Ziva is 5 Months Old!

She's crawling!

Look close...you can see those two bottom teeth!


Having a Tetris tournament with Daddy...what great motor skills :)

Little Chatterbox

Ziva already has Daddy letting her walk all over him.

FreeCyclying

Vince heard about this really great website - www.freecycle.org - where people who want to get rid of things but don't want to throw them away and add to the landfills can post items they'd like to give away. You can find a group in your area and get used stuff for free, or give stuff away. I thought it was worth posting....pretty neat idea!

Little Bookworm

Is this girl my daughter or what? Les Miserables is a fine choice, Ziva.

"I Can Feed Myself, Thank You Very Much!"

Happy Girl

I don't know why these are turned sideways, but I couldn't figure out how to change it. That smile is still cute though! If I can overcome my technically challenged self, I can hopefully post a video of her "crawling" soon....she's getting close!

Sufficient Grace

As I was walking into Walmart today, I thought about my first trip to Walmart with Ziva. She was three weeks old, and even though my Aunt Julie was with me, unused as I was to navigating a shopping cart with a car seat on top of it, I rammed the cart full force into a concrete post outside the store. Going shopping today, I thought (rather smugly) how good I've become at taking Ziva with me wherever I need to go. When we got home from the store, I walked in to the wonderful aroma of the banana oatmeal chocolate chip cookies I had baked before we left, and I thought (rather smugly again) that I really have it together - clean house, check!; baking, check!; shopping, check!; happy baby, check! It wasn't until after I had unloaded the groceries, fed Ziva, and put her down for a nap that I realized it wasn't the cookies I was smelling, but the candle warmer I had left on while I was gone. Sure...I really have it together.

All of this comes on the heels of a minor meltdown I had Thursday night. Thursday was my first day of school, so the day began with me dropping Ziva off at the staff baby room and crying as I left. Follow that with a fairly chaotic day (as the first day of school usually is), picking Ziva up, coming home, and deciding to make a new, very-labor-intensive recipe of stuffed peppers for dinner. Too late, I realized stuffed peppers was not the wisest choice, and as I couldn't turn time back, I cried through half of the cooking, feeling totally overwhelmed at the prospect of working full-time on top of being a wife, a mom, and a homemaker.

God said His grace is sufficient for us, and today that's a promise full of rest and hope for me. I really do believe I'm supposed to be teaching this year, and already I feel God directing me towards certain students in whom he wants me to invest. I'm in the middle of His will, and His grace is sufficient - for those little moments where I wonder where I left my brain (candle warmer!), and for the major meltdowns. He covers us with His amazing grace, and I know He will continue to meet me with His grace to get me through each and every day. I don't have to be the perfect wife/mom/teacher/woman - His grace fills in the gaps.

Something to Chew On

Ziva cut her first tooth today (front, bottom right), and we didn't really even know she was teething! She has been drooling a lot, and when she had her last doctor visit, Dr. Blesch said she may start teething soon because we could see little white buds on the bottom, but that was just two weeks ago and we had no idea it would happen so soon! And Ziva has been remarkably un-fussy, so we didn't realize anything out of the norm was happening. I thought teething would be a pretty traumatic experience, but I think it's just made her have a hard time taking naps. We have such a good baby! Hopefully every tooth will be this easy!

It's the Hap-Happiest Season of All

No, it's not Christmas yet, but in my opinion, fall is the happiest season of all, and today I felt it! Some thunderstorms have brought a dramatic cool down, and as I was out runnnig Saturday errands and taking a walk with Ziva, I felt just a hint of that something special in the air that means fall is near. And I even saw a few red leaves on a tree in our apartment complex! As much as we miss Florida, I am so excited to be back in a place where seasons actually change. As the glory of fall unfurls here, I'll be sure to post some pictures for all our Florida family and friends.

Meeting Miss Angie

Today Ziva and I got to meet Miss Angie, Ziva's "teacher" in the baby room at Rejoice. She is really sweet and I think Ziva will have lots of fun with her. It will definitely be hard to leave her with someone else, but we are confident that God is still calling me to teach for now, and we couldn't ask for a better situation than for Ziva to be able to go to school with me. When we consider how providentially this job came for me (Rejoice is the only school I applied to, and I got the job....how often does that happen?), we are excited about the coming year, and we are blessed to be where we are.

Roly Poly Ziva

Ziva rolled over today...the other way! She can now roll from back to tummy (today's accomplishment) or tummy to back (she learned this one at about 7 weeks!) Hopefully her new skills mean we won't have to get up in the middle of the night when she's rolled over in her sleep and can't get back to her favorite sleeping spot on her tummy. Suffice it to say, we are proud of our little peanut! We're convinced we have the best baby in the whole world (no offense to anyone else who also has the best baby in the whole world)! The next milestone we anticipate is crawling...could be any day now. We'll keep you posted!