14 Months

Happy 14 month birthday to Elijah.
(At what point am I supposed to stop counting in months?)

We had a fun-filled, albeit rainy/dreary day. We left home about 8:20 and went to the park to walk with Carla and Kim before the rain came. It's nice to have some Mommy time and a little exercise. One thing I really have missed, and enjoyed today, was having a deeper-than-surface discussion with a girlfriend. I suppose I keep myself busy with Elijah, keeping the house, working, spending time with family, etc. that I haven't talked about what's going on in my life with anyone for a long time. After we walked Carla and I spoke for a while about marriage, kids, struggles, discipline, and lots of good stuff. It was encouraging.

Then it was off to my Grandma's house to visit with them, Keith and Paula, Gracie, and my 3-year-old cousin Zoe. (Yep, my mom's 50-year-old sister just adopted Zoe from China last Spring! And I thought I was an older mom!) My goodness, those 2 girls kept Elijah chasing after them all day! They are so busy and he loved every minute of it. Having older kids around is good for him I think.

He is getting more and more brave with walking around on stuff. He let go a little too long today and took a spill on the concrete and now has a lovely busted top lip to go with his black eye. Wait... did I mention the black eye?? No? Well, on Saturday night we were watching Cops at my parents and Elijah was walking around and around the coffee table. When the "bad boys" song came on he let go to dance and forgot about holding on. He toppled over and smacked his eye on the corner of the table. So, he got his first shiner. It's actually not that bad; just a small bruise under the eye and an abrasion. He's getting pretty tough when it comes to injuries now. ;-)

Anyway, he had a blast at Grandma's today. We didn't make it down to the festival due to the rain. Maybe tomorrow.

Also, I mentioned my new friend Michelle before. Well, we're still hanging out on Mondays. I'm excited because each time we get together she always initiates a "spiritual" conversation. I'm fairly sure she is not a true believer from some things she has said, but I've been praying for God to use this connection to bring her to Him. I try not to bring it up at all because I don't want to be pushy, and I think building a relationship and trust right now is the important thing. I can tell she's hungry for something more, so I let her take the lead. She always says how spiritual and religious she is. 3 weeks ago we started talking about how she just doesn't feel like she knows very much about God. So I lent her a great book by Kay Arthur called "Lord I Want to Know You". It takes you through the deeper meaning of each of the names God gives Himself, which can open up your eyes to who He is to you. It's a wonderful book! Anyway, she has been devouring it; reading the chapters over and over again. We got to talk about grace a lot this week and I kind of saw a glimmer in her eyes... like a light bulb was going on. She kept saying "you know, I've never heard it like that before." and stuff. It's so cool, mostly because I haven't tried to do anything really - other than make myself available to talk honestly and openly with her. So, pray for her too.

Other than that, I'm reading another great Kay Arthur book called Youniquely Woman and so far have been really encouraged. Maybe more on that later...

I'm off to bed.