To my little Z's

I'm not much for "New Year's Resolutions" But at the start of this year I wanted to focus on the start of a new year to being more "Intentional" with everything. Managing the Home, Andy, Kurdish relationships, other believers, and the biggest one- my sweet Z's! That's who I spend the majority of my time with everyday and I was starting to do the daily grind of my life- fulfilling the needs of the family but not focusing on the opportunity to really love, teach, and "just BE" with them. 

So this post is dedicated to my little loveys! 

Zander-Man is 3.5 years old. My sensitive, introvert, cuddly son!

Here's what you have been up to lately. 

You are currently working on being friendly with everyone even people that aren't like you!

You have become a real mountain man the past couple of months! Making your first Summit and being such a big boy even when you fall!

"Whew, this is hard work"

You still love your cuddles with your mama and told me this month that even when your a big adult you will still give me lots of hugs! I video taped it so you would remember that in high school!

We try to do some sort of organized activity for "homeschool" with you everyday during Zephie's nap. You are memorizing verses, learning how to read, coloring, dancing/singing, and painting!

You are a building machine! You love your legos which is the only toy you play with EVERYDAY! Now you are pretty much transitioned into "Quiet Times" with no nap! Way to go big boy! Oh, and you are also really into posing lately! :)  Are these shots predictive of future senior pictures??

Like most big brothers you get a kick out of teasing your sister and making her "screech" We are working on creating PEACE, not TROUBLE with her!

But we can tell you still LOVE her very much. Trying to make her laugh

Giving her rides on your bike. 

laughing and playing together in our new bathtub!

You still love everything Super Hero...spinning spidey webs or swooping around in your Batman gear....

 and you are and will always be a Super Hero to Zephie! 

And YOU Ms. Zephie Delal.... at 1.5 years old. My sassy, fun loving, spirited girl!

You love being with people

especially when they give you what you want! :)

Food is about the only thing that can make you sit still!

Your dollies are probably your #1 love. Everytime you see them you put your head down and cuddle them. You cuddle them more than us!

The past couple of weeks we find ourselves saying "Zephie, NO NO!" much more often! After we tell you that you look at us like this and shake a single pointer finger back and forth.....

or like this....

Your best friend is currently Henry. 

"Sup People"

Normally you are not the poser, like your brother. It's almost impossible to get a picture of you that isn't blurry or that has you looking at the camera:

  But daddy caught you acting like big bro with that hand on your face!

In a land with no strollers, you are usually in a "carrier".  You still always go get your "SHUUSHH" (shoes) ready to go outside. 

We visited the region's famous "Delal Bridge" I love that your middle name represents a part of the history here. And..... Delal means beautiful in Kurdish. You are definitely a beauty!

Daddy dressed you up as a Valentine for me. You were SO PRECIOUS!

Your melt my heart everyday!

Mama and Daddy love you both so much! Like all relationships we strive to draw each other closer to God. Somedays you do that in "different" ways :) but we thank God for you EVERYNIGHT!  I mean.... can you blame us ;)

xoxo

Learning here thru JanuaryS

This is our third January here in Iraqi K-stan. Things have begun to feel more familar. For example, no longer do we get freaked out by secruity guards. They are not scary anymore :).

I have also learned over the past couple years that January is the hardest month to live here. Remember our first year here around this time? It's rainy, wet, COLD (not like outdoor Iowa cold, but like back in the old days with no proper insulation, no central heating, type of cold. Can you kinda imagine? Well it's kinda like this:

Anyway.... after that first January, God began sanctifying me. Last year, returning back in town during January with an infant had a different set of challenges but yet we just arrived back from America, so we came refreshed by family and friends and most importantly the Body of Christ. This year, planning for the dreaded January... we took some action steps! Instead of just sitting around all day....

We (by the grace of God) have a car now which helps with things more than I ever imagined! So we took a long trip out of town one day with Helen and her mom and brother that came to visit....

love Love LOVE... this girl!

Took some drives up to the mountain just as a family to eat snacks and pray over this city. 

Any chance we could get outside when it wasn't raining, we would! To either play with neighbor kids in our yard for an hour, having campfires,

or going on hikes... This is surprisly a NEW thing for me. I always just stayed home with the kids when Zander seemed too small to get up the rocky terrain and seemed a bit dangerous to carry Zephie during some parts. But, we tried it this year and it was awesome! I was so proud of Zander :)

Here is my first time reaching the SUMMIT of a mountain here!

Sexy i know.... for many reasons... short sweatshirt, fanny pack, pose...etc, etc! I was so excited I didn't care :)

Team Time: Always precious to us!

Naturally the longer we are here the more we start to learn about the culture......

what to do for fun......

 and how to do life differently.....

So, we knew what to expect this January and we did somethings to help us enjoy our time here this month. There were also a few UNEXPECTED things that happened. 

It snowed something like 8 inches here one day. Which is the first time its snowed this much since 30 or 90 years. :) I heard both stories... A wide gap I know! Can you imagine 8 inches of snow in a city of a half of a million people with NO snow shovels or snow plows... Yeah it was nutz! So we just stayed home and played with the neighborhood kids in snow and froze our booties off! Still memorable!

(we were trying to make a bat mobile, but the snow didn't stick as I wanted)

Another unexpected...Andy was away this month more than he ever has been before. Here he went on an overnight stay with the 9th graders to a partnering school 6 hours away on a BUS...  It was worth it!

He also spent a week in Baghdad helping out with a basketball clinic for Iraqi basketball coaches

I'm thankful for both. The blessing of the hard "grey" January days because we learn to depend on Him more, but also learning to be thankful for the joyful moments.  Too often things can often go unnoticed. This post is a remembrance of a season of thankfulness! Thankful for the reason we are here, the sun, laughs, electricity, team, sharing life and loving others. The simple things......