Happy Birthday, Daniel

Just a random sampling of things we have heard from our birthday boy lately:

• "Wesley is my best friend"
• "Are ants friendly?"
• "I am the bestest swimmer ever"
• "Do sharks eat dolphins?"
• "God is the Lord"
• "Wesley is hitting me" (at least 2-3 times a day)
  
• "When is my dinosaur PARTY?"
• "Wesley, I need to tell you something: David killed Goliath."
• "God, please be with: blue frogs, ostriches, elephants and zebras" (during nightly prayers)

Happy Birthday to Daniel, our precious firstborn son who is such a joy to us every day! We can hardly believe it's already been 4 years since you came into our lives.

Evidence Wesley believes he is 4 years old :

He is not even 2 yet, but:

• He can already ride a big wheel (doesn't push the pedals, but he is just as fast).
• He sings along with our "Imagination Movers" cd and chimes in with the one syllable words he knows.
• He is obsessed with "World Word" and "Super Why" (great PBS shows) as much as his brother.
• He only hangs with the big kids at the playground. He ignores babies.
• He will race to sit in Daniel's "big boy" car seat anytime we have our 3rd car seat installed and there are seating options.
  
• He climbs slanted monkey bars, and other inappropriate playground equipment over and over again, even after getting stuck.
• Tonight for dinner he ate steak and green beans.
• He plays Wii (but we take the batteries out of his remote).
  
• He is playing Hot Wheels right now and yelling "Crash".
  
• He can already watercolor, crayon, eat with a spoon and fork, sip from a straw, picks out his own clothes and shoes, and pulled off his diaper the other day and pointed to the potty.

Good thing we have seen all of this stuff before (from our real almost-4 year old).

My Moms Group

Yesterday when Lloyd was going to speak on Nehemiah 13: 23-31, I thought, "where's he going to take this intermarriage thing for the next 40 minutes?". I loved that he went to Proverbs 13:20 and made it all about hanging with wise people. Our dissolution into the world and sin can be prevented by the company we keep.

So it's only fitting I give a shout out to my faithful moms group. I have been longing for a small group of like-minded women for about a year. I had a really hard summer last year and during that time I realized I was needing a small group that shared the same struggles and prayer concerns. So I actively sought a good leader and small group within our church's "Moms Together" program. The first group I joined was not a good fit, so I tried a different group in the spring and hit gold.

What I appreciate about these women is we are real with each other. Everyone has struggles and it's ok to talk about it. Most of us have been married around 10 years and have had our second child in the last year or so. Our roles as wives and mothers at this point are very demanding yet rewarding. Our discussion this summer has centered around a book called "For Women Only" by Shaunti Feldman. Our goal has been to talk about how we can improve our marriages and nothing is off limits in our discussion. We have laughed, cried and laughed a lot more. We have prayed really hard and seen some prayers answered. Many prayers have not been answered yet, but we are not giving up.

This has been the right group at the right time for all of us. We know God put it together, but it's not everlasting and not an exclusive group. We will continue to meet, some new faces may come and some may go. But the biblical purpose remains, "He who walks with the wise will become wise, but the companion of fools suffers harm". I'm just thankful I've found a few more wise ones to hang out with this year.

A fun field trip

We missed the grand opening, but today we received a private tour with our friends. I learned a lot (and so did the kids).

Cousins to the Rescue!

Too bad Claire couldn't stick around for our visit to our new firestation today!

Eating Local - an interesting book

Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life by Barbara Kingsolver

My review

rating: 4 of 5 stars
I found this book very entertaining and informative. The author's family decides to spend a year eating only what they can grow or buy locally, with very few exceptions. They are "locavores". Granted, they are experienced gardeners who already live on a small farm within a farming community, so the challenge was not as great as it would be for you or me. The author is quite the environmentalist and evolutionist, but I was easily able to overlook her agenda to understand some of her rationale.



I do agree we are using too much fossil fuel to support our current food culture. I also agree America has lost its agricultural heritage, to the extent that most people have no idea how to grow a garden or what is "in season" at different times of the year. It is hard to get kids to eat veggies when they don't have the full richness of flavors our grandparents experienced before the grocery store chains reduced their stock to 3 types of tomatoes that usually taste "mealy". Anyone who has had a homegrown tomato in the last year will instantly taste the difference.



While I'm not going 100% organic (which also uses fossil fuels if it's not local), I did feel like I could implement some of the book's suggestions, such as supporting the local farmers market and stockpiling local veggies while in season for later use. I really enjoyed the information on making cheese, which makes it sound easy enough it's tempting to try (stay tuned in case I do). This book did make me think about our every day food consumption. There has to be a balance between food cost and healthy nutrients, I'm sure I'm not the only mother and wife who is struggling to find it.










View all my reviews.

Adventures in Eating

Every parent knows there is a stage where your baby/toddler will only eat 2-3 things. This can be a short phase or a very long phase. Wesley has accepted a limited diet of bread items, applesauce, yogurt, french fries and sometimes a green bean for the last 9 months. It's a nutrition nightmare, but if you make a big deal about it, you can easily turn your meals into battles and your child into a picky eater.

Thankfully, we are finally pulling out this phase in a big way. First, Wesley began eating pizza enthusiastically about 2 months ago. Now, he'll eat almost anything we'll put in front of him as long as he can get it on a fork or spoon. His hand-eye coordination is incredible for a 21 month old. A few days ago he ate most of a container of yogurt by himself with a spoon (yes, he did spill some too). This week he has tried broccoli and tonight he ate 8-10 cheese tortellini by himself. I took pictures (above) as proof!

Preschool Affection

This is Daniel's best "girl" friend, Madeline. He talks about her, he prays for her and last week I let him have a date with her at McDonalds. Her parents go to our church and are currently in our community group, so if this works out, we know she is being raised to love Jesus. Notice her red hair, we just can't get away from it!

Summer is winding down....

After having some fun houseguests last week, this week things are back to normal. Yesterday, I put my "to do" list on the back burner and cleaned the whole house from top to bottom. Today I'm trying out two new recipes and roasting a chicken. So far the first recipe, Banana Peanut Butter muffins, from the "Deceptively Delicious" cookbook is a hit. I added chocolate chips, maybe that's why!

Today is the hottest day of the year, so we will be looking for ways to beat the heat (sprinkler, anyone?) I have organized a playgroup this summer, and tomorrow we are going back to the very air conditioned "bouncy place".

Signs that summer is ending are coming daily. I have gotten Daniel and Wesley's mother's day out teacher assignments and an invitation to an open house later this month. Dave and I have agreed to work with the Toddlers at church and the start date is fast approaching. This is the last week our babysitter is coming for a few hours during the day, because school starts next week. And it's time to plan Daniel's 4 year birthday party for Labor Day weekend. I have a lot of dinosaur-related work to do in preparation for the big bash!