Ava’s PlayPen

What a great and challenging month this month!  Amy and I began the month at Passion 2010 while Ava stayed with Grandma and Grandad for a few days.  I'm thinking she wore her Grandma and Grandad out and I know, even after an incredible time of renewed spiritual Awakening, we were so glad to see her again.  We've been fighting crazy sickness around here.  I've been down with bronchitis twice this month, while Ava's been sick twice, and Amy's been sicker than she's ever been.  She caught a pnuemonia, and developed a pleurisy.  It really has been quite an ordeal, but we are all coming around, and feeling a bit better every day.  Everyone's on antibiotics and have been for a week now.

Amy's pregnancy with Samuel is going well.  The pregnancy has made it much harder on her being sick, but other than that, Samuel has been pretty good to her.  She isn't having the troubles that she had with Ava, and we are still praising Jesus for the miracle he worked with Samuel.  It is hard to believe he is going to be here so soon.  Amy visited the Dr.  today, and the Dr. scheduled an ultrasound for the 11 of February.  With Ava having been such a big baby, they don't want to risk the trouble Amy had with Ava this time around.

It was odd putting the crib up again.  Earlier this week, Ava helped me put Samuel's crib together.  The house we are living in only has two rooms, so we are gonna have to make room for a baby in our room, at least for the short term.  Again, it is hard to believe that, God willing, we will have a baby around here again.  It seems like quite a while ago.  Amy is looking beautiful, and I'll post some pictures of both her, and Ava and I putting up the crib.

Ava has, as usual, come a long way.  She is loving riding the red tricycle Grammy and Pa Pa bought her for Christmas.  Her conversation skills, I believe, are amazing.  I was watering the garden (what is left of it after the unusual cold freezing florida winter) tonight and she was like, "So, what did you do today Daddy?"  I told her that I spent a large part of the day building a Nagios server for monitoring our web sites, equipment, networking equipment, and a bunch of other things, and I spent some time modifying my snort configuration to reduce the false positives I've been getting, as well as replacing a backup system that went bad.  I say this not for my benefit, but was amazed at how she followed what I was saying, and replied with "Thats cool".  I then asked her what she did today, and she said, "Oh, I played in my play room".  It is pretty neat getting to talk to her, and I know she is picking up on Amy and I's conversations, and mimicking a lot of our communication.  We have to be extra careful what we say these days.

She has also been hitting the crazy emotional streak.  So many things seem to be a crisis.  She says to me "Daddy, don't get mad at me, I'll cry!", as if she is warning us of the dire consequences of her crying.  Her emotions have been pretty much limited to crying, as everything seems to be cry worthy...

Well, thats a run down of really just this month.  It has been quite a month, and quite a beginning to 2010.  I hope everyone has a wonderful 2010, and I'll have some pictures up within the next day or so.

Happy New Year to everyone!  I thought we would celebrate the new year by posting some pictures of our Christmas with family in KS.  We spent last week in the blistery cold plains of western KS.  The day after we flew in, we had a snow storm, and some crazy wind.  Ava was, however, able to play in the snow for a couple days before the wind really hit.  She absolutely loved the snow, and immediately ran around, dove around, and built a snow man with Papa.  She also fell in love with my parents dog, Jeter, playing around in the snow and feeding snow to him.  She had a blast, and the wintery weather was absolutely beautiful knowing we would be heading back to warmer weather .

It was also the first time in probably over 10 years my whole family came together for Christmas.  It is sometimes hit and miss, as Amy and I visit every other year, and a few other families spend time with their other families during some Christmases as well.  It really was great getting to see and visit with everyone.

I hope you had a great Christmas, New Years Eve, and New Year.  I pray this year you find overwhelming peace and great joy in Christ.  May 2010 be a year full of love and adventure living lives united with our Savior!

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I'm going to admit that this year I slacked pretty big on the Thanksgiving pictures.  However, we had a wonderful thanksgiving at Uncle Bob and Aunt Jill's house.  We had a full house and some of the best turkey i've tasted.

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The past few years we have taken the day after Thanksgiving to pick up a Christmas Tree, decorate it, and then watch a Christmas movie with the cozy tree lit.  I always look forward to it, and I love the smell of the Christmas tree in the house...  Today, has been one for the record books.  On a side note, I haven't felt more clueless on how to be a parent.  Ava is going through some definite challenging phases.  She is loving to throw fits, disobey, trying to order us around, and beginning for the first time to throw temper tantrums.

We picked up the tree today, and everything started out pretty well.  The folks at Home Depot sold us a great tree, and I'll have to give kudos to a good buddy of mine, Matt for trimming our tree up beautifully for us.  Ava had a blast, helped me get the tree in the house.  Realistically, besides a little disobeying here and there, and a couple of timeouts things went pretty well until dinner.  Ava had a blast decorating the tree.  This is the first year she has really gotten into it.  One thing we have done since we have been married, is collect Christmas ornaments wherever we travel, and during significant periods in our life.  I really enjoy it, as nearly all of our Christmas ornaments have some memory tied to it.  We will have some pictures up at a later time...  Anyhow we had a great time decorating the tree, and decided to try out this new Greek place on Starkey called Athenian Garden.  We had a great dinner, and what a place.  Definately one of the best greek restaurants in the area, I think.  However, it was good we ate early, because Ava was throwing fits, throwing forks, and acting completely crazy.  We left as soon as possible, and brought Ava back home for a "talk".  We have decided we are going to crack down on the fit throwing, and challenging attitude...  Well, to top off the evening, I walk into the bathroom and find Ava playing with her poop.  She proceeds to look at me at tell me, "Daddy, I dropped it a couple of times, whoa!  I dropped it again!".  While draining and cleaning the tub with Ava on the toilet she looks at me and says, "It's my fault daddy, and I'm sorry".  Completely warmed my heart, and shined a light on the value of truly asking for forgiveness.  No ifs, buts, or becauses.  Just an "It's my fault daddy, and I'm sorry".  I'm so proud of her...

On a side note, I absolutely love being a parent.  I love the challenge and excitement it brings to my life.  I thought someone might be able to identify and laugh with us...

More pictures to come of our tree, and some ornaments as well...

Happy Thanksgiving to everyone!  As I type this Amy and Ava are making some yummy pumpkin pie.  We woke this morning and after Ava's ritualistic watching of Peter Pan, we drove to Grandma and Granddad's for Thanksgiving day breakfast.  The weather is absolutely beautiful.  A Cold front came through with some rain yesterday, so it is beautifully cool with warm sunshine outside.  One more thing to be thankful for!

For the first time Ava is really getting into the holiday season.  She's really enjoying the Macy's Parade, with all of the balloons, dancing, and floats.  Really that's about it!  We are looking forward to spending time with Uncle Bob, Aunt Jill and family and friends for Thanksgiving dinner.  Other than that we are going to be taking it a little easy today.  It is good to take time and be thankful for all that God has blessed us with, and it has been a year full of blessing.  We especially want to let our family in KS know we love them, miss them, and are thankful for them!  I'm sure Great Grandma Ross is cooking up a storm for lunch, with some spectacular turkey, stuffing, mashed potatoes, and the best turkey gravy on the planet.  And Great Grandma Staab, Im sure is gearing up for a fantastic turkey dinner with ham, stuffing, more mashed potatoes and gravy, and aunt Mary's famous spaghetti stuff.  Wherever you are, whatever you're doing, we want to wish you a happy Thanksgiving.

A wise man once told me that a sign of true humility, and maturity is learning to give thanks to God in all the seasons of your life.  Through good and bad, praising God for the blessings he has given us, and most importantly the grace he has given, and will continue to give in Jesus Christ.  As always, we have so much to be thankful for!

Happy Thanksgiving!!

Last year, for some reason, Halloween flew right by without carving a Jack O' Lantern.  We didn't even buy pumpkins.  This year we decided to buy a couple pumpkins and carve them up.  Ava has really taken a liking to pumpkins for some reason.  Now, the Lutheran church right across the street has a big fall festival every year, and they sell pumpkins as a youth fundraiser.  They had jump houses, horse rides and grilled hot dogs.  Unfortunately, we were not aware of the big festival they were throwing, and arrived right as they were shutting everything down.  We did, however, get our pumpkins.  We decided to buy a pumpkin for each of us, and Ava picked one out for baby Samuel too.  We had a great time carving the pumpkins, and Ava really got in to digging the guts out of each of them.  She loves the Jack O' Lanterns, and we just fired them up for the first time tonight!

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Wow, what a week.  Amy's now at her 20th week of this pregnancy, and we just had our first ultrasound with this baby.  Everything looks very good for both Momma and the Baby.  Amy's doing so well with her eating (although I sometimes give her a hard time and try to make her eat more), and she is right on track with her weight gain.  The baby's head, brain and organs all look great!  Speaking of organs...  He flashed the goods, and we found out that we are expecting a baby boy.  We are so very excited, though we would have been thrilled with a baby girl as well.  I'm excited as by best bro Luke bought me "The Dangerous Book for Boys", by Conn and Hal Iggulden.  I've been already thumbing through the book for ideas.

Ava's been excited, and I think she is now getting the whole baby thing.  She will be such a great big sister, and I will be sure to show her daddy's special wrestling moves to take down little awnry boys!  Here are the ultrasound pictures:

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We just returned from our trip from KS.  I figured I would throw some pictures up while i have a few minutes!  Here are the pictures from our trip.  For some reason, I had a difficult time getting what I thought were good pictures.  A few turned out anyhow!

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I really don't know how to begin the story of the past 3 weeks of our life.  So much has happened, so much blessing, a lot of fear, a beautiful miracle, and about halfway we were taught a lesson in Faith and the power of our risen Savior.

Amy and I have been trying to have another baby for the past year and have, like many, had a couple miscarriages along the way.  Each miscarriage itself is a lesson in grace, and the imparted strength of God given to us.  Completely undeserved, but strength and peace given out of Love.  Especially concerning Amy.  I could write a book on the many virtues of my wife, but Solomon already summed them up in Proverbs 31 (verse 25 is particularly fitting for Amy during this time)... So it has been a crazy year, and very trying, for me at least if I'm honest.

So we found out we are pregnant again about mid July.  At this point, getting pregnant kind of is restricted to guarded optimism vs. excitement, and that is probably a generous description.  It is during this time that I began reading through 1 Samuel, and ran once again into the story of Hannah.  I really didn't think much of it at the time, but I've always thought it amazing how she poured her heart out to God and he answered by blessing her with a Child.  Well to shorten things a bit, about 9 weeks or so into the pregnancy Amy started bleeding again.  On top of that, she was feeling absolutely horribly weak, cramping like crazy, and it really wasn't looking good as she felt her body was trying to get rid of the baby.  The week before, my grandma was taken in for a triple bypass, and the week following, my dad was taken to the ER for heart issues.  It was a crazy couple weeks.  Early on that Wed morning I was reading and studying a Bible passage we were going to discuss in small group.  I made it about a quarter of the way through Chapter 4 in Philippians when I ran on vs 6 and 7.  "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus".  God really spoke to me through that verse, and through so many similar verses in the bible that portray the intimate Love that God has for us, and the deep interest in every aspect of our life.  There will never be a shortage of things in life that cause us anxiety, but we really don't have to carry them...

Like that very same day, we had a movie come in from Netflix titled "Faith Like Potatoes".  And to make a long story short, God really used the story of a man's great faith in God to inspire me.  At the end of the movie, the lead character (a farmer) feels God leading him to plant potatoes.  The reason for Potatoes, is that you have to have faith to plant and harvest potatoes.  The part of the plant you see, is not necessarily indicative of the harvest you will have, as the harvest is underground...  As I was driving to work the next day, it dawned on me that Amy had a little spud in her!!  I popped out my trusty blackberry, and texted Amy.  "You have a potato in you, we can't see the baby or what is going on, but we are going to pray and believe God has the power to bring us a baby regardless of how things are looking!"  So we prayed, and really gave it all to God and asked for a healthy baby.  Our friends and family prayed for us as well.  The bleeding did immediately stop on the monday following...  On a side note, I have come to the realization that Google just may be one of the great faith killers.  If you aren't feeling well, or you are having symptoms, just search on google and the bulletin boards and blogs that are displayed will convince you that you are about to die a horrible death.

Anyhow, that brings us current.  Today we loaded up the family, and went to the Dr's Office for Amy's first appt. at 12 weeks.  Ava's excited and curious if the baby is going to come out so she can see it (She is still curious as to why there's not a baby in daddy's big belly).  So the midwife (a great Christian woman), took out the heart beat detector, and searched... and searched... and searched.  Finally, we heard the placenta working (which is a good sign), and then about 2 or 3 minutes into looking for the heart beat we heard the little ticker (160).  Ava didn't know quite how to take it, but slice it as you may, Jesus worked in our life and these weeks have been some of the sweetest in my Christian walk.

So, we're expecting number two by God's grace, and we're excited about it.  I apologize if this all seems a little melodramatic to those reading, but a few posts on this blog serve to document times in our life that God works in beautiful ways.  I try to capture what we were thinking and going through as it happens in hope that some day we can read back on this and praise God again for the great blessings in our lives.  And just maybe, someone might read and realize that He truly is a good God, always...

What a day!  Summer is most definitely here.  Then again, around these parts, summer has been here for some time and is bound to stick around for some time longer.  We have had quite a busy day, as we are preparing for Grandma and Grandad to come visit for a week.  Ava and I started out the morning visiting a local mower shop to have the mower blade sharpened.  She enjoyed running around sitting on all the mowers as they were sharpening the blade.  We had plenty of time to look around, as I guess the blade was so dull it required about 30 minutes of sharpening (very mild sarcasm intended).  I didn't realize it, but I guess they are putting water hose attachments on push mower decks to make an easy clean on the underside of the mower.  I thought this was pretty cool, and had to tell someone.  My two year old daughter was the only person available, so I showed her the unique feature of these new mowers and she looked at me and said, "Wow, that's cool dad", and ran off to jump on another mower.

We finished up, and Ava helped me mow the yard.  She enjoys helping me push the mower up and down the yard...  After mowing we put up the jump house that Grammy and Pa Pa bought her for her birthday, and she jumped around for a good 30 minutes to an hour.  She loves her jump house, but summertime in Florida doesn't allow very many days without rain...  After jumping around, it was time to star smoking some chicken!

I love smoking meat, and I'm beginning to become comfortable with my smoker.  In our humble opinion, the absolutely best way to eat the chicken is by sticking a can of can of beer, with the top cut off, in the rear of the chicken.  You then smoke the chicken standing up, and resting on the beer.  You then slow smoke it for around 4 hours.  It is incredible!

Anyhow, that's were we are right now, waiting for company to show up.  Amy's Grandparents, as well as Amy's Aunt, and cousin are going to be joining Grandma and Grandad...  Ava just woke up, and boy is she a little grumpy, so I'd better get going.  Here are some pictures of Ava sitting in a tree.  Our back yard has a few oak trees as well as an orange tree,  and she love sitting in them!  She'll just sit up there and peel off bark for quite some time.  Much love to all our family, especially those who are far off.  We miss you!

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