Our Richer Lives

All of these pictures were taken of Anna today! Time has been flying by so quickly. I can hardly believe we have already gotten to spend 4 months with our baby girl.

Anna is an absolute delight to our family. Already its hard to remember what it was like when she wasn't here.

When we were first "surprised" with the news that we were going to have a baby, I felt scared. I didn't feel like it was the "best timing" and had serious concerns about Brad needing to complete his thesis and find a job.

I felt insecure about our future and was worried about how our finances were going to look: How were we going to pay for preschool for Jillian? What were we going to do about transportation for a family of five (our little red car was no longer going to cut it)? Where was everyone going to sleep in our house (we have three bedrooms & previously both of the girls had their own room)?

But God has been incredibly gracious to us and has faithfully provided for each one of our needs & many of our desires too! For one, we have enrolled Jillian at a great (and affordable) preschool for next year and are prayerfully considering homeschooling kindergarten the following year. The transition of moving Jillian and Faith into the same bedroom went nearly seamlessly! They love being room-mates and I feel like it has only bonded them closer together as sisters. We purchased a mini-van (with "cash" from the scholarship Brad received from the Harvey Fellowship) in October. It has been a dream for me to drive the van & now Brad has the flexibility of going to work in the red car at whatever time works best for his schedule (not according to the Metro's).

Things are not "perfect" of course, we have to make choices of what are priorities are for our family. We don't get to have everything we want and its fair to say that we would have been able to give more materially to two children than we can to three. But our daughters love one another so much and I believe (and pray) that their friendship will only continue to grow in the coming years.

If I were somehow given the opportunity to not had ANY ONE of my girls for 10 MILLION DOLLARS (or even more) I wouldn't do it!!! I wouldn't trade the gift of any one of my daughters for complete financial security in this life.

I LOVE seeing how God has been providing for our family and teaching us to trust in him. His will is perfect and He loves us so much!! We praise God for the gift of Anna. Our lives are so much RICHER. :-)

This is the kind of cool picture you get when you are blindly taking it from your side! LOL!

Anna's grin is hilarious in this picture to me

Baby drool at its cutest!

Daddy is so funny!

We bought Daddy some yummy Apple bread from the Lancaster Dutch Market to celebrate 4 months with Anna!

Daddy's four fingers for 4 Month Old Anna!

I think all three of my girls look a little bit alike in this picture.

I love how Jillian and Faith have their mouths wide open in this photo!

Kisses for Baby Anna!

Anna says, "alright, that's enough photo shooting for today!"