Wha! December?

The month is allegedly December but I remain unconvinced. Not only was I driving around yesterday with windows rolled down but OTHER PEOPLE were, too! Usually it is just I, the hor-motional preggo, along with my usual crew of menopausal women drivers in Boston cruising with windows cracked while snowflakes fall all willy nilly around. Today was 60 degrees outside! That's considered humid and balmy in parts of Ireland!

But I am also stupefied that it is December because that means my students should know MLA citation backward and forward by now, and surely I should have my holiday cards addressed and my presents wrapped and I should actually be taking stock of the fact that my Baby Girl is going to be TWO YEARS-OLD in just over a month's time!?!

I don't know how it's the last month of 2009 Anno Domini but shoot. This year has been so much fun and the last few weeks have been a hoot and a half. I've been festivemaking and just being a busy social bumblebee of late. Here are a few snaps of the mischief:

Attended Kalev and Hannah's baptism. So proud of these kids. We have really watched them grow up, and grow up in the Lord which is indescribably sweet.

Watched Baby Girl and her gal pal Lily chase a cat up onto its perch at a holiday pahty.

Felt some faux wall grass.

Wore a pilgrim hat. Charged the camera.

Set the Thanksgiving picnic table eleventy-few times on the living room floor.

Ate some popcorn. Skimmed the catalogs. (This picture makes me melt.)

Decked the tree.

Toppled some pillow piles.

Took ourselves very seriously indeed.

Let the Children Come

I was talking to our friend Hector, the person who was most instrumental, second to Loverpants, in guiding me through my conversion experience (from US measurements to metrics, of course).  I was sharing with him how I am struggling to orient Baby Girl to the church environment.  It's difficult on many levels, especially because sabbath is a longish day experience and worship doesn't really accommodate the toddler's activity level.  I was telling Hector how frustrated I was because it seemed like No One was hearing the full message, e.g. the sermon in its entirety because Loverpants and I were working so hard to corral Baby Girl, taking turns stepping into the Cry Room and never really getting the full download. Hector reminded me that our roles have shifted now.  We are parents trying to minister to our daughter's heart, yes.  But we are also just laying the foundations for worship, for a religious experience.  He reminded me that Jesus said, "Let the children come to me."  And yet for so many months, I have been the one shushing and holding back and clotheslining my kid from coming to know church as a place that loves children.

I am so glad that Jesus loves kids in all their unadulterated whimsy.

Like this one, for example.

She loves to play shaving cream table.

And then she loves to scratch her nose.

And use her pants in lieu of paper towel.

Wait, don't touch that --

Oh how I love those shaving cream hugs.

Plum Tuckered

I went away for a weekend to visit my sister in O-HI-O. While I was busy eating dinner uninterrupted by a toddler littering sugar packets all over the floor MESSSSYYYYY, sleeping in until the obscene hour of 10 blessed 30, and generally basking in the flatland friendliness of the Mid-West, my Baby Girl was steamrolling every last sapling of energy from my Lovey Loverpants' veins. He was plum-tuckered out when I arrived home. Here's what happened while I was away:

Someone finally took out the trash.

Vehicles were ridden without seatbelts.

Monkeys were pushed.

Hair-raising experiences were had.

***

Oh, and while in Ohio, I got to tell my sister that she was going to be an auntie...again. :) Pee Wee Loverpants, volume II, due May 2010