Take you to the forest, let you feel the raindrops falling down

This is a blog that is devoted entirely to my little Penelope Wren.

Penelope just turned the big 1 back in November and somehow I missed her one year blog!
Well her special day was so great! We had a quaint little family birthday party that she shared with her cousin Fynn, who is just 7 weeks apart from her. It was a day filled with a lot of love for our little ones.

I thought that this time around I would go low key with it since it was just family. I have learned that a) no matter how little work you put into it leading up to the day, the last couple of days is so filled with perfecting all those little details, that it feels like you spent months on it and b) I don't think I actually know how to go "low key"

Penelope was taking a couple of steps here and there on her special day and fast forward 2 months and she is literally running now. It is unbelievable how much changes over the course of just a short month or two.

In addition to running, she is our little dancing queen. Any time a song comes on the tv, she comes running into the room and squeals with delight as she jumps up and down with her big toothy grin. Her favorite Christmas gift was a little teapot set that she spins around with when it sings her it's little song. It is quite possibly the cutest thing I have ever seen.

We are STILL going through some separation anxiety. She is very attached to mommy and daddy at this time- at least when it is outside the confines of our home. She will engage with friends and family's kisses and smiles...but only from the safety of our arms for the time being.

On a separate note- Penelope has lost her need to suck her fingers. I'm going to miss this...

Penelope is going to be strong woman. She takes her brother's daily pushes and alpha male dominance like a champ (working through one day at a time!). She has survived a bathtub incidence and a topple down the stairs- both of which I wish to never recall unless pointing to God's grace and goodness in continuing to entrust us with her precious little life. She plays amazingly well by herself- something Preson still finds to be very hard to do (what can I say- Im his favorite playmate!) It is a welcome trait that has blessed mama with some room to breathe!
She babbles all day and now says "hi daddy" and "bye daddy", and makes any animal noise you tell her to... but still no "MAMA"!! Oh dear, I will just continue to be patient.

As she moves from baby into tot, I am actually a little more prepared on what to expect this time around. She still remains the sweetest and happiest little spirit I could have ever hoped for. She is our little (yet big) ray of sunshine I love you, Penny Wren!

Can you believe there are less than 3 months between the first picture and this one?? Slow down little girl!

roly poly Penelope!

Im not exactly sure why time flies so much faster as we get older, but alas I truly feel like it was the blink of an eye ago that I was holding Penelope for the first time. I cannot believe she is FIVE MONTHS. That is one month shy of 6 months- which is half of a whole year old!

My little girl is growing so fast. She is the master of rolling over. She has been doing this for the last month or so, and without fail, every time I lay her down, she defaults to her position of choice- the belly. I can already see her starting to do these swim-like motions in place- so rapidly in fact that I swear her knees are going to catch the floor in mid stroke and she is going to be up and off on her first crawl.

Penelope is about the smiliest little thing I have ever seen! I mean to tell you, all you have to do is blink in her direction and she is one big gummy grin. Now there were a few weeks there where we had some separation anxiety, but she seems to be a happy camper as long as mommy, daddy or her big brother are around. She has quite the sense of humor already- she just laughs and laughs any time you have a silly face or some peek-a-boos for her.

Preson is also learning to really love and play with his baby sister. I will catch him sneaking her a kiss or laying on her playmat with her showing her all of his stuffed animals.
Penelope is following in her brothers footsteps in so many ways. One of them being that she is a lightweight. She has been exclusively breastfed and at our last visit to the pediatrician, she was recommended to supplement a bottle of formula to ensure she was getting enough calories. Well of course she decides to be stubborn about it and refuses any kind of formula (can you blame her? gross.). So we just try to supplement a bottle of breast milk instead. Note- she has taken many a bottle on the occasion that mama is not around...until now. She decides that she will NOT take a bottle of any kind. Its like she KNOWS. So after much prayer and fear of having a repeat of what we went through with Preson, we have decided to simply continue to exclusively breastfeed since we at least have that down. I am just increasing the frequency of her feedings. I have learned to be ok with my little ones being little.

We are waiting to present solids to her until she is sitting up like a champ (still working on those back muscles!) and very interested in food. I am very prayerful of this first feeding- which I am guessing will happen sometime within this month or next. I am giving my fears of any feeding adversions to the Lord daily. She has followed in Preson's patterns of feedings almost to the T, so of course the thought of it being a possiblility is there. Please pray for Penelope to be interested in eating- and to eat well. Please pray that she will thrive. And please pray that her mommy would give her fears to her Lord and trust him to take care of her baby.

All in all, Penelope has been a dream baby- Happy except for when she is tired or hungry. Sleeps through the night- from 730pm-8am! I love how she will just curl up and snuggle with me or lay on my shoulder and fall asleep. There is something so special about having a baby girl. She is perfect in my eyes and I cant wait to make new memories each day with her.

Keep Calm and Carry On

Things are coming along very quickly with our new house. In the last 2 weeks we have cleaned every inch of it, knocked down walls, pulled down ceilings, pulled up floors, had a new roof put on, new a/c installed, electric is in the works and we have discovered some very cool features. We have had moments of giddiness of what we hope it will be, and moments of overwhelming discouragement when we run into more work than we anticipated being needed- which we actually anticipated happening.

This last Saturday, we had a team of people from our church community donate their day to us and this house. I mean to tell you they got down and dirty! It was such a blessing that it actually brings tears to my eyes to have such wonderful people in our lives to come alongside us to see this thing get done! We got about a week's worth of work done in a day! I dont take a single one of em for granted.

My mother in law came down about every day last week to help me with cleaning and it has been so awesome to just have her motivating me to keep on keeping on! She has been on board with this crazy idea of ours since we first told her about it and she has backed it with some elbow grease to prove it. My hubby and I decided that encouragement is definitely one of her gifts.

I am in the process of designing the kitchen. I am doing the entire kitchen from Ikea and let me tell ya, they provide you with all the tools for a DIY kitchen including trained people to assist in making sure you get it right. One thing I have run into is that the kitchen is much smaller when you put cabinets in than meets the eye- which I also anticipated. I am loving the design we came up with and am so excited to bring it into existence. In the meantime, I was able to get a couple of things for the bathroom. A rain-can shower head and this is the new vanity we got for our bathroom!

We have had a few setbacks. A couple of the ceilings we started to open up just enough to repair the visible damage from the leaky roof (shown below), has turned into a beast of a project (you have no idea). We had to completely remove the ceilings in both the kitchen and the bedroom. Upon opening the ceilings up we discovered that there are termites and mold in some parts. I was pouring my heart out to one of our elders at church the other day about the mold issue and he explained that he specializes in mold and is helping us now with getting it out of there! Wow! God is good! Its amazing to watch him take care of us.

Another shocker was that the electricians have pretty much demo-ed all the walls to get the wiring in the walls and to remove the old knob and tube wiring. We did not realize how messy it would end up looking when they were finished. Surprise!

In spite of all the stress, I am realizing that God has a funny way of giving us time-outs. I am officially at a stand still with hard labor on the house until the drywall work is done- which should be after Christmas. In the meantime, I have welcomed the break to do some design work, catch up on some christmas baking and christmas cards, and *HELLO!*- start packing up this house(!)

I love this poster and I have posted it up in my house as a constant reminder. Though not necessarily its intention, I am reminded through it that God is on the throne. He is sovereign and he knew every detail of my existence before there was time. It will all be ok. It will all pan out. I will not worry and fret, because I know my God will take care of me- even if I cant see how and it isn't how I envision him to.

God, thank you for this amazing opportunity and I give it to you every morning.

Each day his blessings are new.

Little Peanut

Sweet Baby Boy.

Having you in our lives has completely rocked our world in the most amazing of ways. These last 8 1/2 months have flown by way too fast. Sometimes it is a little sad to see you graduate from one milestone into another. I try to seize every day-taking note and savoring all your little changes as they happen.

The last time we went to the pediatrician, I found out you were in the 1 percentile for weight, which of course I worry about way too much. You just dont have much of an appetite and every time we sit down to nurse or eat (really, from the time you were born), we do this little song and dance routine with each other. In fact when you are sitting in your high chair, sometimes daddy has to stand beside me with his silly faces, just to distract you to get a few bites in! We think it is hilarious that you just mindlessly "open up" when he is there doing this! I pray over you before we go to eat, that God will give you a hearty appetite and that no matter how little you eat you will be well nourished. You are my little peanut.

You creep around as fast as you can on your little tummy! You have been doing this since you were 5 months old and have mastered this little army crawl. Every once in a while you will get up on all fours and teeter back and forth only to splat out on your tummy again! I have about the most non baby proof home there is (changing every day!), so I just follow you around all day while you explore.

You are standing up on everything that is within your reach. What is so very sad, is that you have started doing this in the middle of the night and you dont know how to get back down. Its ok! Daddy to the rescue-though we are starting to wonder if we need to impart some tough love and let you learn how to do this on your own.

One of the funnest things you do is babble da da da da da whenever daddy comes around! The other day in bed, you rolled over onto daddy and in a very matter-of-fact tone, said "DaaaD". Though you probably have no idea what your saying, it just means the world to him and keeps us cracking up!

It is fascinating watching you explore every object that you come into contact with- slowly turning it in your hand and then on to your default sense- shoving it in your mouth. One day I will tell you of all the objects that I have swiped out of your mouth, but for now it is much too disturbing to share.

Among many other milestones, your starting to clap your hands; you are having major separation anxiety (thats a post for another day); your cruising 2-4 steps at a time; you can feed yourself finger foods; your developing quite the sense of humor and your starting to combine more syllables.

I am loving watching your little personality blossom. You are my best buddy and there is no one I would rather spend every waking moment caring for. I love you, Little Peanut!

Growth Spurts

My baby boy is 6 months now and I am overwhelmed with how many changes are happening at once. He is on the verge of crawling- he is scooting everywhere! It is exciting, but my house is in no way babyproofed! No longer confined to his play blanket on the floor, I blink and he is across the room and attempting to eat dust bunnies under the couch. He is a quick little bugger and I am fearful of the curiosity of this little one.
His top two center teeth are here! It changes his face from the baby I am used to, into a peek of what he will look like when he becomes a little boy. It is almost too much.

He started eating solids- first organic whole grain rice cereal and now he is very reluctantly eating apples. Next week- sweet potatoes.
I sold out and bought him his first artificial source of entertainment-a Johnny Jump Up. He is addicted and cant stop bouncing in it once he gets going. Today he fell asleep in it and was still jumping!
All this energy of a 6 month old along with eating some hearty carbs has put him into a deep sleep into the night and thus he is now sleeping through the night. 8pm to 8am.
He is my sunshine and my life and I never anticipated this child bringing me this much joy.

Photo Credit:: Rachel Copple