Happy Anniversary

Happy Anniversary Miguel! From that first motorcycle ride, to dinner last night, I have been blessed by these past five years with you in my life! Thank you for everything! I love you so much!

First Family Vacation

This past weekend we took our first "family vacation" with Adrian. We felt a bit like a National Lampoon's adventure - with the station wagon all loaded up, and driving around in circles when we didn't know where we were going (no Wally World though!) But we had a great time! We had perfect weather, perfect fall colors, and a perfect family get-away! And aside from being Adrian's first vacation anywhere, it was also Mike's first time really visiting Duluth and seeing Canal Park too, so it was an exciting adventure for all! And while Adrian won't remember any of it, we think it was the best first family vacation we could possibly have offered him! Here are some of our favorite memories:

Enger Tower & the fall colors

Canal Park & the lift bridge

The lake

The little guy on his first vacation...

...and all tuckered-out from his first vacation! :)

And my favorite part - being together as a family!

We closed off our family fun with Mike's birthday on Sunday. We didn't get to make him a cake because we were on vacation, but we did make sure he got some "Peanut Butter Bucket" from the Chocolate Factory in Canal Park, so I think it worked out and he had a good day. I'm glad - he deserves it! Happy Birthday Mike!!

Hurray for parenthood

Today is Adrian's four month birthday. We celebrated by taking pictures of him with the clothes he wore when he was first born, so he could see how much he's grown and I could tell him how proud we are of him for how he's growing!

By doing some tummy time, to see how strong he's getting! And by spending a little time wishing happy birthday to the cute boy in the mirror (one of Adrian's favortie past times).

Then he sat in his bouncy seat and told his owl and hedgehog friends all about his day, and a few funny (judging from his smiles & giggles) stories about this past third of a year he's spent with his crazy parents. It was a great day!!

Happy Birthday my little guy! I love you SO much, and thank GOD every day for letting me be your mom!!

And now as he's fast asleep, I ask GOD to be with and bless those others I know who are expecting their own little miracles in the coming months:
- Mel & Todd & Kirra (due any time now!)
- Jeremy & Denise & Lauren
- Becky & Dan & Noah
- Wendy & Greg
- Chasity & Eric & Kaitlyn
- Frank & Stacy & little Frankie (extra prayers as they await TWINS!)
- Jo & Dan
- Adam & Dina & Parker
- Jess & Jeremy & Jaxon

"A baby is GOD's opinion that life should go on. Never will a time come when the most marvelous recent invention is as marvelous as a newborn baby." (Carl Sandburg)

No Limits

It has been the day of limits. Trying to pay my hospital bill I was told there was a limit to the amount I could pay at a time from my HSA account. Just a few hours later I was told there was a limit on the amount I could withdraw from my checking account. My grocery coupons all said “limit 2” or if it was a really special deal, “limit 4.” And just minutes ago I returned from rushing our video rentals back to the store before the limit of how long we could keep them ran out, on the way back from which I saw a policeman pull someone over for exceeding the speed limit. Limits, limits, everywhere I turn.

In a world of so many limits it is hard to imagine the limitless. Yet I am reminded, the more limits I encounter, of how limitless our GOD is. He exists everywhere without limit. She desires for us goodness without limit. He guards and guides without limit. And She loves us without limit!

Twice today I was brought to tears while playing with my son, realizing how beautiful and miraculous he is and how much I love him. And yet this love is only a fraction of the love that our creative GOD has for us – a love without limits. Today, despite all those that surrounded me, I am grateful for no limits!!!

"Could we with ink the ocean fill, and were the skies of parchment made;
Were every stalk on earth a quill, and every man a scribe by trade.
To write the love of GOD above, would drain the ocean dry;
Nor could the scroll contain the whole, though stretched from sky to sky.”

("The Love of God,” by Frederick M. Lehman, 1917)