sledding!

Last night we finally took Jonah sledding for the first time this year, despite it being one of the coldest nights of the season! I am not a huge fan of cold and snow, and Jonah seems to be following in my footsteps... he freaks out if he gets snow on his boots, so I didn't think he'd like sledding too much. Boy was I wrong! We took a walk down the street to the Zeeland Christian hill, and Jonah had fun as daddy pulled him around in the street in the new tube. (which, by the way, Jonah thought worked GREAT as a trampoline after we blew it up!) Then up the hill we went, first daddy and Jonah. They had a blast, yelling "WEEEEEEEE!" the whole way down. Then Jonah and mommy, and believe it or not, even I had fun :) Jonah claimed he wasn't cold, but his poor little cheeks were pretty red as he said "sledding again, pleeease?" He went one more time with daddy, then it was back home to warm up. Hopefully after this bitter cold weather we have coming this week we can go again!

prayer

last night at youth group we talked about the rich young ruler from luke 18, and the things that grip our hearts... the things we just can't fully hand over to Him and keep us from fully following Jesus. (our time, worries, goals..) we ended with this prayer that I thought was very powerful and challenging.

"Father I abandon myself to you. Do with me as you will. Whatever you may do with me I thank you. I am prepared for anything. I accept everything, provided your will is fulfilled in me and in all creatures. I ask for nothing more, my God. I place my soul in your hands. I give it to you, my God, with all the love of my heart, because I love you. And for me it is a necessity of love, this gift of myself. This placing of myself in your hands without reserve in boundless confidence, because you are my Father."
~Charles De Foucauld, 1858-1916

a dry driy boy

Jonah loves going to grammie and grandpa's house. When I went to pick him up today after work he had lots of excuses of why he had to stay.. he had to finish watching Bob & Larry, he needed a drink, he wanted to go upstairs... finally I had to chase him down to get his coat and boots on. I had him cornered in the laundry room, so this is what he did...

hmmm... why does he smile in the dryer, but not for Christmas card pictures??

Another random thing.. Jonah's been just cracking us up lately. One funny thing he's been doing over the last couple of days is he's talking about himself in third person. We're not quite sure where this came from. example~Jonah, did you sleep good? "Yes he did" Do you like your pizza? "Yes, he does"

he can always bring a smile to our face, he definately keeps us laughing!

Critter Barn

ok, this should have been before the Christmas party stuff, but oh well :)

The week before Christmas, when it was reallllly cold and snowy my mom, Liz, my cousin Taylor, Jonah and I went to the Critter Barn to see the animals and the live nativity. Jonah loved seeing the baby chicks and duckies (although he didn't want to hold them!) and the bunnies (including one that looked like a small fluffy dog!), goats, sheep, cows, and Baby Jesus. They had lots of pictures of what Bethlehem would have looked like when Jesus was born, told the story of seeing the star from the perspective of a 10 year old shepherd girl, and had a live nativity scene with kids dressed as Mary, Joseph, and shepherds, surrounded by hay and lots of animals.

In the busyness of the season this was a good reminder about what its all really about... not presents and shopping and parties and lots of food, but that precious baby born that first Christmas morning.

believe it or not, this is a bunny!

Happy Birthday Jesus!

I've got a bit of updating to do... we had a great Christmas this year with lots of Christmas parties to keep us busy! At every party we would ask him what day it was, and his response was "Happy Birthday Jesus!!" He quickly got the hang of opening presents, he's now asking almost daily to open more. :) NO MORE!! The house is full!!! :)

Here's the picture I ended up using for our Christmas cards this year.. sorry to all of you who didn't get one. Jonah isn't very into smiling for pictures lately.. he usually says "cheese" and looks the other way. So at the last minute I settled for the best one I could get and cards were mostly just handed out during family Christmas parties.

Hope you all had a Merry Christmas! Here's a couple more pictures from the holidays..

Jonah and cousin Eli getting spun in the chair by grandpa

Jonah playing with his new train table

Jonah getting a piggy back ride from one of his favorite people, my cousin Taylor