Kyra Quote of the Day

"Dad, you need to shave. Dad, why is it in the morning, it all comes back out? Huh. Weird."

Just Seein'

Kyra and I were cleaning up her room, which looked like a clothing bomb had exploded recently. I was asking her to retrieve all the pajamas that were lying around and I asked her for a pair of pajama pants near her. She brought them to me and as I started to fold them up, I was surprised to find yet another pair of pajama pants inside them. I asked her how the other pants got inside these. She nonchalantly replied, "I put those pants on and then I put the other pants on on top of them." Out of curiosity, I asked her why she did that. She said, "Just to see how it feeled." Ok. So of course, I asked her, "So how did it feel?" She responded, "It was a little bit hard, but a little bit cozy."

Our Tenderhearted Baby

It's incredible how much personality can be seen in a person who's only 3 months old. Siana, I can already tell, is going to be my sensitive, tenderhearted child. She takes after her daddy in that respect. It's the most amazing thing...she will hear another child crying, particularly Kyra, and she will go from happy and smiling to her bottom lip trembling and tears welling up in her eyes. We will assure her that everythng is ok, and she'll go right back to giggling and grinning. It's a very sweet characteristic, but it should make the already hormonal teen years interesting.

Angela Version 29.1

Steven and I were blessed to attend a ministers, elders, and wives retreat this past weekend. A wonderful lady from church offered to keep Kyra while we were gone and so we went off to a state park in Oklahoma for 2 nights. This year's retreat was centered around fellowship and community since there are 4 new elders coming in and several ministers who are still fairly new. It was such a great experience for me to get to know some people I had never really spent any time with before, as well as to deepen bonds with people I already call friends. One of the main themes of the retreat was telling your story. This was played out in small groups of 4 or 5. Each person in the small group was given as much time as they needed to tell their story. There was no restriction on what you could say or what aspect of your story to tell. We were each given a free license to tell whatever version and amount of detail of our story as we felt led to do. As I've reflected on the weekend, I realize how long it has been since I've allowed people to really enter into my story. Anyone who knows much about me knows that I'm a pretty unemotional person, but as I told my story with a clear head and calm spirit, I ended up pouring out a lot more emotion than I intended. That was the most difficult part for me. I will tell anyone anything they want to know about me, but it will be a very sterile rendition of the story. As I thought about the version of the story I told that day, I think I can pinpoint my emotional shutoff to when we first moved to Indiana from Michigan when I was 11. I guess I just found it easier to deal with life in general without all those pesky emotions getting in the way, so I just ignored them. I got so good at it that they pretty much disappeared altogether, aside from happy and excited, because those were the "good" ones. Other feelings would pop up occasionally, but it was few and far between. I also remember that when I went off to college without knowing a soul there, I felt like I could basically reinvent myself and start over as whatever kind of person I wanted to be. That was extremely liberating and I did make a lot of changes during that transition, from a publicly quiet and reserved person to much louder and much more outgoing person. I jumped into a lot of college activities right off the bat, whereas before, I wasn't involved in much non-academic stuff until my senior year in high school. To come back to the present, I think that might be the opportunity that God is presenting me with once again at this time in my life. I'm seeing a better way to be and a better way to relate to people than what I've been practicing. After this weekend, I realize I want to know people and to be known myself, good, bad, and ugly. I think that's where true friendship and intimacy comes in, you see all the "stuff" and love anyway. I was able to experience a "safe" environment to be me, all of me, emotions included, and still be ok. I don't know if I'll ever be a weepy, hyper emotional female, but I am re-learning to unlock my emotional closet and give myself some room. I think I've missed a lot of what God has wanted to teach me by not paying attention to the way I feel. By turning off that part of myself, I've turned off a part of what God created in me. I can already see some areas that he's wanting me to work on and recognize that he has already provided me with the support system and the friendships I need to make those changes. I'm a little uneasy going forward into "new/old" territory, but I know, as with anything God asks of us, the rewards will outweigh any cost.

Siana's Vocal Stylings

Over the last week and a half, Little Miss Siana has found her voice. For the better part of the day, she spends her time imitating and inventing all the different sounds she hears and some that she just enjoys making. She will go from little baby aaahs to sudden loud yelps to what sounds like a velociraptor on the hunt. She gargles and laughs and raises her eyebrows so high they just might fall off the top of her head when you engage her in conversation. She opens her eyes as big as she can possibly open them and her body flails and wriggles as she tries to produce a sound, any sound at all. Her legs start running a horizontal marathon and her arms flap as if she may suddenly take flight. Her face lights up so bright you could almost turn the lights off and still see. It's an amazing and precious thing to watch. I think she's going to give her big sister a run for her money as far as being incessantly verbal. However, I believe she, like Kyra, has inherited my sometimes unfortunate trait of a voice that carries. So until both girls learn some volume control, we're going to have a very loud house. Even so, we're having a blast watching her attempting to communicate and are anxiously waiting to hear just what it is that she has to say.

The Fine Art of Negotiation

Kyra and I were in the car after meeting a friend for lunch today and I told her what the agenda for the rest of the afternoon was. She had mentioned earlier on the way to lunch that she wanted to go to Lifeway and Family Christian Store to read books today, and repeated that request again. My main goal was to get some things done to the car, oil change, etc., so the likelihood that we'd be able to fit anything else into the afternoon was slim to none based on typical car place timetables. I told her that we had other things to do today and might not be able to go read books, but if we didn't have time today, we'd definitely go another day soon. She thought about it for a moment, and then said, "Hey Mom, how about we do your plans first and then we can do my plans."

I love that she's starting to really think things through and figure out ways to accomplish everything that we both need to do. I also love that she has "plans." =) However, on days like today, there was nothing I could do to accommodate her. It took almost 2 hours to get the car back, so we didn't get to go to her stores today, but it will definitely be a top priority for an upcoming afternoon!

For Crying Out Loud!

The other day, it seemed like I was forever popping Siana's paci back into her mouth. She was fed, freshly diapered, and sleepy but fighting it. And I swear, I would just sit down when she'd start fussing again because she'd lost her paci. So on one of the trips to replace it, I offhandedly made the comment, "Well, for crying out loud...." Kyra has since equated this, in the literal sense, with Siana crying in general. Now every time Siana starts fussing or crying, Kyra reports, Mom, Siana's 'for crying out loud.'

Amazing Love

It is astonishing to me that little children are so forgiving and unconditionally loving. Yesterday Kyra was playing next to Steven who was holding Siana on the couch. She got a little rambunctious and ended up accidentally head butting Siana on the top of her head. Siana cried like I've never heard her cry before with these giant tears streaming from her eyes. For one, it just breaks my heart to see my babies hurting, and two, I was a little worried she might have more than just a bruise because Kyra has a pretty hard noggin. I took the baby and got her calmed down enough to where I could try to determine whether or not we needed to take her to the doctor. After about 15 minutes, Kyra came over and wanted to talk to Siana and "twy to make her smile." I was completely expecting Siana to burst into tears at the very sight of her sister after what had just happened. However, as Kyra started talking to her and playing with her, Siana broke out into this enormous toothless grin. It was incredible. The forgiveness was instant and the love she has for her big sister was literally written all over her face. I only hope I can one day forgive that easily again and be like a little child in my love for others.

Kyra on death and dying

There was a tragic death involving the son of one of the members of our praise team at church yesterday. There was a lot of talk about it during services and in our own house as Steven works closely with this family. We tried to explain the situation to Kyra as best we could in terms she would understand, but I think the gravity of the situation is a little lost on her at the age of 3. This is evident by the conversation she began this morning:

Kyra: Oh no! My son just died!
Me: I'm so sorry! You must be very sad.
Kyra: No. I'm not sad.
Me: You're not? Well, how do you feel?
Kyra: Well, my friend just went up to Heaven to get my son, so he'll be back in just a minute.
Me: Really? He's coming back from Heaven?
Kyra: Yeah. He was done there.

Ok then. Guess we've got a lot of explaining to do as she gets older. However, she did ask to make Miss Emily a card to help her not be sad anymore, so she's getting some of it. The fact that she's becoming thoughtful of other people is good enough for me.

I see no mint

On the way home from small group tonight, Kyra was trying to dissuade us from the spankin she was to receive when we got home for disobeying Mommy and going out into the street alone. I told her that I was sorry, but she had chosen to receive her spankin when she chose to disobey. She then cried, "But I don't want a spankin because it will hurt!" I replied, "Well, that's kind of the point. That's why it's a punishment." Kyra replied back, "It's not a punishment...it's not a mint!"

You Tell Em!

Kyra was watching Veggie Tales this morning and cheering on her favorite character. She yelled something at the "bad guy" and Steven commented, "Yeah, you tell em!" She looked at him like he was nuts and said, "I just did...."

Blessing in de-skies

We were amazingly blessed to receive, out of the blue, 3 free plane tickets that the girls and I used to go back to Indianapolis for a visit. I had been racking my brain to figure out how we could afford tickets to go because I was missing my family and vice versa, plus I had a lot of shopping that I needed to get done that can't be done in Amarillo, unfortunately. God was truly faithful to our family and provided this totally unexpected opportunity for us. The girls and I had an amazing visit with my family and with my in-laws, but even being there over a week didn't get to see everyone we wanted to visit with. Such is life. We're hoping to go back as a complete family unit soon, as the most difficult part of the trip was being away from Daddy. I'm still blown away by this incredible gift and am so thankful to have been the recipient.

Footwear Foible

My sister and I went out to lunch today with Kyra and Siana. We were passing the time while waiting for our food by playing the games on the kids' menus we got and ended up engaged in a friendly competition of who could finish the word search first. Kyra and I had a clear lead and Adrienne off-handedly made the comment, "You guys are kicking my booty." Kyra glanced under the table and said, "Ady, you're not wearing booties, you're wearing shoes!"