my husband's almost 30!

not quite, but he did just turn 27 in September. to celebrate his big day, we took a family trip to the zoo, looked at a bunch of apartments (sorry that weekend landed on your b-day, John), and then enjoyed some strawberry cupcakes with cream cheese frosting--yummy!!

emma on john's shoulders catching a glimpse of the polar bear.


john's favorite: the komodo dragons!


the animals were enjoying some family time, too. the elephants and giraffes each had little ones walking around.




one of emma's favorite places is just the pond filled with ducks who don't actually BELONG in the zoo. we got a cute video of her chasing around one such duck before it flew away from her craziness.


some more snuggle time with daddy. at this point, she had just ran and ran and ran around the splash park area and was FREEZING!! also, we hadn't been able to see the bears do anything besides sleep at our previous visits to the zoo.


and like i said, we finished the day with yummy cupcakes!!




HAPPY BIRTHDAY, JOHN!!

storytime at the library

a few times this month I was feeling well enough to take emerson to the library for story time. they said it's only for 3 to 5 year olds, but i figured they wouldn't turn us away and emma never had any problems. storytime consists of a few stories all centered around a particular theme chosen by the librarian as well as a craft to go with that theme... here are some photos of of emma with her craft.



here's a closer look. as you can see, all the stories that day revolved around the farm. i wrote on each animal the noise that emerson makes for it (oink-oink and cock-a-doo).



and, lastly, i'm glad i took a picture when i did because ten minutes later this is what her craft looked like.



if i hadn't seen her do it, i probably would have blamed the dog. sorry, belle.

a taste of china

well, a very, very , VERY little taste...

a while back we went to an Asian-American expo on the campus of IUPUI. Here was a little glimpse at what we saw.







and then we finished the afternoon off with a nice little get together with some friends of ours FROM China who currently scientists at IUPUI and their two little ones. (this is teri and tiebing with all the little ones)

currently reading: liberated through submission

So I meant to write about this book when I finished it almost a week ago. Unfortunately, that did not seem to happen. Instead, I can only touch on a couple basic ideas that I took from the book and impacted me in one way or another.

One particular idea is that submission is not just action-based. One can easily "submit" to the authorities in their life in an outward, action-based way WITHOUT truly submitting with their mind and heart. I was convicted because I know there are many times in my life where I have submitted to parents, coaches, teachers, and my husband outwardly. I followed through in an ACT of obedience, but I was sinning and disobedient with my thoughts and attitude toward the situation. Not only is this something that I need to correct for the sake of my well-being, but I want to be able to display the right heart attitude as a model for my daughter to take after.

Also, submission is for everyone... We all answer to a higher authority, whether it be earthly or heavenly, whether we are male or female, whether we are married or single. For some reason, our Christian circles tend to come to the conclusion that submission is only for married women. Not true. "We have conformed to the world's concept, accepting its views. We have become all-too-comfortable, costuming ourselves and acting out roles that God never intended for us."

For those wives who complain and lament the fact that they are required by God to submit to their husbands, this might put things in perspective. Yes, Scripture says, "Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands as unto the Lord." BUT Scripture also gives the following responsibilities to married men:
1. Be the head (final decision maker) of the wife.
2. Love your wife.
3. Be the spiritual leader of the home.
4. Live with your wife according to understanding (understanding why and how God made her).
No pressure, guys! We women should be thankful that submission is our only direct command in regard to our marriage relationship.

I am definitely learning that submission does not happen overnight, nor can it take place of my own volition. By the grace of God and His enabling, I pray that I can continue to strengthen and stretch my submission muscles in order to be the Christian, wife, and mother that God has called me to be.

learning to trust

whether it be trusting God or trusting my husband, i definitely have NOT arrived... and due to the fact that i'm ready to have this kid any day now there are many things that i canNOT take care of in regard to the upcoming weeks. i need to be able to just let my husband take care of the things which he has committed to do for my sake and well-being during the last bit of this pregnancy.

physically, there is only so much i can do when it comes to sorting and packing and unpacking and sorting and organizing. my days are spent chasing and caring for and feeding emerson, and i spend most nights sick and laying on the couch going to bed early. not to mention all of the jabs and kicks i've been getting from within!

mentally, i'm a forgetful, incoherent mess (so, apologies if none of this makes sense). not only am i overthinking all of the things on my "to-do" list that i can remember, but i'm also fretting about the things which i've assumed i've forgotten. i think my subconscious has also added about a bazillion things on my imaginary to-do list and i've been overwhelmed knowing that i could never accomplish all of these things that i've conjured up. i also need to get the picture out of my head that we will be bringing baby boy home to this nice, neat, organized apartment. i need to understand that it's not going to happen, and frankly, i need to be okay with that.

spiritually, i'm feeling very prideful. my human nature does NOT want to ask for help. i WANT to be able to do all of this stuff on my own and i want to do it right--even though i don't have a clue on how to do this moving thing. you'd think i would have gathered some sort of idea by now, i mean we did this two years ago with like three successive moves, but alas, all has been forgotten.

i'm sure that there is much more that i could add to each section of this post, but i'm sleepy and we have church in the morning. hopefully, i will be able to make it through sunday school and the service. last week we left early due to sickness and uncomfortableness (blech) i'm ready to be a faithful attender once again. however, i do not believe that will be the case until baby chi is a few months old and i have at least begun to figure him out. it took at LEAST three months until i felt comfortable with taking care of emerson, so we'll see how it goes!

learning to trust

whether it be trusting God or trusting my husband, i definitely have NOT arrived... and due to the fact that i'm ready to have this kid any day now there are many things that i canNOT take care of in regard to the upcoming weeks. i need to be able to just let my husband take care of the things which he has committed to do for my sake and well-being during the last bit of this pregnancy.

physically, there is only so much i can do when it comes to sorting and packing and unpacking and sorting and organizing. my days are spent chasing and caring for and feeding emerson, and i spend most nights sick and laying on the couch going to bed early. not to mention all of the jabs and kicks i've been getting from within!

mentally, i'm a forgetful, incoherent mess (so, apologies if none of this makes sense). not only am i overthinking all of the things on my "to-do" list that i can remember, but i'm also fretting about the things which i've assumed i've forgotten. i think my subconscious has also added about a bazillion things on my imaginary to-do list and i've been overwhelmed knowing that i could never accomplish all of these things that i've conjured up. i also need to get the picture out of my head that we will be bringing baby boy home to this nice, neat, organized apartment. i need to understand that it's not going to happen, and frankly, i need to be okay with that.

spiritually, i'm feeling very prideful. my human nature does NOT want to ask for help. i WANT to be able to do all of this stuff on my own and i want to do it right--even though i don't have a clue on how to do this moving thing. you'd think i would have gathered some sort of idea by now, i mean we did this two years ago with like three successive moves, but alas, all has been forgotten.

i'm sure that there is much more that i could add to each section of this post, but i'm sleepy and we have church in the morning. hopefully, i will be able to make it through sunday school and the service. last week we left early due to sickness and uncomfortableness (blech) i'm ready to be a faithful attender once again. however, i do not believe that will be the case until baby chi is a few months old and i have at least begun to figure him out. it took at LEAST three months until i felt comfortable with taking care of emerson, so we'll see how it goes!

sick, sick, and more sick...

well, i'm at least 35 weeks at this point... i say "at least" because i feel more like 38+. i really do not remember feeling this horrible when i was pregnant with miss emma... i mean, i remember being pretty sick at the beginning, but not near as uncomfortable with about a month to go!

when i was at the end with emerson, i was probably just as busy--just a different busy. two or three months before emma was born, we bought a foreclosure and adopted two pups only 5 months old or so. there was plenty of obedience training and house training to accomplish before the baby came AND there was PLENTY MORE work to be done on the house. i was also coming to the end of my medical transcription training. so i definitely had my fair share of work to take care of. this time around, belle is much easier to care for and i have an active toddler to chase around all day. i also work anywhere from 10 to 15 hours a week doing MT. Oh, AND we're trying to sell the house, pack up, and move to an apartment by mid-October... i hope we don't continue to make it a habit to move with each pregnancy.

so, maybe this pregnancy is different solely because its not my first. maybe its just the fact that my body has been forever changed after having that first child... either way, i'm hurting! i've been getting horribly nauseated again AND i had my first full day of painless Braxton Hicks contractions a couple days ago. then yesterday i experienced the close-to-the-real-thing-but-obviously-not-the-real-thing contractions. lately, i feel like all i've been doing is complaining and apologizing for the complaining.

i don't head to the doc again until next tuesday. that will put me at 36 weeks. hopefully i'll still be measuring big and i can plan on being induced early... yep, that sounds like a GREAT idea to me. my belly can't too much more stretching, and i've definitely got the marks to prove it!

quick house update: the contractor we hired came in and fixed all the minor things that needed fixin' around the house as requested by the buyers. one step closer... now we will await the appraisal and as long as the offer is less than what the house actually appraises for (although,i'm not sure why that should matter), we're good to go. so we're closer to the house being sold, closer to being debt free, and closer to being on our way to china... crazy!