Getting Around

Well, we did it. We lowered the mattress in Emry’s crib. For at least once in our parenting, we’re trying to beat her to the punch. She’s crawling everywhere. In the last couple of days, she has been pulling herself up to her knees on things. (Like the other day when she was very hungry and ready for lunch, she crawled into the dining room, pulled herself up on her knees using her high chair and cried.) As she has accomplished more than one feat in her crib while we were not watching, we thought it better to go ahead and lower the mattress before she pulls herself up to her feet and over she goes.

Yes, our lives have changed since she became more mobile. There are a few things I have had to pick up and put out of reach. I have to remember to shut the basement door behind me when I go downstairs to put in the laundry lest she attempt to follow me. And I’m never exactly sure where I will find her. She has discovered a whole new set of toys kept in a basket in her room. She loves the full length mirror in our room, jabbering away to her reflection. And now that she is attempting to pull up at least to her knees, she can reach all sorts of things she sees just above her head.

As she discovers new things in her much larger world, she also puts pieces of that world together. She has learned how to sign “please” (although in her own way) and knows very well how to use it (especially if cookie dough is at stake). Her new favorite books is Moo, Baa, La La La! She loves it so much every time she sits down to read any of her books she sings out, “La, la, la!” Today she saw the picture of a sheep in her Bible story book and said, “Baa!” She loves to play peek-a-boo. She is forever pointing at things she wants us to look at. And she is quite good at using her little fork while eating. (Although we’re still trying to tell the difference between finger food and food to eat with a fork – like crackers.)

It’s fun to watch her grow and learn. For even though she is finding the world can be a frustrating place, she remains a cheerful little thing. Such a blessing.

Moo, Baa, La, La La!

 Sit still while you take a picture? No, Mama, I want the camera!

When Everything goes Wrong

I thought it was just me. It wouldn’t be the first time in my driving career that I couldn’t get a clutch in all the way. But when Ed noticed it, too…well, let’s just say I was very blessed to get home from work on Friday evening. For when I tried to park our Tucson, I couldn’t get it into reverse. Then I couldn’t get it into first. And then I just gave up, left it blocking the alley and ran inside to get Ed. He got it into first, pulled it around the block and parked it on the street. Where it sat until we got it towed to the shop Saturday morning.

It was a difficult Friday evening for me. While we knew we needed work done on the Tucson to keep it in operation for at least another year that was going to cost some money, replacing the clutch had not been on that list. We also had until its inspection in July to figure out how we were going to get our lone vehicle to the shop and what we would do (be stranded at home?) for however long it took to get the thing in inspection-passing order. Now we couldn’t get the thing in gear to get it anywhere, we don’t have a regular mechanic, it is the weekend and we don’t have family or friends to help us out in this situation. Yes, I cried. A lot. Ed took my hand and prayed with me, but I honestly felt God had left Pittsburgh, too. The loneliest city on earth.

Saturday morning rolled around. I felt better after a decent night’s sleep, but I still felt very much alone and helpless. By nature, though, I’m not a sit-and-waddle-in-my-problem type of person. First things first. We need that Tucson. So, come what may, it has to go to the shop and get fixed. Ed had called around the night before and a mechanic in Robinson said he would have time to at least look at it Saturday. So, Ed called AAA to get a tow truck to take it there. Meanwhile, I called to get a rental car for at least the weekend and Monday. Ed went with the tow truck driver to drop off the Tucson, plus the driver was nice enough to drive him down the street to Enterprise to get the rental car. As life must go on, once Emry was up from her nap we went grocery shopping. On the way, the mechanic called…

Yes, I was expecting the worse. Even though I was resigned to the fact, I could see the dollars dropping out of my meager savings account. But then I could hear Ed saying, “Really? That’s it?” And then he grinned at me before turning his attention back to the mechanic and grilling him on other things the Tucson needed for inspection this summer. When he got off the phone, he grinned again and said, “Isn’t God good?” And I felt ashamed. For, yes, God is good. And I am fickle and faithless.

The outcome was this: somehow the hoses/cords/whatevers that hook the clutch to the gears so it all shifts together nice and smoothly had gotten kinked up and tangled. All the mechanic had to do was untwist it all. And now that we had a rental car and the Tucson was in the shop, well…we had them do the couple of things we knew we had to have done. And while that cost more than I ever like my car repairs (or anything else) to cost, I knew that expense was already budgeted for. The mechanic said he could get it done by Monday evening when our rental car was due back, but he called us Sunday evening and said he had already finished it. So, not only did we return the rental car early and so get a refund, the mechanic also gave us a 10% break on all the repairs. Lord willing, the thing is ready to pass inspection in July which should only take a few appointed hours in the shop at most.

God is good. Even when I think He’s wandered off to greener pastures. Even when I think He’s left me, and doesn’t care, and only wants to throw wrenches in our plans. And He has blessed us so richly. For while we aren’t millionaires and our incomes simply pay the bills with a little left over, there is a little bit of savings to tap into when things like this happen. And while our Tucson is not the brand new Tacoma Ed dreams about, it has been a very reliable vehicle these seven years I’ve had it, and I pray it will be so for a little bit longer.

God is faithful. God is merciful. God is sovereign. And He hasn’t left Pittsburgh. Thankfully. Now if I would just remember that every day and live in His graciousness.

The Grace of Knowing

And they that know Thy name will put their trust in Thee… Psalm 9:10a

I know Whom I have believed, and am persuaded that He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him against that day. 2 Timothy 1:12

“Faith is an intelligent grace; though there can be knowledge without faith yet there can be no faith without knowledge.” – Thomas Watson

This thought struck me…for I had never really thought about it. I grew up in a Christian home. I grew up being encouraged to know God. To understand Who He is. To know His attributes, read His word, stand on His promises and to pursue these things heartily. Because while an finite being like myself can never truly know an infinite being like God, the more I knew the more I would trust Him. The more I knew, the more I would come to know. The idea that faith could be without knowledge never crossed my mind.

And yet it is a very real thing. Thomas Watson goes on to say, “A blind faith is as bad as a dead faith…  Devout ignorance damns; which condemns the church of Rome, that think it a piece of their religion to be kept in ignorance; these set up an altar to an unknown God.”

I asked Ed, a former Catholic, if this were true. He agreed it is very much so. It is why the mass was once (and still often is) said in Latin. It’s why in the Catholic church reading the Bible for yourself is discouraged; the priest can tell you everything you need to know. There is no encouragement to actually know God – you’re to simply believe that whatever the priest, or bishop, or pope says is good. Which goes a long way in explaining why the present pope has publically stated he doesn’t believe in hell, Adam and Eve or that the Bible is more than an ancient book of moral writings (many of which are out of date). He doesn’t know God. So, in the end, he has no faith.

For faith “is the substance of things hoped for” the writer of Hebrews tells us. Faith isn’t some mythical vapor floating about that is impossible to catch (like Emry’s bubbles that pop every time she attempts to touch one). Faith has substance. And anything with substance can be known. Just try to imagine having faith in God but not knowing Him. Not knowing that He is both merciful and just. Not knowing that He is both gracious and to be feared. Not knowing that He is sovereign, holy, kind, loving, omnipresent, powerful and good. If He isn’t all those things (and so much, much more) then what is your faith in?

It’s a frightening thought to believe in something you don’t know anything about. To blow yourself (and many others) up in a suicide bomb for a god and heaven you hope exists but aren’t really sure. Or do devote yourself to endless hours, days and years of prayers, fastings and confessions to an unknown god you helplessly hope to appease. What hope do you truly have? What guarantee? What salvation? In a word: none.

Oh, the wonderful grace of our God who not only calls us to faith but shows us what we have faith in. Who tells us about Himself, and gives us His precious promises with a “yea and amen” and never, ever changes. That is the God I know. The God in Whom I believe. The substance of my faith. Amen and amen!

She Whom Decided to Crawl

It started on her birthday. We both took a nap after we arrived home from church. When I woke up a few hours later, I opened the door to her room to get her up…and stopped short. I asked Ed if he had been in her room, but he shook his head no and asked why. I pointed. He came to see…and stopped short. She was sitting up in her crib, looking at us and probably wondering what all the fuss was about.

Over the next week, we found her this way many times – happily sitting up in her bed and playing with her stuffed animals. Since she never set herself up anywhere else, we figured she was somehow using the rails to pull herself up. It wasn’t until Saturday morning when I got her up that I saw her do it – she simply got up on her hands and knees, swung her feet under her and sat up. For some reason it just hadn’t dawned on her that she could do this outside her crib. At least until the next morning…

She’s been getting up and her hands and knees, rocking herself back and forth for a week or two now. I haven’t thought much about it for she gets around quite well rolling, wiggling and using her arms to maneuver her body in the direction she wants to roll. This form of transportation is awkward only in doorways (especially in our little duplex where four doorways meet in one small area). But that’s okay because then I rarely find her in a different room than the one I left her in. On Sunday morning, she was up on her hands and knees, happily rocking back and forth. I got down next to her and showed her how to crawl a few feet forward. What did she do? Crawled a few feet forward. Before the day was over, she was crawling just about anywhere she pleased and then sitting down to enjoy whatever it was she was after.

So now we do find her in a different room from the one in which we left her. And I have had to put a few things away (mostly because I’m tired of picking them up every day – she does tend to leave a disaster in her wake as she moves from one place to the next). And it’s kind of funny to find she has followed you whenever you are. But the crawling itself isn’t any huge deal. The big change this has brought about is that her peripheral vision is about a foot further up than it once was. So, she can now see books on shelves, and DVDs left on the television stand, and electric outlets (which are already child proof – or adult proof as you have to be Super Man to plug something into them), and a myriad of other things she never before knew existed. She’s also reaching to hold onto things and so pull herself up to see other things. She just doesn’t trust her own balance enough to pick both hands up off the floor. But once she does that…well, it’s a good thing we have doors to shut.

Yes, our little girl is growing up. Aside from becoming extremely mobile, she is showing more and more of her feminine side. She hugs and kisses just about everything. The other day she was playing with her new Little People barnyard full of animals, picking up each animal and giving it a hug. And I have grown adventurous in trying to put her hair up in pigtails. It keeps it out of her face, but please excuse me if they’re not always even. I’m not very good at styling hair anyway – a moving target hardly helps!

Crawling away…

Just because we’re cute!

National Sibling Day

I know, I know. I’m a few days late. National Sibling Day is on April 10, but since that is also Emry’s birthday…well, I was a bit busy and had other things to blog first. Not that my siblings aren’t very important to me, but I hope they understand.

It would be interesting to find out how long “National Sibling Day” has been around, but I would venture to say it has been made a bigger deal in these past few years thanks to Facebook. I don’t have Facebook, but Ed does and he showed me all kinds of things people were posting about how much they love their siblings, how grateful they are for them, blah, blah, blah. I don’t think I saw one post that said anything about how much they fought with their siblings, hated them for who knows why and resented them for any number of reasons. Probably yet another example of how fake Facebook typically is.

For in all honesty, I could post both sides of that story. I imagine most people can. For the truth is, our relationships with our siblings are samples of extremes. I would do almost anything for my siblings…and yet my siblings have also caused the greatest hurts of my life. Doubtless, they could say the same about me.

Why is that? It’s because we’re sinners. We love and we hate. We cheer and we resent. We uplift and we pull down. All within mere seconds. And just as we love, cheer and uplift those we are closest to, so we tend to hate, resent and pull down those we are closest to. Oh, the sinfulness of mankind. How wretched it is.

But I certainly don’t want to celebrate National Sibling Day remembering all the hurts my siblings have caused me…or all the pain I am sorry I have caused them. For I love my siblings. I truly do. And my life is so much more with them in it. I am so much more. I would be a totally different person if I had been an only child. A totally different person if I hadn’t had Katey to grow up with, Daniel to bicker with, Sally to compete with, Grace to journey with, Jenny to laugh with, Abby to tease, Caleb to enjoy or even Christine to die. So many moments to remember. So many joys and trials so share. And, hopefully, many more to come.

I want my siblings to know that I do love them. I miss them terribly now that I have a family of my own and I realize how little Emry may know her wonderful aunts and uncles she is so blessed to have. I wish she could know and enjoy each of you as I have. But most of all, I apologize that I have not been the best biggest sister I could be. No one really teaches you how to be the oldest and there are so many things I wish I could do over again. But I thank you, Katey and Daniel and Sally and Grace and Jenny and Abby and Caleb for being my siblings – not that you had a choice! But I’m glad God did.

The quiver is full – Daniel, Melissa, Katey, Grace, Sally, Jenny, Abby and Caleb.

June 1995

12 Months!!!

Yes, I am a day late. But after a party on Saturday, church and an exhausted nap and visitors and a church meeting on Sunday…well, I hope you understand. But I did get the pictures made, which is simply not easy anymore.

It went something like this:

Do I have to lie here with this sticker on and get a picture made?

Mama, I really don’t want this sticker on!

Okay, here’s the deal: I’ll keep the sticker on if you give me the phone.

Oh, fine. I’ll keep the sticker on and sort of smile – at least for a minute.

I honestly don’t know how these people who have perfect pictures all twelve months of their kids do it – they either give them tranquilizers or their kids are even better behaved than Emry!

Twelve months…one whole year. It’s hard to believe how the time has flown by… and what life was like before her. Of course, there are so many adventures ahead – so many things to still learn. We do get up on our hands and knees now, but we don’t go anywhere. Just yesterday I walked into her room to get her up from her nap and stopped. She was sitting up in her crib. I asked Ed if he had been in there to check her, but he shook his head. So, even though I haven’t actually seen her do it, I guess she can sit up on her own now. She loves to read her books to herself, we have to be careful because she rolls over on the changing table, she loves to play with buckles and try to get them together and she is very good at pointing out different animals in her book or features on her own face or ours. But best of all…just this morning for the very first time, she said, “Mama”. 

I cried.

The Big 1-Year-Old Birthday!

Okay, it’s official. And I don’t mean that our little girl is one-year-old. I mean that I’m not doing another birthday party anytime soon…like not for another five or more years!

The race to the birthday was exhausting enough. It’s a good thing I took Friday off from work or I would have never gotten everything done – cleaning the house, cooking, one-year-old pictures Friday evening and decorating that cake. I will humbly submit my cake photo. It’s certainly not winning any competitions – it wouldn’t get past the first round – but since all she did was destroy most of it anyhow…  Still, I am hoping and praying she goes for pie, ice cream, cheesecake – anything to get me out of decorating a cake again!

The monkey butterfly cake.

Since Ed had to work all morning of the big day and then go do the rounds to pick up his parents (a half day venture by the time you get each of them, drive half of Pittsburgh doing it and run a couple of errands for them), I did all the cooking. It was so windy and snowy (yes, our little spring girl got snow for her birthday while my winter birthday saw 70 degree temps – something is NOT right about that), the grill blew out a couple of times. But I got it done and everything was ready just after they all arrived.

Snow for the birthday girl!

In our birthday outfit – it has a butterfly on the front!

We enjoyed Emry’s favorites (mac ‘n cheese, strawberries, clementines) as well as hamburgers, brats and hotdogs. Then we opened our many gifts:

Pop beads from Aunt Grace – a toy she loves and brought back memories for both Ed and I who had sets of our own.

A Strider bike from Ed and I. Ed insisted, even though she isn’t walking yet and even if she were, her feet don’t reach the ground when she’s on it. But maybe before the summer is over.

And our favorite – the Little People barn, tractor, dairy barn and tons of animals from Grandpa and Grandma Sturm. We LOVE pushing the tractor back and forth and listening to Old MacDonald had a Farm over and over again.

We also got some money, a cute butterfly headband from Cousin Jay (as you can see from the pictures), a piggy bank and lots of books. (Amelia Bedelia being my personal favorite – yea, Aunt Grace, for starting us out right!)

Next it was time for the cake. She did not hesitate a moment. From the very second I put it in front of her, she poked her finger in and started licking. She loved every moment of it and made quite a mess.

Yea, a cake all to myself!

 

Okay, I think I’ve had enough now.

It wasn’t too long after clean up that Ed took everyone back home and Emry went down for a nap. It took her a while to fall asleep, but she and I both made up for it with a Sunday afternoon nap. After which, Ed’s brother and his wife brought over their three girls. (So much for trying to get Ed’s family to plan ahead by sending out invites a month earlier. They couldn’t make it on Saturday, so they called Sunday afternoon to say they were dropping by. His family’s last-minute everything drives me up a wall!) Still, Emry enjoyed seeing her cousins:

The Camus cousins – Caley holding Zoey and Macey holding Emry.

All in all, a very nice first birthday. But like I said, we’re not doing another one for five years…or maybe ten!