Where is Jesus Christ?

Aedyn: Where is Jesus Christ? (we were listening to worship songs)
Me: He's in Heaven, waiting to be with us.
A: Ae'yn want to play with him!
Me: Jesus loves you! He wants to play with you, too.
A: Ae'yn is Jesus' friend!

I love my job!

Happy Hemi-Birthday, Eliyah Grace Tuleen

She's scooting a bit and vocalizing loud squeaks. She LOVES watching and reaching for her brothers. Her first two teeth came in this week. Our Eliyah is such a Sunshine Baby, always grinning and constantly interacting. She prefers looking into peoples eyes over playing with any toy or even eating. Every day we are delighted to be her parents!

The Night She Slept

Friday evening I drove to the bigger city around here and stayed in a lovely B&B for a night of REST! I arrived around 7:00 and enjoyed a glass of wine and headed upstairs to soak for an hour in a big tub surrounded by Italian marble. A cup of chocolate hazelnut tea and magazine made for one great bubble bath. No crying baby or barging-in 2 year-old! I was in bed by 9:15 and slept for 8 beautifully uninterrupted hours then stayed in bed dozing off and reading for a few hours. At 8:30 I joined 8 other guests for cinnamon swirl french toast, sausage, and fruit salad in the dinning room. Good coffee, too. mmmmm. I took a walk around the pretty neighborhood before a drive to the big mall to pick-up Greek food for lunch. I was back home by 1:30, the kids were napping and Eric and I watched The Daily Show. A long family walk in the Autumn sunshine and dinner at our fave Mexican restaurant topped off the day. What a great early birthday present from my fantastic husband! AND there's more to come--Dinner out at the new (& only) Thai restaurant in town (THANK YOU, Sara for the gift certificates and for babysitting!) and a weekend with our lovely friends in Columbus, OH. Happy Birthday, indeed. (mm-hmm, on Friday my age will be divisible by 5 & 7 but not 6 & 8.)

9 to 5 (and 31)

Eliyah Grace Tuleen is now 5 months old, Justice River is 9 months, and Aedyn Shepherd is a ripe old 31.

Imagine

This week Aedyn met 2 new friends. A few days ago I walked into the dinning room to find him standing on a chair that he had pushed up to the window saying, "Hello, Mrs. Star!" He told me she had black eyes like Eliyah and that the sun was 'so bright' to see her. Today I went to get him out of nap time and he said, "Get Thomas, too."

Me: Where's Thomas?

A: (pointing towards the pillow) "Right there. Thomas awake."

M: Come on Thomas. Let's go downstairs.

Aedyn held out his hand and 'held hands' with Thomas as we walked down the stairs. Near the bottom he said, "Let's go see the pretty flowers, Thomas." and they headed for the front porch. Thomas has blue eyes and dark brown hair and is big like Aedyn.

My 2 1/2 year old! What a fun kid.

Miss Congeniality

Eliyah has been with our family for just over 3 months and in 3 more she will be officially our baby! December 11 is our adoption hearing date. We should have a party. (You coming?) She is such a sweetheart! She's now so social that she would rather smile and giggle than take a bottle.

Aedyn is sitting next to me (we keep up with kid friends on the blog, some he's never met, "Hi" Z & M, Elliot & Isaiah, Micah & Eli). He just said, "The yellow sun smiles so pretty in the sky." It's overcast outside so he must be remembering.

Justice, our Joy Baby, is happily napping right now. He's teething his front 2 top teeth, speed crawling army style, and laughing at EVERYTHING.

I love the opportunity to raise these little people!

August in Review

I just uploaded 60 pictures, our record of August 2009. The kids and I were home, mostly; playing, eating, and sleeping. We did get to the farmers' market in the capital city as a family one Saturday which was a nice outing for us. We also went out to lunch TWICE as a family. These are Big Successful Events to me. You see, a two year old and virtual twin babies are major work. Eric has had some brutal rotations that kept him away about 100 hours a week and I have a hard time functioning cheerfully on the very little sleep I get.

Eric had the great honor of standing up in our friend's wedding in England last week, and, while that kept him away for 5 days, him mom and our niece came to stay with us and help. We loved having Grandma and Ashley here! We miss them already.

May September bring more good growth for our kids, more time with Eric (the second half of the month, maybe?) and more sleep for me. My mom's coming tomorrow and Aedyn is so excited!