Four Months Old!

Look at me, I am 4 months old! It is so hard to believe that Laura Cate is four months old. Time has flown by as we continue to get settled into a new community and new apartment and enjoy our wonderful blessings, Cameron and Laura Cate. She is slowly starting to sleep better and I am getting into more of a routine with both kids. We are blessed to have a sweet, happy girl who lights up when her daddy comes in the room and always laughs at her brother. This month she has been full of bubbles, smiles, laughs, and rolling over front to back and back to front. She also started scooting a little bit. She is growing up way too fast! She is also cutting her first tooth, poor thing.

Joys of Having An Older Brother

I have an older brother, whom I adore, and I pray that Laura Cate will love, respect and enjoy her big brother as much as he loves her. Cameron loves to tell me what Laura Cate is doing and he even runs to get her some of his stuffed animals if she is crying. He also loves to run in and greet her in the morning, saying, "Good morning, sweetie, how are you?" He is ready for her to grow up and eat all the food he does and he often tries to share his food with her. Cameron (our little engineer) loves our bouncy/activity seat that we have for Laura Cate. He often tries to get all the sounds going at once while she is in it...I think it is a little overwhelming for her (and for me!) but he really does care and wants her to get the most out of the seat! What a great big brother! :)

Am I loved or what!













So, once in a while I let Cameron hold Laura Cate (it never lasts for long). But this time the conversation went something like this.

Cameron, "can she lay down next to me?"
me "yes, but remember, you may not lay on her."
Cameron "Can I share my animals with her?"
me "yes, but she may not like them"
Cameron "look mommy, she loves it!!"
me " I am not sure about that, sweetheart" (who wouldn't like a dozen fluffy things falling on their face?! )

Sweet blessings

Laura Cate is 3 months old (in this picture, June 24...I am a little behind)

Settled?

Lots of people ask, how are you all doing, are you settling in? I am realizing that the biggest adjustment is to life with two kids! They are such a blessing, but my time is different than with just one. I really have to pray about how to best spend my time and that the Lord would give Cameron understanding, patience, and love for his wonderful new sister. I often remind him that she (and he) are gifts that we need to take special care of. So far he has been sooo extremely helpful and loving on her. He loves to call her "sweetie", "baby", " cutie"and he always warns me when she is crying or might need her pacifier.

I will have to say unpacking and organizing is slooooow going, but I am learning to be ok with that...putting their needs above my own needs for order and control.

Indigenous?

So, I crawled into bed with Cameron for our time to sing and occasionally talk a little and I never know what is swirling around in his little brain. We started talking about Jesus and the cross and he said some things that a mother will never forget. He said, "If I died and went with Jesus, would you cry, like the Mary and Martha did when they saw Jesus on the cross? Would Laura Cate cry?" 5"If you went to heaven would you take Laura Cate with you? Who will take care of her?" (he observes that little babies need their mommies a lot!) Then started to get excited that he wanted to go to heaven and get a crown, but then I had to gently remind him that we don't have it for very long, but give it to back to Jesus and lay it at his feet. He ask what his crown would look like, maybe painted blue (his favorite color). "But how will we get paint and glue in heaven? How will I get to heaven...in a san lun che or a tuk tuk " (a san lun che is an Asian 3 wheeled little taxi and a Tuk Tuk is very similar in Thailand.) So, he gave me a new perspective when I think about adapting the Gospel to different cultures!

Moving...again

I have not written in a while because we were packing to leave the States with a three-year-old and a newborn. Then when we arrived back home we were furiously packing up our apartment (and getting over jet lag) to move...again. We moved to a different city, but this is our 4th apartment in five years and we really hope we are in this one longer than all the others. Now we are busy unpacking and asking ourselves "how did we get all this stuff?" We are still tired due to moving and a sweet baby girl who has colic (in laymens terms, she is gassy and uncomfortable a lot, but mostly at night and therefore she doesn't sleep well and she is tired the next day and it is a bad cycle).

I haven't taken many pictures recently, but here is one from right before we left of Cameron and Alan "camping" in his parents backyard!

We are so blessed to now live near many other families. Cameron is having a blast with lost of new friends and our new community has been so helpful to provide meals for us, have Cameron come over and play or come over to our apartment and hold Laura Cate. We are incredibly thankful for our new city.

Easter

With a baby only a few weeks old I wasn't sure how I would be spending Easter, but I that in the weeks and days leading up to Easter I would we would be able to focus on the Cross and the resurrection. God is so faithful and we enjoyed reading daily and teaching Cameron about the real meaning of Easter. It was a glorious day and Laura Cate and I walked to church and made it for the last 15 mintues and then left before the crowds came out. We had a wonderful afternoon with family and an Easter egg hunt with Cameron and his cousins.

Cameron loved the hunt in the front yard and made sure he had more eggs than everyone else...a little competitive?