It's been a LONG while!

I was taking things over to "Taking off with the Reeds" for a while, and got super busy with ministry partnership stuff, but since that's on hold right now... I have time to blog again! :)

My little one is 18 months now. Amazing. Seriously I don't know what happened. Well actually I kinda do, but it's still amazing that she is such a fun, adorable, clever little one. You'd think with travelling as much as we did in the past year and unfortunately watching as much television as we ended up watching she'd be stunted somehow, but she continually surprises me.

She turned 18 months on Monday and we have her 18 month appointment with the doctor tomorrow. I am curious as to what he'll say. I know I've been amazed at all the milestones she's met. Sometimes I don't even know the exact time she meets them. I just randomly decide one day to ask her to do things or say things and she says them.

Right now she babbles rather than talks. I think that's pretty normal. She can say a variety of words when she feels like it and quite a few animal sounds. I am not really surprised with her lack of sentences because Eric and I don't talk a ton when we're at home. We both are quieter people, so it would make sense that the little one is quieter too. I am making an effort to get her to play groups so she can be around other kiddos, and I think that is really helping things to progress. I am also trying to read to her more.

The other day she surprised me by saying "night night" when she pulled out her Goodnight Gorilla book. That was about a month ago. For a few months she's been saying, "Amen" after we pray with her at night. That's especially sweet. She LOVES the cat. So she'll pull Eric towards the garage and just meow at him to let him know she wants to see the cat. Anytime she sees a cat she meows. I wish I liked cats more! But I don't. Anyone want a cat before she gets way too attached?

Our daughter is a techie baby for sure. She loves computers and gadgets like her parents. Several times we've given her our cell phones and she's either tried to call someone or txt them. One time when she snuck into the office she started writing an e-mail....an e-mail at 1 1/2 years old. I know this type of technical skill would make other parents shudder. But we welcome it. I like that she knows how to turn things on. I like that she is growing in all her skills. We are monitoring things of course, and don't let her have free reign over everything. She knows boundaries, or well... is learning them.

I can't wait until we find out where Eric's going to work next. Then we can all feel more settled. This being in limbo is definitely hard on our whole family. Hopefully we find out this week! I'll write more when I can. It's kinda hard with both laptops down and when my husband needs to use this computer. As great as the iPad is... it's not the same as a REAL computer.

Ten Month Jenna Letter

My dearest Jennavieve,

What a crazy month this has been for you baby lady. It's been full of change for everyone in our family. This past month Momma and Daddy have been frantically getting the house ready and ourselves ready to go to Candidacy at Mission Aviation Fellowship! You've been very patient with us and have been absolutely wonderful. Lots of times Momma had to have you watch Blues Clues or Sid the Science kid so she could get things accomplished in the house. It was a hard time for momma to have to make you watch so much tv, but we got through it!

This past month you've really started to crawl everywhere and pull yourself up on everything. Sometimes you even stand a little bit. You still carry around a toy with you wherever you go. It's really amazing to see your little mind always working. You've determined that you can now follow us where we go and it's fun to see how much you are growing. We expect you to be able to walk by the time this MAF candidacy is over with! You are talking much more also which is fun to see. Sometimes you even use hand expressions. We can't really understand what you are saying, but you are talking to us and we love it.

Right now you are with us at Mission Aviation Fellowship in Nampa, Idaho. We are here for five weeks for our candidacy for MAF. Your first babysitter is a gal we were with at an aviation camp. She hasn't had too much experience with babies, but you seem to like her so that's great. She's super nice and I am sure after this time is over, you'll really enjoy her. I must admit it is nice to see how much you love momma and daddy though when we come through the door!

We hope with the Lord's guidance to make the best decision possible regarding your future. We know that what happens in this next five weeks will affect your entire life! We want you to know we love you and want the best for you. We're excited to see where this road leads us.

Love,

Momma

Jenna's 9 month letter

Dear Jennavieve,

My how you've grown and developed these past few months! We've hit a milestone, month 9! As you get more active these letters get harder and harder to complete on time. I'll try to write one at least until your first birthday, then after that....we'll see how frequently I can do them!

Right now you're napping in the swing, or hopefully going to nap in the swing. Momma needs to get the hang of having you nap in the crib. I must say though, it's nice when you do nap in the swing because you get a good 2 hours of rest at least which means that momma gets 2 hours to do what she needs to do around the house and for MAF. We have a little less than a month before we leave to go to Mission Aviation Fellowship for their summer candidacy. I must say, momma's a little nervous because you have to spend your days with someone else for a month! So much can happen in a month and momma hopes she doesn't miss too much while we're in classes. Momma's also nervous about leaving you with someone we've never met for those hours. BUT while Momma is nervous about things, she knows it's important to trust in God with the things we can't control and even the things we can. We know that God will protect you always, even when momma and daddy have to be in class.

We are super excited to be joining Mission Aviation Fellowship this summer though. Because God's called us to be long-term missionaries it means that you'll get to explore the world, learn about new cultures and learn new languages. You'll also get to see more clearly what it is to really live by faith and how to impact those around you with that faith. We are really excited you are going to get this opportunity. It will be a drastically different lifestyle than the one you've been living the past few months, but we think you'll like it even better.

But back to what's been happening in the here and now! Well lately you've been crawling ALL over the place. Climbing into bookcases, under chairs, under your exersaucer and wherever you can fit. You've also been using your hands to pull yourself up onto whatever you can find and you "cruise" (or walk) along the sofas, boxes, chairs and anything else that's your height. You love bringing a little friend along with you in your travels and often are seen carrying something either in one hand, both hands or even your mouth! You are a very smart little lady and figure out how to take things with you, even when it seems pretty difficult! We are amazed daily at what you figure out how to do! Lately you've also carried two toys with you and sometimes you bang those toys together to make sounds. You love bouncy balls,cars, airplanes and you adore your ride on bike and ride on car.

Momma's been feeding you breakfast daily now and dinner daily. Soon we'll feed you some lunch but momma's gotta figure out how and when to do that. We do feed you lots of snacks! For breakfast these days you have oatmeal and applesauce and for dinner we just started you on meals that have meat in them. It's kinda weird to feed you meat meals out of a jar, but for right now that's what we're going to do. :) You love using your hands and are a good little eater. You get the food all over your face!

You are still kind of a social butterfly when it comes to playing with other kids, but that's okay. Sometimes you think Momma is the safest place to be when we're in a large group and well you'd be right. I know it's hard sometimes when you want to play with a toy and the bigger kids take it away from you. You do a very good job of just moving on from the situation and not fussing about it and I am proud of you. I hope as you get older we can teach you to confront important situations and walk away from not important situations. Even though you are a social butterfly, you do love watching older kids and following them around. I think the younger kids do stuff that you already know how to do so they are less interesting to you. :)

You still love to be in the hiking pack and being outside. I have a feeling you will be quite the adventurer when you grow up. Your daddy and I are excited about that. We'll see how you like airplanes this weekend because if the weather cooperates you'll be taking your first airplane ride when we go camping with friends. You'll be in the front pack on me with your little headset so we'll see how you like that! Hopefully the air pressure doesn't get to you too much and you decide it's okay to sleep in the front pack. :) Speaking of camping...this will be your first camping trip too AND first time at the ocean. We just like to get these firsts all out of the way at one time I guess. I am not sure how smart that is, but oh well! We hope you'll like it in the plane, camping and at the ocean. It's especially fun because we'll be with friends!

Momma has a lot to do, but she wanted to get this letter mostly written before she went back to work. Hopefully I can wrote more later to you and perhaps fix up the grammar in this letter so it flows better. But know that Momma and Daddy love you very much! We are so proud of all your accomplishments and can't wait to see what you do next!

Love,

Momma

Happy Eighth Month Birthday My Little Baby Lady

Dear Jennavieve,

It's amazing being your momma. Let me tell you that. I am amazed by your abilities every single day. You are so smart, adventurous and pretty too. Quite the triple threat when you get older, heck it's s triple threat now! Let's see if momma can try to recap the last month to you in a letter. It gets harder and harder writing you letters because you take up so much of my time, but it's your nap time now!

This month a lot of life-changing things happened for our family. We went to Idaho to do the technical evaluation with Mission Aviation Fellowship. We took a LONG car ride (about 11 hours) to Idaho and you did great. You slept a lot of the time. Some time towards the end you decided that 10 hours was your limit in the car, but you held on until we finally got to Nampa, Idaho.

We had fun in Nampa while daddy was doing his evaluations. We got to meet The Scheers with their son Blake. You liked little Blake the moment you saw him. I think he was 18months and could run and play. He could do all the things you wanted to do. Which made you extra eager to get a move on. Before our trip you could sit and reach for things you wanted, but you really couldn't full on crawl. During this trip you figured out how to crawl fast and pull yourself up on things! Oh and you also got two teeth!!! I think you were trying to catch up with lil' Blake. :) We went to the Boise Zoo with them and you saw a lot of animals for the first time! Your grandma and grandpa Reed gave us money to buy you a souvenir and we bought you a giraffe from the zoo! I wonder if you still have it today?

It was also fun to walk around headquarters with you because everyone thought you were so pretty and fun! I put fun flower headbands on you and that helped everyone to want to come and see you. You loved all the attention. Sometimes I had to go and talk with a few people and put you on the floor. For the most part you did great playing with the toys I brought for you. Other times you decided it was too boring staying in a cubicle and you tried to make an escape. :)

Because of the weather for Daddy's flying, we had some extra time to go and do things. We took you to a park in Boise and you saw ducks and geese for the first time close up! You wanted to chase them and catch them when we held you up so you could walk. This was also the trip where you saw grass for the first time! You loved it! In fact I think you could sit in it all day and be content. Well... I guess not all day.

We also got a chance to visit with the Maddox's while we were in Idaho. One morning momma and you had breakfast with Miss Sarah and her sons Jesse Jay and Tobey. Tobey thought your flower was so cool and wanted to touch it! He also thought you were pretty cool and kept wanting to hug and try to kiss you. He ended up kissing you during that morning. So you officially got your first kiss too on this trip. I am not sure you wanted that kiss as you were trying to move away from the boy. They say they're raising him with the best intentions, so I don't think it was all that bad. ;)

On the way home from the trip you did great again. You are such a great kid for road trips. I hope you get used to them because we'll be taking a lot of them. We passed our evaluation which means that we'll be moving overseas to be missionaries with Mission Aviation Fellowship. I am sure you'll love living in another country because you are so adventurous and friendly right now. I am excited for you to learn a second language. You'll probably be more fluent in it than me and translate for us when we're overseas. I hope you get to learn as many languages as you'd like. Learning languages is fun and it helps us to communicate with everyone!

Lately momma's been making your food more and more. She just isn't happy with the gross meat products they have available for you to eat in the baby food aisle. In fact most of the food available for you now in the stores has some meat in it...gross. So momma is making your food. She made some zucchini with millet and apple, asparagus "risotto" and is trying out some more recipes. So far you've liked everything you've had with the exception of Yams (not to be confused with sweet potatoes because you love those) and though you ate the asparagus, you liked it better when we added applesauce to it. :)

You are talking a lot these days too. Lately you've learned how to use your tongue and you've been using that to make la sounds. You watch momma and daddy very carefully to try to match how we say things. Your sounds this month have been: mamama, papappa, babababa, lala and some random sputtering sounds. You've actually said Mo for More and Pup for up and Pu for puffs. Unfortunately it's not consistent yet, but you are really trying to use words which makes momma happy! We're trying to also teach you sign language so you can communicate that way too.

Well... I hope to add pictures to this post when I get time but I wanted to put it on record how well you are doing! We love you so much and love to see how you are growing!

Love,

Mama

New Morning Traditions

It's been kind of a whirlwind having an 8 month old moving around this house. Thank goodness most kids don't remember the first year or two! Because getting used to momma-hood has been tricky. You just figure out one way of doing things that works and then the baby adapts and needs a different way. It's kinda like a virus/disease/Star Trek Borg, but a good. :)

We are trying to sleep train the little one and it's been tricky. I am SO tired of reading book after book on different methods. I've decided just to do what feels right for me and my little girlie. It gets hard when she's sick or now teething because she wakes in pain. Plus I've run out of overnight diapers so that's hard too! I really need to buy more so she doesn't wake as easily. But that's for another day.

Lately I've decided that I want to set a good example for my daughter. I know, crazy right? I didn't really remember growing up reading the bible every morning or doing devotions, but I know I want my daughter to have those habits and patterns. Every morning we'll read her bible and she'll get a lesson in Portuguese and Swahili (because those are the language books I have right now that are close to a language we might learn in the future depending on where we go with MAF) I started this before but I kinda slacked off for a few months. No more! She LOVES books so I need to read them to her. :)

Right now I am slacking and writing this while she watches Sid the Science kid and bounces happily in her bouncer. I know I wanted to do the no television thing, but I figure she's hearing continual language from it (or the radio) and I only watch shows that are either kid shows or comedies. She loves text and it does help once in a while when I need it. Because honestly, there's only so much we can do and play right now! I can't wait until she's a little older and we can do some fun crafts, games and songs. I am trying to enjoy this phase though! :)

Okay.... I think I need to jet, the show is almost over!

Blessings,

Kristine

It's been a while!

Things have been busy with the Reed household. I am debating on whether to merge our two blogs into one since our family will soon be missionaries with MAF. That's right.. we are just a two week step away from becoming full-time missionaries with Mission Aviation Fellowship.

In case you don't follow my other blog, "Taking off with the Reeds" our family just got back from two weeks of evaluations with Mission Aviation Fellowship and we passed! This summer we go back for Candidacy and at that time they will show us more about their organization and show us the opportunities to serve. By the end of the two weeks we should have a country! Praise God! Then we do some other trainings and after that we full-time fundraise until all support is met. Sometime within that time we'd also like to have a second child, but I am not pregnant and won't be until maybe next January or something. We're still working out timing details.

I still need to write Jenna's letters....she's so busy these days that time flies by! She's crawling, pulling herself up on things and eating solids. She also babbles a lot. Right now she's got a stomach bug, which isn't so fun for anyone!

But the real reason I am writing is that since it's just me and baby I need an avenue for my thoughts! Today I went to Winco and walked there. Since it's a great day (and Jenna's not 100%) I put on the hiking baby carrier and was on my way. I got the usual What the ? looks, some smiles but most again had never seen a hiking carrier before. It was today, well it was last time too, but today I realized that when you become a mom...you have no shame.

What do I mean by this? Well things that before would make you think twice before leaving the house, you don't care about. Say there's a stain on your shirt that happened right before you are going to leave and you have your kid packed up.... you leave. Who cares if people see you in a stained shirt? Or today when I was walking around in the crazy looking carrier. Yes I could do the more fashionable front pack...but 1) It hurts my back 2) Jenna doesn't last long in it and 3) it doesn't have sun protection for Jenna. The hiking pack is definitely the better choice because: Jenna loves it, it has sun protection and my back thanks me. So what if people stare at me like I am some crazy woman. I don't care! :)

There are other things like this as well. You just do what you can and try your best. That's really all you can do as a mom...or even a human being! Sometimes getting out is worth not having things perfect. :)

Seven Months of my Lady Baby

Dear Lady Baby,

It seems like yesterday that I was writing your six month letter! How the time flies. It might be because I've been super busy trying to get everything ready for the technical evaluation we have with MAF next week! This month you've blossomed and are really growing into your own little personality.

You can pretty much crawl all around the floor in your own way. I have to look around to make sure that you aren't getting into things now! You can sit up on your own and even get to a sitting up position from being on your back. Sometimes now you even pull yourself up on things. I think it's not long until you are a walking girl. That both excites me and tires me to think of it because I know then I'll have to really be on my toes!

You figured out how to use the jumperoo this month that Grandma and Grandpa Reed bought you. It was like a switch turned on in your head and all of a sudden you started using your little legs to jump up and down. You can go for quite a while in that thing when you want to. One day you jumped so long that you fell asleep in the jumper! Don't worry, we didn't let you nap in there. We took you out and you weren't happy and ended up taking a nap.

Lately you've been talking up a storm. This month you've done a great job of really looking at the adults when they talk, especially me. You've said Mo for More, Uh for Up and even moved your little hand in an approximation of please. In the car you babble all the time. Sometimes you say mamamama, or babababa or any number of combinations. You never cease to amaze me. I really think you said Jesus the other day. No joke! We were in bed and talking about church and out popped that. Daddy heard you too. He said maybe it was a sign that we were supposed to go to church that Sunday or at least open the bible. Speaking of which, I need to read you your bible more. I was doing so well and now that I've been overwhelmed I've been slacking. Not cool. I'll make it up to you. :)

On the food front, we're continuing to feed you solids. You seem to like everything we put in front of you. I've noticed that you like Sweet Potatoes but only tolerate Yams. I mean you'll eat them, but you definitely know the difference between the two. That's my smart girl. :) I am now going to start feeding you twice a day. I need to figure everything out but so far you've eaten: Sweet Peas, Sweet Potatoes, Yams, Butternut Squash, Zucchini, Bananas and Pears. Maybe I need to add more variety to your meals? I'll try to do that more this next month. I make most of your food but sometimes I buy containers of baby food. Right now it's mainly organic because I feel that's best at the moment since you are so young. Maybe I'll change my tune later...but we'll see.

We got a hiking carrier this month and you LOVE it. I seriously can take you anywhere and you'll be perfectly content in it. I took a long walk with you in the carrier and we went to Winco. Everyone thought I was crazy, but I don't care and you don't either. I think you and I have kinda kindred spirits when it comes to adventure. We both love to be independent and to see the world.

Your daddy and I are so excited that you are growing up to be such an intelligent, funny, adventurous little lady. We love you so very very much and look forward to the month ahead!

Love,

Momma