Happy Birthday Dave AND Happy Easter 2014! Christ is Risen!

Happy 48th Birthday to my favorite husband and the best daddy!

     Dave's birthday started off with Joshua waking up with a fever and very clingy.  He was happy enough to help stir some of the dry ingredients of the cake but insisted on being held for the rest of the process.  I wasn't sure how I was going to frost the cake....

.....but it worked out!  Jonathan helped to frost the inner layer of the cake ....he's standing just outside the picture.  Our first birthday cake made by all three of us.  

     Easter Sunday started with a fire in our kitchen!   In a crazy twist of events, a wooden trivet had gotten stuck to the bottom of our tea pot.  Nobody noticed and in the morning I put my teapot on to boil!  Off I went to change a dirty diaper, and a few minutes later Dave noticed smoke and stink and discovered a fire on the range!  Fortunately the fire went out as soon as he turned off the gas, but we were smoked out of the house and into the back yard for over an hour.  

      This Easter season we did our usual Resurrection Eggs and multiple readings of the Easter story with much interest (Joshua) and questions (Jonathan) from  the boys.  My new tradition to try this year was the Resurrection Rolls (recipe linked.)  Our local import store had some marshmallows from the Phillipines, so I was excited to give this a try.  The boys helped to prepare the marshmallows and wrap them in dough.  The baking didn't go quite as expected .....I guess the Phillipino marshmallows weren't quite the same.  They puffed up to the size of a lemon, exploded the rolls open, and then did not melt as predicted.  So, the object lesson didn't work like I had hoped.... but they still tasted delicious!  

     This year was the 4th time we participated in the Easter Egg hunt at our international fellowship.  It Jonathan's 4th time.  He knew what to do and was so fast I didn't even get any pictures of him finding eggs this year!  I did get this picture of proud Joshua!

Starting for home with a basketful of candy!  To be divvied out one piece a day for .....many days!

Look who's TWO! Happy Birthday Joshua!

Overheard at our house on Joshua's birthday....

"Joshua how old are you?"
"......Green!"
"Joshua how old are you?"
"........Lellow!"
(Jennifer whispers into Joshua's ear)
"Okay, let's try this again....Joshua, how old are you?"
"I TWO!"

Joshua's birthday was almost a month ago already, but my blogging got hung up by trying to (unsuccessfully) fix my Christmas video....better late than never!  We had a lovely party with chocolate cake and presents and games and Aunt Calista and Aunt Becky in attendance....but those pictures were mostly blurry (sigh).  So here are the pictures from Joshua's 2 Year Birthday Photo Shoot.

What has happened to my little Ham?  For the longest time, Joshua would grin and yell cheese repeatedly at the sign of any small sized tech gadget, including the kitchen timer.  Now he is doing this....

Ah, but here is a smile for the camera!

Joshua is such a precious addition to our family.  I don't know what we'd do without him.... we're so thankful that God has given him to us.

 Josh got some new sand toys for this birthday ....here he is trying them out!

Jonathan is FOUR! Happy Birthday!

Jonathan is FOUR!  We are so blessed to have him in our family.  We decided to have a "big" party this year and invited 10 young friends over to help celebrate!  The theme:  FIRETRUCKS!

It was lot of work but I think our 10 little friends had a lot of fun!  Thanks to some firetruck theme decorations given to us by a friend, a fire truck cake, and a giant box, this party was the most elaborate ever for our simple family.  Oh yes, we had fire fighter hats too!

Talk about perfect timing!  Around the beginning of November the school got new weight room equipment. They were kind enough to let us pick out a few boxes.  I got this giant box, which I think contained an elliptical machine.  It is bigger than even a refrigerator box and quite sturdy!  One thing I think is funny is that the machine and the box were made in Hungary of all places!  I tried to explain this to Jonathan and he kept asking "Why is that place named Hungry?"  So as you see the giant box was transformed into a firetruck. Whoops I forgot to put lights on the top, but it does have 3 steering wheels, 2 doors and 6 windows.  It was a big hit at the party.  At one point there were 10 kids inside, and shortly afterward they decided to start driving it and pushed/lifted it all the way to the end of the dining room!

Oh my, getting photos of the party action was a challenge!  There was so much movement that most of my pictures were just a collection of blurs!  Here are a few fire truck action shots, though.

We had a firetruck version of "Pin the Tail on the Donkey."  The kids had to put a missing balloon on the bunch of balloons in the picture.  First Dave demonstrated to the kids how to do it and made everyone laugh!

Here is Jonathan's turn.  Everyone who participated got a gummy fruit candy.

So, the cake. 

 I'm not the type of person to make elaborate cakes, but somehow I got inspired.  My first google search for firetruck cakes left me feeling defeated, but then my friend told me to search for "easy firetruck cakes" and I found this one!  My friend, who IS the type to make elaborate cakes, came over twice to help me out with the supply list and the decorating.  It was a 4 layer cake!  The funny part was the frosting.  The local red food coloring is just pink....the more you put in, the more pink.  I thought I had it made because I had a small bottle of American food coloring.  I guess it must have been from the dollar store because we put in the whole bottle and ended up with a bright pink cake!   None of the kids ever mentioned it though.  They all accepted it as a valid fire truck and there were no complaints!  

Frosting can really only be enjoyed if you eat it with your tongue!

The eating of the cake was the best part.  Somehow, all of the kids spontaneously wanted to go outside at cake time to play.  So as the cake was served, they all found places to sit outside and there were several spills but no mess to clean up inside the house!

We had the party on Saturday and Jonathan's birthday was Sunday.  I had to include the morning surprise, a big floppy pancake shaped like a FOUR!  I had a fiasco with the syrup, though.  It's a long story, but I accidently mixed our maple syrup with sweet soy sauce (which looks identical in a jar in the fridge!)

Jonathan received several nice gifts this year, but here is one of his favorites:  a box of "colored cheerios."  A few months ago we were at the store and Jonathan quietly stroked the Froot Loops box and wistfully (but not whining) said "Mommy, I really like these colored cheerios."  I couldn't justify buying them on a normal day ....so much sugar!  His birthday seemed like a good occasion!

Sublime to be 39!

Well, I had my 39th birthday last Sunday.  Several people have asked how it went, so here is a little report.  I had a wonderful birthday!

 I woke up to find 3 hand-crafted birthday cards on the table from my 3 Patrow men.  The cards were beautiful and two of them had CHOCOLATE inside!

A few weeks ago Dave asked me what I wanted for my birthday and I said "I want to go to national church!"  Since we arrived in town, we have attended an international fellowship that meets at the school where Dave teaches.  For a while we have talked about going to national church once a month or so.  My birthday seemed like a perfect time to kick it off.  It was lovely!  The whole family enjoyed it and Dave says we should return on a regular basis!

Here are the boys in their Sunday School class.  This is actually a weird picture.  It looks like there are only 3 kids in the class, but there were more in the back.  Normally, they have Sunday School in an outdoor courtyard area, but it was being used for some kind of bazaar so for this week they used this classroom instead.  All of that was not important, though.  The boys did great.  They didn't goof off and participated in class.  I can't wait to get back and learn more non-English Sunday School songs.  After our bad day at pre-school a while back, I was really nervous today....but I was wrong to be. They will be excited to go back!

My favorite moment of the day, though, was when Dave brought out the birthday ice cream (coconut flavor) with candles and he and the boys sang Happy Birthday with much gusto.  I wish we could have recorded it.  They all sang so well together, even Joshua knew all the words.  The Patrow Trio for my birthday!

Thank you Lord for another year!

Happy 47th Birthday Dave!

Happy Birthday Dave!  

I am so grateful for my husband who leads our family to follow the Lord in serving overseas here, or wherever God may lead us in the future.  It's my dream come true, really!  He is a thoughtful and caring teacher, a loving and communicating husband, and a very quantity-time daddy as evidenced by the photos below!  Happy Birthday! 

"Daddy!  Read me this story!" says Jonathan.  "Bu!  Bu!  (book)" says Joshua.

Man-time in the play fort

The Patrow boys LOVE going to eat lunch with Daddy at school.

Definition of bliss for Jonathan:  totally devoted one-on-one face-to-face time with Daddy while swinging

Wanting to see how Daddy sees

Wanting to fill Daddy's shoes

Look who is ONE! Joshua Jason

We are joyfully celebrating the first year of Joshua, who turned one on January 10th!  What an amazing kid!   We are so blessed that he joined our family!  

 Ankle length swim trunks are the latest fashion, don't ya know? 

 He's discovering how much fun can be had in the kitchen....here he has dumped out the garlic and shallots.

No words needed I think.  The cuteness and delight of life speaks for itself.  Okay, I will explain that strange blemish on his forehead is a piece of rice. 

Being one comes with some new privileges....Joshua now gets to take a bath WITH his brother in the big green tub!  We figure he is durable enough now to survive if Jonathan dunks him.  Jonathan is being a bit shy in this picture, but don't let that fool you.  They LOVE taking a bath together!

Now it's confession time:  I did have quite a few lovely videos of us singing Happy Birthday to Joshua and the FIRST cake eating.  I had nice pictures of him with his Birthday crown and cake all over his face.  I accidentally deleted them permanently this morning!  Argh!  I'm still grieving it, but so glad to have the flesh and blood boy in my arms and know that I can take lots more photos on other days!

Jonathan's birthday -- No longer a toddler!

I'm three!

So all of my child development books only go up to 36 months....which means that Jonathan is no longer a toddler.  He is now officially a pre-schooler.  Time to pull out a different set of books I guess.  I need to review Ted Tripp's Shepherding a Child's Heart right away!

I thought about having a big (i.e. 5 boys) party for Jonathan this year...but I chickened out.  Instead we just invited Jonathan's friend Zephaniah over for cake and ice cream.  Here they are together watching a video of the Mars rover landing (one of Dave's favorites.) 

When you live overseas, sometimes your birthday presents are wrapped like this!

Another birthday tradition when you live overseas is a Birthday Skype with family!  Every year Aunt Ruth and Cousins Emily and Erica have a birthday cake with candles in Spokane for Jonathan's birthday.  Here he is showing his birthday presents to Grandma Arlette and Emily.  The "bi-air-plane" is a gift from Sammy and Reuben (really, their daddy made it) and Jonathan LOVES it!

Here are a couple of videos of what our big three year old is doing these days.  :)  Enjoy!

Remembering Bethany in October

It's October.  Most of my life, I had thought of October has being my birthday month.  However, I'm now aware that October is National Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month.  I'm sure you didn't know that.  I sure didn't before we had a reason to know.  Prior to Bethany's death, I had rarely ever thought about what it would be like to lose a baby.  Soon afterwards, I discovered that many -- a dozen or more -- people I know and had known for years, had lost a baby and carried those scars for the rest of their lives.  As we do now.

If you are new to our blog and to our family journey, Bethany's complete story is HERE.  

We celebrated Bethany's 4th birthday on July 22.  Below is a photo of the birthday party we had for her.  Her picture.  A balloon.  A cake that said "Happy Birthday Bethany Joy." Ice cream.  Family.

Our Forever Baby turns 4!

I still get teary eyed at times when I remember our daughter.  The grief is changing though.  How amazing to look at this photo.  Her photo remains the same black-and-white image that will never be replaced with pictures of her growing up.   Our family is changing and growing -- the photo from Bethany's birthday last year did not have Joshua in it!

How does grief grow and change?  After 4 years of avoidance, I'm now thinking about getting Bethany's music CD out again....and it doesn't pain me to think of it.  In fact, I found myself singing one of those songs to Joshua the other day.  It's a sign to me that we are healing, and our boys are the greatest healing salve of all.  We are so thankful for them.  We are also thankful for Bethany's vibrant life in heaven -- I think of her as a growing girl there. 

I met a couple last year who had lost a baby to SIDS about 25 years ago.  They now say that, although the grief process was long and painful, it was one of the best things that could have happened to them, because of how God showed his graciousness to them.   I don't know if I will ever say that Bethany's death was the best thing that ever happened to me.....but I am thankful that she is safe in heaven and am confident in her security.

We still give our deepest gratitude to the wonderful organization, Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep, who helped us in our time of need to provide such beautiful pictures of Bethany during her last day on earth.   These photos have been a crucial part of our healing process.  Do you know that we never held her, wire free, until her last 14 hours of life?  Yet we have dozens of professional photos of Dave and I embracing her -- just herself with none of that ugly medical equipment in the picture.  Those 14 hours were far too short, but our photos keep those memories fresh in our minds while the other less pleasant times are actually fading away to a place too deep to recall easily.

Please, if there ever comes a time in your life that you would know of a family who has just lost a baby, or has a terminally ill infant, do what you can to help them get Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep involved.  They offer this free service to anyone with this specific need and have volunteer photographers on call all throughout the United States and some other parts of the world too.  

Happy 46th Birthday Dave!

"Blessed is the man who does not walk in the counsel of the wicked or stand in the way of sinners or sit in the seat of mockers.  But his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.  He is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither.  Whatever he does prospers."  Psalm 1: 1-3

Our family is so thankful for a husband and father who loves the Lord  and his family and who prays and seeks wisdom from God's word each day.  He's also a very thankful guy, which we feel in how he relates to us.  He is absolutely the perfect husband for me and I love him and thank God for bringing us together!

Happy Birthday Dave!

Dave, these are the best years of your life....but I have a feeling the bestest best is yet to come! 

Look who's 2 months old!

   Joshua is learning to smile -- big huge wide opened mouthed grins!   They are still a bit hard to catch on camera, but we spent a bit of time today to do just that because it's his 2 month birthday!

Here's another.  As my friend Stacey says "I love it when babies smile with their eyes."  I never thought to put in those words exactly, but she's right.  Here we get both....smiling eyes and smiling lips.

I'm including the above picture of Jonathan at 2 1/2 months old because people keep asking me "How does Joshua compare to Jonathan at this age?"  See for yourself.  I think they look like brothers, but not extremely alike. 

Here's the photographer(s)....Yep, Jonathan is still feeling rather clingy after the arrival of his brother.

So they say a growth spurt happens at 2 months.....a few days ago Joshua slept almost the whole day through and sure enough, the next day none of his size Extra Small diaper covers fit anymore! 

This week Jonathan and I were water painting at the table, and I had to leave him to go change Joshua's diaper.  When I came back I found a tattooed pirate with a full beard and mustache!  This is his reaction when I put him in front of the bathroom mirror and told him to clean himself up!

Dave has been taking Jonathan to our school playground everyday, so we must include a few pictures!  In many ways, it doesn't compare (especially in safety considerations!) to all of the fun playgrounds in Singapore, but it does have some impressive features!

So this day one of Jonathan's friends was in the sandbox with him, eager to smile for the camera.  I was trying to get Jonathan to look at the camera and smile, too ....but I think it was more important for him to demonstrate/document what he can do with his toy digger and dumptruck.