'Tis the season to be...

This Christmas season has felt different than many in the past. There has been much joy, especially as we've watched Dorothy take it all in! But I've also been a bit reflective at times.

God saw fit to provide us with a new home during this past year, for which we are grateful beyond words. As such, we have arrived at December with somewhat limited finances. We had to simplify (limited gifts, no Christmas baking). Yet, at this time, we find ourselves blessed beyond anything we can even express. We have a beautiful, healthy daughter, and God has made us into a family. We have a lovely new home which exceeds anything we could have asked or imagined from God. We have family and friends we love tremendously and who love us also. We have a church, a faithful local expression of God's family in a nation where we're free to publicly worship the God who created us and redeemed us without fear of persecution. We have an income - Rob has just marked 21 years with Marriott and at this point God has seen fit to keep him employed there. And though it's not extravagant, this income is enough...enough for us to put gas in our car, to buy groceries for our family, to allow me to stay home with Dorothy full time, to go out on some dates, and to pay a babysitter. I could go on and on.

So...this Christmas has been a time where I've sought to cultivate more gratefulness for the many ways God has provided for us instead of focusing on what we "don't have" or "can't afford".

At the same time I've also been sobered this season by the awareness of those around me who have suffered unimaginable losses this year, and how Christmas for them can be a painful reminder of people who are no longer with them, and a time when even the simplest tasks of wrapping a gift or addressing their Christmas cards have probably been difficult for them to even want to do. My heart breaks for these friends and I pray that they will depend on God more than ever and see that he really is sufficient for their every need.

As I think about these friends and others who are suffering, it inclines me more to focus on what Christmas is really about, without the many competing ideas of what we can tend to make it all about. It is not about gifts or decorations or cookies. It's not even primarily about spending time with family and friends (although it's a wonderful blessing to do so, and helps make the season one that we anticipate even more). But really it's about celebrating the Incarnation - the fact that, at a specific moment in history, the eternal God took to himself a human nature, became flesh and dwelt among us in order that he could provide the salvation of many, and in order that he could most fully provide his people with grace in their time of need.

I think for me, this season has been one where I've reflected on these truths even more than ever before. And I hope each of you reading this will take time to reflect on them as well, so that your joy in this season may be its most complete.

Though this post is already long, I will leave you with the lyrics from my favorite Christmas hymn, "What Child Is This?" written by William Chatterton Dix.

What Child is this who, laid to rest
On Mary’s lap, is sleeping?
Whom angels greet with anthems sweet
While shepherds watch are keeping?
This, this is Christ the King,
Whom shepherds guard and angels sing;
Haste, haste, to bring Him laud,
The Babe, the Son of Mary!

Why lies He in such mean estate
Where ox and ass are feeding?
Good Christian, fear, for sinners here
The silent Word is pleading.
Nails, spear shall pierce him through,
The Cross be borne for me, for you;
Hail, hail the Word made flesh,
The Babe, the Son of Mary!

So bring Him incense, gold and myrrh;
Come peasant, king to own Him.
The King of kings salvation brings;
Let loving hearts enthrone Him.
Raise, raise, the song on high,
The virgin sings her lullaby;
Joy, joy, for Christ is born,
The Babe, the Son of Mary!

Merry Christmas!

Tagged

This is the first time I have ever been "Tagged" by a friend who also keeps a blog. So I don't know if I'm doing it right, but here goes. I was asked by Debbie to post the 5th photo from my 5th folder and comment on it. Here it is! It's a photo of my dear husband from when we were in California celebrating our 1-year anniversary. This one was in front of the Ravenswood winery in the Sonoma Valley where we tasted some excellent wines! It's kind of fitting, because we just celebrated our 4-year anniversary a few weeks ago, and as part of our celebration we opened our priciest bottle of wine that we had purchased on this day, at this winery. Sweetie, I'm so grateful for you!! Thank you for being a wonderful, caring husband and such a devoted father.

So, now I'm supposed to tag 5 more friends. But I don't actually know too many friends who keep blogs, just a few. So, I'm tagging Stacy, Tara, Jon's Michelle, Maria K., and Jonalee. This should be fun. I'll have to send them emails since I don't think anyone except my family checks in on my blog, so none of these girls will ever know they've been tagged unless I tell them.

[...the sound of crickets...]

More of Thanksgiving

Dorothy made this feather headdress in preschool as part of the Thanksgiving lesson. She loved wearing it, and I thought the photos were really cute, so I couldn't move on from Thanksgiving without posting at least one of them. OK, three of them.

Thanksgiving

On Thanksgiving Day we went to my mom's and celebrated with a yummy feast of turkey and all the best side dishes. Since my mom had recently been in the hospital, she decided to order all the food from Boston Market, but it was really good. I highly recommend it for anyone who isn't able to cook for whatever reason but still wants to entertain. (My Nanny also did this last year because the kitchen in her apartment is more like a closet, but she really wanted to host everyone at her place. God bless her!)

Anyway, my mom was determined to serve everything from real serving dishes, and eat at the dining room table with china, crystal, and silver. So, you would never have known that the food had been ordered from someplace if you had stumbled upon our gathering. Of course, if you HAD stumbled upon our gathering, we probably would have offered you a place to sit - but we didn't have one. My mom's dining room table was full. My mom's husband Charlie and Nanny's companion John were even warned about the "overhang" at their respective ends of the table - where the table pad underneath the tablecloth extended about 6 inches past the end of the actual table - so they were under strict instructions not to put their elbows on the table or there'd be a disaster. Funny enough, both Charlie and John heard the word "overhang" and thought it was a comment on their bellies - but this was BEFORE we ate. Ha ha!

But, I digress. Here are some pictures from the day:

Dorothy wore her black velvet dress with red cherries all over it. It is from Gymboree but I bought it at a consignment store and it was like new. There was no question of what dress Dorothy would wear to my mom's - cherries are special in my family, since Cherry is my mother's maiden name.

These photos were taken after we'd put on her second pair of tights because about 10 minutes after making her entrance, she stepped into the dog's water bowl while wearing the first pair. I mention this because the first pair of tights were white with a cherry print that matched the dress.



Here is a close-up of the dress.






Hey! It's my beautiful cousin Shannon. She is 16 and a junior already at John Carroll, the same high school that I went to. She is a smart, multi-talented, and very sweet young lady. I'm so proud of her...can you tell?


My mom and Aunt Jackie looking at some recent pictures of Shannon from her Homecoming dance. Aunt Jackie saves everything from Shannon's high school in an album (photos, correspondence from faculty, programs from school assemblies, you name it), just like my mom did when I was in high school. Someday Shannon will probably be buying a piece of furniture just to house all of these albums!

My brother Shawn, Dorothy, my mom, and Nanny (my grandmother and Dorothy's great-grandmother). The green fuzzy hat was something Nanny brought for Dorothy and she couldn't get enough of it.

This picture cracks me up - Dorothy looking at the Doorbusters ads with Uncle Shawn.

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Then, on Saturday, we were planning on hosting my whole family (including some who were not able to be at my mom's on Thursday.) Sadly, everyone either cancelled or got sick - so Rob and I were cooking an 18-pound turkey and all the trimmings, and as of Saturday morning it became clear that no one was coming to help us eat it except Rob's cousin Kristin, Peter, and Porter. So, we started making phone calls to our friends! Thankfully, our good friends Paul and Sandra were able to join us with little Anna, who is 1 month younger than Dorothy and one of her preschool and playgroup buddies. I didn't take any pictures, but we had a wonderful time and the food was SPEC. TAC. U. LAR. I mean, wow. God gave me a husband with some serious culinary skills, y'all. (And training, of course). We are still eating the leftovers and I'm still going "mmmmhhh" with every bite - even days later.

Kristin and Peter, Paul and Sandra, thank you so much for coming over and sharing our Thanksgiving feast with us. We really enjoyed spending the time with you!

Jumping In the Leaves

This past weekend, Dorothy got to jump in a big pile of leaves. Before Rob cleared the last ones away, I had asked him to reserve a pile for her to be able to enjoy this experience, which I hope might become an annual tradition.

At first she wasn't quite sure what to do besides pick up big armfuls of the leaves and throw them up in the air - which she found delightful. But it wasn't long at all before she was crawling into the leaves, standing in them up to her shoulders, laying down in the leaves and covering all but her face, and crawling through them face-down. This was all SO much fun for her that even at the end when she stumbled out of the pile and took a tumble down the hill, face first, getting a mouthful of dirt - she still wanted to go back and play some more.

The Leaf Harvest

During the past 4 weeks or so, anyone asking Rob what he's been up to lately would inevitably hear an answer containing the word "leaves".

We have been quite stunned to see the blanket of fallen leaves on our new yard this year! It's not that we didn't expect it - we have a big, mostly wooded yard. It's just that we didn't fully know what the "leaf harvest" would look like, or exactly what the timing might be, until it happened.

These photos were taken on November 7th and 8th when maybe about 30% of the leaves had fallen. You can see a thin covering of leaves on the grass and the driveway, and many still waiting in the trees.

Front yard

Driveway, looking towards the street (you can see our little munchkin exploring the leaves, in the middle of the shot)

At the end of the driveway, looking back in towards the house

Of course, the deck was covered as well!

Above is our back yard as seen off the deck (right hand side). The fence in the foreground of the photo is part of a smaller fenced area that our home's previous owners had constructed for their dogs, but the surrounding property in this photo is ours, too. In fact, do you see the little green patch on the far right hand side of the photo? That's our neighbor's yard. The rest you see is ours. (Our neighbor got to his back yard sooner than we did!)

The back yard as seen off the deck (left hand side).

Rob's new lawn tractor with 2-bagger attachment made the job very efficient, for the large open spaces. It was like running a vacuum through the yard. Check out the areas of grass where he had already "vacuumed" a path.

If you look closely in this shot, you can see the path through the back yard, where he drove back & forth carrying full bags of leaves to the wooded area at the back of our property.

And here he is returning to the front yard to collect more leaves!

Check this out... my hard-working husband with a smile on his face! He didn't complain one bit about all the work. It's all part of owning the great new home that God provided for us. (And for those of you thinking that it surely wasn't THAT much work, considering he's riding a tractor...stay tuned til the conclusion of this post and I can fill you in on the parts of this job where Robbie DIDN'T get to drive around on a tractor all day!)

Plenty of lovely, colorful leaves were still in the trees in this photo, on November 7th. The last of the leaves didn't finish falling until the week ending November 21st.

I mentioned that the job wasn't entirely easy...Well, on the weekend I photographed here, Rob started noticing some issues with his new tractor and ended up needing to have it evaluated at the dealership. That was 3 weekends ago, and the dealership still has it. Unfortunately, due to an "administrative error", the dealership kind of messed up, thinking they had returned the tractor to us, when really they hadn't. Then, the dealership kind of messed up again, thinking they had fixed the issue, when really they hadn't. An additional part needed to be ordered and waited upon. So, the latter two weeks of the leaf harvesting was done the old-fashioned way - by raking and blowing the leaves onto a giant tarp, and then dragging it into the woods, and then repeating for the next 8 hours. But even then, Rob did not complain! Hopefully we'll get our tractor back very soon and good as new, and then we'll park it until next year, ha ha. (Unless we get that snow plow attachment...hmmm!)

More Words

Dorothy's been putting two to four words together for several months now. I thought I'd write some of the things I'm hearing her say a lot these days.

(1) For the most part, her diction is very good and the words sound the way they are supposed to. But of course, there are funny exceptions, which I keep trying to remember so that I can write them down:

• "maw-mower" - lawn mower
• "beef-oh-wer" - leaf blower
• "bee-bow" or "bay-bow" - rainbow
• "eth-et" - elephant
• "BAH-yoon" or "BAH-loon" - balloon
• "bip" or "bimp" - blimp (when we drive into Frederick there's a car dealership that has a blimp-shaped balloon high in the air over the dealership, and she will excitedly yell "bimp! bimp! bimp!" when we approach it)
• "tay-woh-woh-woh" - ponytail holder (sometimes she'll add a bunch of extra syllables to this, like "tay-woh-woh-woh-woh-woh")
• "fah-fly" - butterfly

(2) For the longest time she was saying "peas"(please) and "pay" (play). Suddenly in the past week or so she has decided that the words beginning with "pl-" need to have an extra syllable in them. So she's now saying "puh-weeze" (please) and "puh-way!" (play).


(3) Two Mondays ago (Nov. 10th) she was running and smacked her forehead into our kitchen table. She got a good size knot which has thankfully subsided but she still has a "boo boo" there. Whenever she is reminded of her boo-boo (like when I touch it or someone asks about it) she says "hit table". When I ask her how that happened, or what was she doing when that happened, she says "running". (I'm praying the boo-boo will heal before we get holiday pictures taken or else Photoshop will be getting a workout.)


(4) I've been singing "Jesus Loves Me" to Dorothy at naptime and bedtime ever since she was a very little baby. The other day, when she woke up from her nap, I heard her saying, pretty clearly, "Jesus loves me" and "Bible tells me so." I haven't been able to get her to do it since then, but it was exciting!


(5) She likes to say "new one" (new one), "nuh-one" (another one), and "uh-one" (other one). For example, when I am changing her diaper, after I've taken the old one off, she will say "new one dy-per" (diaper)? Or when she's finished reading a book with Daddy, she'll say "nuh-one book" and go get another one for him to read. Or when I give her a bear, but she really wanted the other bear, she'll say "uh-one bear".


(6) She also understands the concept of "two" - she will hold up a spoon and fork and say "two poons" (spoons). Or for her two shoes she will say "two shoes - one, two". Incidentally, she also understands the concept of "too" (and probably thinks of it as the same thing). When I'm putting her to bed, she will frequently ask for both her babies (dolls). After I give her the first one she'll say "baby too?" (can I have the other baby too?)


(7) She has been counting to ten, although not reliably, for a couple months now. She has done it perfectly, without help, a handful of times, but most times she skips 6 and 7 unless I prompt her. Also, she will occasionally start chanting random sections of the alphabet. I have heard her say "A-B-C" and "H-I-J-K and "Q-R-S".


(8) A few of her books are in heavy rotation and she remembers phrases from them. For example, she likes a book called Little Lamb's Playtime (which she calls the "bunny book" because it has a bunny as well as a lamb). It has the phrases "Come and play!" and "Ride on the seesaw" and "Whizz down the slide". She will read this book to herself in the back seat of the car and I will hear her say "Come and pway! Down the slide! Sit see-saw!" Another book is Can You Tell Me How To Get To Sesame Street? (which she calls the "Elmo book") featuring Elmo flying a kite that takes him all over the place. She regularly says phrases from this book, such as "up ee-yair" (up in the air) or "past the moon!" (past the moon) - and she's always looking at the right page when she says it. The other day I asked her something about Elmo flying his kite and she said "Sah-see teet!" (Sesame Street)


(9) She's pretty good with identifying colors (although she's not always correct, but she seems to be improving).

"oh-rinch" = orange
"weh-woh" = yellow
"pur-puh" = purple
"boo" = blue
"red" = red
"geen" = green
"peek" or "pink" = pink


(10) This puzzle that my Dad and Joan gave her last Christmas has all the letters of the alphabet and corresponding pictures. This has expanded her vocabulary tremendously because some of the pictures are somewhat unusual vocabulary words. She knows words like:

"igoo" (igloo)
"ay-pay" or "ay-payne" (airplane)
"op-uh-sus-sus" (octopus)
"jap-ee-box" (jack-in-the-box)
"sy-phone" (xylophone)
"vy-lin" or "vy-o-win" (violin)

Fall Fun

We have really been enjoying ourselves this fall. Dorothy's age and her interest in the world around her, the cooler weather, and our new home & yard have made it quite appealing to be outside. (For me, the absence of crickets is helpful too. I don't know where the crickets go when the warm weather ends...do they die? In any case, I don't mind that they don't stay year-round because I have never seen so many crickets in my LIFE as I did this past summer.)

These photos were taken in the first week of November. The pumpkins are the ones we picked out at Jumbo's. (I picked the big one and Dorothy picked the small one.) I had a hard time deciding which photos to post, since I liked so many of them and Dorothy was having so much fun out in the yard.

These next photos were taken around the house, just before Halloween. One of the joys of having 6 girl cousins, all older than she is, is that she has tons of hand-me-down clothes which include themed clothing for every occasion - including Halloween.

In the next two photos, she put on Daddy's cold-weather hat, which was pretty funny.

Sam & Mike's Wedding

On Saturday, November 1st, Rob's cousin Samantha was married to Mike. Dorothy's cousin Grace was the flower girl. The reception was really lovely and well-planned. It looked like they had as many guests as we had at our wedding (maybe even more), so it was nice and BIG!

The last time we were in New York was Easter (March 2008) and folks couldn't believe how much Dorothy had grown since then. Here are some photos from the reception. She was slightly overwhelmed by the noise and the number of people at the huge reception, so it was difficult to get her to smile.

Dorothy with Grace, who will be 5 years old in January

Dorothy with cousins Katie (who will be 5 in April) and Grace

Momentarily sharing the dance floor with her ADORABLE cousin Ethan, who is just 3 months younger than she is.

If anyone was going to coax a smile from her, it was likely to be Gracie (with help from Grandma O'Brien)

The happy couple as they are introduced - Mr. and Mrs. Michael Maslanik!

Halloween

For Halloween this year, Dorothy dressed in the same fairy costume that she wore last year because it still fit her. Let's take a look back at how she looked in her costume last year, shall we?

October 2007, in her crib - Even fairies gotta nap.

I'm sure I don't have to tell you that I can hardly remember when she looked like this. Last Halloween she was 9 1/2 months old. She was cruising (walking around while holding onto things) and learning how to imitate hand gestures like clapping, waving, and putting her arms in the air over her head. Last Halloween we went to our church's annual Harvest Party so that we could dress her up and allow everyone to see her - and of course, so Mommy and Daddy could score a bunch of candy. (There are always incomprehensible amounts of candy at this party).

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Fast-forward to this year. We were in New York for Halloween this year with Rob's family, since his cousin Sam was getting married on November 1st. So, we went trick-or treating with Rob's brother Ray, sister-in-law Lori, and Dorothy's little cousins Jake and Katie. This was so that we could dress her up and allow everyone to see her - and of course, so Mommy and Daddy could score a bunch of candy. Some things haven't changed, I suppose.

We added a few layers to the costume this time - turtleneck and tights. It was upstate New York, after all. But actually it was surprisingly mild, which was SUCH a blessing!

Dorothy's first "trick-or-treat" transaction.

Pretty soon she was ready to walk instead of being carried.

She's can't choose between the Tootsie Roll and the Starburst. Girlie, I feel your pain.

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We had such a fun time and we will treasure this memory of Dorothy's being able to go trick-or-treating with her cousins in New York. We really enjoyed meeting Ray and Lori's neighbors and savoring the gorgeous weather as we walked around the neighborhood. Dorothy actually did very well with saying "trick-or-treat", considering she'd never heard the phrase before that day...but we couldn't get her to say it when she was at someone's door, only when we were in between houses. However, she did say "thank you" and "night night" at the end of nearly every transaction, which charmed everyone.