As if I wasn’t already lonely enough. Today our wireless network went down, so I was unable to get any internet connection until just now. Then as I restarted our lovely, wonderful awesome new (from January) Dell laptop upstairs, it stalled in the middle of startup three separate times. GRR. I’m starting to get a little panicky about the photos and little projects I had on it. Isn’t it amazing how we can get attached to BITS and BYTES? *sigh*

Anyway, I was going to post a cute little blog about our Mothers of Preschoolers (MOPS) outing to Buds Best Cookie factory this morning. Quite fun! I think I might have gotten a good picture or two… except that I left the camera there. Thankfully, I can pick it up tonight at church. So I guess the cute pictures will have to wait. And my blog will have to wait. And my email will have to wait. (HINT – now’s the time for you to overwhelm me with email messages so that when I’m reconnected I wonder why in the world I was so lonely today.) Say a quick little prayer for our computer!

We bought this beautiful home with a beautiful lawn and yard (the back needed some work, though!). We quickly found out that keeping the yard and lawn beautiful involves some diligent work. Thankfully, Brian’s parents, Beverly and Tom, are amazing landscapers and gardeners. Their house yard is one of the prettiest I’ve seen, and I’ve been checking them all out! So under Beverly’s watchful eye, I planted my first flowerbed last weekend with irises and daisies, as well as a small rose bush. In the Easter Fun blog, you can see a picture of the dogwood tree we planted to grow along with Analise. Today, Beverly brought over 3 beautiful hydrangea plants from her yard to transplant for me. Tom was busy weed whacking our back yard because it was too overgrown to mow:) Hopefully, Brian and I can learn enough so that they won’t have to spend every other weekend bailing us out of yardwork. I’ll post pictures of my flowerbed when it blooms!

Foto Frenzy!

I thought maybe I’d post one a day, but since I’m here, and all the pictures are ready, I’ll just give you all of them at once:) Above – Analise has finally decided she’s interested in something other than milk! Here she’s seriouly involved in a biter biscuit. I have not been prepared for how messy eating can be!

  
Above – We took advantage of Grandma Toone’s beautiful yard and the beautiful spring weather last weekend to try to get some pictures outside. Unfortunately, Analise was quite unsmiley… at least that we could catch!

Below – My little monkey is at it again. A different end table, this one sandwiched between the computer desk (to the left in the picture) and the sofa (to the right). Analise noticed a leftover plastic egg hiding back there, and while I wasn’t watching, climbed back between the table and the wall! I couldn’t reach to get her out, so I snatched the egg, set it back out from behind the table, and she quickly came out to get it:) I’ve got it on video, and I’ll try to upload it. Quite comical!

   

Lastly, a cute one of bathtime. A far cry from the screaming photo we have of her from her first bath!

I feel like the events of this week have caused the world consider death much more than we normally do and prefer to do. The death of Terry Schiavo forced us to think about the end of our own lives and what we would want for ourselves and our loved ones. Discussions with some people at church this week came back to the fact that as Christians we have so much to look forward to beyond this world. We’re going to meet Jesus and be with God for eternity! How great is that? We think this world is great – and it really is full of blessings. But God’s told us over and over in His Word that this earth is just a shadow of what’s in store for us.

“Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall knaow fully, even as I am fully known.” –1 Corinthians 13:12
But as wonderful as we know it will be, there’s still considerable fear at the thought of getting there – the process of death. I think the death of Pope John Paul II has been very exemplary. I can’t think of anyone on the earth who would be watched more closely, espeically as the end of life draws near. And as his life waned, he was an example of peace. I hope that as people watched and prayed for him this week, they take this lesson away from his death. He walked into the presence of his Lord in peace, knowing Who was waiting for him.
In the words of Jesus,

“Do not let your hearts be troubled. Trust in God; trust also in me. In my Father’s house are many rooms; if it were not so, I would have told you. I am going there to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come back and take you to be with me that you also may be where I am. You know the way to the place where I am going.”
Thomas said to him, “Lord, we don’t know where you are going, so how can we know the way?”
Jesus answered, “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me… Peace I leave with you, my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.”
–John 14:1-7, 27

Analise has gone through various phases of sleeping. Back in California, we could lay her down and she’d put herself to sleep without a sound in about 5-10 min. It was amazing. Since we’ve moved, though, she’s fought sleeping so hard. She did get more mobile when we moved here: rolling over, crawling, pulling up. She uses ALL of these after we put her down. I’ll lay her down, she’ll put her thumb in her mouth and close her eyes as I leave. Then moments later, I’ll hear a slight effort over the baby monitor, and we know she’s rolled over. She’ll usually get on her hands and her knees and crawl her head into the corner of the crib and then start fussing. Or she’ll sit up and play with the fish aquarium on the side of the crib. Or perhaps she’ll pull up and stand at the side fussing. I usually let her fuss and get a bit more tired before I go in, snuggle her and return her to normal sleeping position because I’m not sure she can get herself back to laying down. A couple times, I’ve gone in there after she’s quieted herself down to find that she must have been sitting up and gotten tired, so she’s about folded over in a seated position with her head laid down. Poor girl…

This morning she was been pretty good about sleeping. She was tired this afternoon, but just didn’t want to go to sleep. But I just went in to check on her, and she was curled up the opposite direction I laid her down, asleep with her thumb in her mouth. (Just in case you were worried, I always pick her up and put her back into a good sleeping position.) So here’s a glimpse of my angelic little sleep fighter who, by the way, has slept through the night for the last 3 nights – WOOHOO!

I just had to post one of my favorite links to the Top 100 April Fool’s Day Hoaxes of All Time. There have been some pretty amazing hoaxes pulled off around the world! Among my favorites (in case you don’t have time to enjoy them all):

• The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest (#1)
• The Taco Liberty Bell (#4)
• Alabama Changes the Value of Pi (#7)
• Planetary Alignment Decreases Gravity (#10)

Enjoy! I hope you don’t get April Fooled!