Papa & Grandma

This evening my parents came over for dinner. Every Monday evening we go to my parens for dinner but this week we didn't so we had Thursday night dinner at ours instead. It was so fun becasue everyone just relaxed and played.

Here is Lulu and my dad rolling bouncy balls down our hall. Then my mom helped get Levi ready for bed and Lulu danced around in her "getting married" dress.Here's my dad and Lulu....they called my brother on speaker phone and talked to him for a bit. And we want to say......Congrats Stephanie on the new Job!!!!! We are very happy for you.

8 Years Ago Today...

Mark and I met! It's amazing to look back at pictures of us from when we were dating. We have changed so much in some ways and in others not so much. Mark no longer has earrings, but back then Mark was still one of the nicest guys you would have ever met, just like today. He looked like a punk but really he was a so sweet and such a gentleman. We met on the freeway....yes in traffic. I was driving my 1973 VW beetle and Mark was in the passenger seat of his friends car. As I'm sure everyone knows, Mark loves classic Volkswagens and back then owned a 1965 bus. We has a conversation sitting on 520 floating bridge over Lake Washington in stop and go traffic about our Volkswagens. Then as traffic started to pick up Mark invited me out for coffee later that evening. So we set up a time and place to meet later and the rest is history. We had no idea back then that we would be married with two beautiful children living a life for God. It's amazing how we can change when the Holy Spirit does a work in our hearts.

Nasolacrimal Duct Obstruction (blocked tear duct)

(Edited to Add the follow up Surgery we had to have a few months later because this procedure didn't work.  Click HERE to view that post.)
This morning we took Levi to see a pediatric opthamologist at Children's Hospital here in our area. Since birth Levi has had a blocked tear duct in his right eye. We were told that it would probably clear up. Well, unfortunately it didn't clear up on it's own so today we had a procedure to unblock the tear duct. Usually they can wait until a year to see if it will fully clear up on it's own but the down side to that is that if it doesn't by then they would have to use general anesthesia to put Levi under to do the procedure. Mark and I really didn't want them to have to put Levi under so we decided to have the procedure done today in the office. We prayed about it and really felt at peace with our decision to have it done now. It turned out that after the procedure the doctor said that his block was not in the normal spot and that it would probably only have gotten infected down the road. The other part is that she also said that there's a 50/50 chance that the procedure will unblock it. So we will go back in a month to see how everything healed and if it worked and then go from there. The next step then would be to have him put under and they would insert a temporary tube in his tear duct. So if you feel led please pray that the procedure he had done today would work and clear up the blockage.

Here we are playing and waiting for the doctor to see us. We were the very first appointment at 7:40am! You would never know by how this little guy smiles but really his right eye has gunk constantly dripping out. Sometimes the entire eyeball and eyelid are red and the area around the eye is red a puffy. It really never seemed to bother him. When I was a baby I had the same procedure done at about 6-8weeks old. Lulu was having fun coloring. She a great big sister, with lots of hugs and kisses for Levi. She sat in the doctors office so well and prayed for Levi when we stepped out during the procedure. Here Levi and I are in the exam chair. They gave him a typical eye exam before the procedure. His vision is excellent! Here he is with his little eye patch for the check up. He didn't even cry or try to take the patch off. He just sat there and smiled and giggled. This looks worse then what it actually is. They put orange dye into both eyes to see how quickly the dye would drain. His left eye drained very quickly like it should but the right eye wouldn't drain at all so this verified the blockage. And again he just smiled during this part too. Here's the papoose board they were going to be strapping him too for the procedure. That's our receiving blanket they put on there for his comfort (or mine). They asked one of us to stay with him while they did the procedure. This is what dad's are for and so Mark stayed with Levi while Lulu and I went and waited in the waiting room. This picture is right before the procedure. While I was out in the waiting room I heard a baby cry, so I listened and I could tell it wasn't Levi. Then a few minutes later I heard another cry and knew that was Levi. I just wanted to go comfort him right then. I new it was a good thing I wasn't in there. Mark is so calm and cool in these situations and that made me feel good knowing he was there to comfort Levi. The procedure was very quick. I soon saw the assistant and she waved me to come back. We got back into the room and I just held Levi. He put his head on my shoulder and just rested. On our way home he fell asleep. Ahhhh, it's done and now we can just rest knowing it's in God's hands.Here is Levi just about 2 hours later at home happy as can be. Again his eye looks worse then what it actually is. They said he would have some blood in his tears as it continued to heal.These two amazing children are best buds. Look at their hands, they are holding hands. Lulu has been a great helper. She holds the cap to the eye drops and comforts Levi while I give him the drops. Here they are again at lunch. Lulu has been extra lovie-dovie to Levi today. Here is a picture of his red tears and we will see in a month how it is compared to today. Praise God for comfort and wisdom! Levi is doing great and is aciting totally normal.

Happy No Matter What

This evening Levi sat for quite a while just playing on his own. This little guy smiles for almost every picture I take of him. I can't just pick one, I have to post them all. It's funny because the first picture here that his back is to the camera, he's even smiling in. I was calling his name to have him look at me and I could see that he would smile but he didn't turn around since he was busy playing.....but I finally got him to look and then he was just loving the camera.
Then he had enough and went back to playing so I moved and started taking more from this angle......so of course he made mommy happy and smiled some more.

Advice From Lulu

Good alligators are good, bad alligators are not good.

When someone's making me sad I'm just going to be happy!

Happy Earth Day?

In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth. Genesis 1:1

The popular "worship" of the earth today in 2010 is no surprise to God. It's too bad they're worshiping the creation and not the Creator. Truly we should not be so self absorbed to really think we can actually save our planet.....because we can't. God is going to destroy the earth and we should stop wasting our time on pointless endeavors that will go nowhere. We need to start giving God the glory.

But the day of the Lord will come like a thief. The heavens will disappear with a roar; the elements will be destroyed by fire, and the earth and everything in it will be laid bare. 2 Peter 3:10 They exchanged the truth of God for a lie, and worshiped and served created things rather than the Creator - who is forever praised. Amen. Romans 1:25 The wrath of God is being revealed from heaven against all the godlessness and wickedness of men who suppress the truth by their wickedness, since what may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God's invisible qualities - his eternal power and divine nature - have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse. Romans 1:18-20

The entire world can bear witness to God through its beauty, complexity, design and usefulness. We have plenty of evidence of His existence, unfortunately many reject this evidence.

For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. Although they claimed to be wise, they became fools and exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images made to look like mortal man and birds and animals and reptiles. Romans 1:21-23 People today devote their lives to, and trust in, many things other than God. The "peace" that they are all looking for will not be found in saving the whales or having clean air. We are all given a gift that will truly give us peace. And that gift is Jesus.

For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord. Romans 6:23

Lulu's Birthday Party

About a month ago Lulu asked if she could have a chicken birthday. I was a bit puzzled trying to figure out what a chicken birthday was. So I asked her "what's a chicken birthday"? and Lulu then said "you know, cows, chickens, pigs and a barn." So we had a farm party for her. I made a barn cake with cupcake animals. It was so fun and she just loved it.
Playing with squirt guns in the rain. So much fun!
We served hotdogs and pototoe salad. Here's a picture of the cook!
Lulu had a great birthday. We had family and friends come and that made it really special.

Happy 3rd Birthday Lulu!!

One Minute OldOne Hour OldOne Year OldTwo Years OldThree Years Old

Three years ago today Lulu was born!! Thank you Jesus for the blessing she is!! I was 10 days over due with her at that point. I felt like I was going to be pregnant forever. My labor started the evening before while we were leaving a restaurant that we had eaten dinner at. For dinner I ordered "whatever, just make it SPICY", so they brought me the spiciest hot sauce they had. We were done with our dinner and while we were walking out to our car I had my first contraction. This was at 7pm Monday, April 16th 2007. After our dinner Mark and I went for a drive while we were timing the contractions. After an hour of driving we went home and got ready for bed. I still wasn't sure if I was actually in labor, even though my contractions were like 8 min. apart and not stopping. It didn't hurt at all so in my mind I wasn't in labor......first time mom...LOL. As we were lying in bed I asked Mark to start tracking my contractions to see how far apart they were. My contractions at that point were about 3-4 min apart and not stopping. I still felt great and I actually fell asleep. Mark was so funny because he said to me "Kimmy, I don't know what to do, according to my notes your should be having this baby right now." So we tried to get some sleep and at this point it was about midnight. At 3am I woke up and noticed stronger contractions (but they still didn't hurt). In my mind if there was no pain, how in the world was I even close to having a baby? Actually I was closer then I knew. I called my midwife around 4am to tell her all that was and had been going on. Since I was a first time mom she thought I had a while too. So she told me to call back when things had changed and she reassured me I was actually in labor.....I was still in denial so hearing this was good. I called my mom to tell her not to go to work and to come over, this was about 5:30am. I decided to take a shower and get ready for the long "labor" ahead of me. Little did I know but I was actually getting close to transition at this point and most of my "labor" was almost done. Once I got out of the shower I started drying my hair and ate some breakfast that Mark made me. Then I lost the breakfast (sorry TMI) and I had a whopper of a contraction. Now I finally knew what everyone was talking about.....THIS HURTS!! I told my mom and Mark that I didn't want to do this anymore. At this point my poor mother was freaking out inside but keeping her cool on the outside. Later she told me how she was really thinking and preparing herself to catch the baby. So Mark at this point called our midwife back and said that we should "probably" meet her at the birth center. And my mom was thinking "PROBABLY!!!!!! We should have been there hours ago!!!!" so our midwife said she would meet us there in 45min....this was at 6am, we only live about 6min from the birth center. My poor mom......she was the only one thinking logically at this point. Both Mark and I were still a bit in denial and not thinking clearly. My mom wanted to jump in the car right then and go but we still had 45min until the midwife would get there, what's the rush?...LOL. So after more strong contractions we finally piled in the vehicles and headed to the birth center. My mom was in her car behind us anticipating Mark pulling over to deliver our baby on the side of the road. I honestly still thought I has hours and hours of labor ahead of me. Oh, by the way my mom's a trained doula.....she knew what she was seeing and she was seeing a baby being born any minute. Well, we made it to the birth center, this was at 7am. I asked to have the tub filled because I wanted into that nice warm water. Not too much longer I was in the tub and started pushing! My midwife was a bit surprised but when she examined me she had me reach down and feel Lulu's head for the first time. WOW!!! We were all so shocked that her head was right there. I will never forget that feeling. A few more pushes and she was out at 7:59am. Mark announced that "It's a girl.". We were all so excited. We didn't know what we were having. Lulu was a total surprise and such a blessing for us. Later that day we went home and rested. Lulu's birth was picture perfect and I truly enjoyed it.

Lulu, you are a gift from God. He has formed you and made you so incredibly special. I'm so excited to see what the Lord's plans are for your life. But no rush! I love you, your daddy loves you and please know that God loves you even more! Happy Birthday. Love Mommy ♥

Portland 2010 - Part 3 of 3

Good morning! This was our last day in Portland. What a beautiful city and the weather was great. Here is Levi playing with the teddy bear that was on our bed. Doesn't he look like a little prince on that bed?The furniture in the hotel was just so fun. If I could redo our decor in our home I would redecorate like this hotel. I loved the bright colors and the fun furniture.This couch was just calling out my name. I had to sit on it and get a picture. I'm going to be looking at garage sales and thrift stores for this darling sofa, even if it takes years to find.And here again is that chaise lounge.....umm....Mark can we get one of these please? My mom and dad were so generous for taking us with them on this trip. It was so special and truly a blessing to be together as a family. Here we are, all the kids and grand kids. Mark, Me, Levi, Stephanie, Lulu and Todd. Here is my dad taking pictures on Todd's camera. He was just snapping away. Can't wait to see those pictures. After our photo session in the hotel lobby, we headed for the Portland Saturday Market. This was so fun. Hundreds of vendors, tons of artists. You could find just about anything. I just wish we had more time. Lulu saw a little girl with a flower, so we were on a mission to find her one. Of course Grandma found them and Lulu picked out a pink paper rose and what a deal too....only $2!!Stephanie bought this beautiful barrette made from a sterling sliver spoon. So my mom and I had to go see what else this artist was selling. We found and bought these darling bud vases. They are also made from sterling sliver forks and spoons. Isn't that just the coolest thing? I also bought a ring made from a sterling sliver spoon handle.My dad bought each of us a wind mobile from the market. Here are my parents with Levi at the Portland Saturday Market. Who's Lulu looking at?Oh, it's Mark. How funny. Lulu thought it was so neat that we could see daddy from the window. Mark went out to get some food for our train ride home. We were heading home soon. We said goodbye to my parents and headed to the train station. My parents stayed one more night. Todd, Stephanie, Mark, Lulu, Levi and I rode home on the train together.They were teaching Lulu how to thumb wrestle. Daddy and Levi. And someone was tired. She had so much fun. She missed saying goodbye to her uncle and aunt. We got back into Seattle around 6pm and rode the bus back to get our van. It's fun to be on vacation but it's so nice to be home too.
Thank you to my parents for this trip. You guys went above and beyond to make this fun and memorable. We love you and can't wait to do it again!