a good day

today, we ventured out again to the Indy Zoo. i think emma is getting used to seeing actual real-live animals and not just pictures in books. we went in the morning so that we'd still be able to get some things done around the house when we got home (i'm also trying to transition Emma to one solid nap a day instead of two smaller ones--still a work in progress). anywho, john got to see his komodo dragons.

emma was OUT when we got home so i kicked my feet up for a little bit while john made lunch and then went to work on the yard. unfortunately, the weed whacker went up in smoke as he was halfway through the job. otherwise he got everything else taken care of as far as outside things.

while he worked outside I got a few hours of transcription in and made dinner. i've decided to stick to some of the flylady principles and the first one is to shine your sink! after emma went down for bed i cleaned the dishes and wiped down counters and sink. i felt so good after accomplishing that (oh what little battles!) that i decided to go ahead and just clean up the whole main level of the house. now if only it would stay this way! a girl can dream... i'm just happy that things got done around here today and we can actually RELAX tomorrow and enjoy the Lord's day!

last but not least, i put new pictures up for the month of May on my facebook page. check them out!

a lovely sunday

what a great day spent with church family and friends! we have been attending Calvary Baptist Church in Plainfield, Indiana for a little bit over a year now and can definitely say we've found our Indiana church home. (You will always be in our hearts, Willow!) during sunday school, john and i were both urged further on toward pursuing missions in china. it is very encouraging to see God continuing to lead us in the same direction.

we were also blessed to be able to spend some time with our small group tonight at pastor marks' house. it is always encouraging to see how God has intervened in the lives of those around me and saved them their sin and the ultimate consequence of that sin, hell. i am so very thankful that God saved me from the assumption that i was going to heaven which i had received from growing up in a lutheran church. it was hard for me to get over the fact that just because i had been baptized and gone through confirmation and usually attended church i was actually NOT on my way to heaven. both of those things are works and works do not merit eternal life (as opposed to eternal death).

thankfully, God saved me at the age of 15 as a junior in high school. at that time i decided i was going to live my life for Christ since He gave His life as a ransom for mine. my father-in-law then baptized me (by immersion) after my sophomore year of college. how great is our God!

we've been learning a new song at church and i just absolutely love the lyrics:

"Speak, O Lord"
Words and Music by Keith Getty & Stuart Townend
Copyright © 2005 Thankyou Music

Speak, O Lord, as we come to You
To receive the food of Your Holy Word.
Take Your truth, plant it deep in us;
Shape and fashion us in Your likeness,
That the light of Christ might be seen today
In our acts of love and our deeds of faith.
Speak, O Lord, and fulfill in us
All Your purposes for Your glory.

Teach us, Lord, full obedience,
Holy reverence, true humility;
Test our thoughts and our attitudes
In the radiance of Your purity.
Cause our faith to rise; cause our eyes to see
Your majestic love and authority.
Words of pow'r that can never fail—
Let their truth prevail over unbelief.

Speak, O Lord, and renew our minds;
Help us grasp the heights of Your plans for us—
Truths unchanged from the dawn of time
That will echo down through eternity.
And by grace we'll stand on Your promises,
And by faith we'll walk as You walk with us.
Speak, O Lord, till Your church is built
And the earth is filled with Your glory.

doctor visits

so in my lack of clarity of thought with my last post, I completely forgot to mention our trips to the doctor's office this week. I was first on Monday to visit my OB doc for my 16 week check up. i'm happy to report that all is well and the doctor found the baby's heartbeat almost immediately! It's going strong at 150 beats per minute--always good news.

Next up was Emerson's 15-month check up. Well, it was supposed to be her 15-month, but it kind of kept getting postponed. If you do the math, she is actually almost 17 months old. She was a trooper (two shots and a finger prick) and overall a pretty good little kiddo at the office. She didn't really know what to think about Dr. Hoffman, her pediatrician, this time around. Lately, she's been pretty hesitant with guys. Daddy is hoping this new found hesitancy sticks around for a while--like until she's 25!

I finally gave in and went to the doctor AGAIN this morning. The pain in my ear brought me to tears last night, so I agreed to call in the morning and see if they could fit me in. Sure enough, ear infection. Thankfully, my mother-in-law graciously took Emma for me today so that I could just get some rest. I think it made a tremendous impact (I was even able to stay up past 9 tonight!). But on that note, I need to go to bed if I'm going to be able to get up with Emma in the morning. The point will come way too quickly when I will not be sleeping through the night. I think I need to take advantage now! Who knows, maybe I'll even squeeze a nap in during the day tomorrow--although, that would require a very productive morning. We'll see!

This is an old picture, but let's face it, blogs are way more interesting when there are cute pictures involved!

doctor visits

so in my lack of clarity of thought with my last post, I completely forgot to mention our trips to the doctor's office this week. I was first on Monday to visit my OB doc for my 16 week check up. i'm happy to report that all is well and the doctor found the baby's heartbeat almost immediately! It's going strong at 150 beats per minute--always good news.

Next up was Emerson's 15-month check up. Well, it was supposed to be her 15-month, but it kind of kept getting postponed. If you do the math, she is actually almost 17 months old. She was a trooper (two shots and a finger prick) and overall a pretty good little kiddo at the office. She didn't really know what to think about Dr. Hoffman, her pediatrician, this time around. Lately, she's been pretty hesitant with guys. Daddy is hoping this new found hesitancy sticks around for a while--like until she's 25!

I finally gave in and went to the doctor AGAIN this morning. The pain in my ear brought me to tears last night, so I agreed to call in the morning and see if they could fit me in. Sure enough, ear infection. Thankfully, my mother-in-law graciously took Emma for me today so that I could just get some rest. I think it made a tremendous impact (I was even able to stay up past 9 tonight!). But on that note, I need to go to bed if I'm going to be able to get up with Emma in the morning. The point will come way too quickly when I will not be sleeping through the night. I think I need to take advantage now! Who knows, maybe I'll even squeeze a nap in during the day tomorrow--although, that would require a very productive morning. We'll see!

This is an old picture, but let's face it, blogs are way more interesting when there are cute pictures involved!

sick, sick, and more sick

this is definitely one uncomfortable pregnant lady, and i've JUST entered the semi-comfortable second trimester. emma got a bug while we were in iowa and has since shared it with me. i've been in bed by 9:00 each night this week. john has been sick, but none of the same symptoms, so we're thinking his was mostly allergy-related. anywho, i've complained enough on my facebook statuses that I don't really have anything more to say on the matter. we're pretty bummed that this is ruining our plans for a quick weekend trip to iowa to see dad's side of the family.

speaking of iowa, we were in the des moines area for a friend's wedding and to visit my side of the family. unfortunately i didn't take many pictures and our visit wasn't very long. we also had the opportunity to visit Willow Creek Baptist Church (our old home church) while we were in town. It was extremely bittersweet. After spending some time with old friends before the service, we found our seats near the back of the auditorium and tears started streaming down my face. Oh, how we miss Willow!

my ear is hurting so badly right now that I can barely think of what I want to type next. looks like its going to be another early night.

sick, sick, and more sick

this is definitely one uncomfortable pregnant lady, and i've JUST entered the semi-comfortable second trimester. emma got a bug while we were in iowa and has since shared it with me. i've been in bed by 9:00 each night this week. john has been sick, but none of the same symptoms, so we're thinking his was mostly allergy-related. anywho, i've complained enough on my facebook statuses that I don't really have anything more to say on the matter. we're pretty bummed that this is ruining our plans for a quick weekend trip to iowa to see dad's side of the family.

speaking of iowa, we were in the des moines area for a friend's wedding and to visit my side of the family. unfortunately i didn't take many pictures and our visit wasn't very long. we also had the opportunity to visit Willow Creek Baptist Church (our old home church) while we were in town. It was extremely bittersweet. After spending some time with old friends before the service, we found our seats near the back of the auditorium and tears started streaming down my face. Oh, how we miss Willow!

my ear is hurting so badly right now that I can barely think of what I want to type next. looks like its going to be another early night.

boy or girl?

So we won't find out the gender of this baby until June sometime, but the polls are open!! Go to http://marissakayesharbaugh.blogspot.com to vote now! The poll is listed on the upper left hand side of the site. Good Luck!

boy or girl?

So we won't find out the gender of this baby until June sometime, but the polls are open!! Go to http://marissakayesharbaugh.blogspot.com to vote now! The poll is listed on the upper left hand side of the site. Good Luck!

bye byes and welcome homes...

So this picture doesn't really have anything to do with my Emerson "bye bye" story, but it was a quick pic at her first visit to the zoo a couple of weeks ago. She was able to feed the giraffe, and she really did quite well UNTIL that monster of a tongue practically engulfed her little hand. You can see from the pic that she really wsn't too sure what to think about this extremely tall, funny looking animal.

Now for Emerson's Bye-Bye story. So Emma and I have been running more errands lately (any excuse to get out of the house on a nice day). The afternoon was here and 3:00 was quickly turning the corner. I was reminding my precious little girl that it would soon be naptime. After throwing a mini-fit (thankfully, she's not at the point of full-fledged tantrums yet!), it was like a lightbulb went off and she had a brilliant idea. She got up from the floor and started looking around. (At this point, I was curious) She ran over to the couch, grabbed my purse, ran it over to me sitting in the office, and went to the front door knocking and saying "bye bye, go go." It was as if in her own 1-year-old way she was saying, "Nope, sorry Mom. No time for sleep, we've got places to be!




Also, we have our pup back. Or, more accurately, John has his pup back. I was sadly and surprisingly not heartbroken when Belle took off. (She jumped the fence around 1030 on Monday night and never came home. John was out and about until almost 2 AM looking for her and then again the next day after work for a while) At first I was mad at her for running away from our family, but then I thought maybe this was how God was removing Belle from our life so that we'd have one less thing holding us back from going to the mission field. Regardless, I had become very at peace with the fact that she may never come back.

That being said, I did not want anything tragic to have happened to our girl and I was not going to just let John's puppy stay lost. I called around to local shelters to see if anyone had brought in a dog who matched Belle's description. I mainly just got a machine recording, no one really manning the phones. Well, I tried to discern which shelter she would have been dropped off at if someone had called animal control to come get her. One of the options was within 10 miles from where John works now, so I gave him the address. Sure enough, she was there! This was one pregnant lady full of mixed emotions, I can tell you that much. I had to run some paperwork and a picture to the shelter to verify she was our pup and we were able to take her home almost two hours after john had originally showed up to look for her.

All in all, it was a good day and John got his dog back!

reading with emerson

Two posts in two consecutive days... watch out!

John took a video last night of me reading to Emerson what seems to be like her new favorite book--at least she has the most interaction with it. Our favorite part is after the "tick tock". She just started playing along with the story on her own, we didn't try to teach her any sounds or actions... she does a pretty good job!

For those of you who get this in e-mail format or on Facebook, visit http://marissakayesharbaugh.blogspot.com to view the video.

back by popular demand...

okay, so maybe not by POPULAR demand, but it is pretty ridiculous that I went an entire month without posting anything on here. I'm really not even sure why I didn't post anything--April was a good month!! I would love to write all about the wonderfulness of April, but I'll keep it short and sweet.

The biggest adventure April had for our little family was a trip to Florida to visit Curt and Laura and the twins! I had great intentions of semi-documenting our vacation, but alas, it didn't happen. We survived a flight with a one year old and were very thankful that she didn't have some random sort of breakdown while we were midflight.

A few highlights from Florida:
1. We got to spend a week with our favorite Florida family.


2. Emerson never got tired of saying "meow" to cushion and peeve (who spent most of their time trying to stay away from her) or "baby" to micah and mackenna (who are only 6 months younger than Emma).


3. We watched Emerson transition from not wanting to touch the sand with her feet to eventually burying herself in it by the end of trip to the beach. (Also at the beach I was the victim of a fly-by bird dropping. I was actually thankful that it landed on my hand/wrist and NOT on the open Subway sandwich of my husband's I was holding).



4. We had a free night at the ballpark including tickets and dinner!


5. Spent Easter Sunday at their church and at a friend's house for a great dinner and easter egg hunt. I was surprised that Emerson actually caught on to looking for the eggs and putting them in her basket. I thought she would still be too little.



6. We were also able to spend a day at the pool and then the the last day was rainy and time was spent just relaxing at their house. Emma loved kicking around in the water. Looks like we'll be at the pool a lot this summer!


All in all, it was a great trip. We were sad to leave, but are glad to be able to see them again at the family reunion this summer!

Also in April, we were able to get an early ultrasound of the baby! Here are some of the 11-week pictures. Not sure how well they will show up on here, but:



(for more pictures you can follow this link: http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2003950&id=149900012&l=b7703687b9)

Last but not least, John also was hired for a new position with a new company at the very tail end of the month. He will now be working up to the position of Project Administrator for Belcan Corporation. The best part is that he will be working a regular 40 hour business week and the job is an HOUR off of his regular commute each day!! This makes all the Sharbaugh's happy.

So no promises, but I will TRY to do a better job of keeping this updated!