Daffodil Dreams: Ezekiel

Showing posts with label Ezekiel. Show all posts

Monday, July 25, 2011

Surprise! Papa's here!

About 2:15 Wednesday morning, Papa came to visit! Total surprise to me! I had absolutely no inkling that I would walk downstairs to see his luggage in the living room and then have him pop around the corner!

He came because he missed me, of course, but he was really hoping to see his new grandbaby while he was here. But, I guess the baby didn't realize that, so Papa had to go back home without meeting him/her.

On Friday, the day before he left, we went up to Estes Park for a family outing and to walk Serena. Grammie (Serena's mom), Papa, and I explored the town with the grandchildren while Josh and Serena went "hiking".

As you can see, we have an extra couple of kids.

I brought Meg along and Emily brought her other grandson.

The more, the merrier!

Before we all set out, though, we had a picnic. We found this lovely little spot next to a church. It even had a little creek.

Shallah and Papa sharing cookies.

Shallah and Papa have a special thing going. Before he came, she acted like she loved me. But one day, I went to get her out of her crib and she hugged her arms around her and said, "I want Papa." Oh, well. He's gone now.

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Thursday, November 18, 2010

Giving Thanks, Day Eighteen

CUTENESS.

I was perusing pictures on my laptop and thought of two wonderful things to be thankful for today:

1) that we can actually have all these wonderful pictures stored and able to be viewed at just a push of a button, and

2) that so much cuteness abides in my family! To make my point, here are just a few pieces of evidence from my 2005 folder:

See, I told you!

Tuesday, November 9, 2010

Giving Thanks, Day Nine

Rest.

Ezekiel taking a break right before his Little Dragons Karate class.

To be honest, resting and sleep is a difficult thing for me. I love sleeping -- once I'm sleeping. I just have a hard time going to sleep. And resting may be even harder. There are so many things that need to be done.

Have you heard that line, "I like work: it fascinates me. I can sit and look at it for hours"? Well, that's not me. Nope, it stresses me out that things are undone. Now, that does not mean I'm not a procrastinator; it just means I'm stressed quite a bit! So, I find myself always working. Or feeling guilty that I'm not.

But God created me a human being, not a human doing. (Yes, that might be becoming cliche, but true, nonetheless.) So, I'm learning about rest. That rest is a gift from God.

Today was one of those days -- a gift from God. Oh, I did stuff. But, I also sat. And rested. Yes, a little strange. But, oh, so good. And I am trying not to feel guilty. I guess I could do with some lessons from Ezekiel -- and maybe one of those exercise balls.

Thursday, April 22, 2010

Aquarium, Part 1

For Christmas last year, we gave our grandchildren a trip to the Monterey Bay Aquarium, to be taken in family groups (minus the nursing babies and without parents). Due to busy schedules and other stuff, we are just getting around to making good on our gift. We took the Abdelaziz children last month and are scheduled to take the Gombojavs next month. Hopefully, the Correas will follow soon.

The Aquarium is an awesome place where it is very easy to spend the entire day and still feel like you haven't seen everything to your satisfaction. My only complaint is that there were too many political displays. I don't like being bombarded with political agendas while trying to enjoy the wonders that God has created. However, it is a great place and they do a lot of good for the ocean and its creatures.

It is about two hours away, so we left early and had to stop for lunch. We wanted to eat before we went in and the only place we saw was here, a place I haven't been to in ages! But, what child doesn't want fries? And a chocolate chip cookie for dessert?

Here we are walking from the parking garage down Cannery Row ready for our adventure.

I certainly cannot do justice to the sea life, so I won't be showing a lot of "fish" pictures, but since this is definitely Abishai's favorite, it must have its place in this story.

Jael was very conscientious and took little notes about everything that interested her. She brought little slips of paper in her pocket.

The children loved all the hands-on learning.

Standing under a wave is exciting even if you know it's coming -- since you've stood here wave after wave.

So, the girl on the right is the same little girl on the right in the picture below.

How time flies!

(Meg, Izzy, Jael)

The boys have a fascination with all the snails in our yard, so they loved these little vests!

They have something for every age!

Okay, there's a story behind this picture. Papa had the camera most of the day and realized that he wasn't getting in any of the pictures, so I took the camera for a bit. After I took this picture, he took the camera to peruse the pictures. (Isn't digital great?) So, when he saw this one, he started laughing. I looked questioningly at him. He asked who I had taken a picture of. I still didn't get it. So, after a few comments and questions back and forth, I finally understood. He thought I had taken a picture of some stranger just to make him think it was him! He doesn't think it looks like himself. I think it looks exactly like him. I still don't get it.

As gorgeous as those jelly fish are, these handsome men surpass them!

They weren't standing up and they weren't laying down. They were on a slope staring UP into an amazingly enormous tank with sharks, tuna, sunfish, and other huge creatures.

Leaving. Can you tell the sun was in our eyes?

We did a better job this time.

One last stop on Cannery Row before getting to our van. Dippin' Dots! Papa's idea, of course.

The whole day was absolutely wonderful. Not a stressful moment. Pure unadulterated enjoyment. I'm not sure if we gave our grandchildren a gift, or they gave us one. As with Dippin' Dots, good to the very end!

Thursday, April 15, 2010

Easter 2010......Finally

It comes as no surprise here that I have been totally remiss at journaling my days. So, without making any promises to myself or you about how I'm going to do such a better job, I am going to try to do better. How's that for not committing to anything?

And I figured I'd start with Easter. Before April ended.

Easter was a wonderful day. I just love spending time with my family! But, even though the day was spent having a great time, we did not forget that the whole purpose of the day is celebrating the resurrection of our Lord and Savior. How amazing are all the ramifications of that simple statement! Without the resurrection, the birth and death of Jesus would mean nothing. Our Redeemer lives!

And, as is our normal tradition, we try to wear something new on Easter Sunday. Sadly, I can't post pictures of our entire family as the two newest members still haven't had their adoption court dates. So, just imagine how cute they are! And they are really, really cute!

Have you noticed how hard it is to buy a dress without black being a predominate color? I know we don't have an abundance of clothing stores in our little town, but this is the ONLY dress I found that didn't have black in its color scheme! I'm glad I liked it.

Mr. Good-looking Himself.

The Josh Abdelaziz family all dressed in orange. I thought they all looked great, but thought it was amazing that they could all coordinate like this as orange didn't seem to be a widespread spring wardrobe color. I guess I thought wrong. Several families in church were all dressed in orange! Who knew?

Shallah with her orange-suited friend, Mardell.

I just love our little church!

I love it so much that I want it to grow bigger!

I love every last person in this picture!

(And the ones who didn't make it into the picture, too.)

Our main table only had six adults. Odd for us.

But, Grandpa, Grandma, and Aunt Janice all ate in Grandpa's room to keep him company.

I bought our little chocolate bunnies last year at the after-Easter sales. They've been chillin' in our freezer for a year. All wrapped in their atrociously colored foil. But, disrobed and beribboned, I think they are just darling.

These little fake-moss-covered flying bunnies came from Pier 1. I think they are just too cute when planted in a little rye grass. (The basket and grass was a thank-you gift from Sarah-Kate. I just love decorating with grass! And she knows it. I planted some grass in eggshells like Darcy over at fly through our window, but apparently I didn't take any pictures of them. But, they were sweet.)

Lambchops on the grill.

Food is starting to gather.

Table is getting full.

Two little children's tables and one highchair.

The children thought it was great fun to eat a chocolate bunny with dinner. Diego decided to roll the bunny in his hands as it started to melt. Interesting thing to do.