Wow, it’s been a while. Usually that’s a sign of chaos in our life, and this time of silence is no exception. So, here’s a quick update of what is happening in the life of the Saldanha’s.

As you can probably tell from the photo, Eisley Christine the Teeniest Bean is no longer teeny. In fact, she’s a big kid. Running, playing, singing, dancing, talking up a storm, making jokes, getting into everything… it’s amazing. Just the other day she asked for a bowl of toast for breakfast. She often requests to wear one of her many tutus, and wants Baba to play some of “her” songs on the guitar. Thankfully, she loves great music and worshipful music. It’s pure delight. We are past 20 months, and it seems like she’ll be 15 years old tomorrow. Yikes. Slow down, time. Thanks.

I’m sure most people know this by now, but we’re in the process of moving to Des Moines. There will be a detailed and incredibly long post about all of that later, but for now we’ll just keep it light. Our house has been on the market for a few weeks and we’ve had good traffic, but no offers. Equally disappointing has been the houses we’ve viewed so far. But hey, we can walk away with lovely memories and gems such as the smallest bathroom ever built.

Baby Brother is still chugging along. Honestly, we tend to forget about him throughout the day. It’s easy to get caught up in everything that’s going on and just not think about him because he’s not here. Then he sticks his elbow through Katie’s belly and she’s fully aware he’s here. Only two more months, and we can’t wait to meet him!

Baby Cousin Sloane arrived at the beginning of December. She’s lovely! Eisely adores her and still talks about how she cuddled Sloane with a pillow. Don’t worry, she didn’t smother her, the pillow was on her lap.

The elder Saldanha’s are hanging in there. Full disclosure: it’s been a rough couple weeks. I’m not afraid to expose the selfishness in myself and say that I have been the cause of much turmoil in our house. Circumstances have taken a toll on the ol’ Chris Spirit and I find myself discouraged a lot more than usual, which leads to conflict in our house. I think we’re getting better at it, but it’s safe to say this is one of the more challenging moments in our life together. If only to expose the ugliness in my heart and to be better at communicating with and serving each other, I’m thankful for this crazy time. It is such a good reminder of the brokenness that is all around us, and how amazing Jesus is. We destroy, He repairs. Daily. I want to be more like Him every day, and I’m sure Katie wouldn’t mind that, either.

In conclusion, pray for us. Please. PLEASE! We have a house we’d like to sell, a house we need to find, a toddler, a newbie-in-process, work, relationships to maintain, relationships to build, marriage, family… just lots of stuff.

But if this angel face tells me anything, it’s that we’ll be alright.

Well, it’s been almost a month since I threw a baby shower for my sis and my very first NIECE. Sorry for the delay. Sometimes I forget about blogging.

I’ve decided that I absolutely love decorating and planning for parties. The food prep, however, not my fav. But if I could just team up with someone who loves doing food, we would have a pretty sweet business. Thankfully, my sweet mom was on hand to help with EVERYTHING. I knew that I wanted to go with a grey/silver & yellow theme, since these are the colors of Baby Girl’s nursery. I figured any cool thing that I made/bought for the shower, Em could potentially use it in her room.

The vintage, French country, shabby chic loving side of me had to take a backseat if I wanted to plan a shower that EMILY would enjoy. It wasn’t too hard coming up with simplistic, modern ideas for her (thanks, Pinterest!)

We spray painted babies breath metallic silver and I found that chevron table runner online for really cheap! Who knew you could spray paint babies breath? Well, you can. And it’s awesome. The picture doesn’t do it justice. I also spray painted old glass vases I found in our cupboard. The ones on the mantel in the first pic look pretty sweet, if I do say so myself. I think they look like mercury glass! Whoda thunk?

…to make sure that EM got the comfy chair…

The ladies chatting before present opening…

All the love for Baby Girl…look at all that PINK!

Me & Sis…and Baby Fetus Cousins…

Big Girl Cousin wanted in on the action…

Phew! Em got TONS of sweet, girly, NEW things for baby! No more hand-me-downs for THIS girl! Well, except from Eisley of course! We’re so excited for Baby Girl to come any time now, really! Emily is due the first week of December, and GavieLove was nine days early, so sweetie could come SOON! I’m especially grateful that Miss E is going to have a girl cousin so close in age, because if Saldzie’s keep having boys, then Baby Girl Hulling may be the closest thing E will have to a sister!

We love you Em & Baby! So exciiiiited!

Cool tricks, Eisley!

Might want to grab a tissue before you watch this.

I’ve decided to add something to my prayers for Eisley: That she grows up loving to GIVE.

Only forty days until Christmas!

Just a sampling of what is a daily occurrence in our home. A daughter being loved, adored, tickled, encouraged, instructed, doted upon, guided, and just plain delighted in by her father.
Sadly this isn’t the case in some homes in our world.
I am incredibly thankful that it is the case in ours.

READY….

SET…

BOOOM!

Even when Chris is absolutely spent, and Li’l Miss clearly is not, he will keep on throwing, tickling, snorgling, and wrestling.

This girl is going to grow up knowing that the world is her oyster…because she knows her Baba loves her.

People always comment how much Eisley Christine looks like Chris. I don’t know if it’s the big dark eyes or the olive skin, but even today, when I took her in to see some old friends at my old job, the comments came flowing, “Oh little Chris! Look at her! She is EXACTLY HIM!”

Ya think?

Chris did some photoshop magic this morning. That’s Chris on the right as a little Monchichi circa…1985?86? But now looking at the side by side, Chris and I both decided that while everyone always says what a dead ringer E is for Chris, there are a LOT of Mama in her…cheeks and SHAPE of eyes, namely. Yay! So she IS my daughter after all!!!!!!!! (But aren’t they just the cutest??? Oh my…)
In OTHER exciting news, we found out yesterday that Baby #2 is a…

….

B   O   Y  ! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! !

Yep! The ultrasound tech found “it” right away and there’s no denying a sweetie sweetie SON will be added to our mix! I have thought pretty much the whole pregnancy that Baby was going to be a Boy. Not sure why or what it was. But sure enough, Eisley will get to show Brother how to collect rocks, how to grab ants with just your thumb and forefinger, and where it is exactly that poop comes out.

(I know, I know. I’m not sure where this is all coming from, but Little Miss LADY has been quite taken lately with the whole idea of…excrement: who does it, where it comes out of, and most joyously of all, how to say the delightful word. “POOOOP!” has been proclaimed loudly at Target, Hy-Vee, etc. (Better that word than her OTHER new favorite word – Clock! Which is said without the ‘L’. Yeah, I know…)

With that said, Baby Girl is SUPER excited to be a big sissy. She’s going to be an awesome little mommy and teacher for Brother.
Even if his first word is “POOOOP!”

Whilst not a huge fan of a “holiday” that “celebrates” the scary, morbid, macabre,  etc., I do NOT, however, have a problem with Eisley putting on a costume and getting me and Chris free candy.

Which is precisely what we did yesterday.
Eisers became a not-so cowardly lion. And wanted to floss. Before we went “trick-or-treating.” On down Mainstreet Ames. In the middle of the day.

It’s quite a sweet thing what Ames does: Most stores on Main Street have a huge bowl of candy set up and from 10:00 a.m. – 2:00 p.m. on Halloween, kids go up and down collecting their fair share of sweets (for their moms). We started out at Cafe Diem and met up with some friends…

…friends like “Jem” and “The Incredible (Lounging) Hulk” and his big brother “Spiderman.”

A woman on a mission.

Jem & Lion got a little tuckered out…

See? Tuckered.

We got home about 15 minutes before Baba came home for lunch. So we sat on the front step and enjoyed a sucker. And I will say, she ALSO got a mini Milky Way tonight after dinner because she ate all of her couscous and peas and milk.
So, enjoy it, Eisie girl. You got 364 days until Mama lets you have another Milky Way! Yay! I’m THAT mom! Yaaaay!

Love you, Sugar Buns! Your buns have been extra sugary the last couple days and boy has that been fun! XOXOXOXOXO

~Your (that) Mom

“She is a miracle; blessed be the Lord who can create such marvels! I say in truth that she appeared so gracious and in every way so pleasing that those who looked at her experienced in themselves a sweetness so pure and gentle that they were unable to describe it; and there was no one who could look at her without immediately sighing.” – La Vita Nuova XXVI, Dante Alighieri

 

I’m pretty much the worst at taking pictures.
We had a wonderful weekend with an infinite number of picture-worthy moments, and yet scanning through the shots on the camera, I took like four.

Oh well.

This past Thursday marked our FOURTH completed year of marriage. On to five. Wow. That seems odd and perfect and a lot and not enough all at the same time. I’m thankful to our Lord for showing us (pretty much daily) all the crap that we need to work on in order to have a harmonious, joy-filled marriage. It also doesn’t hurt that Christopher is THE most patient, loving, thoughtful, selfless person I have ever known or will know. Truth.

Friday evening, he and I headed BEANLESS down to Des Moines for a lovely getaway! This was the first time we had spent the night away from Sugar in a year and a half. The last time we didn’t have her in a 100 foot proximity to us whilst sleeping was the several hours before she was born. She’s super awesome and all, but oh my word, I was so excited! She doesn’t do so hot sleeping anywhere but her own bed, so my parents graciously (I say graciously but you know they were so pumped to do it) offered to come to Ames, and spend the night at our house so she could have the most routine night possible. Without Mama and Baba.

So Christopher and I headed down to Des Moines and checked in at the Hotel Fort Des Moines, which is where we stayed our very first night as Mr & Mrs. Then we headed to Miyabi 9 which is a really cool sushi restaurant in the East Village. Really delicious stuff. Chris had some raw stuff. With chopsticks. And I had COOKED fish with a fork. I would be worthless in Japan. As far as eating with chopsticks. I may as well have been trying to hold them in my toes. It was that awkward.
Then we walked around the corner to Alba for dessert. Then made a pit stop at Dahl’s because Baby has really been loving SweetTarts lately. Don’t know why, but YES PLEASE!
I was so paranoid in the hotel that we were going to have this raucous bachelorette party camped next door that was going to keep me up all night. My ONE night to sleep long and hard through the night. Bachelorettes weren’t a problem, but I did wake up to the clanking radiator. Oh well. And I also figured that my one night to sleep long and hard would find me waking bright eyed and busytailed at 10:00 a.m.
Hello, 6:30! Again, oh well.
After a wonderful breakfast at Chef’s Kitchen, we headed back home. Not a super long time away from home, but it was so refreshing just being with my Bubbs and only him for a good 17 hours or so.
Here are (literally) the shots I took from our weekend away.

…aaand a belly shot of Lil Miss(ter?) at 18 weeks…

Not sure why I thought that was a good pose.
Speaking of Lil’est Bubbs, we find out what s(he) is on November 8th! That’s soon!
Little caveat here: For some reason, I’m thinking this time, Babe is a boy. Don’t know why. Neither of us have a PREFERENCE to what baby is; a little girl would be awesome because sisters are awesome. I would know. I have one and I am one. And it’s awesome. Plus, with a springtime birthday, all of Eisers’ old clothes would be seasonally correct! And we have 22 pounds of proof that little girls are hilariously wonderful.
On the other hand, having a boy would be super awesome as well. Because boys are just plain awesome. And Eisley loves rocks and bugs and having short hair, so she would make a perfect sissy for a boy. So really, we’re just excited to KNOW. We could really care less which it is.

Saturday afternoon also included a wonderful wedding of a dear, sweet friend of mine, Sylvia. She was one of the first friends I made when I started dating Chris and having a life up in Ames. Saturday afternoon, she married her Love and it was so perfect. Eisers was in awe of her beautiful dress.


Ah, I love both of those girls! Congratulations, my dear Slyvie! Couldn’t be happier for you!

Our friend Travis also gave E his boutonniere…

….which she promptly began to pull apart and sprinkle the petals on the floor. So looks like SOMEONE is getting all primed and ready to be a FLOWERGIRL! So, we’re taking names and numbers! If you want the girl with the biggest chocolate brown eyes to throw down at your wedding (petals, that is), let me know! Ahem, klee. I’m lookin at you.

We decided to stay at home from church this morning, just so we could have some family time. Which included eating donuts and watching the Manchester United v Manchester City derby this morning! Go Red Devils!

We won’t discuss the outcome.

(If you’re familiar with our home, you may be confused by this photo. Chris set up his laptop on the counter so we could watch the game. For some reason, the 5 free channels we get on our tv does NOT include the BBC’s Premier League channel! Weird. Hence Eisley staring at what would seem to be the wall. She truly was engaged in the game and would yell “GOOOOOAL!” at (in)appropriate times.)

(And she is eating blueberries although by what appears to be in her left hand, it looks as though she is eating a penny).

The End.

See?

She’s also giving me a crash course in humility, patience, self-control, patience, unconditional love, aaaand patience. Full disclosure here: Toddler years are really hard. Well, they have been lately in the Saldanha house. When you have a free-spirited, independent, self-sufficient one and a half year old. Who was born with a sin nature. Yep.

“How dare she say that about that sweet girl!” “Children are born innocent! WE’RE the ones who screw them up!”

Um no. Sorry. Not the case.

Genesis 8:21 states that “…every inclination of (a person’s heart) is evil from CHILDHOOD…” and Proverbs 22: 15 says, “Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child.” And I suppose anyone that has a child, or has been around a child, or has SEEN a child can attest to this. I don’t ever recall telling Eisley, “Okay. Listen. If Mama ever tells you to do something that you don’t want to do, simply yell NO really loudly and start to cry. And, if Mama tries to pick you up, just go limp.”

So yes, the last couple days have been kinda tricky with Eisley. With my precious chubby cheeked angel pie who has eyes that will melt you and a smile that makes you burst with joy.

Sometimes I just have had enough.

I know these moments don’t last forever, and that she’ll learn to obey the FIRST time we ask…not the third or twelfth (we’re already seeing fruit of this…just not consistent fruit), she’ll respond to us asking her to do something with a “Yes, Mama! Yes, Baba!” And again, she’ll do it the first time we ask. I know this will happen because I EXPECT it from her. This is how a Saldanha child WILL behave.  That is my JOB as her mama and Chris’ JOB as her Baba to see to it that she is a polite, loving, obedient, kind girl that turns into a polite, loving, authority-respecting, kind woman.

This is more of a self pep talk than anything, so feel free to log off now if you want.

As she was screaming the other night, I was thinking to myself, “Motherhood is when you experience every single emotion a woman could feel. All at the same time.” It’s such a bizarre thing…to feel anger and immense love towards the same individual at the very same moment.

But then there’s also moments like the other morning when she and I were taking big gulps of juice at the same time…

….and then simultaneously letting at a satisfied, “Aaaaaah!!!!!!!!!!”

And then it’s things like this that I’m like, “Okay. We can still play together today.”

God has been very gracious to me the past couple days…it’s nothing I’ve done, mind you, He is just ENABLING ME to be more patient, more tenderhearted to her.
Here’s how we’ve been blessed the past couple days with her: she’s been eating like a CRAZY person (last night for dinner – an entire chicken brat, broccoli, an entire orange, crackers, milk, AND a peanut butter sandwich!)  and sleeping close to 13 hours a night straight (ya think? She was probably in a food coma!) We’re done nursing and she’s fine with it, and she has been super obedient lately as well. (Case in point, we were over at some friends’ house for dinner and it was time for us to leave. I said, “Eisley, please put those toys back where you found them and come get your coat on.” She IMMEDIATELY put her things in the toy bin and ran over to me. PEOPLE. This is huge for us. THIS is what we’ve been fighting for MANY months. FRUIT! Hooray!)

She’s a loveface and has been so silly and goofy and lovey lately. But I hear her yelling for me from her bed. So log off I must.

*** EDITOR’S NOTE: I hope this post does not come across arrogant in any way. Please know that Chris and I fail a LOT when it comes to parenting, we DON’T have it all together, we DON’T know everything there is to know about kids. We DO know that we need Christ every day, ALL day and that without Him, we’re doomed. That we DO know.

Inspired by my sister & her family’s recent trip to this apple orchard, Eisley and I decided to make a usually boring Wednesday into a SUPER WEDNESDAY!

During the summer growing up, my mom would always plan something special for us to do on Wednesdays, titling these days “Super Wednesdays.” Her theory was that if we KNEW that we had something special to look forward to, we wouldn’t be whining about being bored the REST of the week. I remember it working, but I’m sure we whined too. Even though it was usually just something like a picnic lunch and trip to the library, I remember being SUPER pumped about Super Wednesdays.

SO. Onto Miss E’s and my Super Wednesday. Chris suggested that, since it’s discounted prices during the week and probably not as busy, we should make the 10 minute drive to Cambridge to Center Grove Orchard. And for only $8, there is SO MUCH TO DO AND SEE! Worth the drive and price of admission, Des Moinesians!

We got to pet all sorts of fun animals! (Sorry Sweet Baby’s face is blurry and the GOAT is nice and clear) She especially loved the roosters and would GUFFAW every time one would crow. I captured her glowing during a cock-a-doodle:

She would dash back and forth between the rooster pen and the goats who were climbing all over their ramps. So cool, even for me! I was like, “Whaaaa??!!”

And silly girl was like ten feet from these beautiful huge horses, and of course, all she wanted to do was to pet the puppy. Girl loves her puppies!

In addition to all these cool animals, there is also an enormous…pillow thing? that the kids can jump on. I wasn’t sure if she would like it; we’re not SUPER coordinated and not SUPER good at jumping, but oh my word. She didn’t want to get off!

I got on there with her when she just got running and started heading down the slope at breakneck speed. It was so fun to jump and roll around with her on there! But once I got off, oh my word Jelly Legs. Eeeyikes.

We also went on a hay(rack) ride! (The perpetual debate…hay ride or hay RACK ride? We say hay RACK ride, but when I went to school in Michigan, they were so confused as to why I called it that and not a hay ride. And no, this debate didn’t come up a lot. BUT WHEN IT DID. I’m like, “yeah, you’re riding on the HAY, but IT’S not taking you on the ride, the RACK is”…whatever…)
Anyway, here, E is looking mighty pensive about the whole thing. I included this picture because I did you a SOLID favor in getting a closeup of those cheeks. There WAS a little boy named Bennett who was sitting awfully close to us…

And then, we spotted the giant slide. The closer you get, the more you realize just how steep it really is. I didn’t think she’d like it (I didn’t know if I would like it!), but sure enough, we went down once (on a burlap sack…should have grabbed some for you mom! ) and DareDevil Jones was like, “Peez! Peez!” And frantically signing More! More! So three more times, we hiked up the hill, and slid on down! I took video of us as we went down, but of course, thinking the camera was trained on her face, it’s actually just the top of her head and my dumb neck, so I’ll spare you.

This angle shows a couple things:
1. It really is freakin steep!
2. Eisley’s flushed cheeks. She got super excited and super worked up.
3. I need to clean her ears out.

She was really worn out after about two hours of doing everything BUT pick apples and pumpkins. So, after frolicking in the corn pool for 5 minutes, we decided to head for home.

Someone really missed their Baba! We got home about 15 minutes before Chris came home for lunch, and oh my word, she could not get enough of him! She even spent a good five minutes BITING HIS LIPS! He went in for a moochie and she started chortling and chewing on his lips! He was in heaven.

All in all, a pretty Super Wednesday if you ask me. Such a fun place to go with little kids! Saldanha stamp of approval! We’re just excited to take Baba one of these days!