Four Months

Oh where has the time gone?

Recent Accomplishments:

+ Making all sorts of strange new (and loud) noises

+ Drooling, drooling, drooling and chewing on everything within twelve inches of her mouth...which hopefully means teeth are on the way

+ Getting more control over her busy little fingers and grabbing onto whatever she can (including my hair)

+ Discovering her new favorite toy...her pacifier on a ribbon

+ Going crazy grinning, laughing, and wiggling her whole body whenever people give her the slightest bit of attention

+ Rolling over from stomach to back

Merry Christmas to You!

We wish you an especially Merry Christmas and a beautiful new year!

All our love,

Bryan, Ashton & Poppy Louisa

New Keys!

We closed on our town home yesterday. Hooray, it's finally real! We have our own keys to the front door. I'm so excited to get settled again and make a new place our home.

But truth be told, there are some things I will miss about being homeless.

Seeing things like this while staying with my sister, for example...

Yes, that's my nephew Christian's head popping out from the side of the wall. (he may have had a little help from Bry.)

We also learned a lot the past three months. Things like...

• Our family is amazing
• Our friends are amazing
• It's good to be flexible
• Living out of a suitcase for months on end is possible (though not ideal)
• We want to open our house and hearts to others like people have for us
• Don't drink kombucha tea next to other people's laptop computers (Yikes...ask my sister Andria about that one)
• We are so blessed to actually have somewhere to call home

Thank you, thank you to everyone that let us stay with them and helped us get through this transition time!

There may be some before-and-after decorating posts to come. Bring on the paint! And stop by any time, we'd love to see you.

The Little Angel

My nephew Adrian looked at Poppy the other day and crooned in his sweet, talking-about-babies voice, "Aww...she's a little angel."

As soon as he had said this, Poppy decided it was a good time to spit up all over.

Shocked at this rather un-angelic display, Adrian replied in surprise, "Hey, I didn't know angels could puke!"

Hah. Don't be fooled by the innocent face.

My Favorite Couples Group

I was looking through pictures and found some from this summer when our couples group got together for a picnic and some Vivaldi at Symphony on the Prairie. Spending time with those couples every month has been so much fun. I'm very thankful to have such a great group at our church.

Chad and Heather--a few months before adorable little Beckham Eli joined them

Makoto and Anna and Ben and Suzanne--such awesome people