December's Guessing Game

December still likes to sit in baskets and keep herself busy!

I just finished reading that alot of babies despise being in their carseats. Thankfully, December is not one of those babies. In fact, she has created a little guessing game for herself out of our car trips. When we arrive at our destination and I go to the backseat to unbuckle her, December guesses where we've gone (in her own baby way). She looks up at me and says, "Oof? Oof? Oof?" (her doggie sound) That means she's guessing we're at Grandpa and Grandma's house (they have a dog). If I say, "Nope, December. We're not at Grandma's house," then she guesses again. "Baby? Baby?" That means she's thinks we're at church (she plays with the baby doll in the nursery). If I say, "Nope, December. We're not at church," she stops for a bit and looks around (I think she's confused at this point -- after all, where do we go except to Grandma's house or church??). Usually it means we're at the grocery store...then as soon as she gets out of her carseat, she waves to all the cars in the parking lot like she's the Queen of England.

Right now we're playing a different game, a strange one we've never played before. She just woke up from her afternoon nap, and she started to cry (this is normal). As soon as I walked in to take her out of her crib, she cried harder. When I stretched out my hands to pick her up, she started shaking her head "no" quite vigorously. She didn't want me to pick her up! So I waited for a while and then left the room. She stopped crying. I've now gone back in a few times, and she still shakes her head when I try to pick her up. So she's just hanging out in her crib. Must be kind of boring, but I guess she'll stay there until she wants me to lift her out. December likes to play games.

Of Houses and Cottages

Here's my cousin Tyler playing with December at the cottage on Saturday. He's putting a stuffed animal on his head, then winging his head so that the stuffed animal goes flying. December thinks it's the most hilarious game ever created. She was giggling like a banshee!

This is my cousin Justine playing with December -- she's great with December, and she was such a big help on Saturday when Brad and I were doing some painting at the cottage.

The end of last week was pretty crazy! We got two offers on our house! Thank you for praying for that lady to make an offer -- she made one! On Thursday, our realtor came over, and we discussed both offers. The one offer was really low and pretty much out of considering range, so we flat-out denied the offer. The other one was from this lady I told you about, and it was pretty desirable. We drafted a counter-offer to give to her, but we held off from faxing it to her immediately. A few hours after we met with our realtor, we discovered that the low-offer people were upset that we just denied their offer and didn't even try to counter-offer them, because they are really interested in the house. The next day, we discovered that the offer that we actually wanted was taken back. The lady pulled out. She found somewhere else she's going to go. Soo, then we were left with the offended low-ball offer people. We decided to counter-offer them. They have accepted our counter-offer. (This was all alot of excitement within a few days, and I went from excited to sad to nervous to stressed to...everything.)

However, all is not free and clear yet. Our house has to meet certain qualifications in order for them to get the loan they want. If we lived in a house built any time in the past five, ten, twenty, or even thirty years, I probably wouldn't be worried. But, our house was built in 1910. People make historical museums out of houses like ours. It's practically a national monument. So I have huge doubts as to whether our house can pass any qualifications. If our house doesn't pass, that means these people don't have the $$$ to buy our house, which means we're back where we started. Boy, oh boy -- I think I'll be surprised if I live through all of this drama...

December's Baptism Song

Here is the song Brad wrote for December's baptism on March 12, 2006. I love this song...it brings tears to my eyes every time I hear it.

Lyrics:

Welcome to this world
Such a cold and cruel place
For a baby girl
But you are still so small
There are things you need to know
You’ll learn them as you grow

In pain you were born
In blood you arrived
There were tears in your father’s eyes
But in love you’re conceived
In faith you will grow
There’s hope in your beautiful eyes
What a beautiful way to begin your life

But, oh, this realm of dust
It’s not meant to be our home
You can see it slowly fade away
You need to be reborn
Repent and be baptized
For Jesus is the Life, the Truth, the Way

(‘Cause) In His pain you were bought
His blood gives you life
There were tears in His Father’s eyes
In love you’re ordained
If in faith you remain
There’s hope unto eternal life
What a beautiful way to begin your life

So when darkness tries to take you away
Into a life to which you’ve already died
You just tell them, “I have been baptized
And I am holy to the Lord.”

(‘Cause) In this water you died
In this water you rise
This sacred mark placed on your head
So in love you abound
In faith you must stand
There’s hope for you all through your life

Singing in the Rain

This is what the sky looked like last night over our house...so beautiful!

This is what the sky looked like with camera zoomed in. I don't know why the colors changed that much in the camera's brain, but I thought these colors were pretty, too.

Last night, not long after these pictures were taken, it finally rained here! It hadn't rained in forever, and everything was fading into a dull brown color. We were so thrilled that it was raining that Brad and I ran out into the rain (it was POURING), and we got a good soaking! It was great fun! I danced around and sang, "I'm singing in the rain!" (under the cover of darkness, of course). Brad had the good forethought to tell me to have towels ready for us when we came back in, and boy, we needed them! It felt like standing in a shower. How fun!

Brad has been asked to preach at a church while we're in Alberta next month. He's thinking of doing a sermon on Hosea 11. It's one of his favorite chapters in the Bible! A couple of nights ago, he was looking at a devotional he did on Hosea 11 for one of his classes. With the devotional, there was a song he had written a while ago (like before we got married) included with it. It's a great song, so Brad got out his guitar and started playing it. Since it's also a song that I help him out with, we sang together and recorded ourselves. We put the video on Brad's blog: www.epyrus.blogspot.com. Note: if you decide to check it out, be warned that the video isn't much to look at -- we were mainly going for having the song itself recorded on something! Brad's a great songwriter, though.

There's some potential good news on the house front! We got an offer today (though it is, again, very low), and also someone came through today to look at it. She is VERY interested and talked over an offer with our realtor. Her potential offer sounds WONDERFUL, and if she indeed put in this offer, I can't begin to say how great that would be. However, she has to actually put it in writing, rather than just talk about it. Please pray, as we are pryaing, that she will put in this offer!