Easter Week: Day 3

Easter Week: Day 2

What a full and busy day we had. As do most of our Tuesdays, we began our day at the library. It's official. You both have complete crushes on our sweet Ms. Shannon. Your eyes light up when I say we're going to the library, and you both ask, "Sha-shan?" As we walked into the library, there she was, walking towards you. You both went running to wave and say hi.

Not only did you get to see Ms. Shannon (who read a lot of fun Easter books), but Paka and Zsu Zsu surprised us by joining us too!

From there, it was off to McDonalds for some breakfast and your first time playing in the play zone (to which your daddy responded, "Did you wash their hands??" He loves you dearly and is so protective of you, little boys!)

After our morning, we headed home for some more Easter crafts (we made circle prints by dipping Easter eggs into paint).

While on our afternoon walk, we got a phone call from Paka, telling us to head over to their house - they had a surprise for you! Set up in the garage, was your own personal, Thomas the train ride.

What a busy, playful day!

Easter Week: Day 1

While Christmas is, without a doubt, my favorite holiday and time of the year, Easter is definitely the most important holiday we celebrate. I love that Easter falls around the same time as spring begins to bloom because of what both represent. Easter is what our faith and our belief is built on. Without Easter, and the resurrection of Christ, we would not have the hope and promise of eternity. I claim to understand the power of this holiday, but in reality, my human brain cannot comprehend the power of it all. I cannot understand how a man would send His only son to die for each of us. And not just any death, but a horrible, violent death. Since becoming a mother, this has only become more difficult for me to imagine. How much must God love of us all, to make such a sacrifice? It is such an overwhelmingly powerful thought.

I know this is all still far from your realm of understanding. So, we are celebrating the holiday all week in toddler terms because I know every small thing we do is shaping your foundation...even if that means we hide Easter eggs and do Easter crafts. We pray it is these small moments that begin to build your roots and your foundation in your love for Christ.

You both have such a passion for letters right now and I'm absolutely blown away by how many letters you each know already. I hadn't planned on really focusing on learning our letters until you were about 3 years old. However, I wanted to begin exposing you to letters early on - and with that exposure we found, you love your letters! So, who am I to stand in the way of something you've shown such an interest in... especially something as great as letters! Driving in the car has become very entertaining as we hear shouts from the backseat, "A! Two As! R! W! E," and the list goes on.

So, sticking with something that I know you're both passionate about, for the past week, we have been "dotting" letters. Using your dot markers, you hunt for the letters in the Easter egg. I didn't know if you'd be ready for this, but you did both of these by yourselves and love shouting the letter as you "dot" each one. I'd say you got it down!

Today, we also painted a paper "E-e egg (Easter egg)." 

Once daddy got home, we showed off how well we've mastered our colors by going on an Easter egg hunt. Wiley, you were hunting blue and yellow eggs; Ryan had orange and green. This was a HUGE hit!! You were squealing with joy just waiting while we hid the Easter eggs. Daddy and I were both impressed that you seemed to know just what to do without much instruction (this was your first time every hunting Easter eggs). You both kept saying, "hide and seek, Easter eggs!" Being that hide-and-seek is one of your favorite games, it makes sense that you'd be so great at spotting the Easter eggs. My favorite is when you'd find your brother's color - instead of sneaking it into your own basket, you would run it to him, making sure neither of you missed any eggs.

 

 

 

 

 

What a fun start to our Easter celebration!

Let Faith Arise

When I first began writing to you, it was my therapy. It was evidence of my faith that I knew one day you would exist, no matter how difficult and dark the journey to get to you might become.

Recently, it has served as a memory-keeper, a way for me to document our lives so that one day, we will be able to remember all of these wonderful, small moments.

Our "Let faith arise" theme is now even bigger than what it first began - which was our hope that our faith would lead to you, a child / children. As our lives seem to be on the verge of yet another journey, we again hold on to our faith knowing God has everything in His hands. In the moment of any challenge / new adventure, it is sometimes difficult to see past what's right in front of us. It is difficult to see past what seems like the black and white facts. We don't have the big picture though that God already has which is why we trust Him! We must have faith and know completely that God knows exactly what He's doing and where our lives are headed.

There seem to be so many possibilities, and yet so many unknowns for our family in the very near future. And while we don't know the details yet, we are choosing to let our faith guide our decisions.

I was offered a special position on my school's administration / leadership team yesterday. And while this has always been a dream of mine, it means my part-time position will no longer exist next year. So, my options are: back to work full-time and putting you boys in the care of someone else, doing what I've always dreamed of career-wise or staying-at-home full time, doing what I've always dreamed of personally.

Following my heart, this would be such an easy decision - I have years to develop my career. I only a precious few more years with you boys until you go off to school yourself. However, financially, this part-time job provided just the perfect amount of income to help us out.

I was at war with myself all day yesterday - I could not escape the thoughts running through my head. One minute I was convinced I would stay-at-home, the next absolutely sure that I needed to take this job to help provide for our family. Together, the three of us took a nice long walk with God! We sang and prayed to my Let Faith Arise playlist asking God to guide our decision and to calm our souls and minds with this choice.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

So, we are approaching this decision like any other we have made in our lives - praying and trusting that we are following God's lead and that He will continue to provide for our family.

Dr. Seuss Week: Day 3

Today was the grand finale to Dr. Seuss week - and what a full day it was! We started with Toddler Time at the library. Afterwards, we went into the main part of the library to play with the trains and puzzles. Wiley, you love to snuggle with the stuffed animals there too. You always go for Clifford first, and today was no exception...until you spotted The Cat in the Hat. You were so excited to recognize him! Immediately you ran it over to Ryan to show and give to him and then went and got a second one for you (you sure do love each and look out for one another the majority of the time!).

After the library it was off to the mall with Tse Tse. We were out well past naptime, so you didn't really feel like going down once home. You rested for a half-hour and then we began our final Seuss celebrations.

We all three piled into Ryan's crib to read One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish and Horton Hears a Who. From there we made our final crafts of the week and you took a quick bath...both crafts involved lots of painting and we were a mess! Wiley, I kept telling you, you were painting Horton's belly. This translated into you painting your own belly, silly boy.

 

Fridays have recently turned into our family "pizza picnic" nights. So, we settled in for our pizza picnic while watching "Horton Hears a Who." You were so exciting to see the "eh-fant" on TV tonight.

Finally, we wrapped up our night with some One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish jello and a surprise visit from Paka, Zsu Zsu, Funcle, and Lala so we could wish Kye a happy birthday.

Shew! What a long, fun day and what a great week of celebrating some of my favorite books!

Dr. Seuss Week: Day 2

When I walked into your room today, I asked, "Guess what we're going to do today? We're going to the library [to which you both said - "shan-shan, boosh, sing!" (Mrs. Shannon - our teacher, books, and singing!)] and we're going to do some more Dr. Seuss books!"

With that, Wiley you said, "Boosh? Hat?" and ran to your book shelf, frantically searching. You found our other two copies of Cat in the Hat, grabbed your Dr. Seuss hat, and plopped into my lap for me to read!

I was so excited and surprised to see you remembered so much from yesterday, and that you knew what I meant when I said more Dr. Seuss books.

So, bright and early we headed to the playroom for a new Dr. Seuss book and some green eggs for breakfast. (I had Green Eggs and Ham propped up on your table like yesterday when you first walked in. Wiley, you didn't want to exclude The Cat in the Hat. You ran to get that book and propped it up too!)

Before your nap, we played a green eggs letter sort game. Letters (A, R, and W) were written on paper plates, as well as on the paper eggs. Using Attempting to use your spatula, you had to match the eggs to their correct plate.

Finally, we ended our day with a messy, green egg dessert (vanilla pudding and a nilla wafer). Happy early birthday, Dr. Seuss - we sure are having a blast celebrating your fun books this week!

Dr. Seuss Week: Day 1

This Wednesday marks Dr. Seuss' birthday - a perfect reason to reread some of our favorite Dr. Seuss books and throw a little fun into our daily routine. Since I will be working Wednesday and Thursday, we're going to celebrate throughout the week.

Today we kicked off Seuss Week with The Cat in the Hat. We enjoyed breakfast shaped like the cat (doughnut holes, strawberries, and bananas) while we read the book together.

Afterwards, we made our own cat, worked on writing and spelling our name (Ryan, you're getting pretty good at this and know all the letters in your name, but still sometimes shuffle the order around. Wiley, you love identifying some of the letters in your name too, but "W" is your favorite.)

Of course, my own Things 1 and 2 couldn't forget to make Thing 1 and Thing 2! You loved getting your hands "tickled" with the paint brush and were really excited to see how your paint took the shape of Thing 1 and 2.

It was a fun, full day that kept us busy. I can't wait to celebrate with some more reading, painting, and crafting tomorrow!