Sleepless

I'm not one who normally has trouble sleeping.
Nope. Generally when my head hits the pillow, I'm gone. But tonight, I can't sleep.
In just a few short weeks, my baby will have his first birthday. I cannot believe how quickly a year can fly! I remember being so nervous about holding him properly...it's like it just came to me, like a second nature, and we were instantly in love.
From that time, the moment when I first held my newborn son in my arms, I was completely changed.
This year has been one of absolute wonder. When I reflect, I see the Lord's hand in so many places. Ephram was a complete miracle from the beginning. We were told early in my pregnancy that I had miscarried and that we would not deliver a baby in December. Then, he came; 9 pounds and 3 ounces of amazing.
The next miracle of the year was the purchase of our house. When I went on maternity leave, I had plenty of days to take off for 12 weeks. I also had short-term disability insurance that paid me for the time I was off. We were able to put money down on our beautiful new home and pay the fees. The sellers of the home paid all the closing costs. It, of course, doesn't end with the purchase of the house. The sellers also offered to pay for a home warranty for the first year. In the first month and a half that we owned the house, we had to use it twice! Praise God we had it!
The third miracle happened when Michael was able to leave the midnight shift to work days! That was such a blessing!! I had been the only one on overnight duty 4 days a week for 8 months! Since he changed shifts, he is not as tired and is able to spend much more time with us. One pitfall is that he works Sundays, so he misses church with us.
The last major miracle I will mention is that I have been fortunate enough this year to have an incredible class of fifth graders. They are the best students I've had in my 6-year teaching career.
There have been so many other exciting things...Kamryn started gymnastics, Ephram has gone from a eat-sleep-poop baby to a crawl-all-over-the-universe toddler...it's hard to settle on the four most important, but I think they help tell our story best because they are the things of the most importance.
So this is all running through my head, keeping me from sleep because I could never be thankful enough. And when December 21 rolls around and I celebrate the birth of my sweet baby, I don't know if I'll laugh or cry. :)

baby steps

my son is nine weeks old today.

it's so hard to believe that two whole months have already passed! it seems like just last week i was struggling to bend over my pregnant belly to tie my shoes... but, no. he's growing and changing all the time. it is absolutely incredible to watch and be a part.

at two weeks, he smiled for the first time and started to focus on objects in front of his face. now he's beginning to reach for the things he's focusing on. last night, he was playing in his swing while michael and i ate dinner. michael said, "look! he's grabbing his tray!" sure enough, his little fingers were tightly grasping the tray on the swing. my heart could've burst! and then i thought, 'how silly...he's grasping the tray, not doing anything really spectacular...'

actually, though, it was spectacular.

its spectacular to think that the Lord wired our brains to learn to do things exactly when we are ready. some things don't even have to be learned; we do them instinctively. ephram has eaten from the very beginning of his life, but no one taught him to suck.

i believe it is the same for all people who follow Christ. no one taught us to trust Him, but our instincts tell us we can. and i tend to think He looks at us the way i was looking at e last night. He watches us grow and develop and take those essential "baby steps" in Him to become mature in Him. He sees us do something that may seem insignificant, but He bursts with pride as He says, "look, Father! she's grabbing the tray! she gets it! she's growing!"

may we never cease to grow, and may we never despise baby steps.

to be bilingual

in the summer of 2003, i was fortunate enough to make a trip to cuenca, ecuador for missions. i had taken spanish in school, but that summer, i took some extra conversational language classes. i really like spanish and learning about hispanic culture. i want to learn more spanish, but who knows if i actually ever will. i know many people say french is the most beautiful of the languages, but i think spanish is just as pretty. especially when it is lifted up in praise to Jesus. :)

we have had a hispanic congregation meeting in our building for years now and the people of the congregation have recently become able to purchase a building of their own. it is a very exciting time! this past sunday, we had a combined english/spanish service at our church. the combined service was a celebration of sorts, complete with a tamale meal afterwards.

thinking of the two instances, one thing is certain: our God is infathomable. i remember that summer in ecuador...it was the first time i had ever been on an airplane, and i remember thinking just how vast and large the world is. i mean, i had known that the world is big, but the trip really put that into perspective for me. i had never thought of it before, but i remember thinking that at the very same time we were worshipping in ecuador, there were people back at home in oklahoma worshipping too. and that made such an impact on me. i mean, there are things you know in your head, and then there are things you learn with your heart and that was one of them. the same was true on sunday. we did songs in english and in spanish, some switching back and forth between the two languages, and it was so incredible to me that no matter what language we sing in, God is glorified and exhalted and He honestly doesn't care. the feeling of being in a service like that is electric. between the two congregations, i'm certain there were a fair share of differences, but the most important thing was the one we share in common: Christ.