sleeping beauty

the past few nights we've taken pictures of stelly sleeping when we go in to check on her before we go to bed. isn't there something so sweet about watching a baby sleep? stelly has been in some strange positions lately. last night she was on all fours with her bottom way up in the air! the other night she was kneeling again, but a little more comfortably. then a few nights ago she was all sprawled out as one would expect. so funny!

Windy City

we were in chicago from thurs eve - sun last week. the trip wasn't quite what we had planned. by some it might be considered a comedy of errors from car-sickness to a large rear dent (pun intended, will) to a flat tire to seeing hole in the wall apartments, but hey -- God's preparing us to be urbanites and to remember His control over all things. one thing we did accomplish was getting a few good shots for our prayer card. i didn't include the actual shot we selected for printing but here are some shots along the way. we are so thankful for the generosity of phil and julie e. for allowing us to borrow their vehicle. it was nice to be able to ride together in a vehicle where 2 carseats and 4 adults fit (2 of those adults are pregnant too)!!

one of the better shots. this is in millennium park. note the reflections in the metal ball of the glories of the city.
the reality of taking pictures with kids...haddon is looking who knows where and stella is screaming her head off.

haddon being a "big brother" and looking out for little stelly to make sure her hood stays up.
this is one of the first pics we took. matt said stelly looks like the kid in a christmas story whose mom had him so bundled up he couldn't walk. it was after that comment i decided to remove her toboggan.

stella sure is excited!

i wonder why?

Chicago - It's our Kind of Town!

Most of you know we're planning to do a team church plant with Will and Rachel P. in the Bucktown/Wicker Park area of Chicago. The area is an artsy, up-and-coming area that desperately needs God's fame to be proclaimed! There are countless details still in the works, but we are making progress. Here are a few pictures of the kids from our Labor Day trip (taken by our then resident photographer Joy M.). Lord willing, we'll be making another trip there next week.

You can't walk behind Stelly w/o her thinking you're chasing her!

Poor Haddon and Stelly both got sick during the trip. Here Haddon is running a fever and not feeling well at all, but is still as cute as can be!

growing up

stelly ate with a spoon for the first time this morning! she loved being independent and feeding herself (although she still needed some help "scooping")! oatmeal was a great food to start with since it sticks to the spoon so well. can't believe she'll be 14 months tomorrow!

baby bling

stelly got her ears pierced this weekend. i'm not sure you can classify 3 mm diamond studs as real bling, so we'll call it baby bling. it was hard to photograph the earrings b/c they are so small and getting stelly to pose for a picture is impossible b/c she is such a mover! here's the best i could do. (the last pic doesn't even show the earrings but it was still a cute picture!)

pearly whites

stelly went almost a whole year with no teeth. now she has EIGHT that have popped

thru just in the past month and 1/2! here she is brushing away so she won't need

crest white strips down the road.

if i weren't a mom...

i would still think my favorite dessert in a springform pan is cheesecake,

and that strainers were used only to drain pasta.

The Big 1

Everybody loves a birthday party. We celebrated Stella's this past July 28 (put that in your calendars and send cash in the coming years; we'll see that she gets it...) Erica had a ladybug theme (I mean if we did her nursery in ladybugs then we simply MUST carry the theme into the first birthday party, right?) and we celebrated in Ohio with both of our families together. Seriously, though, we recognize that children are a gift from God and we are grateful to him for blessing us in this way. Below are some pictures with little commentary, but then again you aren't on this particular blog to read anyway, are you?

You can't have a birthday without mass quantities of cake. Not bad for Erica's first attempt. I, assuming I could decorate a cake having watched it done once, thought I would tell Erica the best way to ice it. She rolled her eyes but handed me the icing-bag-decorator-thingy (those of you in the cake biz know what I'm talking about). Not only was I completely incapable of creating a dot of icing, but I also managed to smear black icing all over my shirt is I leaned over the cake. Leave it to the experts.
Here is a moment of great anticipation.

And this would be a moment of great satisfaction. You can't see her other hand but she has two fistfuls of cake. She seemed genuinely shocked when we finally took the cake away from her before she had finished the entire thing.

Of course she had a little version of the ladybug for herself but still, it was a pretty large piece. This shot captures the calm before the storm. She has just now realized that she can bury her entire hand in the cake and we're actually letting her do it.
Last but not least, no first birthday is complete without a cabbage patch kid.

Next Stop - Greenville

in may we got to see jenny (matt's sister) graduate with honors and receive her BA in english from bj. she is going to be a dorm counselor in the fall and pursue her MA in counseling. it has been so neat to see her follow the Lord in her college years and watch Him work in her life. we love you, jenny, and are so proud of you!
stelly is having her own version of "opportunity days" - she's getting a "taste" of what the school is like.
this pic isn't the best quality, but it was so good to see cheryl, jen, bec and jonas.
the party girls at jenny's graduation dinner at the tipton's house.
the owen clan (minus matt who is taking the picture).

Sometimes you can't make it on your own

Today, June 15, is our 4th wedding anniversary. I know that Erica has been handling the blogging load lately, but I wanted to jump in and share something with you...


I graduated from seminary about a month ago, and as I sat there during the commencement proceedings, I couldn’t keep my mind from wandering back to a campfire five years ago and a conversation with a beautiful woman who would later become my wife. We were having a campout with the youth group of our church in Ohio, and most everyone had gone to their tents for the night. That was when I first told Erica that I wanted to attend seminary in Detroit. I didn’t think it would be well-received since we were both planning on attending BJ that fall, and going to Detroit would put many miles between us. However, without hesitating, Erica told me that if I perceived God to be directing my steps down that path, she was in favor. Its just a small thing, and I don’t think I really realized it at the time, but it would only be the beginning of many times that she would support the best decision over what she personally would have chosen.

I continued during that commencement service to reflect on the last four years of seminary (the married years) and have marveled at God’s gracious gift to me in her. Though I would be leaning toward hyperbole if I said that I couldn’t have done it without her, I also know I wouldn’t have strayed too far from the truth. Sometimes God gifts us with people who are always there, who lift us up when we’re tired, tell us to keep going, and help along the away. Erica is that person for me. Right away Erica bought into the reality that we were going to serve in the gospel together, that it would mean different responsibilities for each of us, and that it would take both of us cooperating. That spirit has evidenced itself in the way she has handled without complaining everything from having the roof of our apartment ripped off after a month of marriage and rain literally drench almost everything we owned, to work/school schedules that conflicted so much that we could literally go whole days without seeing each other, to simply being alone while I was holed up in my office studying. Today, I want to thank her for encouraging me to press on when I felt like quitting, for pushing me out of bed no matter how strongly I protested when the alarm went off, for making me a pot of coffee at night, and then for bringing me antacid tablets for the heartburn I got from drinking the coffee she made. I want to thank her for reading my papers and telling me they were good when they weren’t, for pulling me back from the precipice of despair just a few times, and for being a godly mother to the girl who happens to star in this blog.

As I walked across that platform on graduation night, I realized it wasn’t quite right for me to be alone at this point when she had been with me the whole way. In fact, when I took the diploma and faced the crowd while my name and future plans were read, I locked eyes with her the whole way to tell her thanks, and I think, as always, that she understood.

Happy Anniversary, Erica. Thank you.

first stop

in an effort to fill in some of the gaps of the last month, we'll start with my big 30 on april 22! my sweet friends put together a dee-lish (for all you Rachel Ray fans) brunch for me.

Swinging in the heat

is about as much fun as singing in the rain. We've had a ton going on since our last post. We'll try to update you in the next few weeks. Until then, here are some pics of Stelly from our walks to the park this past week.

permanent damage?

some of you know when i was pregnant i craved strawberries. well, we didn't see the effects this had on young stella until just recently. we hope the damage isn't long-term...

stelly's happy place

sun afternoon october 16th, we went into stelly's nursery to get her up from her nap and found her sucking her little baby thumb. since that time, she and her thumb have been inseparable, especially when she's sleepy or when she gets frustrated. daddy calls it going to her "happy place." it's so cute now, but we'll let you know how we feel about it in a few years! can anyone recommend a good orthodontist?

happy birthday, grandma b!

while we were home in ohio the first weekend in april, we celebrated grandma's birthday coming up this thursday. stelly sends her love and kisses to you grandma! have a happy birthday!