This week's doings

Biggest news: Daniel finally cut his first tooth this week. It has been a long, fussy process but it looks as though he'll have at least two or perhaps three by this time next week. Hopefully even bigger news: Philip is working frantically to finish the Reader's Hebrew Bible for Zondervan tonight. The deadline is tomorrow. This is been a huge 2 1/2 year project that BOTH of us will be glad when it's done. He was quoting Psalm 34:1 just a minute ago which isn't a good sign :o)


 Let's see: Did two birthday cakes - one Thomas the train and another baseball theme. The top of the baseball is actually a molded candy plaque. Allan received this wonderful ensemble from Grandma Slagenweit. Today the boots arrived and so he wanted his picture taken. He wore the boots the rest of the day! Side note - when I went to Bob Jones University in 1999, I wanted to be prepared for the rain they so often get. Not wanting to loose umpteen umbrellas to mistaken identity I decided to be different (or a total moron) and purchased a frog umbrella just like this one except adult size. I never did loose my umbrella by the way!

Celebrations

We celebrated Daniel's birthday at PopPop and Gramme Brown's house on Friday evening. He loved his cake and stuck his fingers in it and made a mess. I did a stand up train for him just like I did for Allan. When you put the money into a pan it's a shame to only use it one time. He enjoyed the books that he received for his birthday. The other cake is one that I did for a bridal shower. The strings hanging out of the cake were attached to the charms they wanted in the cake. Since the wedding colors are navy blue and burnt orange they said I could just stick with the blue - much safer!

One Year Old

Daniel turned one today. With the second child time goes so much faster. It didn't help that he met his developmental markers ahead of schedule. He's been walking over two months now and just moves constantly. We won't celebrate until weekend but here are a few pictures that I took today. He doesn't have a single tooth yet but is working on them so it was a very fussy, painful day. He played outside in the sandbox. As you can see from his head, he took a fall down our front porch steps last week. Now we have a make-shift chicken-wire fence across them so that he stays put. I'm so very thankful for a very healthy, happy little boy.

Christmas is coming!

And I need some help. My mom mentioned the other day that she'll soon need a "list." That started me to thinking of some ideas for gifts for our boys. Toys mean nothing to them... they'd rather have a wire whip, colander and a stew pot any day.

Allan particularly loves books and enjoys having stories read to him. This has given us some wonderful training opportunities as we use literature that furthers our goal of training our boys to be men who are passionate about serving God. Jim and Elizabeth George's book God's Wisdom for Little Boys, the Uncle Arthur Stories, Max Lucado's Because I Love You, and the Johny and Susie books have been wonderful resources. But good children's literature is hard to come by and I don't have the time to read all that is out there to glean the good. So I'm asking any other bloggers who have found resources that are helpful to please share your "finds"! Even if they are old books (like Johny and Susie) I can try to find them on Amazon or Ebay. Thanks!

Flowers

I was blessed this year that my mother was able to bring flowers from PA in the spring for me to plant at our house. The area I was raised in has the most fabulous greenhouses that I've seen anywhere and the prices are usually 50 - 75% of what I have to pay here in the city. We put together several planters and hanging baskets that just were beautiful this summer. My aunt MaryLou sent me a planter for Mother's Day that also did wonderfully this summer (it's the one in the black pot). Thank you mom!

Family Visit

On Sunday my parents came from PA to visit. My sister, her husband, and my nephew (Evan) also came. We had a wonderful time. They arrived in time to see the Cincy fireworks on Sunday evening, visited the Creation museum on Monday and worked (my mom and dad that is) Tuesday in my garden getting it ready for planting next spring. My mom brought peaches from PA and so I worked them up yesterday (Friday). Kevin Moser came over last evening and helped to eat some of the desserts that we didn't finish while company was here. In a nutshell - that was my week. I have a bridal shower cake for tomorrow and am looking forward to a restful Lord's day on Sunday. I didn't get any pictures while my family was here except of Evan.

Doings

Last Friday and Saturday I completed an order for wedding mints. If I kept proper count there were over 420 that came out of the 7 lbs of chocolate. Part of the order was for white chocolate and the other was for milk chocolate.