![](\"\/photos\/family\/06-aug\/daisy.jpg\")
<\/center><\/p>\nFirst, a few pictures scattered throughout the post. I tried to set up a “photo shoot” of Analise and Josiah, trying to find a good background (down comforter draped over her toddler bed and a blanket over J’s bouncy seat) and a way to get the two of them in a picture together. Didn’t work so well, but here are two of the ok pics. Analise only smiled for this one, and she only grudgingly kissed J once. She got tired of me arranging and rearranging the setup very quickly. I will never be a photographer, that’s for sure.\n<\/p>\n
![](\"\/photos\/family\/06-aug\/daisy-kiss.jpg\")
<\/center><\/p>\nScrapbook catchup<\/b>
\nIt was a quiet weekend, and because I ran out of baby <\/p>\n
announcements to mail out (more came in the mail today, <\/p>\n
so if you haven’t gotten one yet, keep on being patient <\/p>\n
with me! hopefully yours will be in your mailbox <\/p>\n
soon!). I made use of the down time to work on Josiah’s <\/p>\n
baby book, which I’m making myself scrapbook-style. I’m <\/p>\n
pretty excited about it, and I’m really enjoying it. I <\/p>\n
sure love scrapbooking – we’ve got so many great <\/p>\n
pictures to work with! Right now, I’m in the middle of <\/p>\n
the pictures of his arrival (I don’t work in <\/p>\n
chronological order), and I just don’t want to do <\/p>\n
anything that NEEDS to be done because I’d rather finish <\/p>\n
it. Unfortunately, the laundry is waiting (again!?!) to <\/p>\n
be folded and the house needs some serious picking-up <\/p>\n
before our company arrives tomorrow.<\/p>\n
![](\"\/photos\/family\/06-aug\/j-blue-stripes.jpg\")
<\/center><\/p>\nA visit from CA<\/b>
\nYeah! Steve and Corrie are arriving tomorrow, and we <\/p>\n
can’t wait:) We’ve got a fun, relaxing week planned – <\/p>\n
good food, a little adventuring, playing with the little <\/p>\n
ones. Josiah will be dedicated at our church on Sunday, <\/p>\n
and we’re glad they’ll be here to celebrate with us. <\/p>\n
Oh! And Brian’s 30th birthday is Thursday, so it’ll be <\/p>\n
fun to celebrate him, too!<\/p>\n
![](\"\/photos\/family\/06-aug\/j-mirror-8.jpg\")
<\/center><\/p>\nA Calling…<\/b>
\nLast night, we attended a commissioning service for a <\/p>\n
friend from our church who’ll be going to Mali in West <\/p>\n
Africa for 2 years. She’ll be serving with the <\/p>\n
International Mission Board sharing the Gospel through <\/p>\n
storytelling with people groups that have literacy rates <\/p>\n
of higher than 80%, and very very few christians. It <\/p>\n
was a great service of prayer and worship, focusing on <\/p>\n
God’s heart for His people all over the world. It <\/p>\n
brought tears to my eyes… it feels sometimes like I’m <\/p>\n
so far from that season of my life. Just 3 1\/2 years <\/p>\n
ago, I was in Nicaragua, living my dream, speaking <\/p>\n
spanish, teaching. I really miss it. I love my life, <\/p>\n
and I wouldn’t trade it for a second, but I do miss <\/p>\n
being on the mission field. I guess this is my season <\/p>\n
to pray and encourage all my missionary friends, teach <\/p>\n
Analise and Josiah about God’s love for His people, and <\/p>\n
hope that maybe God has a season for us in the mission <\/p>\n
field in the future. <\/p>\n
Praises for Skype<\/b>
\nSpeaking of missionaries, thanks to the wonderful <\/p>\n
technology of online phone services, I got a call from <\/p>\n
my dear, dear friend, Meg in East Asia. It was so great <\/p>\n
to hear her voice! She and her husband have been with <\/p>\n
Campus Crusade over there for about 5 years, and she’s <\/p>\n
raising two boys, 3 1\/2 and 1 year over there. Again, <\/p>\n
I miss living in a foreign culture, being in the thick <\/p>\n
of sharing God’s work, but I’m so glad I have so many <\/p>\n
friends who are obeying God’s call to “go into all the <\/p>\n
world”. What a treat to hear her voice after a year! <\/p>\n
She was surprised at my southern drawl:)<\/p>\n
Such conversation!<\/b>
\n“I wan some candy in a bowl, please.” This was <\/p>\n
Analise’s request yesterday morning when she woke up! <\/p>\n
Crazy girl. It was such a good sentence, though, I <\/p>\n
almost indulged her. I can’t believe how good her <\/p>\n
speech has gotten – using pronouns correctly more often <\/p>\n
and putting together more complete sentences that just <\/p>\n
amaze us. Saturday afternoon, she and I enjoyed playing <\/p>\n
with her animals and blocks, building tables and putting <\/p>\n
all the animals on block stools. They were “vewy <\/p>\n
hungry, yummy samwiches.” Papa Noah was manning the <\/p>\n
“hangaber” stand, and we had quite a time getting <\/p>\n
everyone fed and seated at their table (there are <\/p>\n
something like 36 animals, when everyone’s together). <\/p>\n
She would move them over, saying, “Scoop over, lion. <\/p>\n
Scoop up, zebra.” Quite entertaining. I wish everyone <\/p>\n
could have a chance to play with Analise for a half hour <\/p>\n
or so… you’d enjoy yourself! We’re also learning bible verses. She’s learned Psalm 23:1, “Da Lod is my sheper.” and last week’s verse is even better, “Shout to da Lod!” from Psalm 100:1. I’m proud of her! I’ll have to get her to do it on video so you can appreciate it. You can almost hear a sweet southern drawl in her, too!<\/p>\n
All out of Ebay luck…<\/b>
\nAfter my run of good Ebay luck, I’m not doing so well. <\/p>\n
I sold another item, and the buyer emailed me to say her <\/p>\n
PayPal account had been suspended so she wondered if she <\/p>\n
could send me the money by mail. I much prefer PayPal, <\/p>\n
but that was ok. It finally arrived today – 12 days <\/p>\n
after the item sold. Another item sold for $20, which <\/p>\n
made me really happy… except that they buyer hasn’t <\/p>\n
paid yet, 6 days later. He has no feedback or history, <\/p>\n
so I’m assuming it’s going to be an unpaid item, and <\/p>\n
I’ll have to relist it. Arg. I’ll keep you posted on how my Ebay-on-the-side business goes. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
First, a few pictures scattered throughout the post. I tried to set up a “photo shoot” of Analise and Josiah, trying to find a good background (down comforter draped over her toddler bed and a blanket over J’s bouncy seat) and a way to get the two of them in a picture together. Didn’t work […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-226","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pkzLf-3E","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=226"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/226\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=226"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=226"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.toonesalive.com\/blog\/family\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=226"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}