A May of Many Firsts!

Judah ripped off his sunglasses precisely 2 seconds after this was taken.

it was a May of Many Firsts..

-Judah got his first tooth

-Joel got his first set of stitches (see below)

-Judah said his first word (see below) 

-The Hollidays had their first baby (see below)

-Joel III was in his first wedding (see below) 

-We managed to finally get out our first draft of Joel's newest book, "7 Lies Almost Every Teen Believes" (see below)

Around the time that Judah was learning to crawl and therefore getting himself into more trouble, Joel was having some troubles of his own.  First, he was having a terrible time getting over a bad ear infection.  Second, he got pinkeye in both eyes. and then Finally, He split his forehead open in the back of his grandad's truck. He did very well with the 3 stitches (with the help of some oral versed;) and so far it has healed up well.  We did have a close call 3 days later where a large hard and heavy swing hit Joel so hard that it forced him to the ground.  Oh yeah, and did I mention that it was literally 1 inch away from his stitches? Thank the Lord we didn't have to deal with those opening back up.  At that moment we began to wonder if 'natural selection' was  trying to eliminate our clumsy toddler.

taken after stitches were put in.. very relaxed boy!

scar has healed nicely.. less than 2 weeks later

Judah said his first word "da da" at the beginning of the month.  Since then he has picked up two more.. "na na" for me (Ma Ma). and "ahh da." for all done.  I know it sounds like I'm making this up but when you are around him all the time (like me) its easy to distinguish purposeful words from babbles.  I also think we are just more in tune this time around and not as dumb surprised to how fast they learn things!

This kind of messy results in...

This kind of cleaning!

Ryan and Emily had their sweet baby girl, Whitney on May 10th.  Emily's labor went extremely well and Whitney is just a beautiful baby!  Whitney has very LONG fingers and arms and big feet.  She is a great sleeper and eater and the Hollidays are pleased with how well things are going.  Whitney came over the other evening and Judah was obsessed with her.  He kept staring at her and trying to grab her and stuff.  Whitney also had a reaction about the new surroundings.. each time Joel III yelled or cried or did something loud Whitney would stop whatever she was doing, open her eyes and look around with a strange look on her face like.. 'Wow. I haven't heard noise like that before!' It was cute.

Is this perfection or what? Baby Whitney rests and looks pretty.

on May 14th my brother Mike and his fiancée Lindsey got married! I was honored to be a bridesmaid and Joel III was also a part of wedding!  He was very excited about 'playing dress up' to get into his cute silver vest, hat and black pants to be a ring-bearer.  BUT, walking down the aisle was a disaster different story!  He was a little hesitant and upset at the rehearsal... however after lots of practice and some jelly bellies Joel performed very well at the actual ceremony! 

you can see the video of Joel III with his cousins, Indy and Justin as ring bearers below

The wedding was actually a ton of fun for us.  Joel and I were able to stay out two nights in a row without kids!  Michael and Lindsey had some nice touches including a chocolate fountain, planted herbs as favors, handmade programs and invitations and fresh hydrangeas everywhere! My dad put together some videos and they were a hit! (as always) All in all it was a great time and we are especially thankful it was in Columbus!

It takes a lot of effort to get a family pic these days.. this was the best we got!

 We finally got out Draft #1 of Joel's 2nd book "7 Lies Almost Every Teen Believes."  The book will take the non-Christian teen all the way from Relativity/Pluralism to obeying your church elders. (yeah, crazy I know!) As with many of our projects together (Main Event '06, Main Event '08 and Stand Your Ground) it was so awesome to spend so much time together and work on such a huge task.  It is much more fun around this time though, I must admit, when the project finally comes together.  Right now we have a large (around 25 people) 'editing team' that will serve to mostly comment and give overall feedback on our arguments, stories, scripture illustrations, etc. We are really excited to see what they have to say!