Happy Easter

Oops - it's been more than two weeks instead of one since I've posted about Isaiah. I have a wonderful excuse, though - I'm the mother of a little baby. I will try to be better, though, because so much happens every single week with him, and I don't want to miss sharing and recording any of it. I'll make two posts today to make up for it.

Actually, I'm finding that I am able to get more and more done these days even with Isaiah taking up 90% of my attention. Now that he's nearly 3 months old (I can't believe it's been that long,) I've found that he can entertain himself for short - very short - periods of time, and he's also become interested in watching me as I do somewhat productive things around the house. That is, he interested in watching me as long as I constantly sing songs and make silly faces at him and make sure his pacifier is firmly wedged into him little mouth at all times.

Over Easter weekend, my family came out from Rapid City, SD to see us. That meant that my grandparents, my dad, and my brother finally got to meet Isaiah. They, of course, all immediately fell in love with him. Between my family and Michael's family, Isaiah wasn't set down for a single moment the entire weekend. He loved it. It was especially fun to see how my grandfather interacted with Isaiah. My grandpa is usually a gruff guy, and he is sometimes rather negative. But when he held Isaiah, all he could do was say what a wonderful, mellow little baby he was, and he just melted into a happy great-grandfather puddle every time he jiggled Isaiah on his knee. We also discovered that Great-grandpa is an expert knee jiggler, and he did a wonderful job of calming Isaiah when he was tense.

My dad also had a lot of fun with Isaiah. He would walk around with him, talk to him, and spend time with him looking at the bubbles in the fish tank (which were much more interesting than the fish in the fish tank to Isaiah.) Isaiah also responded very well to Dad, and we have a host of pictures of Isaiah smiling in Dad's arms. I think Isaiah appreciated how soft and mellow my Dad is, and I'm sure he'll have a good relationship with his grandpa as he gets older. My brother, Andy, was a little nervous at first, I think. I'm sure he just wanted to make sure he didn't hurt Isaiah or make him cry, since Andy really hasn't been around babies that much at all. By the end, though, he was making Isaiah very happy by lifting him up in the air and making airplane noises, just like Michael does. My mom, of course, spent as much time with him as she could, and she got in a pretty fair amount of cuddling and kissing. She was amazed at how much he had grown and how alert he had become since she last saw him when he was only 2 weeks old. I have to agree - Isaiah changes every single day, and I am constantly amazed. Sometimes I silently wish that he would slow down so that I have more time to enjoy every little stage, but at the same time, I'm so excited to see what he's going to do next.

On Easter Sunday, Isaiah was dedicated at our church, which was a wonderful experience. He was dedicated along with two other baby boys - another little Isaiah and a little Titus Will. Michael's family came in so that we all could dedicate Isaiah together. Our pastor prayed for Isaiah and asked us to take the responsibility to be a model of God's love for him and lead him to a place where he would be able to know God and hopefully accept him into his heart. It was so wonderful to do that publicly, in front of our church and family, because my prayer for Isaiah has constantly been that he would come to know Jesus and accept him into his life. More than anything else I can pass onto him, I want Isaiah to have the joy and peace that I have from my relationship with Christ, and I desperately want Isaiah to glorify God with his life. On a less important note - Isaiah was wearing a super cute sweater vest and our camcorder ran out of battery just as the dedication started. Oh well, though.

I'll put up another post with the rest of the goings-on from these last two weeks so that neither of them gets too lengthy.