And We're Walking!

Halloween, finally!

Not digging the costume!

Our fairy princess ballerina.

Pumpkins!

Inside of Trav's pumpkin.

I am being attacked from a bunker!

One of our preschool activities we did. This week we learned about community helpers and about how Jesus helps us.

The extent of our jumping in leaves. So sad...

Learned about our bodies and how God made us.

So much fun stepping in paint and walking around!

Videos

Mara has taken to our Saturday morning ritual: Turn on Jump Around, put the Badger flag up on the deck, and listen to Teach Me How to Bucky.

We like to play Sniper.

JOY

At church last year I went out of my comfort zone and joined a large women's Bible study. It was a Beth Moore study and it was good. It was hard for me to go the first night because I knew no one, as our church is quite big, but the small group that I was assigned to was nice. So when this fall began, I was SO looking forward to joining a study again, but it became painfully obvious that me and the girls were overbooked. Mara has speech twice a week until school starts mid-October, where she will be attending Mon-Thurs for 3 hours every morning; Tuesdays I have school all day while the girls go to daycare; Wednesdays are storytime at the local library and AWANA for Samara; Thursdays are MOPs (Mothers of Preschoolers), which is GREAT! and soccer for Samara. While I am NOT a fan of how busy we are, I find that everything that we have on our calendar is VERY important for our family. Mara obviously needs her speech therapy, I need a hot breakfast and some adult convo, and storytime, AWANA and soccer are great for Mara. SO, with all that said, no group Bible study for me. The great thing was, though, is that the Bible study also has an online part to it, so I can do it!

Anyway, the study is on Divine Joy and I think that this is just perfect for me. So many times I have struggled with understanding joy outside of the American standard, commonly misunderstood feeling of happiness. I wanted to know the 'Divine' portion of it. With this big change in my life of being home with two children and contemplating homeschooling our children along with going to school full-time and Travis starting a new job, our lives have been in upheaval and things seemed to be anything but 'joyful.' But I think that I have the wrong definition of Joy. While I am not sure of God's perspective of Joy, I am anxious for this study to help me learn more.

Such a big girl, almost 2 months old!

The longest she has lifted her head so far! I have heard that her hair is just like mine was when I was young!

BIG EYES!

Words can't express...

Samara and Nalani, best friends???

At the Racine Zoo.

Duty vs. Desire

If I could move and live in Africa, I would. Really, I would. I am sure that I have an idealistic view of how it would be, but don't we all have that about place(s) that we want to go to or live in? Since it is not time for me to go to Africa yet (I emphasize YET), we sponsor children through World Vision. Our first was Mariserina from Kenya. We corresponded with her for years before her family moved. When she left, we decided to sponsor another girl in Ethiopia, Birtukan. Now here comes the honesty...

I haven't written her yet. Nothing. Today I got a mailing from her and felt horrible. So we will sit down and write her and include something from Mara and some 'snaps' (what Mariserina called pictures). But thinking deeper about this, I realize that I continued my sponsorship out of duty, not desire to pour love into another child or even wanting to witness to another family. I just did it because that is what we should do. Sad. So that will change, but now it makes me wonder what other things do we do out of duty that shouldn't be. Thought provoking. I think that is what will be on my mind this week.

As a side note, World Vision is awesome and had a very thought provoking blog about the famine in the Horn of Africa I wanted to share:

http://blog.worldvision.org/conversations/what-would-you-give-up/

Too Distracted?

So I have had the priviledge of taking Samara to swim lessons last week and this week, finishing up on thursday. She has done so well and I have loved being able to watch her explore and try things that scare her, like putting her head under. But today I looked around at the other moms here and noted that everyone of us was on our phone. It made me sad. Are we so preoccupied that we can't take 30 minutes out of our day to enjoy our children? I know that this time will fly by, yet I still struggle with taking each and every moment in without interruption and with enjoyment.

Distractions aside, Samara did a wonderful job. She now puts her head under, uses a kickboard to swim, and has learned to paddle, back float, and kick! We are pondering signing her up for the next session, but don't want to become one of those parents that has their kids doing too much instead of just enjoying life (Samara wanted to try soccer this fall).

Wow, she is just awesome!

I have a pic of Mara similar to this....

They almost look the same size, but in this one, Mara is almost 4 months old and Nala is 1 month!

Mara at 3 months, looking a lot like Nala above!

Our girls

Mara is very protective of her sister, much to our delight!

The size of a plate that Trav thinks is appropriate for 'the best brownies I have ever had.' And I even made them!

'Camping' for lunch. Mara was watching one of her PBS shows and they were camping, so she decided that she must go camping....so we went camping in the kitchen. Later that night, we read stories by flashlight in her tent in her room. It was a success.

More pictures

Mara's Coat of Many Colors, to go along with our lesson on Joseph.


Daddy's big art project outside.

Nalani exploring her crib mirror.

This is how Travis eats brownies.

Little Nalani, so serious.

Mara, ready for the sprinkler.

Mara and Mommy at her VBS picnic at Rachel's church.

Family pic!

Cute Nalani!

No explanation necessary.

Peg meeting Nala for the first time.

What a pose!

Mara helping Grandpa with Nalani.

First bath at home.

Mara meets Nalani

We came home from the hospital Wednesday and Trav picked up Mara from Auntie Tanya's. Mara said she had tons of fun swimming and playing with kitties, which was great! What a blessing Tanya was to us!

Another blessing was Rachel making a few dinners for us when we returned. You never know how much a ready-made meal helps! Love it! Anyway, Mara came home and the camera was ready to capture the moment:


Mara was not happy about meeting Nala. She was very shy and timid and confused. Poor babe!


But all that changed when Titi Rachel handed Nala over to mommy and had a lap for Mara!


Daddy helped Mara to understand what was going on and explore her sister a bit.


Mara liked her feet...


And eventually Mara came around and was happy with having a new sister. Good job Dad!


Mara getting up the courage to try to hug her sister. This was a very big deal!


Next day, Mara holding her sister for the first time: Nala was none too happy and Mara does not like when she cries...


...so she told me to come get her 'NOW!'

Nala holding on tight to Rach. Very precious!