Luke has been a busy bee working on further job and post-doc applications. He's also plugging away at the dissertation. All of this has been a bit difficult as he's been sick and getting increasingly sicker for the past few weeks. I know he really feels bad when he actually wants to go to a doctor. We went this morning and got him some antibiotics to help fight a chest infection. I'm really hoping he feels significantly better over the next few days. He was pretty miserable today.
Thankfully, however, he felt just good enough to go out and celebrate our 5th anniversary last night! We got a babysitter and went to a nice restaurant in town called the Vine Leaf had a beautiful 3 course meal. I can't believe it has been 5 years since we made our vows to one another. These years have been amazingly sweet, and we are so thankful to the Lord for sustaining and developing our marriage. We look forward to and hope for many more anniversaries to come.
A lot of our time recently has gone to farewell parties for some of our dearest friends here, the newly titled DR. Josh and Bryonie. They left a few days ago after lots of opportunity to gush all over them about how much we all will miss them. Letting them go reminds us of how transient most of us are here, just stopping through for a handful of years in preparation for the next chapter, which makes us feel really sad but also amazingly grateful for such a unique time of life.
And of course our little Elf has been taking up a good bit of our time, too! Isaiah is developing really quickly. New "words" enter is vocabulary every day. We were trying to come up with a list recently. I'm sure we've missed a few, but his most-used words include - bye-bye, ball, dad, duck, balloon, star, moon, snack, juice, please, cheese, and fish. I know there are a lot more that we don't yet understand, but it is fun to discover what he's talking about!We tried to put Fishy down a bit lower a few days ago so Isaiah could see him better. However, poor Fishy was a little too traumatized by a stuffed dog being shoved into his tank for us to leave him defenseless on the low table. He's back on the higher shelf, and "Doggie" made his first trip through the washing machine. Isaiah's really enjoying putting hats on an off, and he really likes to cover his eyes and wander around the flat running into walls, chairs, toys, etc. Is that normal?? He is turning into a dancing machine, too. At the first sound of any kind of music, he starts bouncing or stomping in place. It's pretty funny at one of the play groups I go to when all of the other kids are sitting quietly in their mom's lap singing a peaceful song about Jesus, and Isaiah is out of his seat (well, he never really sits down...) "dancing". I have a holy roller! One of his other favorite things is throwing things away. About 1/3 of the time, he throws away things that are not meant to be thrown away. Grrrr. But, most of the time, he is really good at finding tiny bits of paper, food, lint, etc., pinching them tight in his little fingers, and walking them directly to the trash can. After dropping them in, he always says "bye-bye" and waves, making sure that we have seen his praise-worthy efforts at contributing to the smooth running of the household.
We're really sad to not be with our families this year for Christmas, but we're also looking forward to a quiet Christmas in St Andrews. We're planning on attending a Christmas Eve carol service, having a meal with another couple on Christmas Eve, and then having a bigger meal on Christmas with all of the other American families around here who are not going home for the holidays. And of course, we're looking forward to the little stack of gifts under the tree. Isaiah has done really well with not touching the gifts, but those shiny ribbons and the colorful wrapping papers are almost too much for him to resist! I can't wait to let him open his little treasures (and have some new things to keep him entertained!).
Wishing all of our blog readers a really peaceful and joyful Christmas.
Love to each of you -
3 comments:
Holly,
I laughed out loud reading your post about the fish and the dog, as well as Isaiah's antics at play group. He sounds like an absolute joy. I hope it isn't too much longer before we get to meet that little fella in person!
I hope Luke gets to feeling better soon, being sick (especially this time of year) is a total drag!
Merry Christmas!
You sound blissfully happy! Merry Christmas to you all.
I'm really not sure there is a "normal" when it comes to child-rearing. If the little man wants to dance to the music, then he should dance! :)
All 3 of my kids made truly ungodly noises on Sundays when they "accompianied" the singing in church--and we are an a capella singing church!!!!! But I was not going to keep them from singing even if they disturbed a few other people!
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