Ewwww!!

posted October 27th, 2006 by Shannon

So I’m sitting here watching the Spurs play the Mavs. I just finished feeding Hannah-Bear and was playing a little with her since she was now wide awake. She has great neck control now and when I lifted her over my head she held her head up high and her arms and legs stretched out like Superman. It wasn’t until I was in the middle of saying “Look at Super-Bear” that I realized what a bad idea that was. Yep, we got baby spit-up on the floor, the couch, my shirt, and ALL in my hair. Eww. Ick. Yuck! The good news is that the Spurs are winning by 18 points right now! Go Spurs Go!

Rest

posted October 27th, 2006 by Shannon

George and I just finished reading Messy Spirituality by Mike Yaconelli. Before returning it to the library this week I jotted down a few things from the section on living busy lives. Yaconelli writes, “we have no slow lanes anymore. Every lane is fast, and the only comfort our culture can offer is more lanes and increased speed limits.” He also describes speed as having “a deafening roar that drowns out the whispering voices of our souls and leaves Jesus as a diminishing speck in the rearview mirror.

Yaconelli then discusses rest (as in Matt. 11:18).

The ugly truth, however, is that many of us do not know how to rest! Actually, we do know how to rest; we simply refuse to rest. Rest is a decision we make. Rest is choosing to do nothing when we have too much to do, slowing down when we feel pressure to go faster, stopping instead of starting. Rest is listening to our weariness and responding to our tiredness, not to what is making us tired. Rest is what happens when we say one simple word: “No!” Rest is the ultimate humiliation because in order to rest, we must admit we are not necessary, that the world can get along without us, that God’s work does not depend on us. Once we understand how unnecessary we are, only then might we find the right reasons to say yes. Only then might we find the right reasons to decide to be with Jesus instead of working for him. Only then might we have the courage to take a nap with Jesus.

I think Yaconelli may be right. It’s not that I don’t know how to rest, I do. But it’s really hard for me to choose to rest. Figuring out how to choose rest without feeling guilty about all the things I’m not doing, now that’s even harder. But I want to try.

Zoo

posted October 23rd, 2006 by Shannon

Christy had some coupons to the Dallas Zoo that were about to expire so we took our first official field trip of our homeschooling year. It was a great trip. Oddly enough, the only photo I came home with included no kids and no animals. Emily took this photo of Christy and I taking a break to feed some hungry babies.

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Speaking of the two mommies, besides being slightly different colors, Christy and I have identical diaper bag backpacks. For a while we were walking side-by-side, each wearing our identical backpacks, each wearing a baby in a sling, and each pushing an empty stroller. We must have been a sight.

The sad news of the day is that Nathan lost his blue squid toy somewhere in the zoo. Maybe now they will understand a little better why we say time and time again that they need to leave their toys in the car.

Trip to SA

posted October 21st, 2006 by Shannon

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Time to blog about our trip back to San Antonio a couple of weekends ago. Our wonderful friends in our Sunday School class graciously hosted a baby shower for us and two other pregnant mommies. So we headed down south to see some old friends. I felt so blessed to have so many people who cared so much for us to go through the trouble of having a shower for us when we’re not part of their group anymore. It was a wonderful shower and we won’t need to buy diapers or wipes for a while! Thanks everyone!

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While the women were inside doing shower stuff, George and the kids played outside. (The host had an amazing backyard!) Our kids were so excited to spend some time playing with Shane. I hear weekly (if not more often) that they miss Shane. Particularly from Nathan. Almost on the same excitement scale as playing with Shane was getting to drive this big tractor. Okay, so Nathan’s not driving it in this picture, but he did drive it later.

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Our friends Casey and Hannah allowed us to sleep at their home. We’ve known them for several years, but sometimes the busyness of life keeps people from really getting to know each other. We really enjoyed visiting with them in the evenings. On top of that, they have a cute new baby girl too!

We had the opportunity to eat ONE meal at a restaurant in San Antonio. The obvious choice was Mexican, but narrowing it down to just one restaurant was the difficult part. In the end, my favorite won: Alamo Cafe. The big one, of course. It was great weather for sitting outside too. Ahhh! Freshly made tortillas, gooey cheesy queso, tasty brisket quesadillas dipped in guacamole … oh wait, I ordered the enchiladas instead. Bummer. They were good, but I should have stuck with my old favorite. I had not realized how much my husband’s taste buds had grown on me until we moved here. We just haven’t found a place here that can really compare to the Mexican food we can find there. But enough about food because it’s making me hungry.

We got to visit with Alisa for about 45 minutes. She was our midwife while we were there. We were all a bit bummed we couldn’t visit for longer, but it was certainly better than nothing. She got to hold Hannah and see our other kids and we got to talk about birthing stuff with her. Fun stuff.

Speaking of baby Hannah…Thanks to her and two children with small bladders, the drives there and back took 7 and a half hours each. That part of the trip was not fun. We took an alternate route on the way back and after 5 long hours we reached the halfway point between San Antonio and G’s parent’s house. We were SO glad to not be making that trip this time.

There were a few people on our list of people we wanted to see that we did not get to see, but we did see a lot of old friends. We even drove by our old house. Good grief, that was harder than I thought it would be. The kids did fine with it, but I didn’t do so well. I do like our new house just fine, but I find myself really missing our old one too. It was very strange driving down the familiar roads and highways of San Antonio. It felt like home, but it wasn’t. It seemed like we had never been gone. The roads were so familiar, I found myself almost thinking I’d been driving them just yesterday. But then we’d see a new store that had been completely build while we were gone. More than once I had to remind myself that this wasn’t home anymore. We are still glad that we made the decision to move, but I sure wish I could transplant all of San Antonio a little closer to us so we could pop on over and visit anytime we wanted.

Oh well, too much sadness for this late at night. My keyboard’s getting wet. It was a wonderful visit. Thanks to our friends in S.A. for making our trip a great one. (For those friends we didn’t get to see, or didn’t get to see for very long, we’ll try to plan a little more in advance next time!) Good night.

Yeah for Nathan!

posted October 19th, 2006 by Shannon

When Nathan turned 3 we decided he was old enough to be in underwear full time during the day at least. Little did I expect things to go as easily as they have gone. It’s been less than a month and he has not had an accident in the past 3 days. AND we’re not constantly reminding him about it either. I usually make him use the restroom before we get in the car to go somewhere and we ask him after naptime if he remembered to use the potty when he woke up. But that’s pretty much all we say to him about it. Yeah!! (This has been WAY easier then training E was. Those were very un-fun days.)

Congratulations, buddy! We’re proud of you!

State Fair

posted October 19th, 2006 by Shannon

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(Ackk. Another picture I should have turned before I uploaded them.) I’ve already been asked twice about this photo so I better go ahead an explain it. Last week we took the kids to the state fair. They had a good time. N’s favorite activities were the ferris wheel and the lighted parade. (Mommy opinion: I thought the ferris wheel was way too expensive and that the lighted parade was a bit too cheesy for me.) E put those two actiities on her favorite list along with the addition of this kid’s farm. The kids walked through this activity while pretending to be farmers. There were signs instructing them on what to do: water a tree, pick a peach off the tree and put it in your basket, plant a seed, harvest some vegetables, feed corn to this sheep, etc. Along the way they collected many things (a peach, an egg, a bit of wool, a vegetable, a carton of milk) and near the end they were able to ‘sell’ their goods for a pretend dollar which could be spent in the store to buy a pack of gummi snacks. Actually 3 packs of gummi snacks – too bad they had some gooey stuff in the middle and the kids (and grown-ups) all thought they were yucky. So that’s where the chicken picture comes from. And no, they were not real.

This year’s state fair trip was a bit last-minute for us. Next year I think we’ll plan a little more in advance and we’ll likely have the kids save up some money to pay for their own $6 ferris wheel ticket. We’re glad we went though. The kids did great. Hannah slept pretty much the whole time in the sling. It was a long day, but very fun.

One Month Old!

posted October 17th, 2006 by Shannon

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I finally downloaded the photos from our camera so you finally get to see Hannah’s one month old picture. Sorry it has taken so long.

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I attempted to get some pictures of all 3 kids but they never all cooperated at once. No big surprise there. The cute sleeper Hannah is wearing came from my Uncle RD and the blanket came in a box of goodies from my Aunt Donna. Thanks guys! (I didn’t really plan it that way, but since I have the photo up here anyway I figured I might as well give credit and say thanks!)

September Happenings

posted October 17th, 2006 by Shannon

I’m a bit behind, but here you go:

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Hannah was about 2 weeks old here. Her Aunt Christy bought her this brightly colored outfit before we knew what her gender was going to be. I think it goes quite well with the bouncy seat. Sorry that I forgot to rotate the photo. I’ll try to go back and fix that eventually but it would take too long right now.

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Big sister reading to Hannah at rest time. Emily really enjoyed having Hannah in her room and reading Bob books to her. Hannah would usually stay happy like this for, oh, 10 minutes but that was enough time for one to run to the restroom, get the laundry out of the dryer, and check their email if they were REAL quick.

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Nathan turned 3 in September and the lucky boy got 3 birthday celebrations. The weekend before his birthday Grammy and Granddad were in town so he opened presents from them at that time. Then he had his actual birthday during the week. We helped him buy a bike for his birthday and he got to start riding it on his birthday. And then Gran and Gramps were in town the next weekend and we celebrated Nathan’s birthday (and Gramps’ birthday) with them then.

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On Nathan’s actual birthday George took some time off work and we all went to play Putt-Putt and ride the bumper boats. They had a blast and it was much nicer weather and far less crowded then when we went on George’s birthday.

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And then finally here we have one adoring brother lovingly peeking in on his precious sister as she peacefully sleeps….or something like that. I imagine it’s probably difficult for a toddler to fully understand when his mommy says “Hey, hold that pose while I get a picture, but then don’t EVER do that again!”

Hannah Smiles

posted October 10th, 2006 by Shannon

Or at least I think she did. The past few days George and I have been commenting that Hannah is getting close to smiling, but not quite. However, I think I actually got a real genuine smile this evening. It was great! I wish I could have recorded it. George was curious what I did to get her to smile. The truth is it came shortly after giving her some good ole’ Momma milk. I guess George will have to find his own way to get sweet Hannah smiles.

Car Picture

posted October 9th, 2006 by Shannon

I’ve been meaning to take and post a photo of what my kiddos call the ‘car picture’ for a while now. I just never remember to take the camera when we get in the car. Not to mention that is also needs to be a time that I’m not in the driver’s seat. Well, the newspaper folks did it for me a few days ago.

We drive this way often and have really enjoyed seeing this mural develop. The had just started painting the fence when we moved here so we’ve been able to watch most of it develop. The Roadside Diner part of the mural you see in these photos is only about a third of the entire mural so far.