So over it!

People say when you have young children your household gets sick more often. And the more people you have in your household, the longer a sickness takes to enter and leave it. We have discovered this is so true! You’d think the last bit of spring and the first start of summer you wouldn’t get a cold that makes you feel like it’s fall or winter. But our household had two in the last 5 weeks that took us out of commission for 4.  

The last cold that hit us made Shilo the most sick. It was the first time we had to deal with high temperatures and really keep a close eye on it. Poor Shilo had a moderately high fever for just over three days. Thankfully it never got high enough that we had to go to the ER, but it was still pretty bad. Seeing and caring for a baby that is so sick is miserable. And I’m not referring to the constant crying and getting barely any sleep. It’s having to see this look in their eyes that says “help me! I don’t know what’s wrong. Why do I feel like this? How come I don’t feel better when you hold me, love on me or feed me?” It was so sad and depressing.

I am so thankful Shilo is getting back to being 100% healthy. She’s nearly there! She just has a cough and a very slight runny nose. Kayley is almost all the way better too. Her nose is looking much better. Please pray that all of us are 100% healthy for our trip that is coming up. Flying when congested is never fun, and I’m sure flying with children that are congested would be horrible not only for us but everyone else on the plane…

We hope we’ll be able to get back to a “normal” life too. Being sick has worn us out and we feel so disconnected from the world around us. I don’t think we’ve seen friends in over 6 weeks! We’re happy family doesn’t mind if you’re sick around them (especially when they have the same cold) so we were able to see my niece graduate from high school and hang out with my nephew home from war before he had to go back to base.

Thank you, God for getting us through these two colds! 

Happy graduation!

We love you, Derek!

Comparison

I took this picture of Shilo

Shilo 7 months

And remembered I had this one of Kayley

Kayley 5 months

I guess they both like sleeping the same way. It's hard to tell them apart and yet they're so different.

Mommy

It happened on Tuesday while at the zoo. Kayley had climbed up on a bench that was near the gorillas and I just finished parking the stroller with Shilo right next to it. The bench was high and Kayley wanted down so she could look for the gorillas in the exhibit. She turned to me and said “Mommy! Mommy, help!”

My heart melted.

It was the first time Kayley had called me “Mommy.” I think I nearly cried.

Oh to be a Mommy. It is so special!

Girls' Room

About two weeks ago we moved Shilo into Kayley’s room, now called “The Girls Room.” We were planning on doing it soon, but the actual day that it happened just kind of fell into place. It all started with scoring a $1 TV at Value Village on Purple Tag $1 day. Our TV died over two months ago and could not be saved and we made the decision to not spend money on a replacement and instead rearranged our furniture. Well, with the $1 TV we had to rearrange everything again, and I mean everything. The way things worked out is that each room had something change in it. We really liked how it all turned out and that includes Shilo’s bed being out of our room.

 The transition went a lot better than expected the first few nights especially since we didn’t really get to prep Kayley for the big change coming. But Kayley was excited to be a special big sister with the baby in her room, and she surprisingly sleeps through Shilo’s crying more than half the time. We prepped Kayley by telling her that mommy would have to come get the baby during the night to feed her, but that it was still night-night and that the baby would go back to sleep after she ate. Thankfully Kayley seemed to understand this concept quite well and for the times she has stirred or woken up completely I just have to say “Mama has to feed the baby. It’s still night-night time. Baby will come back to sleep when she’s done eating” and Kayley lays back down and goes back to sleep. There have been two occasions that she was upset I took the baby out of the room and stayed awake waiting for Shilo to come back before going back to bed.

It did take Shilo a while to get used to the room. As if on cue, 15-30 minutes after putting Shilo to bed she would cry to just make sure I was nearby. Thankfully she isn’t doing this as often anymore, but when she does I go give her her paci. We haven’t had her cry it out yet since we all happened to get sick one day after this all started and I wanted both the girls to get good sleep. The whole sick thing did throw a bit of a wrench into the whole adjustment, especially for nap time…

Night time goes a little like this:

7:50pm Girls get ready for bed, followed by family prayer time.

8:10pm Kayley’s special book time with daddy followed by him singing 3 songs before putting her in her crib (I’m out in the other room with Shilo playing)

9:45pm Shilo nurses

10:10pm Shilo goes to bed

4:00am Shilo wakes up to eat

4:30am Shilo back to bed

8:30am Girls wake up and get ready for the day

Nap time has taken longer to work out. Before the cold struck our family, the girls were actually synced for their napping schedule. But the cold threw that off completely. I actually had Shilo sleep in our bed a few times, surrounded by pillows so she wouldn’t roll off just so both girls would get at least some sleep without waking each other up. It has taken 2 weeks for the cold to hit our family and leave. We are finally getting back to our “normal” nap time schedule where Kayley’s finishes her lunch and is then put down for nap time. I then nurse Shilo and then put her down about 20 minutes later. They tend to have about 2hrs of overlap sleeping before Shilo wakes up to play. So I go get Shilo and we have play time for about an hour, then I nurse her and then we go get Kayley who typically has been having quiet time for the last bit.

We’re still adjusting to the girls being in one room, and I think they are too. But oh my goodness it nice to have our room to ourselves again! We can have the light on when getting ready for bed, and talk in normal voices! I’m glad we’ve had such a great experiences. I really didn’t think it would go this well. Now Shilo just has to work on sleeping longer at night and we’ll all be getting more sleep.

Mother's Day

Mother’s Day was an adventure this year! It was jam packed with activities. It started with the 1^st-6^th grader’s performance at church of the musical “The Amazing Grace Race” by Celeste Clydesdale. I was part of the director team again and helped teach the children the music, lyrics, and reminded them to sing loud with a smile.

Directing the kids during the first song.

Their performance was wonderful! Each one of them worked so hard to memorize their parts and they each were spectacular! I’m always so impressed with their performances.

"Coutch Potato" song

A side effect of helping to direct the musical is that everyone in your household learns the music and lyrics. The kids did two performances, and we let Kayley set in on the second one. Oh my goodness was she into it. I was busy directing, so I only got to hear the stories about how she was trying to do the hand motions and singing part of the songs with the kids. I did hear her a few times clapping and cheering after each song. I guess she’s getting ready to join in when she gets old enough.

The musical performance of course made Mother’s Day special, but it was extra special to us because Shilo was dedicated! In my blog about Mother’s Day last year I explained that Kayley was dedicated and explained it as “Andrew and I saying in front of our church family that we will raise Kayley to know God, and asking our church family to keep us accountable to that (Proverbs 22:6 Raise up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it). It’s different from baby baptism, which I disagree with, but that’s a whole other theological story and explanation.” We actually took Kayley up on stage with us because we wanted her to be a part of it as well.

Pastor Craig interviewed each parent to learn a little about their little one (5 children were dedicated this year). We explained why we picked the name Shilo; not only did we think of the name because of a good friend named Shilo and her great characteristics as a Christian woman, but that the name can be translated to mean a resting place and is a biblical name. During my pregnancy I had to continuously find rest in God and get strength from Him, especially since my emotions were even crazier than they were with Kayley and I was constantly getting sick. We bestowed Hope as her middle name because both Andrew and I agree that we find our hope in the Lord, and we both thought of a worship song that emphasizes that. Mine was “I Will Not be Shaken” by Tony Guerrero (lyrics at the bottom).

Pastor Craig also asked what we’ve been able to see of her personality thus far. Andrew explains Shilo is the thinker as opposed to Kayley who is the doer. As I’m explaining how she loves to examine things and puts any and everything into her mouth she began reaching for the mic with her mouth open wide, perfectly demonstrating what I just explained.

We also shared how our hope and aspirations for her is that she will also find her hope and rest in God and will trust in Him at a young age. We also hope she will continue to be curious about the things around her and see God’s work in all things.

We know we are all sinners and fall short of the glory of God, but to the best of our abilities we want to raise our girls to know the truth and follow after the one true God. Part of this is to be godly examples to them and continuously strive to be more loving like Jesus each day. If you are a believer in the one true God, we’d love for you to help keep us accountable to this. If not and you have questions, please feel free to ask.

Mother’s Day didn’t end with just these two exciting things. As I explained in my last post we then had a family party for Kayley’s 2^nd birthday. We’re so glad Andrew’s folks were able to come join us for it all, and that they watched the girls the following day so I could get my Mother’s Day gift: a movie date out with Andrew to see Iron Man 3.

(I Will Not Be) Shaken by Tony Guerrero

My soul finds rest in You, my fortress and my rock

My hope for life, my hiding place, my refuge and my God

In You I've found my home, my shelter from the storm

And I'll pour out my heart to You and lean upon Your throne

I will put my trust in You, I will put my hope there, too

I will stand upon Your word and I will not be shaken

I will let my praises show, holding on to what I know

‘Cause I know You're always there and I will not be shaken. I will not be shaken!

I will not be moved, I'm leaning on the throne

‘Cause You died for me and called me to Your own

And even when the strongest winds begin to blow

I will stand my ground, I will not be moved, I will not be shaken

Two

Mama: Kayley, how old are you?

Kayley: Two!

That’s right! We officially have had a two year old under our roof for a week now. She is currently very into the birthday song (“Ha-ha” as she calls it) and telling you she is two when you ask. She had lots of opportunity to practice this too. Here’s how we celebrated her birthday.

The weekend before her birthday we went to the zoo with some of her little friends to enjoy seeing some animals and having a picnic. Kayley loved having all her little friends there with her, and like always, she loved seeing the animals.  Highlights for animal sighting for this visit were the gorillas, hippos and baby sloth bears. I think we all enjoyed the picnic part the best. It’s always amusing what happens and what is said with toddlers and their parents are around.

Sloth bear and her two cubs

Picnic time!

Kayley loved everyone singing happy birthday to her and being out in the sun with her friends.

Group photo

The little people.

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The morning of her birthday I woke her up by singing the happy birthday song, which she immediately told me I was doing wrong because I was not holding her pretend cakes while I sang. Oops. Next time I will be better prepared. We spent the morning at a new park with my mom and had a tasty lunch at Olive Garden. 

Bubble time!

Jump!

A face full of pasta

Kayley even drew a picture of a birthday cake on her menu.

Kayley's drawing of a birthday cake

That night we took Kayley to Red Robin to celebrate some more! The waiters sang for her and brought a sundae for her to enjoy. Kayley loved the singing, but didn’t want to have anything to do with the sundae, except for the rainbow sprinkles.

Red Robin!

Clapping and singing

Excited for the rainbow sprinkles

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We had more birthday celebration on Mother’s Day when we had her family birthday party. Andrew’s folks were even able to fly up to join in on the celebration! 

The girls with their grandparents

We had a relaxing BBQ before singing happy birthday and having some cake. Oh my goodness was Kayley excited for us all to be singing while the candles were lit. She knew exactly what to do without any prompting and immediately blew out her candles when the singing was done. She was a total pro!

Blowing out her candles like a pro

She enjoyed the vanilla-lemon, egg and milk free cake and kept asking for more. The fact that it was rainbow colored probably had something to do with that too. Andrew and I had fun planning how to decorate it and ended up icing it blue, using letter candles to spell her name, brown sugar for an island, and then we used toothpicks and construction paper to make the palm tree and mermaid tale.

The cake

My first rainbow cake

She loved being able to open her gifts from her family. She now has legos, a kitchen, kitchen supplies, a backpack,a Rapunzel and Ariel toys. She’s is quite the happy toddler and has figured out how to use all these toys at once during play.

Cooking some dinner

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Wow! Kayley is two! It’s hard to believe she’s becoming a little girl and slowly growing out of the toddler stage. Her vocabulary is sprouting, along with her creativity, problem solving skills, kindness and social skills. God is doing so much in her and it blows me away how much our Squigawiga understands things. I’m sure He has a lot more in store for her and I’m excited to be a part of it all.

Thank you to all those who wished her a happy birthday and joined in on the celebration!