Julian-isms and CP's new favorite jingle

Some Julian-isms:

The alphabet song...hum hum hum hum hum hum G, hum hum hum hum hum hum hum hum P, etc.

When he is pretending to be a race car, he bends his knees, bends over, sticks his arms backwards so he looks like an Olympic swimmer about to jump into the pool, revs his engine by way of vocalizing, and then takes off down the hallway. I think he always wins the race.

Another funny arm thing he does is when we ask him 'where did it go?' instead of opening his arms up and sideways, he pushes them down and back.

Last one for the post: tonight he thought it would be good to use the empty mustard container to crush the corn kernels that had fallen off of his plate. It was quite entertaining, though we didn't get any corn meal from his efforts.

Tonight we were in the living room. Dan was playing songs on his guitar in the vein of lullabies. Christian asks him to sing the cars song. We ak him what song he means and he sings, '1 8 7 7 cars for kids, k a r s for kids, 1 8 7 7 cars for kids, donate your cars today.'

Jonah a kid's story? A Bible Study Debrief

So last night at my small group we studied Jonah. For those unfamiliar, this story follows an Old Testament Jewish prophet as he runs from God. In his disobedience, he boards a ship, which subsequently finds itself in a squall. The sailors fear his God and, obeying Jonah's directions, throw him into the raging sea. The sea calms. And then underneath the waters a fish swallows God's prophet and keeps him in his belly for 3 days. In the belly of the fish Jonah seemingly repents of his disobedience. The fish vomits him out and he makes the 3 day journey to Nineveh preaching death and destruction for those who do not repent. The Ninevites immediately repent and God stops the judgement. Instead of rejoicing in this peace and mercy, Jonah gets bent out of shape under a tree.

So today I'm thinking of this. The irony and the self-righteousness and the heaviness of this short book. One question comes to mind - why is this such a popular kids Bible story? Can they get the layers of irony and symbolism and foreshadowing? If not, is the simple narrative worthy of telling to children.

And then I think about my sons. Hearing about the big fish resonates with them right now. Later will this impression morph into the richness of the theology of the everyday? Yes, your obedience means something I tell them (more than once a day for sure); yes, your disobedience means something. Your faith is seen by the world as you make decisions.

Those sailors feared the Lord and worshiped him even as God's own prophet fell into the depths of Sheol.

Those Ninevites immediately cried out to God for mercy and believed in his salvation even as God's own prophet preached nothing more than "Yet forty days and Nineveh shall be overthrown!" and then pouted about God's compassion.

This the sign of belief and faith - definitely worth telling kids. God's faithfulness always worth telling :) And why not through the vessel of an enormous fish?

Matthew 12:38-42

Can this still be called a blog?

Perhaps not...but my account hasn't vanished yet! The biggest news since summer 2010 is the addition of Julian Paul Koehler to our family. What a joy he is.

Baby picture above and now a current shot:

Julian loves to communicate and sometimes we can understand him. He seeks meaning over the fun of using language (like his brother perferred) and even chooses to use words instead of emotional out bursts for the majority of his crises. Welcome change,that. Christian and Julian are already great play mates, though Christian still needs to learn more about personal space. The both prefer to be out and about - looking at cars, bugs, dirt, stairs and inclines, EL trains and metra engines.

Timing

yes. time flies by. and then stands still in the waiting. baby #2 due in 9 days. i thought for sure i'd be in labor by now...not my timing apparently! so no breath holding, just deep breathing and sighs.

since christian turned 2 our lives have gone through roller coaster loops. the month of april was our perfect storm of finishing the dissertation and going through the final stages of some possible job opportunities - which ultimately fell through! we are still recovering from that month. there were positives like being able to shift my work schedule in order to spend mornings with christian. tiring but fun - doing regular 'mom' stuff like going to the park and meeting other moms to chat while we chase our children and save them from each other.

may brought the dissertation defense, which dan passed with distinction! what a praise! and then the actual turning in of the dissertation (which didn't need any revisions!). my family had a mini surprise reunion for my mother's retirement. and then june came with the graduation of dr. koehler. and july a vacation to virginia beach, the retirement city of my parents.

through all of this christian has been growing leaps and bounds and we have been trying to mature right along with him, especially in terms of discipline, reproof - consistency, etc. he's such a personality at times so loving and cuddly and at times so annoying!!!! (his favorite response right now is a whiny 'no.' - awesome.)

we've been coaching him on his duties as older brother as we slowly add more and more infant things to his surroundings. but in speaking with other moms it's just going to take the baby being born for it really to sink in.

and so we continue to wait! i'm not overdue just ready due:)

and then what's next? after baby, my leave for about 12 weeks during which dan will apply again for academic positions around the country. there are actually openings despite the economy looking like a double dip whatever. and then we go through the whole process again - me working full time, dan fathering full time while seeking after the beginning of his career.

so i will try to post here to tell you how it's all going - this crazy season of parenthood.

Turning 2

Christian turns 2 in 13 days...Can't believe it in some ways. Though when I look at him, he hardly looks like the baby he was, especially since last week when Dan took him to get his first haircut. His long locks had been irritating him. He'd shove them out of his face and grunt almost. We admitted that we were just letting him have wild hair for our own sakes and not thinking about how he felt. Obviously the cut was overdue. The haircut salon/barber was like a small amusement park/toy store. The chairs were shaped like cars, each one had a TV in front of them and the child was able to choose what movie s/he wanted to watch. He chose Robots - not that he knew what that was. He loved the car chair and didn't really mind the cut. Dan brought him to my work after to show it off. When he arrived he said, 'Show momma haircut!' I was thrilled to see him, and not really sad about the rite of passage. It makes him look taller and it also makes it a lot easier to put on hats, bibs, coats, etc.

I wanted to write some Christian-isms again but they always seem to fly out of my brain the moment I open up this blog...He can repeat anything you say for the most part and the meaning of things is more and more clear to him. My mom came back from visiting my brother, sister-in-law, and baby niece in Germany. She brought back an original Steiff bear for CPK. He was sitting on my bed, on a pillow with his back against the wall, hugging and cuddling with it, saying, 'Aw.' He then held it up in his hands as if to examine it and said, 'It's so cute!' repeatedly. I laughed so hard. Yes, it is cute, and so is my son:) (At least I think so!)

Perhaps next on the CPK agenda is finishing cutting his 2-year old molars (please soon!) and preparing for baby #2!

Yep - we are expecting a second child around August 12th. We'll probably find out the sex around Easter time. We'll keep you updated...

As Christian says, 'baa bye! mommadaddymomma'

Merry Christmas!

Christian-isms and his first prayer

If you spoke Christian, you'd say

watey for water
corney for corner (he LOVES the corners of his blankey - he strokes his face with them when falling asleep)
buttah for peanut butter
dahk for dark
eintine for little einsteins...

which brings me to his first prayer. Every night after we sing and rock together we pray thanking the Lord for what happened that day. Last week I was mentioning the people he interacted with and toys he played with - he perked up during this, looked at me and said, "eintine" with a few head nods. I tried to stop from laughing but then thanked God for the Little Einsteins show that brings Christian such joy.