more goofiness

I love the goofy little things that Ethan does. Recently he's taken to stretching out his arm with his fingers outstretched - I think it's his new way of pointing at something he wants. Except that it looks like he's trying to summon it to him. :) And sometimes he does it to a person and it looks like he's blessing them.

He's also discovered how to carry things around when using all 4 limbs to crawl...use the mouth! He is always carrying things around in his mouth, like a little puppy. Then he'll stop, sit, and grin at me while still clamping onto his ball, box, or toy.

hooray!

Since the return of the afternoon nap, Ethan has been in a great mood! Today I took him to work for a couple hours and he just crawled happily around in the church basement, playing with the nursery toys, exploring classrooms, and watching mom. Hooray for naps!

every good and perfect gift

I just love Ethan. We've talked so many times about how we just love to hear him yawn - he's so loud, it's like he's singing. He's always done like that. I love the way he crawls, hands pattering on the floor. I love the way he gets so excited when I come into the room. I love watching him eat - sometimes he takes a piece of food and almost throws it into his mouth, like he's afraid it'll disappear if he holds onto it too long. I love getting him in the morning and seeing him standing in his crib, grinning. I love nursing him, because when he's done he just lays back and smiles at me, like he is absolutely and completely content. I love how he always checks to see if I'm watching when he's playing, and comes crawling over if I'm not paying attention. I love his giggles when I hold him upside down.

But I know I'm not the first parent to ever fall in love with their kid. If most parents love their kids like I love Ethan, it just blows me away how there can be so incredibly much love in the world! It really is a gift from God.

Dentist?

Ethan loves looking at and touching my teeth. It's a recent obsession. Today I was laying on the floor and he was poking my teeth and suddenly decided he wanted to (like with everything else), taste them. So he essentially gave me mouth-to-mouth. So funny!

one story

The man on the left, William Estrada, is amazing. He is the pastor of a church in an impoverished rural community. He lives on whatever the church gives in offerings, which is about $4-5 per week (his church has 280 people in it, which gives you an idea of how poor they are). He also uses that money to help his community. He talks about times when his family hasn't had any food to eat, and instead of despairing, he tells them that they are going to fast and pray. He also has a story of when his car was needed as the ambulance, but he only had 1 gallon of gas left and that was to take his very pregnant wife to the hospital when she went into labor. They discussed it, and since the lady was going to die if he didn't take her, his wife said that he had better take this woman to the hospital, and she would just deal with labor at home. Well, when he got back from taking the sick woman to the hospital, he discovered that someone had left a gallon of gas on his doorstep! Honestly, when he was sharing, I felt like I was listening to the Apostle Paul.

Some of the team in front of William's house. The smoke you see is from burning garbage.

A child in William's community.

The family pet.

ahhh!

Ethan's been grinding his teeth recently - apparently nothing to worry about but it drives me CRAZY!

climber

The little weiner can barely stand and he's already climbing!

...and home again

When I was in Nicaragua, I felt like I'd been there for weeks. And now that I'm home again, I feel like I never left! On the practical front, Ethan is still willing to nurse, so I'm happy. He's been a little clingy for the past couple days, but I decided to take a few days off work so that we can just hang out with no separations for a while.

The trip itself was marvelous! I was right about it being heavy on the meetings, but I sure learned a lot! We learned about the different aspects of poverty, about the history of Nicaragua, about what the Nehemiah Centre is doing in the country, and about what it means to do incarnational ministry. We also met with several local pastors and heard their amazing stories of ministry. We went to churches and participated in some pretty wild worship. We went to the crappiest areas and saw both hopelessness and victory. We spent a day with Compassion children, and were all amazed at their ministry...again.

And of course, we had a few hours to do some tourist stuff - we went to the beach for a couple hours, peered into a volcano, and ran into some bats in a lava cave. We even played hooky from a meeting and took some rickshaws to the gas station and had snacks!

I have to say, going with the church staff was a great decision. Not only did I already have a relationship with them, but I knew I had to continue the relationship so we really DID have to get along! It was a hoot. I haven't laughed so much in a long time.

I'll post some pictures when I get my camera back - Continental managed to leave a half-plane's worth of luggage in Houston!

Thanks to those who prayed, specifically about Ethan - it was tough but we kept busy, so I was mostly ok. Every couple days I had a pity party for a few minutes, but there was always so much going on to distract me.

on another plane...

In less than 36 hours I will be flying over the States on the way to Managua, Nicaragua! It feels kind of surreal. I'm going with the rest of the pastoral-type staff from church. We're going to be meeting with other church leaders to encourage each other and to find out if there are useful ways that we can have future teams do short trips. It should be interesting, if not a little heavy on the meetings. But there will be food and sun, so I shan't complain!

I'm definitely going to miss Ethan - 8 days is a long time to be away from your 10-month old that you haven't even weaned! But he will be with family, so I'm not worried. Ethan and Jon will be okay. Hopefully I will be too.

SUGAR!

Ethan had his first real dessert today. We were at a birthday party and they had white cupcakes. I thought he might like to try a bit. Did he ever! Leaning forward with eyes aglow...that's definitely part of what childhood is all about!

Sweetie pie

Jon had a sweet moment with Ethan today.

He went in to wake him up from his nap (since he was still sleeping and it was suppertime!). Ethan was still asleep, but when Jon said his name, he slowly opened his eyes and said very softly: "dada".

the little goof

Our little goofball strikes again! Today he was in the jolly jumper and suddenly he stopped bouncing, stuck his legs out in front of him, and grabbed his knees...he just hung there, going up and down for a minute, grinning at us. It was hilarious! He did it again later. We caught a bit of it on video. I really need to figure out how to upload stuff from our video camera!

finally!

Ethan started crawling today! Just a foot or so, but it was definitely crawling! I just about started crying - hadn't expected THAT reaction! I think it was maybe because I was afraid I was going to miss the start of his crawling career while I was in Nicaragua. What a relief! He wouldn't do it again after that, but he was trying to push/pull himself along on his stomach and actually succeeded in moving a bit that way as well.

Who knows if this will continue or not though. He turned over several times at about 4 months old, then didn't do it again for a month, so maybe he will just wait for a while to try again. But he's really trying to get to things now - when we put him on his bum, it's usually less than a minute before he's pulled himself onto his stomach, where as before he would contentedly play on his butt for 30 minutes or more.

Every mother I know says that having them start moving isn't really cause for celebration because it's so much more work, but I'm so ready for the next stage!

oddness

I'm not sure how he did it, but this morning when I went to get Ethan out of bed, he was on his stomach and completely flipped around! He must have rotated himself on his back and then flipped...or something. I guess it will only get more interesting from here!

possibly the cutest father-son picture ever!