Zach has 2 bottom teeth as of last Sunday. Those little suckers are SHARP! He has not bitten me while eating, but I can only imagine. His days of 'mommy milk' may be numbered. :) My hope is to be able to feed him until Christmas time.
We went to the pumpkin patch and have some amazing pictures I need to get on here.
So, I am falling behind, as I have not even started Zach's baby book. I think blogging is more fun. I will hopefully do that this Summer. So, fess up, how many of ya'll ar good baby book keeper upers. I am sure many of you are.
Other things going on in Zach's world include:
He is trying very hard to crawl. Once he figures it out, it is over for us. ;)
He can roll over both ways.
He loves to such his thumb.
We are horrible at letting him 'cry it out' at night.
He is going to be a Monkey for Halloween.
I need ideas for good toys for Zach. I think I am going to make a toys r us wish list for family. Any good ideas out there? He is very active.
Baby Dedication was at our church this morning. How humbling and special it was to stand in front of our church family and give Zach to the Lord. I know that this is just what God wanted us to do and is the vow we made to Him.
And she made a vow, saying, "O LORD Almighty, if you will only look upon your servant's misery and remember me, and not forget your servant but give her a son, then I will give him to the LORD for all the days of his life, and no razor will ever be used on his head."
As surely as you live, my lord, I am the woman who stood here beside you praying to the LORD. 27 I prayed for this child, and the LORD has granted me what I asked of him. 28 So now I give him to the LORD. For his whole life he will be given over to the LORD." And he worshiped the LORD there.
From First Samuel
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Friday, October 17, 2008
Something I feel but could never really say the right way
A wonderful friend sent me the link to the following blog. I know that many of you can relate with the feelings this blogger writes about and relates to scripture. As I think of my sweet Zachary and all he means to us, I know that it is not him that gives me the joy and peace I constantly seek, but only our Father. How often we seek our joy in other things, but He is enough and sufficient for me!
My friend says that this blog haunts her, and I think haunt is the correct word. It haunts me, and rattles me to my core. I am beginning to see I have yet to scratch the surface of the pain, longing, and grief that our family went through tyring to have Zach. I put on a happy face and was strong just to get by so many days.
Our God is enough!
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The Dawning in the Dark...
In my own way, I have known dark. A black memory's suffocated for years, this recurring nightmare of my younger sister's body falling under the wheel, her lifeless little body laying still in a pool of blood in our laneway. That horror-moment's smoldered at the fringe of dark days, branded our nights. Too, my mother’s mental hospitalizations, depression, and hauntings studded my childhood, months of me trying to fill Mama’s shoes that were painfully too large for little girl feet. Then divorce shattered our home, cracked our memories. Agoraphobia strangled me during my university years. I cried with the rain the day I miscarried. For me, in my own way, I have known moonless nights. Others know nights to fall far darker, inky, impenenetrable black. Terminal diagnosis, dug graves, empty wombs, living nightmares with no dawn in sight. Is He really enough? Dayenu? Like Jacob, on moonless nights we wrestle in the dark with He who allows this dark, this anguish. “I will not let you go until you bless me.” Like Jacob, we struggle with God:
Why this? Give me something different! Do you not love me? I didn’t ask for this, I don’t want this. The pain of this is unbearable, inhumane. Bless me! Bless me! He renames us. We are Israel, the God-wrestlers. Abram, Sarai, they know this writhing too, this wrestling in the night and how the cold dark wears at a soul. Hadn’t God heard their pleas for a child, a babe of their own, with Abram’s eyes and Sarai’s nose, to hold close and dream over? Month after agonizing month, Sarai is empty, nothing moves in her, their nights have no little one to swaddle and comfortingly kiss. They simply cling to each other in the moonless silence. God had promised. But has given nothing—or something: cutting sorrow. They self-medicate the pain. Sarai gives her husband Hagar and says. “Go. Sleep with her. Do what it takes to takes away this burning ache. Relieve this sore soul.” Come a night nearly a year later, the dark is pierced with a baby’s cry. A child! One to hold! A babe to rock, a son to love, a man with their name! The dawn must be close and warm? Instead the nightmare continues, Hagar and Ishmael, this thorn stabbing deep in Sarai’s side. For thirteen long years, the moonless night hangs. Then, finally, God appears: "When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, 'I am God Almighty, El Shaddai.' ” El Shaddai, literally translated, reads, "God Almighty who is all sufficient" or "God Almighty who is more than enough."
Dayenu. More than enough.
A quarter of a century since the promise was made, and the dawn had never come. Thirteen stretching years of the pain of Hagar’s son while Sarai’s womb shriveled. In the smothering dark of that night, God now comes and says “I am El Shaddai. I am enough.” In a hopeless, impossible situation He says, “Come. Know me as the One who is enough, the sufficient God, El Shaddai.” Dayenu. More than enough.Is He really enough? Elizabeth Elliot writes her intimate experience of this God who makes such a claim:
“But it is precisely when we do not have what we would ask for, and only then, that we can clearly perceive His all-sufficiency.
It is when the sea is moonless that the Lord has become my Light.” Is it so? When I do not have what I would ask for---peace, certainty, painless days, settled nights --- when I don’t have all that my soul cries for, it is then I stumble into the mysterious, buoying truth: He is enough. He reveals Himself as the light, the dawn, when my night is the darkest. Grieving Boothe, having just lost her baby girl, writes courageously of her moonless sea of sadness:
“Sitting in the sorrow means embracing all the emotions, all the incredibly painful stabs of disappointment and anger and frustration and agony that jab at the heart almost every single second of the day...
It means finally, finally, embracing the fact that He has created nothing that will give us as much joy and peace and fulfillment as Himself.”
It is good that we have wrestled, for now we know: He alone is El Shaddai, the one who shows Himself to be enough precisely when we do not have what our heart howls for. Like Jacob, we haggardly come through the night. But the God-wrestle has left us changed. In the black, He has touched us. We limp and we remember. Like Jacob, we name this place, this moonless night of wrestling, Peniel-- literally meaning "God’s face"--- for in the middle of the black, we have seen God face to face.
And feeling along His features, we find Him to be El Shaddai: Enough. The dark becomes our dawn. Lord, let the dark come. For in the dark, when I think I don't have enough to make it through to the dawn, is the only place I'll find that You alone are more than enough. In my dark, You dawn. In the dark places of today, let me touch Your face and know You: El Shaddai. Today's drink of Scripture: "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of El Shaddai." ~Ps. 91:1 Reworking of a post from the archives
Posted by Ann Voskamp @Holy Experience at 7:00 AM
Labels: Eucharistic Living, Joy, Refiner's Fire, Worship
My friend says that this blog haunts her, and I think haunt is the correct word. It haunts me, and rattles me to my core. I am beginning to see I have yet to scratch the surface of the pain, longing, and grief that our family went through tyring to have Zach. I put on a happy face and was strong just to get by so many days.
Our God is enough!
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
The Dawning in the Dark...
In my own way, I have known dark. A black memory's suffocated for years, this recurring nightmare of my younger sister's body falling under the wheel, her lifeless little body laying still in a pool of blood in our laneway. That horror-moment's smoldered at the fringe of dark days, branded our nights. Too, my mother’s mental hospitalizations, depression, and hauntings studded my childhood, months of me trying to fill Mama’s shoes that were painfully too large for little girl feet. Then divorce shattered our home, cracked our memories. Agoraphobia strangled me during my university years. I cried with the rain the day I miscarried. For me, in my own way, I have known moonless nights. Others know nights to fall far darker, inky, impenenetrable black. Terminal diagnosis, dug graves, empty wombs, living nightmares with no dawn in sight. Is He really enough? Dayenu? Like Jacob, on moonless nights we wrestle in the dark with He who allows this dark, this anguish. “I will not let you go until you bless me.” Like Jacob, we struggle with God:
Why this? Give me something different! Do you not love me? I didn’t ask for this, I don’t want this. The pain of this is unbearable, inhumane. Bless me! Bless me! He renames us. We are Israel, the God-wrestlers. Abram, Sarai, they know this writhing too, this wrestling in the night and how the cold dark wears at a soul. Hadn’t God heard their pleas for a child, a babe of their own, with Abram’s eyes and Sarai’s nose, to hold close and dream over? Month after agonizing month, Sarai is empty, nothing moves in her, their nights have no little one to swaddle and comfortingly kiss. They simply cling to each other in the moonless silence. God had promised. But has given nothing—or something: cutting sorrow. They self-medicate the pain. Sarai gives her husband Hagar and says. “Go. Sleep with her. Do what it takes to takes away this burning ache. Relieve this sore soul.” Come a night nearly a year later, the dark is pierced with a baby’s cry. A child! One to hold! A babe to rock, a son to love, a man with their name! The dawn must be close and warm? Instead the nightmare continues, Hagar and Ishmael, this thorn stabbing deep in Sarai’s side. For thirteen long years, the moonless night hangs. Then, finally, God appears: "When Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to him and said, 'I am God Almighty, El Shaddai.' ” El Shaddai, literally translated, reads, "God Almighty who is all sufficient" or "God Almighty who is more than enough."
Dayenu. More than enough.
A quarter of a century since the promise was made, and the dawn had never come. Thirteen stretching years of the pain of Hagar’s son while Sarai’s womb shriveled. In the smothering dark of that night, God now comes and says “I am El Shaddai. I am enough.” In a hopeless, impossible situation He says, “Come. Know me as the One who is enough, the sufficient God, El Shaddai.” Dayenu. More than enough.Is He really enough? Elizabeth Elliot writes her intimate experience of this God who makes such a claim:
“But it is precisely when we do not have what we would ask for, and only then, that we can clearly perceive His all-sufficiency.
It is when the sea is moonless that the Lord has become my Light.” Is it so? When I do not have what I would ask for---peace, certainty, painless days, settled nights --- when I don’t have all that my soul cries for, it is then I stumble into the mysterious, buoying truth: He is enough. He reveals Himself as the light, the dawn, when my night is the darkest. Grieving Boothe, having just lost her baby girl, writes courageously of her moonless sea of sadness:
“Sitting in the sorrow means embracing all the emotions, all the incredibly painful stabs of disappointment and anger and frustration and agony that jab at the heart almost every single second of the day...
It means finally, finally, embracing the fact that He has created nothing that will give us as much joy and peace and fulfillment as Himself.”
It is good that we have wrestled, for now we know: He alone is El Shaddai, the one who shows Himself to be enough precisely when we do not have what our heart howls for. Like Jacob, we haggardly come through the night. But the God-wrestle has left us changed. In the black, He has touched us. We limp and we remember. Like Jacob, we name this place, this moonless night of wrestling, Peniel-- literally meaning "God’s face"--- for in the middle of the black, we have seen God face to face.
And feeling along His features, we find Him to be El Shaddai: Enough. The dark becomes our dawn. Lord, let the dark come. For in the dark, when I think I don't have enough to make it through to the dawn, is the only place I'll find that You alone are more than enough. In my dark, You dawn. In the dark places of today, let me touch Your face and know You: El Shaddai. Today's drink of Scripture: "He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will rest in the shadow of El Shaddai." ~Ps. 91:1 Reworking of a post from the archives
Posted by Ann Voskamp @Holy Experience at 7:00 AM
Labels: Eucharistic Living, Joy, Refiner's Fire, Worship
Thursday, October 2, 2008
Boots
Look at my new Boots!
Yes- I bought my child cowboy boots. He looked adorable, like a little cowboy. Zach (and James and I) went to Guthrie to the horse sale Friday night fajita dinner and dance. We had a really good time. Zach's boots were a hit.
We are all doing well. I am slowly adjusting...kind of. :)
Yes- I bought my child cowboy boots. He looked adorable, like a little cowboy. Zach (and James and I) went to Guthrie to the horse sale Friday night fajita dinner and dance. We had a really good time. Zach's boots were a hit.
We are all doing well. I am slowly adjusting...kind of. :)
Hope you guys are all well also.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Help and update
I am a terrible blogger in every aspect of the word. I don't have time! Please pray for balance for me and my sweet family!
Help-Someone please tell me how to get my blog looking right. I have no idea, or the patience to figure it out. I'll give you my log in if you want to play around with it.
Zach is sick! It is his first time being sick like this. He has horrible congestion. You can hear how congested he is. He cries while he is sleeping. So, Zach and I or rather Zach has slept on me in the recliner the last 2 nights. I feel so helpless when he feels bad. To top all of this off, he had his 4 month checkup and shots yesterday. He was so tough when he got his shots. He only cried for like 5 seconds. He started running a fever last night from the shots. So between the shots and the congestion, Zach is a miserable little boy and mom is exhausted. So far, he is doing well today.
Zach weighed 16 lbs (75th percentile)
His head was in the 80th percentile
AND his height was in the 97the percentile!!!!! (26 and 3/4 inches) He is too long for most of his pjs!
I think he might be a hoss (that is such a hick term).
I'm having a really hard time lately putting on a happy face and pretending like everything is okay. I feel like I am juggling so many roles and not being 100% at any of them.
Other than that, all is going really well.
I started reading the Twilight series. I am hooked! I ready while I pump.
I hope all you guys are doing well. My goal today (sense school was cancelled because of rain) is to catch up on all your lives.
Help-Someone please tell me how to get my blog looking right. I have no idea, or the patience to figure it out. I'll give you my log in if you want to play around with it.
Zach is sick! It is his first time being sick like this. He has horrible congestion. You can hear how congested he is. He cries while he is sleeping. So, Zach and I or rather Zach has slept on me in the recliner the last 2 nights. I feel so helpless when he feels bad. To top all of this off, he had his 4 month checkup and shots yesterday. He was so tough when he got his shots. He only cried for like 5 seconds. He started running a fever last night from the shots. So between the shots and the congestion, Zach is a miserable little boy and mom is exhausted. So far, he is doing well today.
Zach weighed 16 lbs (75th percentile)
His head was in the 80th percentile
AND his height was in the 97the percentile!!!!! (26 and 3/4 inches) He is too long for most of his pjs!
I think he might be a hoss (that is such a hick term).
I'm having a really hard time lately putting on a happy face and pretending like everything is okay. I feel like I am juggling so many roles and not being 100% at any of them.
Other than that, all is going really well.
I started reading the Twilight series. I am hooked! I ready while I pump.
I hope all you guys are doing well. My goal today (sense school was cancelled because of rain) is to catch up on all your lives.
Wednesday, September 10, 2008
Friday, August 22, 2008
Just a few things
I have so many things I could reflect and say, but once again, I am exhausted.
So, bulleted lists are now my friend.
Zach is getting so big, his feet, his hands, his legs, his head, his belly :)
He is holding is head up really well and focusing on things. He is getting really good at 'mini' push ups. He will 'talk' to you and just look around smiling and laughing. He blows bubbles and just loves life. He is a really happy baby. We are so blessed.
Our friend Averi and Eric had their baby Cade this week. I cried as I looked at our 2 precious sons and thought of the Lord's faithfulness to our families. These two babies will bring such joy to us, and are testaments of God's faith and love. What gifts they are!
I just realized that I am rambling, not listing. :)
Here are some pictures of our little/big guy.
Here are some pictures of our little/big guy.
Wednesday, August 13, 2008
It's 11:50 PM and I get up at 5:00 AM
This is the first time I have posted sense I have been back to work.
I am too sleepy to post much of anything.
Other than-Work is good (BUSY) Please pray for me and my new role as mom and administrator.
Zach is Fabulous and LOVES his babysitter (Ms. Janie)
I feel like a milk cow while pumping what seems like every minute of every day. :) But, that is going well.
I do not see how working folks keep up with a blog. I am going to have to make an effort to keep it updated with Zach information. ;)
I am too sleepy to post much of anything.
Other than-Work is good (BUSY) Please pray for me and my new role as mom and administrator.
Zach is Fabulous and LOVES his babysitter (Ms. Janie)
I feel like a milk cow while pumping what seems like every minute of every day. :) But, that is going well.
I do not see how working folks keep up with a blog. I am going to have to make an effort to keep it updated with Zach information. ;)
Monday, July 28, 2008
Back to work
I have dreaded writing this email sense I found out I was pregnant. I have officially gone back to work. Friday was my first day, but today really feels like my first day. I am sure that it will be like a first day all over again next Monday when I leave Zach with the baby sitter, and another first day when school really starts.
Background-I have never imagined or thought of myself as a stay at home mother. I enjoy working. I have a new job for the fall where I will be in the classroom and have the flexibility to leave for Zach when he is sick and needs me. I have a great schedule that allows me more time in the evenings with him. I do not feel like staying home with Zach is what God has planned for our family.
With all of that said, leaving Zach has been the most difficult thing I have ever done. I don't even think it is the actual act of leaving him that is difficult, but all the thoughts that Satan allows to creep up and make me doubt our families decision. Such as, someone else will be with him more hours in the day than me, give him more bottles, work with him on how to read, write, count, and play with him. I am scared that I will miss something. I just don't want to miss a thing in his life. He is growing and changing so much every day.
After many prayers and worries from me, we have found a wonderful lady to keep Zach rather than put him in day care. She is my friends, hair dressers, mother. She keeps her 9 month old grand daughter and now Zach. I know that Janie is an answer to our prayers.
Please keep me/us in your prayers as becoming a working mother is a huge transition.
Background-I have never imagined or thought of myself as a stay at home mother. I enjoy working. I have a new job for the fall where I will be in the classroom and have the flexibility to leave for Zach when he is sick and needs me. I have a great schedule that allows me more time in the evenings with him. I do not feel like staying home with Zach is what God has planned for our family.
With all of that said, leaving Zach has been the most difficult thing I have ever done. I don't even think it is the actual act of leaving him that is difficult, but all the thoughts that Satan allows to creep up and make me doubt our families decision. Such as, someone else will be with him more hours in the day than me, give him more bottles, work with him on how to read, write, count, and play with him. I am scared that I will miss something. I just don't want to miss a thing in his life. He is growing and changing so much every day.
After many prayers and worries from me, we have found a wonderful lady to keep Zach rather than put him in day care. She is my friends, hair dressers, mother. She keeps her 9 month old grand daughter and now Zach. I know that Janie is an answer to our prayers.
Please keep me/us in your prayers as becoming a working mother is a huge transition.
Saturday, July 5, 2008
2 months
Zach had his 2 month shots. I cried and so did he. That same day we also went back to the fertility clinic that we spent so much time at last year. As I went up the elevator, as I did so many days last summer, holding my beautiful baby boy, I was over come with emotions. I had to stop a minute before I went into the office to compose myself. There were so many times I walked through that door hopeless, scared, and wanting something I thought may never happen. As I stood there watching Zach sleep on my shoulder I once again was lost for words to Praise and Thank God, and just kept thinking what a miracle he is.
Zach weighs 12.13 pounds and is 24.?? inches long. His weight is in the 75th percentile, height in the 85th, and head size in the 80th. So, to sum it up, he is a big little guy.
We went for 2 month pictures today. They turned out well. I will post those later.
Zach weighs 12.13 pounds and is 24.?? inches long. His weight is in the 75th percentile, height in the 85th, and head size in the 80th. So, to sum it up, he is a big little guy.
We went for 2 month pictures today. They turned out well. I will post those later.
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