I sit!

but I still don't roll . . .

Psalm 127

~Children are a blessing from the Lord - Psalm 127:3~

I remember reading this verse when I was pregnant with Emma and it blew me away. I knew the verse - but in differing versions it says that children are a "reward" or "heritage". Meditating on this is truly overwhelming because I can't think why I should be rewarded in anyway.

Emma Grace is 5 months old and as we enjoy her more and more each day I realise just how much of a blessing children are. Though totally undeserving of her and the joy she brings us, we are truly blessed to have her in our lives. God is good!

Foodies!

Emma actually ATE solids! We've tried a number of times over the past month with no luck. She is hilarious. She would get the tiniest portion of rice cereal mixed with milk on her lips and totally gag. Mum suggested giving her just milk on the spoon so she could figure out what was going on. So today I did that and whatddyaknow? mum was right. of course :) so Emma happily ate some rice cereal for morning tea and was very pleased with herself.

These photos are actually about a month old and this is the first time we tried.

I'll post some "smiley eater" pics soon :)

Shmodels

We went for a drive to Cleveland yesterday. It's on the water's edge, from there you can see Stradbroke Island. We often bemoan the fact that we have terrible lighting in our house for photos, so we were glad to get some in before the sun set.

I still can't believe I let Lyle convince me to allow our 4.5 month old to sit in a swing by herself!!

first model pose


I told her the Springboks might beat the Wallabies in September
Haaaahahahahaha

How photogenic are these two?!

Having a giggle with dad

Not sure how clear it is, but lately (probably because I do it to her) Emma Grace is forever sticking her tongue out at people! She LOVED this, I could hear her laughing from where I was.

To be a shmodel one must first learn to do the model walk...

But one must learn to stand first!

(look how tiny her feet are compared to Lyle's hehe)

WHOA!

The following story is true. Any and all characters are not fictional and do represent who you think they represent...In fact, it occurred in the Wetherston household an hour ago.

Lyle took Emma Grace into her room to change her nappy (diaper for my American readers) and this is what I hear

Emma: coo coo coo

Lyle: WHOA!!!!!!

Emma: waaaaa

Lyle (concerned): hey babe?

Liz: Yeah?

Lyle (panicked): we're out of wipes

Emma: WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA

So for the less astute among you...Emma had an explosive nappy, upon its discovery by her father he yelled in surprise, scaring the living daylights out of his beloved daughter, he then realised there were no baby wipes in the baby wipe box.

But never fear. Our story has a happy ending. The heroine, who shall remain nameless but we all know who she is, came to the rescue with the wipes and smile that calmed the beloved Emma. Although Emma didn't smile at her father for the rest of the 15 minutes that she was awake. So it has a partially happy ending.

The Partially Happy End.

Water, water everywhere!!!

Emma's favourite thing in the whole world is having a bath. Which is great, because typically kids hate baths, of course this might still happen in a few years but for now, we're on a good role! We'll try to get some video footage - it's too good to miss!

I love that something as simple as this is just another way in which the Lord blesses us with our little girl and brings so much joy to our lives!

This is how mummy fairs after the bath - my jeans were

super wet too, but I suppose you can't really see it.

And here's our clean little bug in a rug.

Cuteness personified

pigtails! how cute is the expression on her face?!?!

Kisses from cousin Finn - he's taken quite a liking to Emma Grace. He makes a 'gentle' sound (like a whisper) and touches her gently - it's very sweet.

The Cage

We're borrowing a playpen, dubbed by my brother as the cage. So far she likes it which I'm thankful for. As long as she can see one of us walk by occasionally she's a happy camper.

See? a little smile...it's probably also because Moose is right there next to her.

Some recent pics

Just some more cute pics of Emma . . .sigh, she's so cute!

Having some mummy time With my mum - note, Emma is NOT crying. This is a good thing....
she has been crying at mum a lot lately (I think we need to spend more time over there!)
She did keep looking at me the whole time to check that everything was ok though :)

I love her long hair!

A rare family photo!

The girls got skills!

OK so admittedly it's embarrassing for adults when we see ourselves on video, so excuse the high pitch voices and silly comments to Emma Gracie, but this is pretty cute. We tried it for the first time today and she apparently thinks jumping is rather fun!

Welcome to Winter

Winter has made itself known in Brisbane - which, to be honest, really doesn't compare with winter as most places experience it! However, it is still very cold causing us to value our fireplace and pull out all the stops to keep baby warm! Our house is raised and only has a second story - called a "Queenslander" - to keep it cool in the ridiculous summers. Underneath is all air...cold air. So we have been using the fire in the evenings but keeping Emma warm with a heater for most the night - I appreciate my slippers very much at 3am, especially on the wooden floors!

Ready for a walk to Grandpa and Granny's house!

Grandpa bought her this vest!

This is a gorgeous outfit that the Archer's gave us...

But it's currently a little big...

And not very condusive to thumb sucking...

but we're very thankful and look forward to dressing her in it soon!

Hair

Emma's hair is getting so long that it sometimes is in her eyes. In an attempt to curtail this discomfort I decided to try tying it up to see what happens...you must simply agree, it's very cute!

Michelle's Visit

We have had the great blessing of a visit from our dear friend Michelle these past 10 days. It was so fun to have her here, we had lots of laughs and it was a delight to introduce her to Emma Grace. We went to a zoo (very touristy) to show her the Aussie animals and on a road trip which sadly made for quite miserable viewing as we hit flooding keeping us in doors!!!

Michelle took this photo in the car...I'd love to know what Emma Grace was thinking...

Emma with her new favourite person!

I promise, even when Emma was overtired and super

hungry Michelle could STILL make her smile!!
At the beach on the way home from NSW
At Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary

Michelle feeding the kangaroos!

This sign made me laugh because it was near the Wombats,

which I always thought were merely 'cute and furry' creatures!

the 'vicious' biting wombat?

perhaps they're simply masters of disguise

unfortunately this is blurry, but it's not often

that you see Koalas actually moving!

They usually do this...

We think this cockatoo was an escape artist as he was moving

the corrugated iron and making a huge racket doing it!

A Rainbow Lorikeet (pity about the bars!)

This is Surfer's Paradise with erosion from the rains...

and....flooding

One reason we didn't get to see Byron Bay Lighthouse

A Saturday Outing

We live opposite a primary school (elementary school for my American readers of which I'm sure there are at least 3) and on Saturday they had their annual school fete. It was a rather noisy affair so we decided to pop along and have a nosey around.

Getting ready to check it out!

I waited in line for some fairy floss but it was on a stick which I decided was too undignified...

Here's some random trivia:

Australia: fairy floss

USA: cotton candy

SA: candy floss

I'd like to know where in the world it's called 'Fairy Candy'

They had a massive jumping castle

These girls were super cute. I love that the little poppet second
from the left (stage right) is stopping to scratch her elbow... AND we saw some familiar faces there
(as it happens the bloke in the background is
our next door neighbour with his little girl) Poor Eli is covered by Maiah's excitement...
if you look closely you can kind of see his shirt :) And of course by the end of it all (and we're talking 30 minutes haha) Emma Grace was done!