Prayers for Eli

Please continue to pray for Baby Eli. In case you don't know the background the Wedehase family blog is www.wedehase.blogspot.com. In short, their son Eli was born with a serious heart condition. He has open heart surgery two days after he was born. He is now almost a week old and he is recovering well, but is still very fragile. The Wedehase's our dear friends of ours, and they continue to amaze us as they put their faith in our mighty God and seek Him in the midst of all of this.

Thank you for the prayers!

Valentine's Day!

What a wonderful Valentine's Day! Doug and I actually celebrated yesterday. My Dad came over after we put the kids to bed and we went out to dinner at Tony Roma's. It is one of Doug's favorites, and we haven't been in a long time. Doug loves the onion loaf thing, and I love that they have mini deserts! Which means I got to get two! Red Velvet Cake and Warm Brownies with Vanilla Ice Cream. Yummo! We had some great conversation and reminiscing about our 5 1/2 years of marriage. I am married to such a wonderful man!

This evening we went to dinner with my parents and my Grandma VeVe. We were going to go to Cheesecake Factory, but that was a BAD idea. The wait was 1 1/2 - 2 hours. Crazy. We ended up going back to my San Joaquin Gardens and having a really nice dinner there. They had it all decorated for Valentine's Day, and even a dance floor with a band playing. Doug and I danced for the first time in...??

Noah enjoyed handing out his Valentines that he made earlier today. Abigail was happy and enjoyed eating little bites of everything. Well, not everything, she TRIED to get her hands on my ice cream. Not till you are 1 little girl!

Here are a few pictures.

Noah making his Valentines. He loved putting they googly eyes on the heart frogs.


Sweet boy.


Abigail ENJOYING her food. She is such a loud eater!!


Doug enjoying HIS treat.




Noah showing Papa his card

. Noah giving Grandma her card.



Grandma VeVe's heart and pom-pom card.


My beautiful card from Doug.

Abigail crawling - Noah encouraging

Here is a little clip of Abigail crawling... in this one she is still kind of dragging her leg, but she seems to have it pretty even now. It is cute, you can hear Noah saying "I am racing you Abigail", thinking that will encourage her to go for it!


Abigail crawling to Mama.

Crawling!!!

Abigail is crawling!!! She officially began on Wednesday night. 2/11/09. So 9 1/2 months old. She had been on the verge for quite a while, she could pivot herself around on her bottom, but then when she would get on her knees she would just fall to her tummy and get frustrated and kick her little legs like she was doing the frog stroke. My friend suggested taking her clothes off, that naked babies crawl better. So I took everything but her diaper off, and sure enough - that night she figured out how to crawl. Here is a picture from that night. She wasn't very happy about the whole thing, she was frustrated that we kept taking the phone away and putting it just out of her reach. Now though, she is really liking her new found independence! She is such a little sweetheart. Noah has been great with her also, he has taken on the roll of coach, and had been trying to teach her and is always cheering her on.

World Ag Expo

Today we went to the World Ag Expo in Tulare as part of Noah's Birthday present. He will be 3 in one week! He loves tractors, farm equipment, construction equipment etc. , so he was in heaven. I think some of the Reps were impressed when he was "talking shop" with them. It was so cute, when we would tell him he could he would run as fast as his little legs would carry him (which isn't very fast) to the next piece of equipment. We got there about 10:30 and stayed for 2 3/4 hours. We checked out all the equipment, watched some different exhibits, walked through all the booths and of course ate a tri-tip sandwhich, a corn-dog, and some ice cream. Abigail had a fun time too. She was a trooper the whole time, and just took a little nap on the way home. We thought for sure Noah would zonk out too, but he made it the whole way home. It must have been the adrenaline rush from all of the heavy equipment.

Swinging and dinner

Swinging in our backyard.


Dinner with Grandma VeVe. Abigail loves to sit on her lap - and Grandma loves to hold her!

Woodward Park

We went for a picnic at Woodward Park last week. So fun! Abigail loved kicking her feet and legs in the little wood chips.

Friends

I snapped a few quick pictures of the kids and their friends at a little play group we had over here today. All of the kids were great and everyone shared well with each other. The other 2 girls that are about Abigail's age are 8 months, and 9 1/2 months. They are both crawling very well. I was hoping Abigail would have an Aha moment and realize she can crawl too! :-) Actually, I am quite ok with her still being stationary and enjoying that for now.

Playing with tools.


Lego's and heavy equipment - Noah was trying to smile really big!


Girls

Abigail is almost crawling - video

Abigail is getting closer and closer to crawling. Here is a cute little video of her attempts!! :-)

Quick pics

A few quick pictures

At the park by our house - one of Noah's favorite hang outs.


Daddy's girl.
Cutie pie

Sign language - cat

Here is a cute little video of Abigail signing CAT. Both of our babies first words were MILK, CAT, then EAT.

25 random things about Heather

I was "tagged" on facebook for writing 25 random things about myself and just posted this there. I normally don't do these types of things, but I enjoyed reading/learning about other people, so I figured I should put something up for those that wanted to know more about me... and figured I should post it here too. So, here are some random things about me!

1. I love listening to God and am working on doing it more consistently. It is amazing to me that He loves to communicate with us.

2. It would be much easier for me if this were 25 random things about your spouse / children... i.e., my husband is currently getting his PhD. in ancient history from UCLA. etc.

3. I climbed halfdome when I was in high school.

4. I drove a 4x4 Jeep Wrangler as my first vehicle... and I didn't get to get my driver's license on my birthday because when we went I had a brake light out, and my Dad wouldn't let 'his daughter' take her driver's test on an automatic transmission.

5. I love being my parents' daughter. I am an only child. The other day a friend shared with me that I was the only only child that he knew that he couldn't tell right away (because of being totally messed up in one way or the other)... maybe he will reconsider after reading this.

6. I peek at my children every night before I go to bed. I love being a mommy - I enjoy my kids so much.

7. We don't go to church... at least not a church building. We are the church, and we "do" simple church / home church.

8. We would love to have a lot of kids. As many as God blesses us with... we are leaving that up to Him.

9. I played Volleyball and soccer in highschool. They didn't have a girls soccer team, so I played on the guys team.

10. We plan on homeschooling our children and giving them a classical education.

11. I have a hard time making friends; I always think that someone wouldn't want to be my friend.

12. I love my Arbonne business and the freedom and options it has given our family. I enjoy helping other women with the same thing.

13. I am married to my best friend and wouldn't have it any other way. He is an amazing man of God, treats me like a princess, is a hard worker, a wonderful dad, AND he does most of the laundry and dishes. (I am working on changing that last one).

14. I have little patience for puzzles or online games. The other day Noah and I did a 25 piece puzzle and that was just about over my threshold. Our family does play a lot of board games.

15. Being real... I have clinical depression. I over analyze things to a fault and decisions can sometimes be very overwhelming for me. I have challenges with over eating... serious challenges.

16. We have 2 cats - Ninja and Mama.

17. When I first met my husband after going to a Bible study for the first time I went home and told my parents that it was a really neat group of people, but there wasn't anyone there that I would consider marrying. Glad God knows better than me.

18. I can recite Mel Gibson's pre-battle speech from Braveheart. I even have a trophy for best performance at a talent show.

19. I can't sing well - not well at all. I can, however, make a joyful noise.

20. Both of my babies were born via C-section, after 31 and 24 hours of labor.

21. My daughter had to be transported to Doctor's Hospital in Modesto after she was born, and we didn't get to bring her home for 13 days.

22. We really enjoy going to Carmel. My Grandma has a house over there, and we try to go every few months at least. Lot's of special memories.

23. I planned on having Abigail at home and did a good portion of the labor at home, in a birthing tub.

24. I call my children Pooka (as in pooka shell).

25a. I cut my kids' hair.

25b. I have lived in Hawaii.

25c. I believe a wooden spoon is very helpful in training your children properly.

25d. I have loose shoulder joints. I have dislocated my shoulders playing volleyball, surfing, rock climbing and sleeping (dangerous sport). I have since had 2 shoulder surgeries.

25e. I love ice cream. LOVE it.

Noah amazes me...

Noah continues to amaze me - what a gift from God! He is going to be three this month, on the 19th. He is such a good boy and such a joy. Often he will just out of the blue say "Mommy, I love you." He is talking and conversing so much. He loves to pretend, he loves to tell stories, and have stories told to him. After we took Daddy dinner tonight at Fresno State there was a big bar that was blocking off a field, and he asked if we could go in there. I told him it was closed and that was just a bar that could be opened for emergency vehicles to go through... so he asked to be told a story about that field and an emergency vehicle going through. So I told him one and then he told me one.

He loves to be read to also, and he can recite a lot of his books. Tonight when we were reading his Baby Bible, there is a prayer at the end of each one. I have him repeat it after me. One of tonight's stories was about Noah and the ark, so it said, "Thank you God for taking care of all of the animals and for taking care of me." I started with "Thank you God for taking..." and he said "Thank you God for taking us to heaven." So sweet.

When we were playing Geotrax this afternoon he threw the switch on the track to make one of the trains go the other way and he said: "Mommy, I diverted your train". Diverted? Seriously, you are not even 3! I didn't tell him that - I just told him that was a really big word and I was proud of him.

Later this afternoon he was sitting at the table having a snack and I was making dinner. He said: "Mommy, I have a question for you." I replied - yes? He asked "Do Koala bears eat pineapples?" This must have been a very pressing question for him... :-) Anyways, I told them that I didn't think so, that they mostly eat bamboo, but that we could do some research and find out for sure. So I guess we will be researching Koala bears tomorrow.

Thank you God for such a wonderful son.