A Life of Little Adventure

I wish I had something more exciting or meaningful to write about.

If I were my sister, I could write about my exciting adventures on the mission field in the Philippines. I could tell you about visiting a church in the dump, sleeping on the beach, speaking at a Compassion International Youth Camp, trying fried crickets, and living in a house with three generations of Filippino Christians.

If I were my mother, I could write about my new car, and how after 22 long years, I am no longer a "mini van mama." I could also tell you about my recent trip to Boston with a friend from work.

If I were my sister Joni, I could write about my new purchase and becoming a "mini van mama." I could also write about how 13-month-old Mallory Jo is entering a new stage of mobility: walking!

I also have friends right now doing missions work and internships in Jamaica, Albania, the Middle East, Guatemala, and soon, Uganda. Others are working at fun summer camps across the country. I am sure they have exciting stories.

Me? Today is my third day at my new job in a little office at the cemetery. The majority of my day passes while I wait for the computer to refresh and load a new page. During today's lunch break, I went to a local Christian bookstore to read a few chapters of David Platt's Radical for Sunday School. [FYI: If you do not damage or remove from the store, they will not make you pay for the book! How great!! :)]

Despite a present lack of adventure in my life, I am grateful - grateful for the sun and for airconditioning, for good books, for an incredible church family, for a Skype date with my fiance last night, for Joni's great assistance in planning my wedding, for challenging and encouraging Scripture, and much etc. etc. etc.

Love love love, Jewel

Cuteness

I have the cutest nieces ever.

Mallory (1-year-old next week!) and Leah (3-years-old in July)

and I'm excited to have another cutie in a few weeks.  Poleak and Malout are having a baby girl!

Love love love, Jewel

"My Auntie is Awesome"

Here's a picture of my precious niece to brighten everyone's day:



Good morning sunshine!
Auntie Jewel loves you, Mallory Jo!

Three Month Pictures:

Baby Mal is three months old! She really is the sweetest baby and is always full of smiles. It's already hard for Aunt Jewel to choose between sitting on the couch and holding Mallory, or running around and playing with older sister Leah, but either way.. I love it!!



Baby #2 is just as sweet as Baby #1!


Yeah, she's a model!


I'm telling you, she's precious!


Look at that face!


This deserves a cute baby award!


She's happy!

Two Years Old!

Little Baby Face is not so little anymore. Two years old!! I can't believe it. After returning from Puerto Rico on Thursday evening, I went with Jessie (twin sis) and my parents to Jeff and Joni's (bro-in-law & sis) to celebrate Leah's second birthday.

Leah is FULL of personality. She loves Gramps and Grams, and she loves every food imaginable (beets are one of her favorites.) She loves to swim and she is fearless. She is a ham behind the camera, and she is actually a ham even when there isn't a camera. She loves attention and she easily gets it with all her little quirks. She isn't talking much yet, but her speech therapist said she has the intelligence of a three-year-old.

Here are Leah's [unedited] two year pictures:

While we at Jeff and Joni's house, I also got in some nice snuggle time with neice #2, Mallory Jo, who is nine-weeks-old today.

Life otherwise...

Life has continued to be eventful since I returned from Mozambique on Monday evening. I spent most of Tuesday with my older sister Joni, brother-in-law Jeff, Baby Face, and Baby Face's younger sister Mallory Jo that was born only a few days before I left for seven weeks.


It was good to see them again, especially Leah and Mallory. I also went with Joni [above] to take Mallory to meet Grandmom for the first time. After dinner Joni, Jeff, Leah, and I went swimming. At 23-months-old, Leah was fearless! She went right to the steps and started walking in! We are going to have to get that baby some sufficient floaties, because she wants FREEDOM in the water. Then we had banana cream pie for dessert and they were gone.

In other news, my friend Nahun's parents are visiting the States for a World Gospel Mission conference at my university. The missions organization WGM is celebrating 100 years of evangelism, and they have come as honored guests and pastors from Honduras. They are living on campus, but I have been hosting them during their time here.

Nahun told them his friend Joya [me] lived in Indiana and that I might be attending the conference since I am so involved in missions, but he didn't remember that I actually attend IWU and live only ten minutes away. So his parents weren't actually expecting me to walk up to them and greet them, "Pastor Fredy Zelya and Sonia Garcia!? I can't believe I'm meeting you here!" I should mention that Nahun and I actually met on Facebook, and we only know each other via Facebook and Skype, but we have been good friends for two years.

I have really enjoyed spending time with Papa Fredy and Mama Sonia. Since we met Thursday evening we have shared a meal at the local mexican restaraunt La Charreada, and at Taco Bell, and we have been to Wal-Mart three times. First, because when you're in Marion, the first thing to see is the Wal-Mart Superstore. The next two times we went for flipflops and candies and souvenirs for the grandkids. I am excited for them to visit my church tomorrow night!I will be sad when they leave and I hope next time they visit, they bring their son - my friend - Nahun.

It's A Girl!

Meet my second niece:

Mallory Jo Sedberry

7 pounds, 8 ounces - 20 inches long

Born at 7:15a - May 2, 2010

I'll post more pictures in the morning, but for now I'll just leave you with this tease while I continue working on sermon and lesson preparations for Mozambique. When will I ever be ready!?

Only FOUR more days.

"All the days ordained for me

were written in Your book

before one of them came to be."

[Psalm 139:16] ♥ ♥ ♥

This baby is ready for a baby

My neice Baby Face is ready for her little brother [or sister] that should be arriving soon!

Christmas Eve traditions..

Merry Christmas to everyone! I'm a little sad, because soon, the Christmas posts will be ended. Anyways..

Every Christmas Eve we go to my aunt's house to celebrate with my dad's family. Lots of food and cousins and pictures and dogs. Mom always gives cheeseballs and crackers, Dad gives coupons for car washes, sister always makes deviled eggs, and the night ends in an agreed, "we should do this more often," but despite the fact that five of the six siblings are within five miles of each other [yes, FIVE], we only gather two or three times a year.

Then Mom, Dad, twin sister [Jessie], and I return home and Jessie and I open new pajamas, and we watch a Christmas movie. We used to put out milk and cookies [although I'm pretty sure neither Jessie nor I actually believed in Santa.]

After Dad and I brutally beat Mom and Jessie in two games of euchre, tonight's movie of choice: A Christmas Story

A Tribute to the Original, Traditional, One-Hundred-Percent, Red-Blooded, Two-Fisted, All-American Christmas...

CLASSIC. [Sidenote: You know what else is classic? Ribbon candy!] I can't believe two of my four roommates haven't seen it! I love it, and my know my parents do also, but they are snoring through it as we speak...

"My kid brother had not eaten voluntarily in over three years," and, "Aunt Clara had for years labored under the delusion that I was not only perpetually 4 years old, but also a girl."

Which brings me to this: What is the worst gift you have ever received, and have you actually ever had soap put in your mouth?

Anyways, here are three pictures from tonight. Who would have thought that the world's cutest 18-month-old little girl would be the party's biggest star? And she is the biggest ham!

Her new favorite game: Feeding Aunt Jewel with her chubby little baby fingers. Chex, Cheerios, and Gold Fish never tasted so good!

Me, niece, and twin sis. LOVE them!

Leah was NOT happy when those bows lost their stickiness and fell off her head!

A second sidenote (and you can have this one for free!): Men of a Certain Age. Seen the previews? They say it is riveting, revolutionary, bittersweet, and has a certain charm of its own. I'm intrigued.

What's cuter than this??

Look at this precious baby face!!

My niece Leah Marie.
I love her.

Baby Face here again...

I have a guest blogger today -- my niece, Leah Marie

HI it's Baby Face here again. Back in April when I was only 9-months-old, Aunt Jewel let me write my first blog and you can read it HERE.

Since then I have perfected my crawl, taken steps on my own, grown hair, grown a mouth full of teeth (including molars), started brushing those teeth, and been told that I'm going to be a big sister in May.

It's been a pretty exciting 16 months of living, and next to eating (I eat absolutely everything by the way), my favorite thing to do is go to Grams and Gramps' house and play with Aunt Jewel and Aunt Jessie.

Right now Aunt Jessie is my favorite, but Aunt Jewel told me that she has a plan. When everyone is giving all their attention to baby #2 that is coming in May, she plans on still loving me and swooping in to be the fave in my life!

So on Saturday, I spent the evening at Grams and Gramps' house with Aunt Jewel and Aunt Jessie. The rest of the blog will detail a few of the things that we enjoying doing that night. Also included should be: chasing the kitty cat Simon, eating dinner, playing with my toys, reading books, and going to sleep.

I can crawl so fast and I like to run my head into walls and the furniture at high speeds!

Here I am with Aunt Jessie (my fave) playing with all the cans and such in the bottom cupboards. Next to chasing Simon, this is my absolute favorite thing to do at Grams and Gramps' house!!

Here I am playing with the telephone. I was amazed that it would stretch so far across the room! Please notice my beautiful bracelets (technically they are infant foot rattles, but I like to wear them on my wrists and shake 'em around!)

Before lotion, pajamas, and two stories, Aunt Jewel gave me a bath. Here I am wet and naked, and reaching for a hug!!

(I told you I had hair and a mouth full of big teeth!)

Well everyone, that is all I have for now.
I don't know when I will be back, but hopefully soon. Poor Aunt Jewel has been so busy preparing for her World Civ. exam tomorrow and her Theology exam on Wednesday, she was only able to take a short short break to monitor me as I wrote.

I love you all (really, I love everyone!),

Bye bye! ♥ Leah Marie (Baby Face)

Little Baby Face has an announcement!!

The big birthday girl!

My niece Leah turned ONE on July 6th. This afternoon Jessie, my parents and I are going down to the house in Fishers to celebrate with her. I can't wait for everything she will learn in the next year!

And from her special day::

The cake! What a mess!

Opening gifts!

Sitting forward in her carseat!

To see more go to her mommy's blog HERE.

Baby Face here, bloggin...

Hey guys it's Leah here....

I'm 9-months-old now and figured it's about time to start blogging...

First, I gotta figure out how this lappy works...

Wheeeee... is that ME on the screen???

Wait, what is that... NASCAR on the TV?