Evangeline The Brainiac and More Thanks

Poppy & Evangeline having a long chat

I absolutely love the stage when babies discover language. It is so fun to watch them learn new words every day and put them into practice. Evangeline's ability to communicate is exploding right now and we are having a ball with it! OK, so verbosity isn't exactly an unusual trait in our family, but my dear little Evangeline is a wunderkind!

Marg was this way too, but because she was our first, and the first grandbaby, no one realized how amazing her verbal skills were! At 18 months she was talking in long sentences and by 2 she was singing songs like the Star Spangled Banner word-for-word beginning to end and telling elaborate jokes. Evangeline is this way, too. It's crazy! At 12 months Evangeline used about 75 understandable words. She could name everyone in our family including Poppy, Nana, Auntie Becky, Uncle Buddy, and most of her cousins. She said small phrases like "brush hair", "eat food", and "uh oh fall down".

Now at 14 months she tries to repeat everything you say and she's venturing into constructing rudimentary sentences like:
"Ricker read book."
"Margie say night night."
"Mama say don't touch."
"Papa please kissy kissy."
"Jackie sing song."

She calls herself "Uh-vange-in" and pretends to breastfeed her beloved Sleepy Bear saying, "Seepy Bear more milk, mm-hmm". She's also getting bossy with her baby sister.
"Ray Ray, say please, K?"
"Ray Ray, look see!"
"Ray Ray, don't touch Seepy!"
"Ray Ray, no cry!"
"Mama, Ray Ray... all done... toy!"

This stage is so fun!

Therefore, since we are receiving a kingdom that cannot be shaken, let us be thankful, and so worship God acceptably with reverence and awe, for our God is a consuming fire.

- Hebrews 12:28

Adding to my thankful list... Today I praise the Lord for things that are relaxing or comforting to me:

• Worshiping Jesus. There's nothing better in the world!
• Our home. Even though I miss living near the beach, I love love love our house.
• Reading. Some books are like old friends. I know I'm too busy when I don't have time to read at least a little each day.
• Spending time with friends like Mary, Tony, Kim, and Xinia who make me laugh until I ache
• My slippers
• Quiet. I'm sure all you moms can relate to me finding the quiet of all the babies being fast asleep so luxurious.
• Everything about the beach, listening to the waves, smelling the salt air, being out on the water
• A crackling fire (as long as it stays in the fireplace and not raging across California)
• Kapalua, Maui... We skipped our trip this year because our trip to Ethiopia got moved up, which we wouldn't change for the world, but we still missed it so much! We can hardly wait for next year.
• Montecito & Santa Barbara... 'Nuff said!
• Long walks with Michael
• Sunday brunch with our family

Here are a couple more photos from last weekend.

My precious niece, Charlie

Will someone please tell him to ditch the wig?!?

with Mother & Ellie

The whole gang having burgers at Ruby's

"Oh, the great JOY of giving thanks!" - C. S. Lewis