Nate and Ashley's Big Day

The most beautiful wedding I have EVER been to. And they did a wonderful job of making their guests feel well-loved. They had such cute creative touches, like the guest book was quilt squares that we got to sign. And since the wedding was outside, they had little fans for each guest and lemonade while we waited for the ceremony to start.

Trying to put on his tie. I may be smiling, but at that point it was all a facade. I was so stressed out about this little guy!

Ceremony took place just to the left of this picture. Gorgeous day. Waterfall. Flowers. String Quartet. Singing.

(So no one noticed the little ring bearer who didn't make it down the aisle only to make a beeline for "Uncle Nate" right after the bride got to the altar).

Ashley walked down the aisle to "How Deep the Father's Love For Us." And yes, I cried a little.

How cool is this?! With a real cowboy! (I guess we were pretty close to Branson...)

Reception. Love the twinkle lights. I can't believe I don't have a picture of Sharks dancing. He was tearing up the dance floor. And after the awful struggle to put the tux on, he wouldn't take it off. Not even the jacket, til the very end.

Gotta love the cake pictures. And the cake. So good.

After all the eating and dancing, when we thought there couldn't possibly be anything more coming...there was a sweet fireworks display (it was the Fourth of July, after all.) Since you all know what fireworks look like, I won't post a picture of them. However, you don't know what Sharks avoiding the fireworks looks like. So here it is for your viewing pleasure. I am pretty sure he didn't realize that it was the sound that was scaring him. My mom ended up covering his ears and he watched quite happily after that. Oh, and see the quilt? Every family at the wedding received one and we used them to sit on during the fireworks.

[pictures all taken by Leigh Broderick]

Tree Hugger

So. Deedo is crawling.

When I say crawling, I really mean army crawling. But he is fast. He knows what he wants and he goes for it.

And what he wants is trashcans and electric cords.

Not my first choice out of all the toys in the house, but to each his own.

I do not remember this crawling thing being such a sudden change with Sharks. With Deedo, it's been a shock.

One day, he was just sitting on the floor, playing with his toys, and the next I can't put him down without him getting into something.

He is still so little, I can't believe he is moving at all.

Some thoughts and ramblings on parenting

I have been realizing this week that there are two main points of change when you add a new child to the family. The first is when you bring him home from the hospital, and your old life is disrupted by the arrival of a little person! who is your complete responsibility. The task of caring for the physical needs of a baby is daunting enough; but we also have been given the responsibility of caring for their spiritual needs too. I think that during those early days, the physicality of the baby is at the forefront of the mind, because his helplessness is evident and he is fully reliant on you for everything. It is an overwhelming time, those first few weeks when you realize that this is life now, this is life with a family.

The second main point of change is when that child starts moving. No longer do you have a tiny baby, but now a little child who can move about freely with his own will. Though we have been praying for him since before he was born, this is when I begin to understand the enormity of what is before me in terms of raising him in the Lord.

Our God is good and richly blesses us through the gift of our children. I am so thankful that his Spirit dwells within me! I do not even want to imagine the struggles of parenting without that!

I have been reading Ephesians lately and I love the verse that talks about how we are sealed with the Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance. I think that is in chapter 1. A verse full of great comfort to me recently.

How to calm fears

Like I mentioned earlier, Sharks is deathly afraid of the smoke detector. Which went off AGAIN yesterday while I was making dinner. The obvious solution to this problem is to become a better cook. Duh.

But, what I really want is to help him calm down and stop getting so frightened.

I mean, he has a meltdown every time this happens. He is inconsolable, poor little guy. He just clings to me and shakes and cries and cries and cries.

Any ideas? What have you done (or heard of someone doing) to calm the fears of your kids?

And they want her back? Really?

We pass this during our afternoon walk almost everyday.

She probably has a great personality.

Speaking of rednecks...

So SPRING is finally here. Hopefully to stay. Yesterday we spent the morning at the park and it was glorious. Sharks walked all the way there and back, pretty much without incident. (One being that he had to go potty so I just took him behind a tree and pulled down his pants and let him take care of business. Not sure if that's ok to do, but no one was around, and if no one saw, well, who's to know that I'm a closet redneck...And the other incident being that he did get tired and just plopped down on the sidewalk, but since we were almost home I pointed out our house and he rallied his little legs and trotted home.)

I am amazed at how sponge-like his little brain is. I guess that's why it's important to fill it with Scripture, hymns, etc. right now while it's easy for him. Like on our walk, we saw some daffodils which Sharks pointed out and said, "Sythia." It took me a minute, but I realized he was calling it 'forsythia' which I had showed him the day before. I had told him it forsythia was a yellow flower...so he took that to mean all yellow flowers. Cute cute.

So on that note, I am looking for good music for Sharks and Deedo to listen to. Right now we only have one decent kids' cd, and I really want to fill their heads with age-appropriate stuff, not, um, pop music. Not that Sharks happens to know any of that. Right. Anyway, Sharks loves to sing so I think some good Scripture cds would be great...I just don't know of any that won't drive me crazy (not cause of Scripture, cause they're cheesy). Any ideas?

(For some reason, the Blogger won't split this into the paragraphs I typed. It just combines them all into one big one. I can see the paragraphs when I type, but when I look at the preview and when I post, it's all together. I have no clue how to fix that.)