The Pep

I wanted to update on my most amazing three year old daughter. She is the sweetest thing ever. Boy does she get some attitude but that comes along with being a toddler. Right before she was going to bed, I laid down by her on the bed and she just put her arm around me and started rubbing my back. For a moment, I thought I was with my mother..heehee, not really but what a nurturing thing to do, huh? Anyways, she's a huge blessing and I wanted to share some of her recent things.

 *We have been walking up a HUGE hill called Tuscany Hills (a community) and this little girl, if she is not tired, can practically walk up the whole thing. Sometimes to get her going, este or myself will say, "I'm going to get you!" and she just squeals from the anticipation...but it gets her moving faster!

 *This girl is seriously the most amazing sister. She loves our baby samuel so much. She always wants him to be with us and cares so much for him. Sammy thinks she is amazing...she can get him to smile and laugh like nobody else. it's ridiculous.

 *Peppy loves frozen fruit...mango, strawberry, blueberry, cherry, pineapple. all of it. We love to make smoothies and her fav. part of making them is eating the frozen fruit out of a plastic measuring cup.

 *She is such an encourager. She's our Barnabas. She is all the time telling people how pretty they are or she will tell me how well i do stuff. like...putting the groceries away, "mommy, you are great at putting that food up!" i melt. I can picture her being one of those special friends that every girl wants...always complimenting and never jealous...just always so happy for you.

 *This girl can shake her hips like no other! Seriously. Since she was a little thing, I would tell her to shake it and she would shake her hips side to side but like really well. Now that she is older, she is a bit advanced and can do a "shake walk"... she does it while walking. it's amazing.

 *She also LOVES to make people laugh. I was in the nursery a few weeks ago at church and I was looking out the window. I saw peppy and her class walking outside and noticed that she was doing the "shake walk." The kids were laughing and the teachers were looking at each other cracking up. They had no clue I could see but I was laughing so hard inside the room. I love that she can be herself wherever she is.

 *When she finds out somebody is coming over, she gets so excited. No matter who it is, they might as well be the president because that's how exciting it is for her.

 *This detail about my daughter is crazy scary for me. I'm a planner. I like to plan my day..and for that matter, my husband's day as well. (naturally, he is not a planner and i'm so thankful he puts up with all my daily questions about what is going on the next few hours, etc.) Anyways, this has been passed down to my girl. She will ask me several times a week the details of whats going on that day. "mommy, where are we going? ...after that...then what?" oh man.

 *We went camping with our church a few weekends ago and something just clicked with peppy and she started putting her whole head under the water. last summer, she'd jump in to where her head was under but now she will keep it under and look and go places. maybe it's because she now has goggles. not sure but she loves to do it. she even does it in the bath.

 *Last week she sprained her ankle. it was horrible. she fell on our steps...those blasted steps....and we just knew that with a cry like that something wasn't right. she got xrays and we found out it was only a sprain. i think i cried more.

 *She told me the other day, as she looked me straight in the eyes, "i love you to pieces." She also told me last week after I had told her i love her, "I love you too, sweetie."

 *She has such a vivid imagination. One of my favorite things about her at this age. She is constantly having conversations with "people" and when she's gonna do something i don't want her to in the middle of a "pretend state of mind" she will say, "mommy, I'm just pretending."

 *She's got dancing in her blood. We regularly have family dance sessions. *love* and the girl has skills!


Her friend, Hannah, had a birthday party and had Peppy sit next to her while she opened her presents. She would hand Peppy all her presents to hold and Peppy totally did...without complaining.  For a moment, I flashed forward in time to her being a maid of honor supporting her friend.


Hannah got a Rapunzel wig...lol.


Sink baths.


The only earrings I allow her to wear...her idea.


This girl got serious cleaning.


We like to be close....so glad she does too.


"glamping" with the family


She fell asleep after coming back from urgent care. poor thing.


goggles!


seriously, not a cuter toosh out there!

 so much to be thankful for.

VICTORY

I seriously have so much that I want to catch up on and tell, I have a list of roughly a hundred things to jot down here on this world wide journal, however, I feel the need to step back from my desire to talk about how amazing my kids are and their progress as little people and mention an amazing thing that happened in our lives a week ago today. Not sure if you all remember this blog from over three years ago that I wrote. It has been a little more than 3 years since the hardest day of our lives happened. My husband was accused of some horrible things having to do with his work and charged with 23 other people in a huge scheme. The possibility was prison. Never in a million years did we ever think this would be part of our lives. In the midst of it all, the Lord began to give us promises to cling to. One of the main ones was 2 chronicles 20. You have got to read this chapter. We truly felt the Lord was telling us that we would not have to fight in this battle, to stand still and see the salvation of the Lord. He gave us confirmation after confirmation...but three years is a LOOOONG time to stand still. There is so much more to share, I could write a book, but the important thing is that I want to declare that our God is faithful. I realize that horrible things happen to believers all the time. Just because we are christians does not mean that everything is going to work out perfect (in our eyes) however the Lord had made it clear that He was going to deliver us from this horrible trial. And that He did. Last Friday, Esteban was about to teach a bible study to some young adults when he received the call from our lawyer that they were dropping all the charges. Victory in Jesus! We have been through so much these past 3 years. There were times I prayed for the Lord to return ASAP or take Esteban home because I couldn't take seeing him in pain anymore. We went through people not believing in the promises that we felt the Lord had given us and planting seeds of doubt in our minds. Esteban went through the birth of two children that he didn't know if he was going to be able to help raise. We have been persecuted, but not forsaken; struck down, but not destroyed. Through it all, we don't regret a bit of it. Why? Because we got to experience our Jesus, His amazing, fulfilling Word and experience living by faith every single day. When I say, I know that I know that I know that my Lord is faithful..I'm being honest. He is good and He cannot go back on His Word. Praise you, Jesus!!