Tuesday, November 30, 2010
Our Flat Friend Stanley (this one's for you, Kelsey!)
One of my awesome cousins, Sherry, has some pretty awesome kiddos, one of them being Kelsey. Kelsey did a project at school called "flat stanley". she made him and sent him to us so we could take him along on all of our adventures, but, unfortunately, her original didn't make it to us. very sad. so, we looked at a picture of her original Stanley and made our own to take along on all of our exciting...and not so exciting (i am a stay at home mom of 2 after all) excursions. we do have some more pics of him out and about in our city, but they won't come off of Vip's phone card, so for now, here you go, kelsey! we miss you all tons!!
Stanley took a long taxi ride with me and titus to the big city for a retreat time with some friends. he kept titus company since he was the only other boy there that weekend.
and, here's our cool cousin, kelsey! Elly bean LOVED playing with her cousins while we were in America! we miss yall lots but are so glad that we got to have fun with Stanley! thanks for thinking of us and sending him our way!
Stanley took a long taxi ride with me and titus to the big city for a retreat time with some friends. he kept titus company since he was the only other boy there that weekend.
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| he kept titus company on the changing pad after bath time while he was getting ready for bed. |
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| he came in time for our trip to Hong Kong (more on that in a later post), where he got to ride the subway several times. it was usually MUCH more crowded than this, but its not so convenient to get the camera out and take care of the two kiddos (three if you count Stanley i guess) when it is packed with people. he had a front row view of Hong Kong in the stroller's cup holder! |
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| hong kong's disneyland! |
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| he kept Titus company while he napped beside a waterfall in Tarzan's jungle |
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| not the best picture of him, but he's in his cup holder here in front of Cinderella's castle. |
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| he celebrated thanksgiving with us and our friends, and eliana thought that one of our little friends (a.k.a. titus' girlfriend) would like to meet Stanley. |
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| i think she was a fan |
Quilts!
for the last few years, i've been learning more about sewing and doing a few simple things here and there for our home. when we were in the states, my hubby helped me find a very nice used bernina sewing machine to bring back with us so that i could do even more. he also got me a beginners class at the bernina store to help me learn how to use and take care of my new machine. then, my Aunt Tina also helped me out a ton to learn how to quilt! and, i am now hooked! I just love it!! if you know me or have ever spent any time in our home, then you know that i am a do-it-yourself decorator. i love looking around our home and seeing things that me and my family have created on the walls, etc. i love things that serve as conversation starters. i love the homeyness that doing something yourself creates! anyways, these are a few of my recent creations
the center fabric has the character for "love" painted on it (did not do that...bought that). the words on the wall above it wrap all around our living area and remind us to remember where our true home is.
this is a story quilt that tells our favorite story
we have it hanging above our table with the hopes of it starting conversations when guests are over for a meal, etc.
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| titus' baby quilt....complete with baby and his big sisters toys on top as well! |
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| and this is our "art gallery" on the wall opposite the story quilt in our dining area. in the spirit of d.i.y., me and eliana display her artwork (and later titus' too!) on these magnetic kitchen knife racks i got from good ole' ikea! we write verses we are learning and other reminders on the white (grey) board. |
Mr. T
there's an ongoing discussion in our house over what Titus' nickname should be. Eliana says T-pot, Mommy says Mr. T, other friends say T-paq, and Daddy is undecided. but, since i am the one writing the blog, he will be nicknamed Mr. T from here out until further notice. :) but, seriously, doesn't my little boy have one of the cutest smiles ever? he's gotten to the point where he smiles on cue now. I say "give me a smile" and he just lights his whole face up! whenever i say that, eliana then comes over and says "mommy want big smile, i want little smile". being a mommy of two sure does have some fun and precious moments in the midst of all the craziness! anyways, i hope that you enjoy these pictures of our little guy. he really has been such an encouragement to us (especially his mommy!), even at just 4 months old. I hope his smile brings you one too.
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| he wore his tie onesie for thanksgiving...gotta be stylish! |
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| he's getting bigger! woohoo! |
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| this is his serious pose...very GQ, don't you think? |
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| for some reason, he finds biting his lip absolutely fascinating. he spends about 1/3 of his awake time probalby smiling and biting his lip. |
Monday, November 22, 2010
life in a nutshell
sorry that i have been a little absent lately. life has been busy. it always is. right? you think that if you get past one week, then things will calm back down and you will get back to "normal". i have now come to realize that there is no "normal" and that as soon as we get past one week, another one will arrive that you will have to work your way through too! :) so, all of that is to say that we have been staying BUSY! vip's company is off to a good start, but he is definitely gone 8-5 most days. honestly, he could work through the night and all weekend too, but, thankfully, he thinks his family is important, so he doesn't. :) he's always worked a good bit, but his schedule was more flexible. now, it's not so much. he's got to work around the work hours of government offices and hotels and work in lunch meetings to keep up contacts, etc. etc. it's been quite the adjustment, but we are making it. vip has been so good to make sure that the time that we do have together (usually breakfast, and 5-7 pm once he gets home until the kiddos go down) quality time.
eliana and i are enjoying being home together each day. recently, i took a day trip on a saturday to the big city to see some friends for a baby shower. i took titus with me and vip kept Eliana and took her along on a few casual work meetings. i ended up being gone for most of the day but did manage to get back in time to tuck her in for bed. when we were getting her dressed for bed, she said "mommy, daddy go work, i stay home you." now, don't get me wrong.....she LOVES HER DADDY, but it was nice to hear that even at 2, she appreciates the time we have together here at home. as "boring" as my life may seem to some, it's special to her, which encouraged me greatly. she is talking more and more and cracking me up all the time. some of her funnier statements of late are
"not yet, wait till i get older" (usually said when i ask her to do something for me)
"family!" (whenever we sit down all together, even with friends here, or when we are all piled in a taxi together)
"mickey mouse do it!!" (when i told her she couldn't jump on her stool....apparently, she was pretending it was a trampoline like the one mickey mouse jumped on in order to catch a sheep on mickey mouse clubhouse..)
"I full for..." (translation: I'm thankful for...we love to write on our thankful list that is now proudly displayed in our art gallery area in the dining area!)
and, just so you know that our lives are definitely not perfection, here's a little more of our reality. we get to deal with lots of discipline issues daily! she's learning to work the system (or so she thinks!). whenever she does something that she knows she's not supposed to do, regardless of whether i saw it or not, she runs up to me and says "i medicine heart, mommy". (from prov 17:22...a joyful heart is good medicine). the translation for this is "mommy, i know i did something bad, but please don't give me a discipline!" :) oh, its way too hard not to laugh when she says this! then, there is the fun skill of hitting that she has recently acquired. so, we are also talking about not sinning in our anger a lot these days too and asking JC to help us with self-control in this area!)
and last but not least is our little guy, who turned 4 months old yesterday! titus is still his sweet self, but he is not so low maintence anymore, although this is not his doing but ours. we took him for his two month shots and check up when he was three months (i know...but the doc is in another city and you have to order the shots from the capital and wait for them to come in and life was just a little nutso) when they checked his weight it showed up that he had dropped two lines on the growth chart, which means that he just isn't gaining weight realy well. everything else is on target, and they did some tests on his thyroid to make sure that was normal, which it was. so, now, we are just making sure he eats very often and regularly. that first week after we saw the doctor, i even pumped after each feed and then gave him that milk to ensure that my milk supply isn't the problem, (so thankful for that double electric pump my family got me!) it seems like he might be a little bit of a lazy nurser, so i'm trying to work with him on that. we were at the doctor yesterday (more on that in a second), and he has stayed on the 5 percent line that he was on a month ago, so he hasn't dropped anymore and the doc said he is doing fine. it wouldn't hurt for him to gain some more, of course, but he is okay. now, the reason we were at the doctor yesterday was that he has had a cough and nasal congestion (even though he is stubborn and won't sneeze it out!) for over two weeks now. then, saturday night he started to scream every time we put him down to sleep (which he NEVER does), so it seemed like he had gotten an ear infection on top of it all (really!!??? he's only 4 months old!). anyways, the doc said his lungs were clearn (ptl!), but he couldn't see inside his ears because they are too small (errr). so, he is on amoxicillin, and we will go back in a week if he doesn't get better once the antibiotics are done. he is back to sleeping in his bed though (not for too long though :( ), so i think he is getting better. after this month though, i am ready for my sweet, healthy, and low key baby to come back! i hate seeing him so uncomfortablle! despite all this though, he still gives us sweet smiles afte rhe eats, loves the bath, is working really hard on rolling over, and is holding his head up really well.
in the midst of all this, we also had to take a trip to Hong Kong due to issues with our visa! we tried to have fun with it, which we did i think, since we had to leave, but it was tiring to say the least. and, vip is now working even harder to catch up from the time he missed while away.
so, that is us lately. as you might imagine, i am working hard with Father to not get overwhelmed and to just REST in Him! please forgive me for my absence in blogland, and lift up our family when you think of us! i'll work on getting pictures downloaded and posted soon!
eliana and i are enjoying being home together each day. recently, i took a day trip on a saturday to the big city to see some friends for a baby shower. i took titus with me and vip kept Eliana and took her along on a few casual work meetings. i ended up being gone for most of the day but did manage to get back in time to tuck her in for bed. when we were getting her dressed for bed, she said "mommy, daddy go work, i stay home you." now, don't get me wrong.....she LOVES HER DADDY, but it was nice to hear that even at 2, she appreciates the time we have together here at home. as "boring" as my life may seem to some, it's special to her, which encouraged me greatly. she is talking more and more and cracking me up all the time. some of her funnier statements of late are
"not yet, wait till i get older" (usually said when i ask her to do something for me)
"family!" (whenever we sit down all together, even with friends here, or when we are all piled in a taxi together)
"mickey mouse do it!!" (when i told her she couldn't jump on her stool....apparently, she was pretending it was a trampoline like the one mickey mouse jumped on in order to catch a sheep on mickey mouse clubhouse..)
"I full for..." (translation: I'm thankful for...we love to write on our thankful list that is now proudly displayed in our art gallery area in the dining area!)
and, just so you know that our lives are definitely not perfection, here's a little more of our reality. we get to deal with lots of discipline issues daily! she's learning to work the system (or so she thinks!). whenever she does something that she knows she's not supposed to do, regardless of whether i saw it or not, she runs up to me and says "i medicine heart, mommy". (from prov 17:22...a joyful heart is good medicine). the translation for this is "mommy, i know i did something bad, but please don't give me a discipline!" :) oh, its way too hard not to laugh when she says this! then, there is the fun skill of hitting that she has recently acquired. so, we are also talking about not sinning in our anger a lot these days too and asking JC to help us with self-control in this area!)
and last but not least is our little guy, who turned 4 months old yesterday! titus is still his sweet self, but he is not so low maintence anymore, although this is not his doing but ours. we took him for his two month shots and check up when he was three months (i know...but the doc is in another city and you have to order the shots from the capital and wait for them to come in and life was just a little nutso) when they checked his weight it showed up that he had dropped two lines on the growth chart, which means that he just isn't gaining weight realy well. everything else is on target, and they did some tests on his thyroid to make sure that was normal, which it was. so, now, we are just making sure he eats very often and regularly. that first week after we saw the doctor, i even pumped after each feed and then gave him that milk to ensure that my milk supply isn't the problem, (so thankful for that double electric pump my family got me!) it seems like he might be a little bit of a lazy nurser, so i'm trying to work with him on that. we were at the doctor yesterday (more on that in a second), and he has stayed on the 5 percent line that he was on a month ago, so he hasn't dropped anymore and the doc said he is doing fine. it wouldn't hurt for him to gain some more, of course, but he is okay. now, the reason we were at the doctor yesterday was that he has had a cough and nasal congestion (even though he is stubborn and won't sneeze it out!) for over two weeks now. then, saturday night he started to scream every time we put him down to sleep (which he NEVER does), so it seemed like he had gotten an ear infection on top of it all (really!!??? he's only 4 months old!). anyways, the doc said his lungs were clearn (ptl!), but he couldn't see inside his ears because they are too small (errr). so, he is on amoxicillin, and we will go back in a week if he doesn't get better once the antibiotics are done. he is back to sleeping in his bed though (not for too long though :( ), so i think he is getting better. after this month though, i am ready for my sweet, healthy, and low key baby to come back! i hate seeing him so uncomfortablle! despite all this though, he still gives us sweet smiles afte rhe eats, loves the bath, is working really hard on rolling over, and is holding his head up really well.
in the midst of all this, we also had to take a trip to Hong Kong due to issues with our visa! we tried to have fun with it, which we did i think, since we had to leave, but it was tiring to say the least. and, vip is now working even harder to catch up from the time he missed while away.
so, that is us lately. as you might imagine, i am working hard with Father to not get overwhelmed and to just REST in Him! please forgive me for my absence in blogland, and lift up our family when you think of us! i'll work on getting pictures downloaded and posted soon!
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