Soon-to-be Big Brother

Brooks turned two and a half years old this week - how is that possible?! Every day, I look at him and think "he's not a baby anymore. What a grown-up little man!"

As evidence, check out this photo taken on Tuesday. He's in the hospital (the one I would have given birth in, if we planned to stay in the UK for the arrival of #2) and holding Annarose Ruth Grizzle, daughter of our dear friends and neighbors Heather and Ben, and little sister of his girlfriend Abby.

He is so proud of himself for holding her carefully, and practicing being a "big brudder". What a sweetie.


Ann, another friend from Pastorate, and her 3 month old Aiden were also visiting Heather and Annarose at the hospital while we were there. We had kids at 2.5 years old, 3 months old, and 15 hours old in the room together, and it was such joy to see young happy life everywhere.

We can't wait to meet our own new little one in (hopefully) less than three months!

A Rest in my Bathtub

Brooks has decided recently that his crib is simply too far away after bathtime, and he wants to just curl up in the bath for a rest. This video is from about 6 weeks ago, but we do this little ritual about once a week. I love the little contented sigh when I cover him up. Do you want us to turn the lights off? No! What a cutie!

Writer's Block

Wow! In the last few weeks, massive writer's block has hit me with regards to this blog. I'm sure it's not from lack of material. Life has not slowed down in the least over the last 2 months - in fact, it's definitely picked up its pace as we've tried to savor our final season in London. But I think all my creative juices have gone into this growing baby in my belly and trying to keep a silly, happy, energetic two and a half year old productively occupied! Here's to new blogging inspiration!

What's on my mind today? We've just welcomed two new babies into our family of dear friends! Deborah in Colorado gave birth to her second, a son, yesterday and Heather in London, gave birth to her second daughter, Annarose, in the wee hours of the morning today. Brooks will have lots of opportunities to interact with both of these dear babies soon, and I'll take the chance to suggest no eye-poking nor any breath-restricting hugging to prep him for his little brother's arrival! Two more dear friends are also eagerly awaiting little ones in the next week - Becca in Florida and Laurel in DC. What a great spring for new life! Congratulations, sweet friends.

London is beautiful in this season. The little hidden courtyard gardens tease and beckon me to peek over their tall brick walls with lush roses bushes and lilac and wisteria in full, fragrant bloom. The trees are all wearing their summer leaves now and the green grass lays like a blanket on all the parks nearby. I love the sound of the strong wind blowing through those leaves outside my window in the garden. I will miss the expanses of green everywhere, once we're back in Chicago.

Our washing machine is finally functioning again - actually a new one has replaced the old. I'm so glad to be done schlepping our things to the laundromat, even though Brooks might be a little sad about it. He now enjoys one of his favorite stories - "A Pocket for Cordoroy" - even more than before! This morning, we greeted the two Iraqi men who own our local laundry with waves and hellos and high fives. Brooks thinks of them as friends now, and they grinned at him for a couple of blocks as we approached. This neighborhood has finally started feeling like home.

Love to friends and family far and near. More photos and stories to come soon.

Extreme Sheep LED Art

Yes, you read that title correctly. Extreme art using Sheep and LED lights. Just one reason why I love this crazy country.

Thanks to my vet friend, Becky, for sharing this with me.

Enjoy!

London Snow Day

In the early hours of February 2, I woke up at an ungodly hour - that's what pregnancy will do to you - and happened to glance out the front window. Um - WOW! SNOW! A LOT of snow, in London!! And it was still coming down... So exciting!


We rarely have snow of any kind here, but inches and inches was incredibly unusual. Eric had already decided to work from home the next day, as I was feeling a bit under the weather. Thankfully, he didn't attempt the commute to the office - all of London's buses were suspended, and only one Tube line was operating in the whole city. We heard lots of stories of folks being stuck for hours and never making it to their destination. We ended up having a fun quiet day at home, without any of that hassle.

Our friends the Ericksons had just loaned us a hand-me-down heavy jacket - perfect for playing in the snow!!


The American college kids who live below us had either been out late or up early to construct this impressive towering snowman in front of our steps. It was taller than Eric...


Checking out the garden with 5 or 6 inches of powder... Brooks was stunned.


Brooks's first snowball!


Our helpful little man enjoyed brushing the snow off the benches so we could have a seat.


Brooks supervised as Dada rolled the base of our own snowman. Unfortunately, Brooks got cold and tired before he was finished, but it was sure fun to watch Dada's efforts! :)


I loved the way the ancient trees in the garden looked, all iced and glistening. It really was incredibly beautiful.


Another park member with his dog was out enjoying the weather, and snapped this winter wonderland photo of all of us. What a fun day!!

Video of Brooks with the Snowman

Here's Brooks enjoying a chat with the friendly pint-sized Snowman in our garden during the big snow fall in February.

I love his little wiggle when he's talking to him...

"Hi Snowman!"

"How are *you*, Snowman?"

and then later... "I wanna see the other Snowman, again".

Malshanger 2009

We had a long wonderful trip to the States over Christmas and New Years, and Brooks and I didn't return to the UK until January 10. After a week of settling back into our London life, in mid-January we went out to the English countryside with our Pastorate Group from our church, HTB. Our Pastorate has really become our family here in London. HTB is a big church, the largest I've attended with several thousand attendees on a Sunday. Given that and the typical "British reserve", I think we might have felt quite lost and alone in London without this community of friends. We meet weekly in either the larger pastorate or in smaller home groups, and study the Bible, and eat, and hang out, and pray, and live life together. It's been an amazing blessing.

So that's the who. As for the where, Malshanger is a country house and parklands owned by the Colman family, as in Colman mustard - anyone heard of them?


They're loosely connected to HTB somehow and have generously given half of their country house to HTB for the use of Pastorates and other church folks - just a big comfortable place to gather outside of London. What a fantastic privilege! Eric and I got to meet Lord Colman while we were there, and he was a delightful English gentleman, happy to hear that we were enjoying the house and eager to tell us about the previous day's hunting party...


So anyway, we drove up on Friday night and settled into the house and played games and cards until the wee-hours in front of a roaring fire. Note to self - "Star Munchkin" doesn't really cross international cultures as easily as one might hope, but then no one really minded.

The next morning we served a "big fry up" - bacon and eggs and whole bit and then had a wonderful discussion about Biblical Stewardship. We looked at over 20 passages of Scripture, dividing them up between small groups of 3 to 4 so we could study and discuss and then present the nuggets of related truth to the group. It was a wonderful way to cover a lot of ground and stir up many ideas from various contributors.

After lunch the group spent time strolling through the parklands, napping, and just hanging out talking. All three Wheelers napped for a while so I missed the big group hike but I decided to go out myself for a short walk and enjoy the beautiful afternoon and radiant sunset. I'm rarely by myself outdoors these days, so it was great to get some alone time with the trees and the wind and the birds and the sheep. I could hear the Colman's hunting party out on the other side of the property, shooting... It was a lovely restorative walk.





That night we enjoyed a yummy supper - everyone took turns prepping the meals and we spent lots of time cooking, eating and cleaning up together.


A bit later on, we gathered again for worship and more discussion time. Ross played guitar and I led the singing - it was a casual set-up but so great to look around the room and realize that we had more than 10 nations represented in our group. During the meeting time, Brooks and Abby enjoyed reading books and playing toys in the floor, right there in the middle of the room. It was somewhat distracting for their parents, but several single members of the group mentioned how nice it was to have the kids around all the time, and to not worry about them being into everything (which they were). Honestly, Brooks had a hard time keeping his hands off of Ross's guitar - I think that is the weekend that clinched his love of the instrument. Afterward, Eric got in lots of good conversation with our new friends from Malaysia, Yang Ping and Shireen while I learned a bit more about Texas Hold-Em style poker.

Late that night, we all watched the movie Slumdog Millionaire together. Yes, I enjoyed seeing it, yes I'm glad it won the Oscar for best picture, but why in the world was it billed as a feel-good movie?! I have no explanation for that. I felt uncomfortable watching parts of it and felt like the ending couldn't possibly overcome all the hard stuff leading up to it. I mean, the abuse, and the crime, and the treatment of women, and the poverty - there was so much sadness in that movie!! Am I the only person on the planet who felt like this?!?

On Sunday morning, we listened to a sermon download from Nicky Gumble, vicar of HTB, on Stewardship and enjoyed some extended worship time. After lunch and cleaning up a bit, it was time to say goodbye. Brooks ran around hugging everyone and being cheerful. At one point while we helped tidy up the kitchen, I found him curled up next to Katya, our Italian friend, who was reading him one of his favorite books.

I was sad that the social time had come to a close so quickly, but was thankful for the newly cemented friendships that a few days away produced. Weekends like that don't have to be too structured, if we're all looking for the same sort of connections. It was relaxing and relational and just about perfect.


Thanks friends for a wonderful time!

Learning to blow out candles...

One early February night, Brooks wanted blow out the candles after supper. Grandma was visiting with us via computer skype and we all cheered him on as he tried to snuff out the flame.

I love when he gets tickled at the end. That's his most authentic belly laugh. Now that he can blow them out without too much effort, he thinks this video of himself is very funny!