Praising God!

No matter where you are or what you are facing, on September 11th, you are always a little extra thankful to God for his hand of protection and all that he has done for you and your family. Today, we are particularly grateful. My heart is still pounding a bit from what I found when I opened Daniel's door after his nap this afternoon...

On the floor, was a picture that had been hanging on his wall. The picture was about 2 feet from the frame and next to the frame were large pieces of broken glass. I immediately got a lump in my throat and frantically checked Daniel for any cuts or bleeding. He seemed to be fine, with the exception of a tiny cut on his toe. One kiss and a band-aid and he recovered. I then sent him out of the room so that I could clean up the mess and thoroughly vacuum the carpet.

My eyes filled with tears as I got a closer look at the pieces of glass on the floor and I immediately began thanking the Lord for keeping my baby boy safe. Here are some of the pieces I found. It is ONLY by the grace of God that Daniel did not get seriously hurt.

Let's just say that the rest of the pictures have been removed and placed well out of reach. I will happily live with blank walls and will begin my search for foam and/or rubber home decor items!

I'm Now An Expert

I consider myself a source of countless pieces of completely useless information. Today, I learned something that even amazed me. It is possible to clean an entire bottle of Mr. Bubbles out of carpeting- just in case you were wondering.

We are potty training...again. You parents of two and three year olds understand the "again". I can see you nodding sympathetically. I'm happy to report that we've been much more successful this time. Daniel has actually managed to "go" in the potty. This is quite an accomplishment considering the months it took for him to learn to sit on the thing. Two years and 4 potty seats later, we might actually accomplish this task! At any rate, he has managed to go, but prefers to do so with some privacy. Inevitabley, as soon as he's seated he asks us to leave. Pointing at the door and saying "Mommy, you go" is the three-year-old equivalent to asking, I suppose. This morning, I left as usual. Moments later Daniel appeared in the doorway of the bedroom. I put on my best "you did it!" face and prepared to overreact to his accomplishment. But, instead of telling me he did it, I was informed that he needed new socks. I immediately aniticipated the worst, or so I thought, and expected to find a puddle on the floor. I did, but it was not the puddle I was anticipating. It was a thick, slimy, soapy puddle and it was far worse than I assumed. One hour, 48 oz. of water, and an entire linen closet worth of towels later, I had gotten enough of it out of the carpet to consider my attempt a success. Praise God we are in a rental! :)

Who Are You and What Have You Done With My Baby?

We have a mysterious, albeit adorable, imposter in our house. The imposter arrived last week just days after Sofia's 3-month birthday. This new precious little bundle sleeps on a regular schedule, eats normally, smiles uncontrollably, and is generally content. Many wise friends and family members reminded us that the first three months were often difficult and that, once they were over, we would see glimpses of life as it could be. We honestly didn't expect the change to occur almost to the day, but we've seen a noticeable difference and we are so thankful to have our sweet little girl back. We've missed her. :) Whether or not the change in her is due to her age or the fact that we are simply adjusting better doesn't really matter. Whatever the case, it appears the aliens that were previously inhabiting our little girl have vacated the premises!

Family Pictures

We recently had some family pictures taken and were thrilled with the results. The kids looked great, but our very favorite picture of all was of just the two of us. In fact, we loved it so much that we immediately had it matted and framed.

A Series of Unfortunate Events

It has been a crazy couple of weeks at the Orona house. Both of our kiddos came home from Phoenix with a head cold, thanks to the little girl in front of us on the airplane who coughed all over them. We started last week off with yet another trip to the doctor, this time for Sofia, whose cold moved down to her chest- or so we thought. We all survived the trip this time, since it did not involve any weighing of or looking at Daniel. The good news was that Sofia's chest was clear. The next day we woke up to find that our air conditioner was leaking and had soaked the carpet in our hallway and into Daniel's bedroom. The maintenance guy came to do the repairs and moments later I was asked to leave with the kids because the smell of ammonia was getting dangerously stronger in our apartment. When we returned, two gentlemen were here tearing up the carpet and setting up fans to dry the carpeting and the foam underneath. Daniel's room was in disarray with furniture rearranged and toys strewn about (the only difference from any other day was really the furniture), and this is what we dealt with for the following 24 hours.

All the while Fernando was on the phone with the company we had purchased a part for our television from and UPS in Little Rock who was unable to deliver it in under a month, thus my previous post about Arkansans and their apparent incompetence. Evidently in this state it takes a college education to tell the difference between a 4 and a 1 in an apartment number- but I digress.

We spent the weekend on our continued quest for a Nintendo Wii, to no avail. Perhaps one day someone will explain to me the marketing genius behind shipping 10 units of one of the hottest electronic items on the market to a store once every 4 weeks. Or is this just another example of the wonder that is customer service in this state?

Despite the fact that Fernando had to head to Lincoln, Nebraska this week (sorry, babe) this week has been going much better. Thanks to Gamestop.com we were able to find a Wii and it arrived yesterday. Today we received our new kitchen appliances. It was a bit chaotic, but worth it in the end. Now we are looking forward to Fernando's return home tomorrow and a very Wii-ful weekend.

Before

After

Before

After

Time Machine

If I could go back in time, this is where I would want to be right now...

Arkansas...really?

During the summer of 1994, while visiting California with a friend, we stumbled upon a ballpoint pen in the home of her elderly aunt that held the saying, "The South will Rise Again." I remember how odd I felt when I read that, although we laughed about it for days- years actually. I've always held the position that Abraham Lincoln did the right thing by preserving the Union. But, having lived in Arkansas for almost a year now, I'm beginning to think he may have made a huge mistake. I won't be flying a confederate flag outside of my house any time soon. But, I'm of the opinion that there was at least one state he could have let go of...

Now, don't get me wrong. There are some really great people here (most of them transplants- but that's beside the point) and we are blessed to have met them. Having said that, however, I must add, that given the option, they would most likely move as well. Arkansas is deceiving and it takes time to figure out that the entire state is trying to pull one over on you. The state of Arkansas is like a used car. Everybody talks its up and it looks clean and shiny on the outside, but drive it a few miles and inevitably the wheels will fall of, the engine will start smoking, and the radio will break. (and you won't be able to find a decent mechanic to fix it) I take that back. Mechanics are plentiful in Arkansas. The only problem is that they work from 10-2, are closed on weekends, and don't answer their phones (convenience and customer service are concepts that waved "bye bye" to this state years ago).

In the grand scheme of things, is there anything we really NEED from Arkansas that we can't get elsewhere? Maybe that was something President Lincoln should have considered.

One of my favorite quotes is from what I consider to be the funniest show of all time- Friends- and I find it particularly fitting of my opinion of Arkansas.

So, in the immortal words of Monica Geller..."If that fell off the back of the truck, it wouldn't be the worst thing."