Neighborhood Egg Hunt

I opted to stay home because egg hunts make me anxious - ha!  But Josh was in the mood for walking to the park, so he took the kids to hunt.  Some highlights ...

 

 

Someone was not keen on hunting all of a sudden.  

Then she did hunt ... ever so gingerly.

 

Then she resisted again?  It's hard to be a toddler with this many moods.  🤣

Group pic outtakes! Poor Anna works so hard to keep her eyes open in the light.  Lasa doesn't even try to keep her mouth shut for a smile.  Ha!

 

Sweet shots in the shade instead.

One more outtake. 😏

Finally! 

Ready for Easter tomorrow!

Updates

Anna got a new dresser/vanity in her room.  It replaced a simple cubical shelf we have already sold.

We moved this shelf to the corner and put her butterfly pic on that wall.  Had to get rid of a pretty wall shelf in the process as well as her sewing machine and table, but it's all good.  Room to breathe now!

 

Her room got a big ole cleanup and cleanout in the process and looks fresh and updated again.

Josh is about 1/4 way through putting up this fence along the back of our yard.  We love it.  Not as much as we loved having natural green privacy, but love the restoration of privacy already, bit by bit.  

One of Lasa's ear tubes fell out last week.  The pediatrician was able to extract it easily where it was lodged in her ear canal.  Since then, she has continued to complain of stuff in her ear and I have DAILY been pulling so much pus and crap out of it with the back end of a bobby pin.  But I could see more in there and could not reach it.  So Josh took Lasa back to the ENT (her fourth ear-related appt in a month!) for some difference-making help, and I would say we got the start of that.  The ENT could not even see if her tube was there or not because of all the gunk in there.  So Josh held Lasa down and through her tears and pain, THEY VACUUMED her ear out and then they were good to go. No infection at the moment, but doing ear drops and saline nose rinses daily.  We will go back in three weeks to check-up on that stinker of an ear.  This girl is a trooper. 

Speaking of this girl, how about a TPR/Adoption update?  It's been awhile since I have done that.  We last saw Angelique in mid-December and today we are supposed to see her again.  It's been 3.5 months!  That is the longest she has been this absent and we are quite interested to see what is new with her and her new baby.  Wish us luck on this visit.  We have court coming up in just 2.5 weeks and I am on the edge of my seat in hope-mingled-with-what-I-know-is-a-disobedient-touch-of-anxiety.  I am working minute by minute on the daily,  confessing my weakness and momentary waves of fear to keep them in check and to praise the Lord in trust for what He is orchestrating and allowing to be or not be in these results.  I know it will be for our best! We have not heard word of a continuation this time, so we are quite hopeful we will actually see some closure one way or the other in April.  Please, Lord!!  Begging our Judge for favor from the judge.  Or better yet, a miracle change of heart in Angelique that would prevent this whole proceeding entirely.

A precious friend encouraged me greatly this week ... She said, 

And she sent me this and I say it out loud to steel myself.  Nope - is becoming my new fave word. Helps me take every thought captive and keep my eyes fixed on the Lord.

In other random news, I have been the recipient of TWO random acts of kindness in the past two weeks.  I had fun paying one forward, now we'll have fun paying the other forward!  Noah lost TWO teeth this week, one being his first molar.  Josh's air compressor that is older than the kids finally died.  This does not bode well for our washer and dryer which are older than our marriage.  HA!  And we had a zillion friends come visit see the bunnies this week.  We learned a valuable lesson - the bunnies do better with smaller crowds.  Going forward we will cap how many heads can be in the bunny bin at a time.  👍🏻

Passover Seder

Noah, Anna, and I got to participate in our first ever Passover Seder this year.  This was Josh's second time.  It was such a rich experience, I wish I had been doing it all along. I learned so much and can tell I will learn much more from the practice, recitations, history, symbolism.  We loved it!  Thankful for our Redeemer Church.  They prioritize this tradition every year on Maundy Thursday.  All 100 seats were filled and there was a waiting list.  Alas, the room was packed and could hold no more.  Some pics (thanks, Brandy, for letting me borrow this first shot!)...

 

Anna was stunned by the fire of the bitter herb (horseradish) and panicked when she could not get her water open.  She was dying and silently shrieking but did so good to control her misery until someone could help the poor girl out.  It was hysterical.  The bitter root represents the tears of affliction for the Israelites during bondage.  Anna FELT the tears of affliction.  Bless it.

 

Toward the end of the process, we all enjoyed a more full meal together and it was delicious.  

Humbled by the goodness and abundance of our Lord this Easter season, communicated so well in the Dayenu portion of the Seder meal.  My favorite part. Thankful!

Incoming Vocabulary

My latest finds from the last few books I have read and some from my dictionary app daily doses, too. Faves in bold...

• wastage - loss, decrease, or destruction of something; especially avoidable loss
• envisage - to view or regard in a certain way in advance of realization
• rancor - bitter, deep-seated ill will
• fey - fated to die; marked by a foreboding of death or calamity
• muckraking - to search out and publicly expose misconduct of prominent person/business
• withal - together with this; besides
• dilettante - an admirer or lover of the arts
• bespoke - custom-made
• hale - free from defect, disease, or infirmity; sound
• gloaming - twilight; dusk
• twixt - between
• tractable - capable of being easily led, taught, or controlled; docile
• metier - vocation; trade; an area of activity in which one excels; forte
• plenitude - the quality or state of being full; completeness
• desultory - marked by a lack of definite plan, regularity, or purpose; not connected with main subject
• blench - to draw back or turn aside from lack of courage; flinch
• logomachy - a dispute over or about words; a controversy marked by verbiage
• carp - to find fault or complain querulously
• adust - scorched, burned
• biddable - easily led, taught, or controlled; docile
• scarp - a line of cliffs produced by faulting or erosion
• ennui - a feeling of weariness and dissatisfaction; boredom
• plangent - having a loud reverberating sound; having an expressive and plaintive quality
• thimblerig - to cheat by trickery; to swindle
• specious - having deceptive attraction or allure; having a false look of truth or genuineness
• tenebrous - shut off from the light; dark or murky; hard to understand
• agon - conflict; especially between chief characters in literature
• fug - the stuffy atmosphere of a poorly ventilated space
• phiz - face
• arrant - being notoriously without moderation; extreme
• costive - slow in action or expression; not generous; stingy

Here/Hair Lately

My fave from this batch!

This last style I am so pleased with how it turned out.  I just split each triangle from the style above into two triangles each after two days when it needed a refresh.  I think I will try splitting each triangle into two again when I take touch this one up.  The smaller the section of hair that I twist, the longer the twists hang when they dry, which I can tell Lasa likes the feel of. I love the look of it! She got a lot of compliments on it at church, too.  Of course, by then I had popped a pretty pink bow in one of the front twists. ;)

The more of these twists you do all over the head, the more it looks like her hair is actually free because of how many are hanging down. The beauty of it will be that it is still in a protective style though.  Now to see how it holds up overnight.  🤞🏻  This is the first time I have done so many.

Daddy + Lasa

Ever since her Daddy + Lasa intensive week in FL, each morning when she wakes up she asks right away where Daddy is.  When I say he is at work, she objects by saying, "But I will miss him!"  And bless it, if Josh didn't come home from his first day back at work this week saying how much he missed Lasa, too.  They clearly bonded with all their Sans Mommy/Siblings time.  I love it!  

I pulled out a few pics from the trip to post separately of the smiles and silliness those two shared.  These are from the night they all went to Downtown Disney.  Noah walked around with Tania and Justin.  Anna went off with Hannah.  Lasa and Daddy did their own thing.

This is one my faves, I cannot tell you why.  It just makes me grin so.

Josh also gets a thumbs up on how well he managed her hair this week.  This was a big deal ... me not being there to make sure she looked well-kept!  HA! 

Florida Trip: Brown Family Visits

My in-laws are just as easy going and welcoming as they come!  It means so much to me to have that sort of people and that sort of genuinely loving input so significantly in my babies' lives.  Not only do they welcome the crazy train that is our crew into their home, but they welcome sharing their visit time with Noah's birthfamily EVERY SINGLE TIME.  And this time, specifically, 4 different days out of 7 that they were there.  And they welcome them into their home and feed them every time.   I mean.  I don't take that for granted.  They are so dear and so selfless and so appreciated.  I love them!

Josh and the kids left FL with full hearts after some good quality time with Memaw and Papa John.  Lasa, in particular, has been telling us all week that only Mewaw is allowed to kiss her. Ha!  Pics of sweet moments from Brown family visits last week ...

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Can you even get over this bedtime cuteness?  This was the first time Lasa has ever NOT slept alone and, apparently, she did just fine with it.  Josh has funny stories to share about their time that had me rolling in the floor. 

How awesome is Josh to have traveled to FL and back ALONE with three kids, including a newly potty-trained toddler?  Awesome indeed.  He's a saint and a hero and I never could have done that. I stand amazed. Good work, Josh!  Thank you, John and Carol and Jason and Hannah for fielding my peeps for a week!