny, I know, and I really should not admit that I named my 2 bedroom house. But I love the Fall, that is the real point here.Here is a shot of Lylah acting out what the Turkey says and does. It is a bit of a strut and run and a pretty convincing gobble. She can do a pretty realistic elephant too. I am pretty basic with my animal sounds. I think my mouth is too small or my tongue too big or my teeth all a jumble that prevents me from true mastery of authentic sounding animals. Aunt Lori, Glen's sis and our friend to boot, on the other hand, has no limits. You name it, it sounds correct, and fun. ( I can make a giraffe sound though--bet you don't know what they sound like--our favorite children's librarian told me).Taken at the beginning of our visit. As you can see, it is windy and it looks pretty crisp. Lylah is sporting her too small vest from last year and her new hoodie jacket. The vest is a stop-gap until we are ready for the BIG COAT. Shouldn't be too long now. Winter seems to be here already. I am jealous of my Florida family who are still frolicking on the beach. But, I don't complain too much. As I said before, I love fall.
A cute one of Lylah amongst the pumpkin selections. Notice the cold looking nose and the very cute and "long-ish" pony tails?!

She laughed and laughed upon noticing that the chickens were eating green beans.

Glen said, "Lylah, feel the sheep. Isn't it so soft?!" She said, " Oh, Yes!! and a little bit dirty too.""Look at me, Mommy! I can drive a tractor!" You can also see the mounds of pumpkins so prettily placed around. How fall-ish!! They were selling kettle corn and mulled apple cider too. Last one: Lylah and Daddy. He is wrapped around her tiny finger and he loves it. She is SO into Daddy right now. If Daddy says it, then it is the best thing ever. She always wants to sit with Daddy and be right where he is. If he is not there, then I guess mommy will do.

Hair It Is

Here you see my new do. I tried to get a front and back mirror shot. You can kind of see the back. I love it. It is not as short as the hair I asked for, but I really like it and am now very happy with it. I wanted to make a major change. This hair is a big hair change for the better. I hope it will also go along with the changes I am making spiritually, physically, relationally, and lifestyle related. Changing the whole of who you are, you ask? No, not everything. But I really am feeling as though there are several things that need serious attention, so why not now?! I have been a nominal Christian at best for quite some time. I run to Jesus when things look bad or when I need something or just after a convicting seminar or revival. After the "high" runs out, I am back to the same old me again. This goes the same with every area of my life. I am notorious for "turning over a new leaf" and telling myself that it's OK to quit when things get hard. Truth is, I have always been a quitter. I have never not quit if I really felt like it was REALLY what I wanted to do. As it would turn out, I married a serious NON QUITTER. This has proven to be a bummer sometimes. He is always there to say (like a good coach), " If you give up, then you will never get anywhere.' Now he has not said these exact words, but something very close to them. So it has been a blessing to me to have a strong person in my life who really sees through mt shenanigans and calls my bluff. He is honest with me and my BS (pardon the French). Good for me to have a person willing to call me out. I digress....Point is I have chosen to make some changes for me. I am doing it little by little starting with a biggie: my attitude and outlook on life. As I stated when I began this blog, I am a wanna be optimist. I want the "wanna be" to be history. I am pretty 'glass half-full' sometimes, if i am honest.
Spiritually, I am not willing to let the closeness I felt with Jesus after the loss of our second baby just a couple of weeks ago pass me by. I am determined to know that Jesus who was my comforter and who answered my prayers when I was not able to feel like my prayers amounted to anything. A little over a year and a half ago when we lost our little Anna, I was devastated. I had no thought that anything like that could ever happen to me. But it did and it has been a long and hard road. After loosing Anna, Glen and I chose to try to have another baby without fear of loss. After an unsuccessful year and a half of wanting a baby and praying and working through grief, I finally felt like I was OK and felt ready to have another baby. I knew that it would be soon. When I found out I was pregnant, I had prayed my heart out hoping that this would be the time that God would give us another baby. When I found out I was pregnant, I was overjoyed. Glen was too. I was feeling emotionally strong. When I went in for the Dr appointment and found out we had lost the baby I was devastated. I had literally prayed every time I thought of the baby ( which as any pregnant person knows is almost every moment) for the baby to be healthy. When I found out we had lost him/her I was not so sure that my prayers counted for anything. I was mad that I had had faith and I had prayed so long and this had happened again. But I knew as well that that was not truth. The Bible tells us that prayer IS valuable to God and he hears our prayers. And little by little God impressed upon me to pray. I heard it on the radio to persevere, I got calls from people who don't usually CALL me to ask me to pray, I was bombarded with prayer requests and people saying they were praying for me. I began to pray again for little things and God answered my small requests as if to hold my disbelieving heart and say it was OK and he was with me still. I am by no means "through" this all. I have not achieved some level of spiritual-ness , but I am here, and I am taking tiny baby steps toward the right direction.
I realize this is a long post and maybe I rambled a lot, but I have so much more to say about where God is directing me and how he won't let me go and how I want to hold on for everything I am to Jesus and know him more. It is real to me like never before. Praise God for Reality. It is better than a wish world. Maybe more later....

bibs and a "willing" assistant

Hello again. I spent last weekend getting back into some crafting. I Made 3 bibs for Lylah and I also stripped a table and cleaned the oven. The latter 2 projects I will elaborate on later. The bibs I made for 2 reasons ( maybe more if I start writing and thinking about them). #1 We just bought Lylah some new clothes and she reallly gets into her "skoo-weppi" (aka spaghetti). #2 I really needed to MAKE some stuff. I have been given several people's ex-craft stash as of late and I have a lot of new material to use. #3 I have a need to get my creative stuff going. I really wanted to start this blog and an ETSY shop all at once, but I did not have even a scrap of handmade anything to put in a shop....I do now. At least a bit of something. #4 I needed to get my sewing chops again after so long so that I can finish a certain niece's Christmas stocking in time for decorating season. #5 I needed to do something to feel like ME again. So I guess that is 5 reasons.
Any who, I made 3 bibs and they got progressively cuter as the bib making went on. I loved the 3rd one the best. It is a fall-ish plaid with acorns embroidered on it. I now have a basic pattern that I will use to make more. They are all apron-style and tie in the back in a way that makes the nesck adjustable and makes the bib not so easy to PULL off, ( like my kid likes to do). Fun, Fun, Fun! I thought, for the sake of the blog, I would have Lylah put each of them on and model for me. Our camera has a rapid speed whatever, but I was not really able to catch such a quickly moving target. So I will post what I got and try to take some ETSY quality photos on a non-moving dummy or a two year old in a reallllly cooperative mood. But I won't hold my breath on the second one.
I said I would explain the table stripping and oven cleaning. I did those because they were projects I was unable to do as a pregnant person. That and eat lunch meat and blue cheese. But I decided to do those projects as an optimistic thing. I want the projects to be done (and done right--hence MY doing them), and so I chose to do them now with the thought that I will not be able to get them done in the near future. See, positive thinking! Truth is, there is a lot more to the whole miscarriage thing and I am still pretty heartbroken and a little ( and sometimes a lot) scared to try again. But I am trying to live in the moment and live my life with hope and faith and courage. Sounds great as I write it now....but you were not here about an hour ago when I was in the "depths of despair" over my entire existence. That was a pitty party to behold and I am soooo not proud of it. But I will move froward. As Marilla Cuthbert would say, " to despair it turn your back on God." There is truth there. I am endeavoring to NOT BE A QUITTER even though I was really wanting to go there a short while ago.
So here's to getting things rolling in the right direction. Yippee!! Today I celebrate progress to come.

A Proud and a Paper Preschooler

I have crafted something for the first time in I can't remember when!!! Yipee!! A couple of weeks ago I sent home a roll of paper with an outline tracing of the child with each of the children in my classes. Sent home as a "do with your family project", the goal was to make a paper preschooler and send it back to school. I would then display them in the hall for a super visual for Open house ( coming up next week). We have has a great response and were running out of space in the hall and I needed to get Lylah done so we could get her on the wall. So I traced her on the paper and she painted her arms and head and hands. Then on a separate paper she painted random colors that she was interested in. When it was all done I collaged it all together in an Eric Carle kind of way. You may remember his techniques from The Very Hungry Caterpillar and Brown Bear. I added a few of her favorite things represented in photographs. She modeled her "duck boots," (duck slippers) and I took a picture of one of her favorite books, Peter Rabbit, and her Olivia stuffed animal. Glen was pretty sure I might be overdoing my project ( in my usual way) and possibly "showing up' the other families. But I assured him that there were plenty of pretty fancy specimens on the wall and Lylah would not totally stand out. But in the end, hers was pretty cute and I loved it. You will see by Lylah's proud face that she loves it too. She went and got her duck boots, Olivia, and book to show me that they match before she ate breakfast that next morning. I pieced it together after she went to bed so she did not see it until she got up.
It is a fun project though. Got my creative juices flowing. She visits her paper self every day before and after school. Proud of her "Good Job, Yaiya!"


It was been a long and heartbreaking weekend this weekend. I will write more soon. Right now I am tired and in need of some serious sleep. My final thoughts for today are that God is good and He loves me and us all so much. I am clinging to this today and to the song we sang in church yesterday by the David Crowder Band "oh how he Loves Us". It's beautiful and speaks so well to my soul just now. Do you know the David Crowder Band? They have wonderful and beautiful style that speaks to me so well. Fleshes out the words I feel and believe toward Jesus so perfectly. I love to praise God with song and then have such with songs and they have such beautiful songs of praise. Give them a listen. More later. Bed for Me.

Here ya Go Henry

Lylah's job is to set the table. She loves to do it. So I usually give her the stuff she needs and she goes about placing them on the table. She is really getting the hang on getting the spoons and forks and knives in the right spot...when I am there for a bit of guidance. A few days ago I was cooking and she was so excited about setting the table for Daddy to come home for dinner. She reached in the cabinet and grabbed about 12 forks and distributed them all around the dining room and table. Henry even got one as he was sleeping under the table. I heard her say, "Here ya go, Henry" But is wasn't until later that I saw what she did. Cute.

Pretty Scary But All Better Now

We went to the emergency room Monday morning after I went to get Lylah up for the day and she was unable to stand or walk. She just kept falling over and said her legs felt wiggly. She did not have any pain to complain of and had had no falls or anything serious happen recently. She was running no temp and seemed otherwise fine. But to have your super duper motor child not be able to run, or walk, or jump, or stand is a big, scary thing. She was pretty excited to be in the hospital. I got this very adorable picture of her laying down in her hospital bed. And you can see she is not at all upset to be there ( as we all were). I took my camera so that I could document her walking in case it got worse. I did not think to video her when it first was happening and she could not stand or walk at all. I got her about an hour later when she was able to walk but walked like her foot was asleep and her walking was a like like a twisted waddle. She looked like the little sweeties I work with at school who have CP. I was worried. We were all worried. They sent us home with no answers and we were all worried.

She got Black Cookies at lunch and was ( in retrospect) beginning to feel bad. She just kept saying, " Mommy, oh Mommy Mommy... Hold me like a baby, please"

Later in the day she started a fever and was really feeling bad. We rushed her back to the ER and she said in the car, " Mommy get me out of this seat. I NeeeeD Medicine. Make me feel better, please. Ok Ok Ok Ok " It was heartbreaking. She had a cough and congestion and got choked up and puked on herself as we pulled up to the ER. That was very upsetting to her and she just wanted to be cleaned off. They did more X-rays of her chest and throat culture and flu test and it was all negative. Dr. gave her an antibiotic for a red throat ( probably not necessary ) and we went home again with still no real answer.
Today I took her to her Dr Bartulica. ( which she can say and it is so cute). He said the he saw another child Lylah's age this week with the exact same thing. They had been to the children's hospital and gotten some blood drawn ( I thought they should have done something like that here but they didn't) and it showed a viral thing that will work itself out. After 24 hours the other child was functioning normally too. So I feel much better about the whole thing. He said it is not COMMON but it is not unheard of that a child will have a symptom like the inability to use her legs as a result of a viral thing. it clears up quickly and leaves no ill affects behind. So PRAISE GOD!!! She is fine, except for the getting over a respiratory cold thing. She has a hard time when she is stuffy. Can't breathe through her nose exclusively and so she cannot suck her fingers and sleep like usual. She even told me today, " Mommy, I can't get my fingers in my mouth... my nose a yucky" So it will be another long night of me going back and forth from her room every 30 min to an hour when she wakes up over and over. But I'll take and love it. She is OK and I am so happy. So thankful. Jesus answered our prayers again. Thank you Jesus.

Couldn't have done it without GPS!!

I went to my college friend Lisa's wedding on September 4th. It came together as a mini college reunion as there were 7 of our college girls group there for the event. Everyone has been doing a great job of keeping in touch and even getting together yearly, for the most part, ever since we all graduated. The last of the bunch got done in 1998. I really can't believe it's been that long. Now I will say the cliche line, " I feel so old." But it's true. I still feel like it was just the year before last or something. Maybe that has something to do with us all keeping up with each other or maybe it has something to do with the fact that I still feel like I really haven't grown up yet.... Who knows.
Any who, the weekend was a blast. We all piled in one hotel suite and drove around Minneapolis in a caravan of rentals and my car. we defiantly could not have made it without our GPS. I don't know how we ever did it before. Well I guess we just had to pay attention to our surroundings. I have found with the GPS that I just do what she tells me and don't try to remember my way because she will get me there with her persistent, "Turn Right....recalculating...TURN RIGHT." I have a serious problem with distinguishing my left and right. I believe it's a bit of dyslexia that also manifests itself in my spelling issues and reading speed. I digress... The point is that the blessed GPS said, " turn right," and I would always begin to glide left. So there was always a designated passenger assigned to keeping me going to the actual right and not my own crazy way.
It was a great weekend full of LOTS of deep, and not so deep, conversation and lots of activity. I came home POOPED out and had to go right back to work. I am afraid the classroom suffered that week as I was a ZOMBIE all week long. I was really wanting to be a faithful post-er, but alas, I was a pooped out pregnant person trying to hang on for the weekend and a little rest.

Top Picture: Here is Me, Lisa ( the bride), Loveday, and Amy
Second down: Alicia, Me, (Jennifer) Loveday, and Nicole at the reception
3rd down: Me and Amy
4th down: Me and Loveday
5th down: Lisa and Kerry dancing to "Dancing Queen" put in the mix as a tribute to "the Cumbrland Girls"
6th Down: Beth, Loveday and Nicole dancing to "I Like Big Butts" yes it was on the play list...the crowd went crazy. You should have seen Lisa's grandparents dancing to it...totally oblivious to the words I hope.

Here are a few shots of the most wonderful wedding I think I have ever attended. It was such a celebration and the reception was so fun too. The service was such a worship experience and I could feel the love and excitement for the couple in the air. every person in the place was thrilled for them and celebrating the union for Jesus and for each other and others that their marriage would bring. Seriously, it was so neat to be there. Sometimes the guys your friends end up with you just think to yourself, " Well she must love him and he must not be SO bad if she loves him..." But not in this case. He was just so perfect for her. I'm so happy for them.