New hobbies and more

The other day I found Joy beginning a new hobbie. She was combing through our book shelves and stumbled upon a book she decided to look into a bit further. Can you see the Biblical Preaching title? Hmmm...wonder what she will grow up to do?!
Here is a picture of Elle's hand in her papa's hand. It's so tiny, but it is starting to get pudgy.
I had to add a couple pictures of the girls and their papa. I love them all so much!


















On another note, we had a bit of a sad incidence here. Our sweet golden retriever bit our Joy. Thankfully it was in the arm. She had a fairly decent puncture wound that they ended up putting 3 loose stitches in. It is healing well and she doesn't seem to be scared of the dog; though he isn't spending much time around her these days. I know he was just being a dog and protecting himself, but oh, how I wish I could reason with him and convince him to never do it again so that he doesn't have to be so isolated. Poor guy. But I need to protect the girls.

Dress up, laundry, and girls

About the middle of the month, I decided to try a few things on little Elle. So here are a couple pictures. This first little outfit is actually preemie size and fits her quite well. She is just getting into newborn sizes, but those are still large.

Here she is in a 0-3 month dress and little newborn shoes. I don't know if you can see how big the shoes are on her, but they are ginormous.
In the meantime, Joy spends time playing in the laundry basket. Oh, so much fun.
She climbed in there all by herself.

Here is a picture of all the girls. It may not be the best posed picture, but it is fun to have us all together.

The girls

I finally decided to take a couple pictures of the girls together. I was pleased with how well the older one did with the younger one. That is until she wanted to find out about her eyes. I didn't include that picture. The other day we went on a couple hour car trip for an eye appointment and the older girld was very excited to be in the back seat with the younger one. She kept pointing and smiling. So, here are a couple sweet pictures.

This one is after her second home bath. She always seems to be so alert after a bath. This time she didn't cry but seemed to enjoy it.
Lately the older one has been doing this to the couch cushions because then she can climb up on her own. She has also been reading a lot lately. I thought this was very cute.

First home bath

Now, I don't have any pictures of the actual bath, I was too busy scrubbing, but I do have a few after shots for you all. She didn't like her bath much and seemed to cry much of the time, but we both survived. She was very alert afterward and had her eyes open more than usual. We are curious to see what color of hair she will have and what color her eyes will be. But I guess we will have to wait it out. She is starting to look a little plump here.

This is a hand towel that I used for drying her off.

All in all, I would say the bath was a success and, Lord willing, we have many more to look forward to.

Halloween

Now, this is a holiday that can be hard to decide what to do with. I realize that there is certainly a group who values this as a religious holiday, yet most think of it has just a fun day to dress up and eat candy. This is the first year that I have had any children for the holiday. So, with the new little one being so, well, little, we just stayed in. But we did a few fun things, one of which I think I may make into a Halloween tradition. We dressed the older girl in an elephant costume and took a few pictures, ran over to the neighbor's house so she could "trick or treat", and then came back here to pass out candy. In between candy passing, we made cookies. The cookies are the part that I am thinking of making a tradition. We made candy corn looking shortbread cookies. I am such a sucker for shortbread! I think that the next time I make them they will look a little more like they are supposed to...but in the meantime, these looked fairly cute and tasted really yummy. Here are some pictures of the cookies as well as the very cute little girl elephant.

They might not be shaped right, but at least they taste right.
The trunk hung down over her face, so I helped hold it up.
A picture with papa. This is how she looked most of the night while helping to pass out candy.

Sorry, no pictures of the littlest one, though I have a little story. I was feeding the baby a bottle when a couple cute little kids knocked on the door, so I set the baby down and gave out candy...the little boy said, "I know you have a baby...she's cute." So the baby got noticed on her first halloween.

We are all home

Yesterday we brought the littlest girl home from the hospital. She weighs (as of Saturday night) 4 pounds 8.7 ounces. As most of you who have had first newborn children can imagine, last night was a virtually sleepless night. I am hopeful that it will get better. It doesn't help that I have had a sinusitis and need my sleep to get better. I guess God will have to protect us from each other and from other illnesses. It amazed me how much noise that little girl can make. I think tonight she will be at the far end of our room so that we can all sleep a bit better. The 14 month old is very curious about the new girl. She had such a happy look on her face when she first saw her. She continues to have a smile when she sees the baby. I hope that continues as she learns that it means she has to share...everything. Having a preemie is different than having a newborn, at least that is what I have been told each step of the way. We are going to have to be a bit protective of her since she is especially vulnerable due to her size and her gestational age. That means that I might not be able to take her to the store with me or to church or anywhere where there is a large crowd until April...when flu and RSV season is finished. Life is going to be very different for me for awhile. Anyway, here are some pictures from the hospital and finally our leaving for home.

I thought this bow was sooooo sweet!!!!

Her going home outfit.
Proud Papa holding a wireless baby girl.

Here she is all ready to go.

A picture of us with the newest addition to our family. I hope to have a picture of our whole family soon. Stay tuned. :o)

Time for an update

Okay, so 2 months is a long time to not update things, so, here is an update. Last Tuesday we got a phone call regarding a preemie baby girl and whether or not we were interested in adopting her. We then started praying and elliciting lots of others to pray with us as we made a decision. Wednesday we decided to go for it. So, for a week now, we have been the proud parents of (at most recent knowledge) a 3 lb 2 oz baby girl. She is still nameless, but we have been working on that of late. It is amazing. We got to meet her Thursday and everything looks really positive. We don't know when we will get to bring her home, but we trust that God's timing is good. In regard to our other little one, things are still up in the air in regard to her permanency plan, but we are trusting God. If we do get to raise them both as our daughters, they will be 13 months and 15 days apart in age. We will certainly be busy, but God knew all that as well. It has been amazing to see how God has gone ahead of us on so much. He has provided a place to stay when we are at the hospital, He has provided women to take over for me for the ladies retreat I was working on. He has a place for the college gal that lives with us to be when I'm not here. He has even brought together people to help with Bible study. He is a great and mighty God and is worthy of praise and adoration. I feel very blessed by Him! And, now for a few pictures! Here I am with my tiny daughter.
Our hands by her to show her size.
Celebrating at Red Robin...our favorite chain restaurant!
Our other little one playing the piano!