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Today is my wonderful Husband's birthday, and to honor him, Tristan helped bake a beautiful cake. Of course, now he can hardly wait for Daddy to come home so we can eat it! Anastasia said "Down" today! She is getting better with her sign language too. She claps for "more" and her "all done" looks like a baby chick trying to fly away, but she gets her message across.

Today I came up from working in the yard to find Tristan with the broom and mop out. He was using my nice green table cloth to mop the floors after sweeping. Such a good helper. He proceeded to get out the vacuum and is now silently vacuuming the floor of the office. He even vacuumed the shoe bin with the attachment! The big news here is the forest fire in Denver. It has been so dry! We went from playing in the rain, going to Merrymead in the spritz, and rain in our trash can every Tuesday in Pennsylvania to no rain. It has only sprinkled twice in the four months we've been in Colorado. What a shift! It has beeen a dry year for snow also. -Though Tristan is still hoping for one more big storm.- Because it has been so dry a routinely scheduled burn out by Denver got out of control. Now twenty something homes have burned to the ground and a couple people have lost their lives. It is shocking. Thankfully the scheduled burns have been halted until things get under control.

King of the Wind started it, Tristan's love of Marguerite Henry's horse stories. Jason kept King of the Wind from when he was in school and Tristan found it on the shelf in our office. The story about the Godolphin Arabian captured his interest and sometimes bored him, but the illustrations kept him asking for the book again and again. His keen knack for finding books about horses did not fail him last week at the library either. He found and brought to me Misty of Chincotegue another title by Marguerite Henry. We've been enthralled by the story since. Today he wanted to borrow another of Henry's books about horses, but I told him that we have to finish Misty of Chincoteague first. I'm not sure what God has in store for Tristan, but he amazes me sometimes. How can a two year old have a favorite author? Especially one who writes chapter books? Well, I'm not complaining. I am trying to expand my mind, and today I checked a book out for myself. It is a children...

It's here! The madness! Even though my bracket is destroyed the madness has been fun so far. We've seen some good basketball. Go Big Blue!! We've also had some fun out in the warm and sunny weather. I am a strong believer that children are so much more happy when out of doors engaging in God's creation. I also enjoy being outside as much as possible. The kids and I have been doing some yard work getting the beds cleaned up around our home and on the weekends we go hiking! Good times I feel like God is teaching me just how to live in the present moment and to seek to do His will every minute of my life. Like, not just with the "big" stuff but in every word, every action, every thought. It's impossible for me to do on my own and so God is teaching me to pray more, to ask for help, even if it means a thousand times a day. Like, He wants to help me, He wants to be a part of the little things in my life and He is ok with my dependence upon Him. I don't know...

God is so gracious! He knows exactly how much we can handle and this week He's been pushing me to the limit, maybe expanding my limit, for all I know, but it's been kinda rough. Then yesterday it's like all things good just came. Like a dam of blessings busted and needless to say, I was kind-of emotionally spent by bedtime. Only to be awoken an hour later by my wonderful hubby (who rides my emotional waves with such sympathetic calm) letting me know that Aiden Cartwright Pennington was born. A new nephew! My first nephew! I am so excited! Another blessing of the Lord. God is so good and gracious. He is showing me that when I am out of control, that's actually awesome, because then He can be in control. You know, I want God in the driver's seat of my life, and at times I feel like I'm on the passenger side going, "watch on the left!, they're stopping ahead! Aaaggghhh!!" when I need to be resting in the knowledge that He is so much greater than I am....

These past few days have been fun. Denver Aquarium on Saturday when the wind chill made it tough to be outdoors. Yesterday, biking and running and playing in the back yard in the sunshine that made it feel like 80 degrees. Today the temperature gauge reads 85 outside and all my windows are open to air out the house. Wednesday will be cold again, but today is a good day for cleaning the house:) Tristan also poopied in the potty, finally, yesterday! Hopefully he can keep it up. We'll see:)

The idea of Jesus as king is a recurring theme in our home. Tristan is fascinated by the idea of Jesus as the Mighty King! Of course, this is a common theme for praise and worship songs and so we have the conversation about Jesus as King often. Anytime he hears the word King, Tristan immediately chimes, Jesus is King! Reading through the book of Judges, this phrase struck me. "In those days Israel had no king, so the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes." (Judges 17:6 NLT) This phrase, or a variation of this phrase is repeated throughout the last few chapters of the book. Of course, immediately following Judges, the poeple cry out to God for a king and the books of 1 and 2 Samuel are followed by 1 and 2 Kings. Having a king did not solve Israel's sin problem any better than the judges were able to, and by the end of 2 Kings, the people of Israel were in total slavery. I realized that Israel needed to acknowledge God as their King. He wants to reign supreme....