Madelyn Page is Four Months!

It has been a great four months, and we are both enjoying Madelyn very much! She is finally growing out of her colic and is a much happier baby. Her personality is really starting to show; she is talking like crazy, and her new favorite thing is to show us how she rolls over.

Uncle Mikey is finally able to hold Baby
without her crying.

Neither of them have had their
morning coffee yet. 

Mountain Day at Berry College to visit Uncle Mikey.

Bath time.

Taking a walk in the jogging stroller.

I don't think she knows she is reading upside down. 

Burt's Pumpkin Farm

Daddy searches for the BEST pumpkin for the
LEAST amount of money. No lie.

 Eating every sheet in reach is
much more fun than folding.

Aunt Cheryl and Uncle Art visit Baby.

Nana got Baby a walker, but someone
forgot to tell Nana walkers are so 1980.

The family.

Happy four months, Baby!

A Letter on the Refrigerator

I feel as though God has shown himself to me in many ways throughout my life, but there are two instances that stick out the most where I knew, without a doubt, God was directing me, or us, to take a leap of faith and follow him, no matter how scary or uncertain the situation. One being marrying Eric in college at age 21, even though others thought we were crazy. Best decision I ever made. The other being, deciding to stay home longer with Madelyn and giving up teaching at the school I LOVE and possibly being out of a job come this February.

My passion has always been to stay home when I had children of my own, and I was having a hard time accepting the idea of me working as both a mother and teacher full time. One night Eric was reading a letter from John Bloom, the executive director of Desiring God ministries. As we sat on the couch together, Eric read me a part of his letter. The words provided me with a sense of peace, and I immediately took the letter and placed it on the refrigerator.

Four weeks before I was due to go back to work, through a situation I know only God could have directed, I received a call about taking a job working 10 hours a week, providing me the ability to stay home with Madelyn for the vast majority of each week.

A few days later, I came across the letter buried under old pictures, invitations, and papers. I pulled it out. In the closing of the letter it read:

The unplanned, inefficient detours of our lives are planned by God. They are common for disciples and they commonly don't make sense in the moment. But God's ways are not our ways because our lives are about him, not about us. He is orchestrating far more than we know in every unexpected event and delay.

We will see what February brings, but I know without a doubt that this is God directing our family, and I just have to trust that all the other details will also work out.

Daddy-Proof

When you see these types of shirts at the store, you might laugh and think, "That is a bit of an exaggeration." But for Eric, it is no exaggeration. He never snaps her bottoms, and he takes her shirt off by pulling her entire body through the hole for her head. But whatever the method, even if it denies logic, he still achieves the same solution- a dressed or undressed baby.

Mother's Intuition

I teach special education, and each year the kids have the vocabulary word "intuition". When discussing this word with my students, I used "mother's intuition" as an example.  It was always the first thing that came to mind.  I understood the definition of mother's intuition. What I didn't understand was the value it held.

As a parent, there are so many decisions to be made: Breastfeed or use formula; Cry it out or don't cry it out; Sleep in parent's room or sleep separately; Vaccinate or don't vaccinate; Hold often or don't hold too much - the list goes on. And when you love someone so much, it makes these decisions that much harder. Before, when I made decisions, it primarily affected me. But now I have my child counting on me to make the "right" decisions.

When I was pregnant, so many people reminded me, "There is no baby manual for her." And they were right. There is not one book that has all the answers. No baby manual. Yes, there are hundreds of baby books, but they all focus on completely different problems giving completely different solutions.

So with no baby manual, I was forced to learn quickly. If my intuition says something, I follow it. Nine times out of ten it is right. Every time I ignore it; I always regret it later.  And with all the decisions required in raising a child, you have no choice but to follow your intuition.

So maybe some would suggest I do things a different way, but I can't worry about that. I have to do what I feel is right, and maybe sometimes that is the best answer of all.