Brielle is spending more and more time each day walking, and less and less time crawling. She'll really be keeping up with her brother soon!
Sunday, December 13, 2009
Monday, December 07, 2009
What to be when I grow up
When we ride in the car, I try to keep Josh entertained by looking for buses and construction trucks. The other day we saw some construction trucks doing work and he got pretty excited. I asked him if he wanted to be a construction worker when he grew up. Josh replied, "No...play football!" What a perfect little boy response...how in the world did he know all boys want to be professional athletes when they grow up. Too funny!
See him in training below:
Not football, but practicing his throw - even stepping with the opposite foot!
Building his core strength
Doing dips!Sunday, December 06, 2009
Workin' 9-5....or not
We've been talking a lot recently about how to make Dan's schedule work best for our family. He actually doesn't work an insane number of hours (we calculated <40/week when averaged out), but he works nights, weekends, and holidays and the rest of the world is organized around a M-F 9-5 lifestyle. This has been really hard for me - I hate it when he works on the weekend, and doing dinnertime/bedtime alone is sometimes a lot at the end of the day! He loves the emergency room environment though, and it is nice having 3-4 days off at a time...so rather than looking for a new job, we've been brainstorming things we can do to make it work better.
As part of this we wanted to get some input from people who have been where we are. Amazingly, at almost the same time Daniel became interested in the PA profession he found out his new college bible study leader was an emergency medicine PA. John, and his wife Sharon, have been great friends and mentors for Dan (and now me too) for over ten years now. We were able to spend about 48 hours with them last month and it was great. They are just the kind of people that are refreshing and encouraging to be around, and it was especially great to get their input into our circumstances since they've been there too.
They didn't have a lot of suggestions for things we could change, but said we're thinking about the right things. Things we're considering are: setting up a regular sitter to come one morning a week, trying to be better about planning out our days in advance, seeing if Daniel can get more Sundays off to go to church regularly, figuring out a way for us make exercise a priority. Sharon helped us realize that some of our stress doesn't necessarily come from Dan's schedule, but from having a 2 year old and a 1 year old...no matter what our work situation was, life would be crazy right now, but that it's for a season. The next season won't necessarily be easier, but it will be different. It's easy to think the grass would be greener if Daniel had a 'normal' schedule, but it's not necessarily true - there would just be different challenges.
Also, as Dan told John about his job, John was really impressed with the experience Dan is getting, the way the docs run the group, and the compensation/benefits...what we've started to take for granted, he reminded us is really a pretty sweet deal! I mean really - Dan works half the days of the month and makes enough for us to live on one income - pretty amazing gig!
It was also the first time for us to get to introduce John and Sharon to the kids. They have 4 grown boys, and I think they really enjoyed having some little ones around. Amongst all the serious talk, we had some fun too. The first morning the guys went out fishing and the women and kids headed to a really cool playground. We also took some walks down to the dock, ate yummy food, and visited the beach (St. George Island) where Daniel and I first met!
All in all, it was a great trip. We were challenged and encouraged by John and Sharon's generosity, servant hearts, and loving way of living out their faith in their neighborhood.
As part of this we wanted to get some input from people who have been where we are. Amazingly, at almost the same time Daniel became interested in the PA profession he found out his new college bible study leader was an emergency medicine PA. John, and his wife Sharon, have been great friends and mentors for Dan (and now me too) for over ten years now. We were able to spend about 48 hours with them last month and it was great. They are just the kind of people that are refreshing and encouraging to be around, and it was especially great to get their input into our circumstances since they've been there too.
They didn't have a lot of suggestions for things we could change, but said we're thinking about the right things. Things we're considering are: setting up a regular sitter to come one morning a week, trying to be better about planning out our days in advance, seeing if Daniel can get more Sundays off to go to church regularly, figuring out a way for us make exercise a priority. Sharon helped us realize that some of our stress doesn't necessarily come from Dan's schedule, but from having a 2 year old and a 1 year old...no matter what our work situation was, life would be crazy right now, but that it's for a season. The next season won't necessarily be easier, but it will be different. It's easy to think the grass would be greener if Daniel had a 'normal' schedule, but it's not necessarily true - there would just be different challenges.
Also, as Dan told John about his job, John was really impressed with the experience Dan is getting, the way the docs run the group, and the compensation/benefits...what we've started to take for granted, he reminded us is really a pretty sweet deal! I mean really - Dan works half the days of the month and makes enough for us to live on one income - pretty amazing gig!
It was also the first time for us to get to introduce John and Sharon to the kids. They have 4 grown boys, and I think they really enjoyed having some little ones around. Amongst all the serious talk, we had some fun too. The first morning the guys went out fishing and the women and kids headed to a really cool playground. We also took some walks down to the dock, ate yummy food, and visited the beach (St. George Island) where Daniel and I first met!
All in all, it was a great trip. We were challenged and encouraged by John and Sharon's generosity, servant hearts, and loving way of living out their faith in their neighborhood.
Our Little Helper
Joshua is really into 'helping' right now...which is great! He helps take the diapers to the outside trash can, dustbusts, cooks, and brings us stuff we request. If we neglect to invite him to participate in one of his self-appointed tasks, he comes running up saying, "Helper, helper!"
(Notice Brielle spends a lot of time in her high chair - not only does she love to eat, but it keeps her safe from big brothers rambunctiousness!)
(Notice Brielle spends a lot of time in her high chair - not only does she love to eat, but it keeps her safe from big brothers rambunctiousness!)
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