JESUS IS ALIVE!!

Just wanted to share this little story...

Last night, Emma was coughing a bit as she was sleeping so I went in her room to give her some cough syrup.  Before I left, I knelt beside her bed and whispered a prayer for her...that Jesus would help her get some rest, get better quickly, etc.  As I was walking out, I heard Emma say something to me, so I knelt back down beside her and asked, "What did you say, Emma?"  With her eyes closed she repeated, "Jesus is alive!"  I smiled and thought, "Hmmm...that's really sweet--thank you, Jesus!"  Then I went back in our room and fell asleep.  

Then this morning, Brett was telling me about a dream he had last night.  He was teaching a bible study on the resurrection.  Him and some others in his dream were discussing the idea of how Jesus is alive, yet He's not physically here with us.  The last thing he remembers saying in his dream was "Jesus is alive!"  

And the coolest thing is that I didn't tell Brett about what Emma said to me until this morning.  It's been an awesome day so far!  My mind can't stop thinking about what happened and my heart feels so full as I think about why this happened and what this truly means for us as believers...Jesus is alive!  I feel overwhelmed sometimes thinking about how much God loves His people and so humbled by the fact that He is actively pursuing each one of us.  I am grateful!  Jesus is alive!!

Here's our happy, little Luke!

Hard to believe he's almost 3 months old already!!

Here's a couple older pics that I wanted to share:

These first 2 were taken by my sweet friend, Sarah.  Several times in the weeks right after I had Luke (and before I had him too), she came by and picked up Emma to hang out with her and her daughter, Mary, so that I could have some time to rest.  She emailed these pics to me after they went to the zoo one day, but I forgot about them until I was going thru old emails today.  They're pretty cute, so I had to share!  :O)

Now really!!! How cute are they?!?!  This is her friend Mary.  They look like they could be sisters or something....the "matching-look" was not intentional, but it sure makes for a cute picture! 

This was a different day at the zoo with Sarah and Mary.  They did one of those boat tours....Emma came home talking about it-she had a blast!

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We spent a couple weeks in Texas recently.  While we were in San Antonio, my parents invited some family & friends over so that we could see everyone and get to introduce Luke.  My cousin, Nick, and his wife, Holly, were there, & they brought their little girl, Sarah.  Emma and her had lots of fun playing that night!  They were really cute together!

Emma & Sarah--

Looks like they're long-lost friends or something, doesn't it?!?  :O)

  

PILLOW FIGHT!!!  She loves playing rough with Daddy!  She knows that when Daddy comes home from work, he's going to chase her, tickle her, play hide & seek, wrestle with her, pillow fight, etc.  She truly looks forward to it each day....it's cute to watch!

  

And here's our little girly-girl...she loves her jewelry, painted nails, dresses, purses, princess stuff, lipstick (when Nana & Meme are around), having tea parties, etc. etc. 

Big sister with baby brother

Yeah...so I walked in on Emma a couple weeks ago giving her baby Dora some "num-nums."  Hmmm....we hear it's normal so we're not too worried.  :)

Emma & Luke's first bath together

Here's a little conversation I overheard Emma having with her Princess dolls yesterday:

• How are you today? I'm good. Oh you have an ouchie? Yikes! How did you get an ouchie? Cinderella has an ouchie too? Oh, I'm so sorry! 
  

I'm sure she would have continued on, except she looked up and saw that I was watching, and she got all embarrassed.  I tried to convince her to keep on going, but she wouldn't.  

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On a completely different note...

Anybody else out there a fan of the show "Yard Crashers"?  I LOVE watching that show!! I have caught myself daydreaming a lot lately about how I want to change our backyard and what I would do if I ever saw that guy at Home Depot or Lowe's (can't decide if I would run up to him and BEG for him to come to our house OR if I'd whimp out and be too shy because I'd have to be on television).  Anyways, I know that the chances of him ever coming to Wichita and us being at the right place at the right time are like slim to none, so I need to just stop thinking about it...but I CAN'T!!  (If I ever found out he WAS coming to Wichita, I just might camp out in front of Home Depot!! haha....that would be funny!!)  Oh well.  I still really enjoy watching the show.  Such a cool idea!  It always makes me happy to watch it and know that somebody out there is receiving such a nice gift.  You ought to check it out if you've never seen it.

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Okay, I'm done rambling...

I hope to take some more pics soon of just Luke by himself.  The little guy sleeps all the time....it's hard to catch him with his eyes open!  :o)

  

Hey there!! So it's been 5 weeks or so since my last post...CRAZY!! I think we all know that blogging (along with email, facebook, etc.) is just not my thing! :o)
--I feel like I'm doing good if I update the blog once a month! I went over 2 weeks without checking email recently...had 258 in my inbox with over 100 unread! Ugh!! And Facebook...I've only dabbled in. It's not that I don't enjoy blogging, email, & facebook--I DO!! I truly can't seem to find enough time in the day....and before I know it, weeks go by!! Oh well! Maybe it's just this stage of my life...or not, I don't know.

Sorry to say that this post will have no pics. I have a few minutes to blog right now, but I'm not at home and the computer I'm using doesn't accept the memory card from our camera. And just a word of warning...I'm in the mood to type, so this may be a bit lengthy. I'll try not to ramble!! :o)

FIRST, I must share a joke. I read this on a kid's menu at a restaurant recently and just burst out laughing (nobody else I was with thought it was near as funny as I did, but oh well). I know at least one of our faithful blog readers will appreciate this joke...Lauren, this one is for you!! :O)

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• What do you call cheese that you do not own?
  
  --NACHO CHEESE!!! haha

Anybody have any other good jokes to share?? I could always use a good laugh!!

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We've been trying to take Emma swimming every chance we get because she really, really enjoys it....she is quite the little fish!! Anyway, one Friday afternoon in mid-July, Brett got off work a little early so we all got suited up to go to the pool. We pulled into an empty parking lot and were very confused. So we tried another local pool. They were closed too! So we got on the phone and called. Found out that the reason they were closed was because it was below 80 degrees that day.....in MID-JULY!!! Crazy! Emma was pretty disappointed. Can you believe that?!? Below 80 in mid-July!! That's unheard of for us native-Texans....but I must say, it is really nice!! (aside from not being able to swim, of course)

Emma has a folding-cell phone with princess stickers on it that she likes to play with. The other day she handed the phone to Brett and said, "Daddy, take my picture." She then smiled a big, cheesy smile, and then wanted Brett to hand the phone back to her so she could see the picture (her pretend picture). We were shocked! It's amazing to think about kids in this generation....all of the things (namely technology) that we have now that they probably won't be able to imagine what life was like without. I know that there's nothing profound about this thought....it's comparable to me not knowing life without phones in general. Still, it was just one of those moments that made us stop and think about life, technology, etc.

UPDATE ON LUKE ANDREW:
Our little Luke is the sweetest little thing!! He is 8.5 weeks now! And he's growing like a weed!!!! Such a change for us compared to Emma. He weighed 8 pounds when he was born, and he's nearly 12 pounds already!!! (Almost half the weight of his big sister!! Em is almost 3.5 years old and still only weighs 25 pounds....which is below 1 percentile -"off the charts"). Luke, on the other hand, was in the 67th percentile at his 6 week check up. At this rate, I'm pretty sure this little guy will pass up his big sister in weight sometime around his 1st birthday. Yikes! But he sure is a cutie!! And sooooooo easy going!! Seriously, he cries when he needs something (ie: hungry, needs burped, tired, etc). It usually doesn't take too long to figure out what he needs--It seems like he hardly ever cries! We're so thankful!! When he's awake and doesn't need anything, he is content to just look around at his surroundings. He's got the sweetest little toothless grin and is now smiling and interacting with us all the time. So FUN!! We're loving it!! Nights are getting better all the time. He did a 6 hour stetch last night! I had to WAKE HIM UP because I was full and needed to feed him. I'm definitely looking forward to having some more 6 hour stretches!! :o)

Well, I'll have to quit now. Thanks for reading all this! I promise to post pics soon....I've got some really cute ones! :O)