Faith Like a Child

I have been battling this awlful cold that has settled in my throat and caused on and off again laryngitis all week. By the end of each day, my voice just hurts. Last night, I read Jenna her favorite book, Love You Forever, and barely got through it with all the coughing and hoarseness.

On the way up the stairs to bed tonight, Jenna asked if I would read again and I told her that my throat hurt and that it would be better if she would read me a book. (Jenna is 3 and doesn't read, but we've read some books so many times that she has them memorized pretty well.) She turned around and said, "Oh Mommy, don't worry, Jesus will take care of your throat. He loves you all the time and always takes care of you. We can't see him, cause he lives up in the sky, but he watches us all the time."

I looked at my three year old little Jenna and realized that God is already working in her. How wonderful:)

Daddy Carol Hartke

Recently, Jenna has discovered that everyone has a middle name. She has been referring to everyone in our family by their whole name. I am Mommy Marie Hartke. Abby is Abby Marie Hartke. Jenna is Jenna Chase Hartke, and Nate is Daddy Carol Hartke.

No matter how many times I tell her that his middle name is Carl and not Carol, it still comes out Carol. Feel free to call Nate, "Carol" anytime:)

Happy 1st Birthday Abby!

Today we celebrated Abby's first birthday! Our lifegroup (small group) from church joined us in celebrating and we had a fun afternoon on a beautiful Spring day.

Abby put on quite a show. For the first time, I got a cupcake cake, which is a bunch of cupcakes with frosting on the top to hold them together. It was awesome! Above the regular cake, there were three cupcakes bunched together with a heart on it. We gave that group of three cupcakes to Abby to eat.

I was fully expecting to have to encourage her to dig into the cake, but I soon realized that was not necessary. Abby bent down and put her face right in the cupcakes, not even bothering to use her hands to help her eat. She kept diving back into the cake getting more and more pink and red frosting on her face, in her hair, and up her nose! She was delighted! In the end, Abby ate two full cupckakes and loved every second of it!

Happy Birthday sweetheart Abby!

Filling up the Gas Tank

I have been driving around for days with the gas light on and the needle at the empty line because I didn't want to pay a crazy amount of money for a tank full of gas. As I came home from church this morning, I noticed that the needle was below the empty line and knew that I'd have to face the gas station and its prices.

The cost of living here in California is incredibly high and our prices are usually higher than most of the country. I know that gas is high everywhere and I honestly don't know if we are significantly higher than everyone else, but $3.21 for a gallon of regular gas is just wrong. That's my two cents--or actually 5,313 cents, which is what it cost in order to fill up our van today.

A Few Pictures

I wish I had a funny story to tell you about the kids, but I got nothing for right now. Over the last few weeks, I've spent a good deal of my time bent over Abby, holding her hands, helping her walk. She's not walking yet, but is a speedracer if I hold her little hands. We signed Jenna up for preschool last week--she'll go two days a week next fall and we are all very excited about that! Jenna doesn't understand why she can't play on the preschool playground now or why she can't play with the kids she saw there. She asks me every day if she can go to preschool. All I know is that September is a long time away for me to have to be explaining that to her!

I included a few pictures of the girls. Abby's 11 months and I took this picture as she was desperately trying to get into the fireplace. We have to work hard to keep her out! Jenna is in her dance outfit. She takes ballet/tap on Saturdays:) Very cute:)