Yes yes, it's been quite some time since I posted, but I was washing my hair, or trimming the hedges or some such thing. I promise.

This time I'm coming at you with a touching story about my baby daughter. She's 14 months old now and learning new things every day and I am truly amazed and humbled at this precious gift in our midst. Here's a quick rundown of what she's doing lately, then I'll get to the good stuff.
? walking (that's right...full on walking)
? saying real words (up to about 20 or 30 I believe)
? giving kisses and hugs on request (when she's not distracted by something else)
? drinking out of a straw
? She knows her feet, hair, nose and eyes

Jaime and I were eating dinner with Noelle tonight and Jaime decided to play with Noelle by blowing in her face. She just thought that was the funniest thing and started cracking up. So of course Jaime did it a few more times, then as a joke, told Noelle to do it. Well, we've noticed that Noelle is a really good mimic and this time proved to be no exception. Noelle pursed her lips up and blew right back and Jaime. We both about died laughing, and I thought Jaime was going to spit out her drink. So Noelle can blow now...

The other story is really cute. I was reading her a book tonight called Two Hands, Two Feet. It's the story, in rhyme, of a typical day for two little girls. As you might expect, they talk about hands and feet in this book. Remember earlier how I said Noelle knows her hands and feet? That comes into play soon. As I was reading this book, each time I would get to a word that she recognized ("stamp your feet"), she would move the appropriate part of her body. When the story mentioned dancing, she shook her whole body.

Those of you that don't have children just can't understand the feeling you get when you watch your child walk, or talk, or dance, or laugh. It's the most amazing thing and each time I see it, I still get shivers thinking about the trust that God had in me that he would give me this person to care for. Thanks for letting me share.

Round 2!

We've had squirrels taking up residency in our ceilings and attic space on and off since we've moved in, and Andy has already filled in two holes where we thought they might be getting in to keep them from invading. We haven't heard them in the ceilings for quite some time, so thought we had the problem taken care of, but Andy recently found evidence that they have been in the attic above the garage. Where our stuff is stored.

Today, he heard some scurrying while walking out to the carport and realized there was a place he hadn't been aware of that was giving them access. After pulling a board off the front of the carport, we found what we thought might have been a nest - a mess of pine needles, leaves and other debris. And then amidst the debris we found it. A nut. A pecan in fact. This was definitely the doings of a family of squirrels, and now we've got them right where we want them.

This morning we woke up to this lovely sight out of our massive picture window in the living room. SNOW! Finally, for the first time this winter. Well, we've had "flurries" before, but nothing that even really landed on the ground. Andy was very excited, as he's been looking forward to snow all season. We didn't have any in Chicago for Christmas, and he was beginning to think that he wouldn't see any at all this year.

All the schools in the area are closed today, and some people are taking off of work so they don't have to drive in these hazardous conditions. For those of you in my home state of Illinois - no, it's not deeper than it looks. It's just about an inch of snow, maybe two. This kind of snow in Illinois wouldn't change anyone's day. I frequently had to walk several blocks to the bus stop in 4 or more inches of snow (uphill both ways).

There are a variety of factors that cause Nashville to go crazy when it snows. One, it doesn't happen very often so they don't have much of a budget for cleanup. Two, it's pretty hilly and that does make for some slippery roads. Three, these people don't even know how to drive well in heavy rain, so snow is too much to handle. And finally, the schools just want to take some snow days, darn it!

We're still recovering from Noelle being sick, so we probably won't be going out today. (She did sleep all night again last night though!!) Hopefully I can at least bring her out to touch the snow and see what it's like. It will most likely be gone by Monday!