Mental Health Day

Today I played hooky. It was for a very important reason, though. :) Our tail lights have been out for quite some time, and we've been driving at night when necessary in spite of the lack of lights, but it definitely needed to be fixed. I took it in yesterday afternoon and got it fixed, but the lights went out again almost immediately. So I called in, took today off, and planned to spend the whole day if necessary getting those lights fixed. I dropped Ziva off at 7:30 for PJ day at school, and the lights were fixed by 9:00. I do feel a little guilty about this, since I missed a whole day of school (and right before finals), but the day off was good for my soul. I got to clean, de-clutter, organize a bit, plan meals, catch up on laundry, pray. Good day.

We have one more week of school and then, Christmas break! I'm counting down the hours, and now with even a little more excitement. Vince and I are thinking of making the switch to a big girl bed for Ziva over the break, since sleep won't be quite as important for me while I'm out of work, and I can train her to stay in bed and not be a zombie at work. AND, I think Ziva is on the verge of readiness for potty training! So we may even give that a shot during break too, who knows? I talked with Angie, one of Ziva's teachers today about it a little bit, and was beyond thrilled to hear that she and Donna are happy to help with the potty training when she's at school...how cool is that?

I think Vince is going to post some more tomorrow and we'll do pictures. Check back soon!

Our funny girl

I know this blog is already mainly about Ziva, but since tomorrow is Thanksgiving, and we're thinking about how blessed we are, here's another post about how cool Ziva is and just how much we love her and are thankful for her!

Today I discovered just how much our little one likes to draw. She was especially fussy this afternoon (crying for a cookie for close to 2 hours!) when I finally plopped her at the table with a few pens and some paper, and she got busy and sat there drawing for about an hour and a half!! Sometimes she wanted me to sit and draw with her, but for most of it, she just happily scribbled away on her own. (and I got LOTS of dinner/Thanksgiving food prep done!) I realize it's probably a little early to start telling what her "bent" will be, but it's fun to dream about, wonder about, and pray about. Maybe she'll be an artist some day....

Speaking of prayer, that's another thing Ziva is developing quite an interest in. She loves to hold everyone's hand, bow her head, close her eyes, and then say a very loud AMEN! at the end. Again, who knows how much real spiritual tenderness that indicates, or if it's just a love of mimicking us, but Jesus did say that when it comes to matters of faith, children get it more easily and more completely than adults. We certainly pray that she learns to love Jesus as a young girl!

Cuddling with Daddy at our bonfire last week

My dad always used to play horse with us and give all four of us rides around the house. I now have a new appreciation for that....especially since all I did was "trot" a few circles around the living room and I was definitely feeling it the next day.

Is she precious or what?

He is STRONG!

Pardon my singing...I thought I was a little better than that, but apparently not. It doesn't matter, though, because Ziva is the star of this show. She does do more defined movements to the song, and she does sing more of it, but I think this time she was a little camera shy. Enjoy!

Bye-Bye, Tia

I know I keep saying I'm going to do better about blogging, and then I keep not doing better about blogging. Sorry. I don't think I'll say it this time, and we'll just see what happens. :)

Today we said goodbye to Daneli (Tia) after a great weekend visit. It's just so wonderful to see favorite friends, especially when they don't mind just sitting around and not doing much. We did have a pretty cool bonfire at my parents' last night (where everyone wimped out on the s'mores so I HAD to eat three so they didn't go to waste) and Ziva LOVED having Tia here (she's so cute when she says "Tia"). We didn't get any pictures with Daneli this time, and I haven't downloaded our most recent so we'll save some of those for the next post.

Let's see, what else has been happening around here? Last week at school was Spiritual Renewal week, which was a really great time. I saw new sides to some of my students, and was reminded many times of how much I love my job and how crazy hard life can be for teenagers these days. Both great things to pray over. We are loving our church, and last weekend we did finally meet with another couple about starting a small group. The plan is to wait to start anything official until after the holidays are over since this is such a busy time, but we're going to try to get together to just hang out and get to know them at some point. So far it may just be the four of us (six counting Ziva and their little one due in March), but we're excited about the possibilities there.

This week we are looking forward to some time off together, good food, and great times with family. I also have a short list of "projects" I'd like to accomplish during the week off of school. When I wrote it I felt it was fairly realistic since there are only 3 or 4 things listed, but I'm not so sure. One of the things is to do a baby scrapbook for Ziva. Yes, she is almost 2. And I still haven't done that. With my track record, the chances of it happening this week are not that good. We'll see. :)

October's over?

Let's see...I guess I'm a little behind on the blogging. Nothing spectacular has been happening around here, just lots of good days (and some somewhat sleepless nights, thanks to coughing or new teeth or ear infections or who knows what else).

Last weekend we went to a pumpkin patch for a little bit and had some fun with Ziva. Then Vince and my dad took a guy's trip to Stillwater to watch the OSU-Texas game. They had fun, even thought OSU lost. And Norma came over and we girls hung out for the night. Fun times!

We've been checking out the youth group for a few weeks now at our new church, and so far we're liking it. We're planning to meet someone this weekend about joining a small group, so we'll keep you posted on that.

Other than that, not too much happening. Tonight we're kind of sad since our friends here at The Greens are moving tomorrow to Texas. Good friends are few and far between so it stinks to see them go, but we know God has great plans for them there and for us here.

Here are a few moments from the last few weeks...
Reading in a diaper box. I got a good video of this too, but it's several minutes long and might literally take an eternity to load to the blog...sorry.

We're creating quite the little ham

When I saw her feet poked through the bars like this during her nap I just had to get a picture. I've got one of just her feet, too. Precious.

Running through the hay maze at the pumpkin patch

You may remember this one from last year, when Vince perched a 7 month old Ziva atop this giant scarecrow. I wasn't much less nervous this time around. :)

The best $3 dollars I ever spent

We have been unusually busy lately. Last week we met with two different pastors on two different nights, and Vince got to go see the TU vs. Boise State game last Wednesday. Friday I got a call at work around lunch time that Ziva had a fever of 101, so I packed up my books and picked her up early. She conked out before I even got her car seat straps on, and then slept for about 2 hours without even eating lunch first. When she woke up she was still burning up, so I gave her some Tylenol and by the time we got to the doctor her fever was gone. It turned out to be an ear infection, so she's on antibiotics for 10 days. Which is where the best $3 I ever spent comes in. I wish I could shake the hand of the man (or maybe mom) who came up with the brilliant idea of adding flavor to kids' medicine. Ziva has always taken medicine pretty well, but this time, other than the very first dose, she just wasn't having it. We tried every thing we could think of--forcing it down her throat, mixing it with yogurt or juice--all things everyone knows you're not suppsoed to do. And they didn't work that well anyway. So yesterday I headed back to Walgreens in desperation and paid $3 to add grape flavoring to the yucky amoxicillin. (no idea how to spell that) Ziva loves grape Tylenol and actually asks for it ("peez!") whenever she sees the bottle. So after we added the grapde flavoring, Vince had the awesome idea to rinse out an old, almost empty bottle of Tylenol and use that dropper to give Ziva her meds. And it worked!!! It takes about 8 droppers worth to give her each dose, but she sucks down all 8 without one bit of protest. Our home is peaceful once again!

Ziva showing us her grill

Showing off Uncle Mitch's hat

Go Hurricanes!

Bedtime story with Daddy

Finding Home

After many, many months of searching, we have finally found a church to call home, and we are EXCITED! Monday night we met with an associate pastor at Discovery Bible Fellowship and did all the "official" business of joining the church: sharing our testimonies, discussing our talents, interests, and spiritual gifts in order to find a place to serve, and signing the church's membership covenant. At some point we'll be introduced to the congregation, but even without that, we feel finally at home. Another pastor emailed us about finding a small group to join, and we're meeting tomorrow night with the youth pastor and his wife to find out if/where/how we can work with the student ministry. Did I say we're EXCITED?

I have to confess, when we moved up here from Florida, finding a church was the last thing I expected to be difficult. And yet, that's been one of the toughest parts of this season for us. We both loved Calvary so much, and were so plugged in there, that the leaving was definitely an up-rooting, and left some painful reverberations in our life. There were some weekends when we didn't even want to visit a new church, because we could never find something as great as Calvary, and wasn't it just so easy to watch Calvary online?

We know that God has many different seasons for us to walk through, and when we're in one we really really love it's hard to move on to the next, but we trust His heart and His plan for us and move forward on our journey. It's been a long (to us) walk in the dim light, not fully seeing why we had to leave what we loved so much, but God in His goodness is giving us more and more glimpses into the "why," and we are feeling more and more settled in our new life, in this season. Of course, the moment we begin to feel settled may be the next time He moves us (like we're finally making some good friends, but found out this week they're moving to Texas. Boo.), but every change draws our eyes back to Him and reminds us that we just don't know. And that's okay. And it's EXCITING. Because only He could plan exactly what we don't even know we need.

(And yes, Ziva pictures will come soon. And maybe some awesome video, if you're lucky. You've got to see her show her "grill". We love our gangta girl!)