Anniversary Celebration

This past week we spent 3 nights (4 days) in Christchurch with Marco's side of the family celebrating his parent's 40th wedding anniversary! Wow, 40 years... 

40 years is the same length of time that God had the Israelite's wander around in the desert before bringing them to the promised land. There are a few conclusions we can draw from this comparison.  

1) The Israelite's wore the same pair of shoes for those 40 years, surely I can keep the same spouse!

2) If I had to walk for 40 years, I'd probably be a lot skinnier. 

3) 40 years is a REALLY long time :)

So, we went down on Sunday morning and immediately my girls slotted in with their cousins, picking up where they'd left off 6 months ago (having a baby has meant we haven't gone down to see family as much as normal)

On the Monday, we all went to a wildlife center.  Morgan loved it! She got to feed the giraffes and while at first she was a bit timid, she warmed up quickly. 

 Unfortunately, Owen and Addison didn't get quite as close to the action as the others. This is them feeding the giraffes...

 Kelsey enjoyed herself if the animals stayed a safe distance and if Oma stayed close. Oma was very obliging!!

 Master Owen got quite the preferential treatment. This was his bed in our "house" for the week. There was a playpen for him to sleep in, but one of the sides didn't go up entirely and there was no mattress or blankets for it.. so.. the bed worked just as well.

 And of course, everyone had turns holding the newest family member, even if he did always have to have one eye on where his mama was. (Ok, I like it that he's a bit of a mama's boy. The girls have always preferred their daddy and now I finally have one that prefers me.)

 On Tuesday, the men folk took the older kids to the beach for the morning. Kelsey took a bit of an accidental swim! haha! But she was great about it and got up and started smiling right away. However, that ended that trip!! Meanwhile, the women & babies were having a lovely quiet time at one of the houses.. ahh, peace and quiet.

 We had 2 of our dinners catered while we were there so that it could be a holiday for all of us. Here's Kelsey chowing down on the dessert platter on the second night.. Mmmm!

We also taught the big kids a song to sing for Oma and Opa:

Congratulations on 40 years of marriage. May God bless you with many more.. 

Silly Faces & Funny Giggles

Owen's growing up. 

He's soo adorable, and I'm quite certain it has nothing to do with any sort of mommy bias.. 

He is becoming quite the little talker and just loves looking at anyone and talking and telling them his life story. 

And, as one would expect from one of my children, he's becoming quite expressive. 

Aye Aye, Captain!

It was an exciting day in our house last week when Marco passed his final check and officially became a captain!!
The girls were VERY excited! (but mostly to get him home after 2 days away)

We also made cupcakes to celebrate!!

Well done Marco!! We're very proud of you!! 

Busy, Busy 7th week

What a crazy week we've had!

7 weeks old

Owen had Plunket (the well child nurses) come and visit him for the first time, a Dr's visit, his 6 week vaccines, his last visit with my midwife, his Oma and Opa came for the weekend AND he as baptized! Whew, I'm tired just remembering everything!

All three different health professionals deemed Owen healthy and fit. Phew, what a relief! :) he even did really well for the vaccines.  He screamed bloody murder for while they were poking him and then just as abruptly he stopped and was fine. But just for good measure, he gave the nurse a really good sneer! He only put on another 250g or so, but he's at a full 11 pounds now. Yippee!

7 week cutie pie

And, because he's healthy and putting on weight, he's started to sleep longer stretches! For the past 3 nights, I've managed to put him to bed around 7, give him a sleepy feed before I go to bed (around 10), and he's slept until between 4-5 and then with incredible precision, he wakes up at 7:30! Long may his perfectly timed precision continue!!

And, speaking of sleep, we just moved all our bedrooms around today, and Owen is officially in his own room! Woo hoo!! He's already slept there for 2 naps, and now I've just put him down for the night. I'm so excited to get our room back! We are just not cut out to have babies in our bedroom!

Our newest family picture

Owen in the baptism gown that his daddy also wore. (He has a tie underneath to "man" it up a bit!)

Oma & Opa. 

Marco's parents came for a visit this weekend and we had Owen baptized. Nothing overly exciting happened over the weekend, it was just a great time spent with family and letting them cuddle Owen and play with the girls. The baptism was nice. Great sermon about families. Kelsey refused at the last minute to come up on the stage with us. Morgan was happy to come, but had a minor wardrobe malfunction. As we got up on the stage, Marco pointed out that I needed to fix her skirt as it was all bunched up around her waist. Turns out while she as sitting in the pew, she had been playing with her stretchy necklace and got it around her waist somehow, and all tangled up with her skirt. So, while the entire church waited patiently, I fumbled blindly with her dress and necklace, until the necklace finally was flung across the stage and the skirt hung free again. Owen, meanwhile was oblivious to everything and staring up at the ceiling. He's a lovely little baby.

Baptism - minus Kelsey

If you're interested, you can watch Owen's baptism here. 

We did receive one other piece of news this week. Marco was offered (and accepted) and Captain's position with his company!! Yippee!! We've been waiting for a position to be offered to us. And, we'd decided a long time ago that when a position was offered to us, we would trust that it was God's timing and God's will for us to go to that place. So, even though it doesn't seem like good timing for us to move right now, we believe it is God's will for our family. So, on with our plans. 

Owen, announcing Daddy's new job

Marco will start training next week and be away from home a lot for that. When he is home, he NEEDS to keep working on finishing the house. We have a LOT of work to do before the house can be sold. Plus, we have plans to go to Canada in June, so we're going to go ahead with that plan as well. Hopefully when we get back from that trip, we can finish off the last two rooms in the house and get the house on the market in the spring. So, we would covet all your prayers over the next few months as we prepare for this huge transition. 

And so begins a new week...

"Amazing Grace"

Ok, sometimes it takes longer to learn songs.. or rather, sometimes it takes longer for mom and dad to teach the songs. Yikes! I think we worked on this song (on and off) for 4 weeks.

Anyway, here's the girls singing "Amazing Grace"

"Whiter than Snow"

Next song in the list: "Whiter than Snow" aka "Lord Jesus, I long to be Perfectly Whole".
We spent 2 weeks on this song, mostly due to being out and about on a lot of nights and interrupted family devotions.
And, this week, I thought I'd have both of them sing it together.. :)

"Holy, Holy, Holy"

The third song we taught the girls was "Holy, Holy, Holy" - well, at least the first verse. The whole point of teaching the kids these songs is so that when we do sing them in church, they'll be familiar and they can singalong if they want. And, if they want to sing the first verse 3 or 4 times over again.. well, I hope no one around them cares too much. (and frankly, if they do, they need to get over themselves - naturally, i say that in the most loving and compassionate way possible... )

Anyway, here's Morgan's rendition (please keep in mind that she's just turned 3. I think she's adorably cute.. even if the words aren't 100% right)

For Mom

Ok.. this is a post for my mom. 

Sit back in your chair, put your knees up and drape your blanket over your lap. 

Then gently place your iPad on your knees - like a little baby. 

Click play. 

Almost like holding him yourself, eh?

"Glory Be to the Father"

Continuing on with teaching the girls "church" songs, the second week, we taught them "Glory Be to the Father". 

Here's Morgy: (and yes, as usual, Kelsey interrupts her when its not perfect - we're working on it)

And, here's Kelsey: (one of these days, I'm going to tape her hands at her side.. )

Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow

We've decided, as parents, to be a bit more proactive about allowing our kids to engage in Sunday worship. One of the easiest ways to do this, we feel, is to help them learn some of the songs that we sing in church. Unfortunately, there are a lot of songs, and we don't know which ones will be sung before going to church. So, we decided that this year, we'd teach our kids one verse to one song every week (or most weeks).
To keep it a bit fun/easy, we started with a simple one: "Praise God from Whom all Blessings Flow".

Here's Kelsey (at the end, I cut her off as she started singing "The Three-Fold Amen", sorry):

Sign Language

OK.. I'm behind again. I'd like to blame Christmas and the holidays, but considering that we didn't do anything.. its hardly true. I'm just lazy :)

Anyway, I took the cutest (parental bias) video of Morgan the other day, and I wanted to try embedding a video so.. here it is:



We love sign language. Its REALLY easy to teach, the kids love it too, and their so proud of being able to say things when they're this little. I usually only teach a handful of words that I find most useful - so I'm not hard core like some baby sign language enthusiasts.. but, it still works for us.
Enjoy!