New Photos

We've posted Abby's 16 month photos and a few from our trip to the outer banks in North Carolina. The top photo gives a glimpse of what everyday life with Abby is like, always a fun and exciting adventure! Click below to view.

16 Months

East Coast

Mommy Blog Meme - Looking to 2010

I decided to try out my first meme ever! This one happens to be located at momdot.com.

Want to join in? Go here to learn how and to view the weekly list Small Talk Six topics for 2009.

Today’s topic is “6 things you are looking forward to in 2010.” You can answer this with a list of 6 words, 6 phrases, 6 sentences, 6 paragraphs, 6 photos, 6 videos, etc . . .

This past year passed so quickly with Mat getting laid off, Abby's first birthday, Mat landing his "dream" job, relocating to from California to North Carolina, and relying heavily on Jeremiah 29:11.

For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. -Jeremiah 29:11

We are really looking forward to the following in 2010:

1. Abigail. Watching my daughter grow, mature, learn to talk, refine many of her skills, and have so much fun while doing it.

2. Mathew. Growing in Christ alongside my husband of five years and spending quality time with him and with our family.

3. Christ. Deepening my faith in and commitment to Jesus. We hope to find a church family to call home.

4. Materialism. Fully give up all traces of materialism in my life...I hope. If anyone has any tips, I'd love to hear them.

5. North Carolina. Developing new or closer friendships.

6. Proverbs 3:5-6. Trust in the LORD with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make your paths straight.

Miss Mary

"If I had money like you Miss Joy, I'd done go to the beauty parlor to get my hair done."

This comment really put things in perspective for me as I thought about Miss Mary's life as a single woman, whose job is keeping the Athletic Department clean, where Mat and I work. I am so blessed to have a husband, who has a full-time job, a beautiful baby girl, and a job myself. I really don't have money to get my hair done at the "beauty parlor", but it was interesting that she thought I did.

Athletic Department

Mat and I usually see Mary every morning when we go into work. She is such a hardworking sweetheart. We are both enjoying our jobs, for the most part. My job averages out to be about two hours a day, five days a week. I mainly shuffle papers from person to person and keep track of the athletic budget. I share an office with two other ladies, the men's golf coach, and the assistant director of compliance.

Soccer season is now over for Mat, and we are both looking forward to the off season. Mat's job will now involve more recruiting, which Abby and I can join him for, fund raising, scheduling games, off season training, and much, much more! Mat is thinking about possibly starting an optional bible study for the team. I think this would be wonderful!

Abby, Mat, and I have all had cold/flu/throw-upy yuckinees the past week. During all of this, Mat was away for two overnight trips within six days. This was hard on all of us, especially for Mat when he had to drive home six hours with a fever. Abby has learned to Moo like a cow, which sound like, "boooooo". She's also become surprisingly picky when it comes to food. I'm hoping this is only due to not feeling well. As I type, she is poking her cantelope and mushing her cheese, two of the foods that she still loves.

New Pics and Tricks

We finally have our computer back after 9ish days of living without it! In the mean time, I've been catching up on reading, Mat's been busy traveling with soccer, and Abby's been learning new tricks such as kissing the baby in the mirror and suctioning her ear to my shoulder after a shower. I've uploaded Abby's 15 month pictures have been uploaded, Yay! To access them, click on the link to the right, as usual.

Baby Signs

We started teaching our baby, Abby, sign language around nine months of age. She was a little too young for this, which I didn't realize at the time, so I gave up and thought she was just too stubborn. When she was around twelve months, I saw an 18 month old doing the sign for please before he was given food. After seeing this, I thought to myself, "hmm, maybe I should try and teach Abby again." I started out teaching her please before she could have her animal crackers or other snacks. At first, she wasn't too happy about it and made her emotions evident by throwing a mini tantrum every time I made her sign. Once she mastered "please", we moved on to the words "food" and "more". I thought the essentials would be best to start out with.

Abby began picking up sign language fairly quickly and uses the words she knows on a regular basis. As a parent, it makes communicating so much easier for me and her. She is now up to 11 words, at 15 months of age, including, "please", "thank you", "more", "food", "pacifier", "up", "taste", "milk", "hi", "hot", and "come", with a few more on the way. We are in the process of teaching her "water", "juice", "mommy", and "daddy". The only words she is verbally able to say clearly are "Mama" and "Dada". Signing gave her the chance to communicate where she would have otherwise not been able to.

I have found that she learns best when I focus on one word at a time and use the word as much as possible until she masters it. Of course, when she learns a word we get really excited and tell her what a good job she's doing. There are many sources to help out in teaching a baby sign language. I prefer looking the word up online, where it is free and easily accessible. Once I have a new word in mind that I would like to teach her, I go to the American Sign Language Pro (ASLPro) website and teach myself how to say the word in sign language. I then begin to use the sign language whenever I am giving Abby that object or doing the action. I will also take her hand and show her how to do it. Babies signs look different than when adults sign, so I'm always watching for Abby trying to sign. Now, whenever she wants her pacifier, I have her say "pacifier" before I will give it to her. She is now to the point where she comes up to me and does the sign for "food" if she's hungry, "all done" when she's finished eating, "up" when she wants to be held, etc.

I would encourage any parent wanting to more easily communicate with their baby to give sign language a try. It has made our life easier and has definitely been worth it.

Have any questions? Leave us a comment, or even if you don't have questions, we love getting comments :)

New Shoes

We're still on our church hunt, and ready to find a home! We went to another new church today, but it is still not one to call our own. Abby had a wonderful time playing in the nursery, and they were even kind enough to change the poopy diaper that she had when we dropped her off, te he he. Or, maybe it was that they couldn't stand the smell...hmmm.

I feel like I haven't seen my baby all day. After church she went immediately down for a nap, actually she fell asleep on the way home and slept until two. Once awake, we swept her immediately away to Aunt Jolynn's and Uncle Randy's house for an evening of dirt, dishes, and dinner. Meanwhile, in the phelps family vehicle, daddy and mommy were off to Chesapeake for a little Best Buy, Babies R Us, and bread sticks. I know it's pathetic, we went to Babies R Us on our date, but it's not everyday that we're close enough to pop in, plus we had a gift card.

Abby at the Harrell House

While at Babies R Us we bought Abby two new pairs of shoes, because hers are getting too small and we wanted to keep her little tootsies warm. After bringing the baby back home from Giant Aunt Randy and Aunt Jolynn's house, she went exploring in the shopping bag and pulled out her new shoes. She was so excited about the new shoes, and couldn't decide which to wear, so she ended up with one fuzzy pink boot on her left foot and one dusty pink Converse like tennis shoe on the right.

The New Fuzzy Boot

Favorite Pastime

Lately, Abby has been enjoying eating crayons. At some point she was coloring and sneakily hid a blue crayon somewhere where mommy and daddy couldn't find it. She's a little like a dog hiding it's bones, but I don't think she remembers where she puts things, she just happens upon them every so often, such as the case with the blue crayon. I thought she was to the point where she enjoyed coloring with the crayons more than eating them, but apparently she enjoys them equally. All this to say, I found her today with bits of blue around her mouth, pursed lips, and a refusal to open her mouth. When I was finally able to pry open her mouth, out popped the crayon, and down went Abby into a helpless heap on the floor.

Church

We've been looking for a church since we moved, and still haven't found one that we feel like God is telling us to make our home church. So far, we've been to five, three Baptist, one Assembly of God, and one non-denominational. For the most part, the churches have all been very traditional. It has been difficult being away from our Brookside Family, please pray that we find a church soon.

**Quick commercial break: Garfield just snuggled up to Squirt and they're sleeping together on the couch. Sooo Cute!**

My aunt and I were shopping on Saturday and when we checked out, they asked for my phone number. Of course, I started with the area code, 909, and she almost wet her pants, because she was from Rancho Cucamonga, and moved back east to start a church. The location of the church is about 40 mins. away from our house, but we're still going to check it out. We've also been invited several times to join a Sunday school class at a local church for a 40 day program. We may go to that, not sure yet though.

Abby Antics

During dinner tonight, our little Abigail began waving at the fruit fly that was buzzing around her high chair. I didn't even notice the fly, but I always have to remember that everything is still new to her. After dinner I was using the restroom and when I came out, I found the baby girl standing on the dining room table, in the dark, because she had climbed up there to flip the light switch off, her new favorite activity. I even had all of the chairs pushed in, so she had to pull the chair out before climbing up. What are we going to do with our little acrobat? I was reading "Where the Sidewalk Ends" to Abby, while she was having her bedtime snack, and I was reading a poem that went through various animals on a farm, as soon as the word, "dog" left my lips she was up and barking. She's a very good little barker, and an almost better meower.

Dress up

Abby has decided that her new favorite game is to play dress up...with Squirt, our dog. She loves him so much, and he really doesn't like her much at all :( Poor Abby. When she decides it's dress up time, she'll follow him around until she catches up to him, then try and put various articles of clothing on him, such as her feet pajamas on his head, needless to say, he hates it. Abby has also discovered mommy's undergarment drawer, which is low enough for her to dig around in, and has a fun time trying to fit as many articles of clothing over her head as possible.

Busy Day

Abby and I had a fun and eventful day today. It was a nice switch from the usual, semi-boring routine. We started the day off by meeting two other women, and their children at Mug Shotz, a local coffee shop. Abby played with Peter, who calls her "Applegail" and tried to sit on the toy piano several times.

Next, we headed to the office for about 30 minutes, then went to the preschool age program at the library. The kids learned how to stop, drop, and roll, got to try on firefighting gear, climb around in the firetruck, see the lights, hear the siren, and make their own mini-fireman (Abby's looked more like a mini mess with a head). She was super cute, and kept walking up to all the adults to give hugs during the program.

After picking out a few new library books for Daddy to read to Abby at night, we went back to the office to pick up daddy, who took over Abby duty, while I took over my role as Athletic Business Manager. Abby and daddy had lunch and a nap. Everything else was the usual, until dinner, when Abby and I went to the 1st Baptist Church for dinner. Abby ate a wonderful meal, ran around with more kids, and, her favorite part, played in the curtains. We were even introduced in front of everyone as first time visitors :)

Sylvan Heights

Abby and I were able to spend the whole day with Mat yesterday, which we were really excited about, so we took a day trip to Sylvan Heights Waterfowl Park. They have the largest collection of waterfowl in one place in the world, and Abby loved all the birds.


Baby Chicks who just hatched!

Abby on the playground

To see more pictures click here

Bathroom Sink

Our little Miss Abigail is quite the climber, she can now climb onto the couches, into her stroller, onto the dining room chairs, into the tub, and into her high chair. This morning we even found her sitting inside the bathroom sink, eating soap. Needless to say, this was a bit alarming, because SHE COULD FALL!!!! AHHHH!!! Okay, just calm down. So, we take her down and she's up there a few minutes later. Now, we have to keep the bathroom door closed which aided in all the things that upset Abby this morning and caused her to throw her little body down onto her bedroom carpet floor in a tantrum. Poor little baby. By the time she finally calmed down, she fell right to sleep in daddy's arms wrapped in her blankie fresh out of the dryer. Needless to say, it was easy to put her down for her nap today :)

Small Town

There have been many indications that we're living in a small town since we've moved here. I'll list a few, some are funny, some silly, and some frustrating!!

1. I've seen four instances of people riding in vehicles in a very odd manner. 2 people were riding in trunks with their legs sticking out, one person was riding a tractor that was being pulled by a truck on a trailer, and the last was a little boy riding on the top of the back seat of a convertible, who happened to be Chowan's president's grandson. Ahhh, it's not safe!

2. While pumping gas the automatic shut-off did not shut off and I found a gasoline waterfall running out of my car.

3. Banking situations. The first was when our bank was supposed to put a hold on our checks, but another teller whispered that we worked for Chowan, so it was okay. Phew, we narrowly managed to escape that hold. The second hold, of 11 business days, was put on one of our checks because it was from CA and they didn't know us...grrr.

4. The distances we drive: 1/2 hour to Wal-mart, 45 mins. to a contemporary church service, 1.5 hrs. babies r us and the closest mall, 2 hours to Trader Joes!

5. Our lawn is the favorite pee spot of the neighbor dogs.

6. People tell me that my backpack for Abby is "such a neat new thing" when my mom had one for me when I was a baby.

7. Customer service just isn't the same. The DMV, which only deals with license plates and nothing else, had an employee telling a customer about a man who thought the people on TV were watching him and he walks around the house nude and he has lost control of his bladder. She then looks at me and says, "Dimentia." She finishes her story to the customer, who is the only other one in the room, and says to me, "you need to sign something don't you." I say, no, I just had a question. Then she helps me. Tee he he. Funny, to say the least.

8. All the shops in town close for three day weekends (well, almost all).

I would love to post some new pics of Abby, but I don't have any, due to the fact that my camera is missing...still :(

Rain!

It's been raining here for two days :) It's so nice to have a break from the hot weather, especially since it doesn't feel as humid when the temp. is a little cooler outside. All is going well with us here in our tiny town. Mat's team lost by one goal in his last game, which is much better than it has been.

I promised I would finish our moving story two days ago, so here goes. After Mat, My parents, and I finally finished peeling off three layers of contact paper and paint from the cabinet shelves, sweeping, mopping, scrubbing, replacing a broken toilet (our fault), removing four layers of linoleum in the bathroom, and putting down a new one we were finally ready to unpack. By this time it was close to Wednesday and my parents were leaving Monday morning. By the time they left we were able to get the whole kitchen, most of Abby's room and a few boxes here and there in the other rooms unpacked. Phew! Now we are in a routine of going to work, taking care of Abby and unpacking when we get the chance.

Please pray that we find the church that God wants for us. Ta ta for now!

Home sweet home

We are now in our new home and life is finally beginning to slow down a bit. Life has been crazy over the past two week moving in, visiting with family, meeting college staff and students, starting our jobs, and adjusting to life in the south. It has been an exciting, sad, shocking, and tiring experience. Mat is settling in with his new role as Men's Soccer Coach, and I am training to become the Business Manager for the athletic office and, as usual, we're both still learning how to be Abigail's parents. Still seems weird when I read that I'm a parent.

The move went fairly smoothly, Mat, Abby, and I flew out on Monday, August 17, and my wonderful parents (yes, we know and appreciate how great they are) drove a moving truck, in four day, all the way across the country, with all of our stuff, two cats, and Squirt. They only had some minor hiccups, such as driving through a torrential down pour, bathing and clipping poopy/peepy soaked cats, and staying in a moldy hotel. While they were driving the three Phelps' stayed with Uncle Randy (dad's brother) and Aunt Jolynn. Abby loved Lucy the cat, but she didn't like Ab so much. The soccer team helped us move all of our belongings in on Friday then we discovered all the cleaning that had to be done, ewwwww. Renting here is not like renting in so. cal.

Ok, I'm tired of writing, so I'll finish catching everyone up to date tomorrow. As for where we are at right now, Abby is down for her nap and Mat is away at his fourth soccer game, someplace four hours away. He couldn't find enough drivers, due to an away football game that the whole town was going to, so they had to rent a bus, which made a big dent in his budget. Abby and I walked down Main street today, only to discover that almost every place was closed for the three day weekend. Hmmm, definitely not used to that. We did find a park behind the Baptist church that is open to the public, which was a wonderful blessing :) She loves going to the park.

I'll upload some photos of our new place/town as soon as I find my camera. Been missing for a while, and I'm really hoping and praying that I didn't leave it in the rental car.

Moving across the Country

We are all packed up and ready to roll tomorrow morning to the airport. Our wonderful friend Melissa is driving us and we will arrive on the East Coast tomorrow night. God has been so amazing through this whole process, and it has been obvious that his hand has been at work in every detail on both ends. We are so grateful to all of our Brookside family for all of their love and support over the years that we've been in Redlands. We are going to miss everyone terribly, but are looking forward to the new opportunity, and super excited to finally have a job! Thanks again for all of your prayers!

He's Back!

Mat returned from the east coast last night after a whirlwind trip of 6 meetings and meeting the team. Abby was especially glad to have him home. She had been looking for him every morning and waving goodnight to him at night. She was even looking for him in his pillow case. We will find out sometime today if he got the job, then we just have to figure out all the little details. Thanks for all your prayers and support!

East Coast

Ahhhhh, it's actually a possibility, Mat is flying out tomorrow for an interview. His flight leaves in the a.m. and returns Wed. p.m. He's going to miss youth group :( Makes me sad. So many questions, and so little answers, hopefully we'll know some more concrete details on Wed. Please pray.

Many Changes

It's been a long, long time since we've published anything and that is largely because of all the changes happening in our lives. To start with, new pictures of Abby have been posted.

To start with, the six of us, Mat, Joy, Abby, Squirt, Garfy, and Skeetsy, moved in with my parents at the beginning of June. We thought it was a little ridiculous to keep renting an apartment when neither of us had a job. Well, actually, Mat had just started his club coaching job, but that wasn't bringing in any income, as the team was brand spankin' new.

To keep it brief, Mat has now applied for well over 100 jobs, had 1 interview, soon to be 2, and has had 0 job offers. Mat is coaching a U-19 Titans club team, which he is now getting paid for, and has his final exam for his first class for his master's in Coaching and Athletic Administration this week. He has gotten a 100% on all of his assignments so far, keep your fingers crossed. He will be starting two more classes next quarter. He is still the wonderful youth pastor at Brookside Church and a wonderful father and husband.

Joy has started working with Kari, the associate pastor at our church, for three days a week. She loves spending time with Kari and is able to bring Abby with her. Joy also helped start a women's bible study at Church and is loving that. She also helps with all of the office type work for the youth and is thinking about starting discipleship groups for the youth. Joy still loves being a mommy and watching Abby girl grow and change.

Abby is keeping busy, as usual. She has learned to walk, wave, blow her nose, blow kisses, now has eight teeth, and still loves grapes and berries. Abby loves her baby doll, ducky, dirt, sand, mud, bubbles, playing with her two best friends, Jacob and Elijah, anything shiny, especially jewelry, or "Bling" as my mom says. She can say Mama, dada, and a few other words. Rick and Diane have been a huge help with Abby and she loves being able to see grandma and grandpa everyday.

Thanks for all your prayers and support!

New Abby Photos

Abby's 9 month photos have been posted.

She got to see great grandpa and grandma Phelps last night and had lots of fun crawling around their hotel room and being noisy, as usually. She actually let grandpa hold her for a few minutes, without squirming, which was amazing.

We are still waiting for those little teeth to pop through, only one has shown up so far. Another is about to make it's entrance, but it seems a little shy. Abby got her first new pair of shoes today. We're going to Disney Land next Saturday to celebrate My dad's and Elody's birthday and we thought it would probably be a good idea for her to have a pair of shoes that fit :)

We've been busy packing. Only 6 days left, Yikes!

Week 3 of the job hunt during prayer and fasting

Day 1: Mat got in touch with his school and figured out everything he needs to do.

Day 2: Joy picked up the job application for Mat and he filled the whole thing out in about 10 mins.

Day 3: Not much on the job front, we had youth group and spent most of the day preparing for that. We did pray for Mat during accountability though. We decided to move in with Joy's parents.

Day 4: Mat received a call from the varsity coach asking if he was interested in coaching a club team. He called the mom in charge of the team and is meeting with the team next Tues. Mat was also able to find out where to turn his other job application in at. Joy got in touch with the charter school she applied at and her credential analyst.

Day 5: Mat talked to the contact about the driving job. It turned out to not be what he was expecting. It would involve driving to Orange County daily and overtime.

Day 6: Joy found out that the charter school is only hiring teachers who already hold their clear credential :( She only has her preliminary.

Day 7: We went to church and a night of worship. Two people were given references to fill out for Mat's grad school.

Week 4

Day 1: Mat got in contact with his best friend, who works at William Jessup, and he's putting in the good word for Mat. Our LIFE group continued to pray for us during our weekly meeting.

Day 2: Mat heard back from the soccer coach from William Jessup, who would like Mat to work with the team if he is able to find employment there. We received a very encouraging e-mail from a member of our church about trusting in God to provide a job. It lifted our spirits! Joy heard from her credential analyst, who knows a possible job contact for teaching in a Riverside charter school. Mat also had his first day of soccer coaching, it seemed to go well.

Day 3: Mat continued to apply for Jobs all across the country, which he has been doing all along.

Day 4: Nothing New.

Day 5: Mat heard from school and everything except his transcripts are in. Mat's family came to town for Melissa's graduation. We had dinner with his grandparents.

Day 6: Packing, packing, packing.

Day 7: Melissa's graduation.

Things Too Great

"I do not seek, O Lord, to penetrate thy depths. I by no means think my intellect equal to them: but I long to understand in some degree thy truth, which my heart believes and loves. For I do not seek to understand that I may believe, but I believe, that I may understand."

-Anselm, an 11th century English monk

Jeremiah 29:11

For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future. -Jeremiah 29:11

I have been seeing this verse absolutely everywhere. At a time where we are unsure of our future, it is very encouraging. A few times that I've seen it in our lives were first, my bible study leader had us read it a few weeks ago. Second, when Cathy sent my birthday card with that verse written in it. Mat and I play frisbee golf once a week and I looked over and saw it written accross the back of a car. Then, yesterday, it was a huge part of my bible study homework! Yay God! I love it when he communicates super clearly :)

A quick note about Abby:

She discovered her belly button on Monday. Her favorite game is still peek-a-boo. Abby tried to eat poop at the park, but Mat, being the amazing dad that he is, rushed to her side and popped that poopey right out of her mouth. She is climbing all over EVERYTHING! I was talking with a youth and turned away from her for a few seconds and when I looked back she was halfway up a flight of stairs. Other times it's been on a box, in the dishwasher, on the cat post. She sure is fun!

Week 2 of Prayer and Fasting

Our LIFE group is still fasting and praying for us, because we are still waiting for a job! God has been good this week, no job yet, but good none the less.

Day 1: Mat decided he was going to go to grad. school :)

Day 2: A friend of Joy's told her about a friend of a friend who has a job opening delivering medical supplies.

Day 3: Mat got in touch with the person who has the job opening.

Day 4: Mat tried to figure out how to pick up the application for the job (it's happening on Tues.).

Day 5: A day of rest.

Day 6: Mat finished filling out the FAFSA for school.

Day 7: We celebrated Mother's Day, Yay!

Abby Update

This morning Abby and I were in her room and Garfield came flouncing in and I said, "Here comes the kitty." Abby then tried to say kitty, but it just came out as "key." So cute! I love the baby babble. She is beginning to try and say a few words. She has "mama" and "dada" down, and is working on "Bumper" (my parents dog) pronounced "Bumpa," "Baby" = "bebe" and hi. We think she calls herself baby, which we often refer to her as, and Abby also sounds like baby. I know, it's confusing, but it's fun :) She also says hi, but I'm not sure she knows what it means.

Recently Abby has also learned to clap and kiss with her mouth open. We ask for a kiss and make a kissy sound and she give us a big, opened mouth, wet one, yummy! Today she also started playing peek-a-boo by herself. She would hold whatever was in her hand over her face and wait or not, for us to say, "where's Abby?" Then the idea is that she'd pull it off and we'd say, "boo." But sometimes she just gets too excited and does the whole process before we get any words out. One last thing she is learning is how to share. Mat said, "we didn't even have to teach her!" She shares her pacifier, sippy cups, gooey cookies, and more (you're jealous, I know). Next time you see her, I'll be sure and save some cookie for you.

Four more teeth are very rudely making themselves at home in Abby gums. They are all on top and only one has poked through so far. I'm checking her mouth every morning, but all I keep seeing are swollen gums with the outline of teeth on them. Hurry it up teeth!

We went to the park yesterday, as we do every Sunday afternoon, and most of the time we were on the grass, Abby was bear crawling around. We saw a Dr. who attends our church and he was watching Abby crawl around and pull herself up on the stroller, and he thought she might be walking in a month. Yay, I'm excited! People keep saying that she'll get into more things, but I really don't see how that's possible, I'll let you know when she starts though. I have been wrong about various other major events in my life before, such as thinking being married or having a child wouldn't be as much work as they actually are.

Review of Week One

Members of our life group have now been fasting and praying for God to provide Mat with a job for one whole week! Thank you so much :)

Day 1: Mat was able to get an incredible amount of applying done (7 applicaitons), and we found out that our rent will be lowered.

Day 2: Nothing new.

Day 3: Mat received a phone call from the Cal Baptist soccer coach, giving him advice on starting his collegiate soccer coaching career.

Day 4: Mat talked to a lady from William Jessup University about job openings, he called her, but it still counts as something!

Day 5: Joy received an email from on online teaching position she applied for in January. They are going to contact her in 4-6 weeks.

Day 6: Our day of rest, ahhhh.

Day 7: We received a check from a member of our church to help support our family until Mat finds a job.

Thanks for your prayers! God has been and is good to us :)

Why Life with Abby is so humorous

1. It's not every day I get to tell another person to get her mouth off of the garbage can, only every other day.

2. Mat talks to Abby the same way as he talks to the dog...no, sit, stay.

3. When Abby finishes her meal, she gets a whole second one with the contents of her bib.

4. We get to talk about poop.

5. We are raising an expert in escaping naked from stinky situations.

Life Group

I'm convinced that we probably have the best LIFE Group in the whole world. We've been sharing some of our job concerns with the group and, of course, they've been praying for us since we found out about Mat losing his job. We meet on Monday nights, and last week, the idea of fasting and praying for us was brought up as something to do until Mat finds or is offered a job. We thought this sounded great, but didn't seem to really go anywhere until we received an e-mail mid-week asking our group members about it. We didn't realize it until Monday night, but the time of fasting and prayer began Monday morning and we had several good things happen.

The first took place when we went into our rental office to give our 30 day notice. We have a new manager now, and we haven't been very impressed by him, but then again, it seems like we're always finding little things to complain about...another thing I need to give over to God (Thank you Jesus that I am saved by grace and not by works). Anyway, he asked us what was going on, found out Mat is a pastor and actually lowered our rent for the next two months instead of raising it :) Whoopie! Yay God! When he was working in his office, the assistant said to us, "He never does this, it must be because of God."

We didn't even realize the second had happened until we were at LIFE group. Mat was able to apply for between seven and eight jobs in one day. I thought, "wowzers, that's a lot" and he made up some excuse about being able to use the same resume and cover letter for them all. Needless to say, this is the first time he has come close to being able to apply for this many in one day. Yay God again!

Even though we've had all this amazing stuff occuring around us, he is still without work, and I feel like we're being attacked. Great things happen yesterday, but not without much conflict within our home :( At least we realize this now, ah the beauty of hindsight. Please continue to pray for us!

May

Please join us in praying that Mat finds or is offered a Job in May. Our rent is going to skyrocket in June, so we will be giving our notice on May 1st, that we will be moving out. This means the packing must begin...ugh! Moving again, for the 4th time since we've been married.

You may have noticed that we've changed the blog up a little. The links to the left are some things that are important to us in our lives, like church, Elody's photography business, and the Eden Projects. Check em' out and we'll add more periodically.

Abby is sleeping, something that she's been very good at lately by the way. Yay! I like getting sleep. Mat is trying to shove donuts and cupcakes down my throat! Tell him to stop! I don't think he understands that I'm trying to lose the rest of the baby weight. The cats are fighting in the hall and Squirt is begging Mat for some of his cupcake. Mat made the cupcakes for me for my birthday, how nice of him. Funfetti...mmmm...my favorite :)

Little Fish

We took Abby swimming today and will post pictures in a little bit. They're on the camera right now, so that means I have to get them off of the camera, and that's a lot of work! She wasn't too sure about it, and I don't blame her, because the pool was so hot it felt like a bath tub...ewww. We got kicked out a little later, because a maintenance man by to test the water and said it was not good for us to be swimming in it :(

On the brighter side, we were changing Abby to get ready to go swimming and she escaped as soon as we had her diaper off. We decided to let her be free in her birthday suit for a few minutes and found her peeing next to the cabinet, ha ha! It was a good laugh.

Food Fight

We celebrated my birthday and my wonderful friend Melissa babysat Abby for us! When we got home, Mel told us that Abby wasn't really too interested in eating, and instead wanted to throw her dinner at Mel! Ahhhh! She had dinner spots all over her, te he he. Life is always an adventure :)

Long Long Time

It's been a while since we've updated Abby's blog, but we'll try and be a little more on top of things now. Abby now has two teeth and is teething again. It seems like she's always teething! Abby has discovered the toilet bowl...oh boy! As I type, I can hear my Mat saying, "no, I'm using the toilet, you don't need to stick your hands in it" ha ha!

Abby got to finally meet my best friends Sarah and Julianne. That was lots of fun! Abby loves all of our pets, but they're not too sure of her, actually they don't really like her at all. They run when they see her coming.

Abby's favorite thing to wear is nothing. She always tries to crawl away when she's having her diaper changed, even when she's on the changing table. She also tries to crawl out of the shopping cart when she's strapped in. Speaking of crawling, she is crawling now, if you hadn't already figured that out and is pulling herself up on everything. Today she figured out how to open the sliding glass door. Lookout world, here comes baby!

Food is the new love of Abby's life. She will eat just about anything we give her, and gets very excited when it's time to eat, whoopie! This makes me happy, because apparently I didn't like to eat when I was younger, don't know what happened there :) Mat is still looking for a job, so please keep us in your prayers!