Crawling

My girl is fully on the move these days!  I love it!!  :)

She is exploring everything and has made her tracks over our entire house already.  Last year at Thanksgiving I felt her move for the first time inside of me and this year at Thanksgiving, I got to see her move on her own for the first time!  My life has definitely changed as now I can't just lay her down on the carpet or sit her with a few toys.  I have to constantly be watching her and making sure she's not into anything. I can only imagine that this gets more difficult as she will get faster and eventually start walking.  I just LOVE being able to stay home with her and help her learn the little things.  :)  I came into her room the other day and this is what I saw...

I'm just waiting for the teeth marks to start showing up on her crib rail.  haha.

We got to spend Thanksgiving this year down in Austin, Texas at Ben & Stacy's house.  It was a ton of fun and I thoroughly enjoy spending time with Pete's family.  I have been so blessed to get wonderful inlaws and I couldn't have asked for a better second family!  They are so great!!  We get our family pictures each year...here's our most recent one -

And that's after many takes trying to get Keira to look at the camera.  This is the best we could do.  :)  Here's one of everyone -

We're heading home for Christmas on Christmas day this year.  It will be weird not going to the Christmas Eve service with my family, but my parents and Christy will be in Israel Dec 23 - 31st so we're spending the week after Christmas with Pete's family and then the first week of January with my family in Batavia.  We'll also be celebrating my dad's 60th birthday that week.  I love this time of year as we just get to spend a lot of good quality family time together.  This being Keira's first Christmas will make it extra special!!  :)  So if I don't post within the next couple weeks....Merry Christmas!!  :)

Reflective moments....

Today my heart is for some reason extra sensitive.  I feel like the littlest thing is making me cry.  Yesterday was a rough day for me.  Woke up at 4 am and couldn't fall back asleep, subbed for a 7th grade language arts class and had to physically break up a fist fight during class, got an email from a lady canceling a party, got another email from a lady expressing frustration with some things (harsh words are VERY hard for me to hear...especially when directed at me, I ponder them for days), hurt by some other things that happened, had a POUNDING headache all day long, then got some terrible news about someone I am very close with.  My heart was heavy last night and I was anxious to just crawl into bed.

This morning I woke up with that same heaviness.  My heart just hurts for the broken and hurting.  I have spent much needed time with the Lord this morning and as always it is refreshing, but it just leaves me feeling more aware of my need for his active presence in my life.  Today my heart is soft and Jesus has been extra close that which I am so thankful for.  I often picture him hanging out with Keira and I during the day.  Just watching her with complete awe as I do.  There are moments when I feel like He's telling me how beautiful she is to him.  That makes me smile and I continue to make that a prayer over her life...that she would be so fully aware of God's deep, unconditional love and pursuit of her.  She has given me joy today.  I love turning around to see her and she just squirms with excitement that I'm paying attention to her.  Her little voice and sighs as she plays absolutely melts my heart.  There is no other place that I'd rather be than here with her today.  We occasionally have these moments where we just stare into each others eyes.  She stops moving, I stop moving and we just look at each other.  It's in those moments that I know our souls are communicating.  She can't talk yet or understand my words, but it's in those moments that we share our love for each other.  It's one of the most satisfying things I've ever known.  She is physically a part of me and when they say a mother's connection with her babies is deep, I now know what they are talking about.

Anyways, I'm obviously in a deep reflective mood today.  Take my thoughts for what they are.  I'm off to put my girl down for a nap.