Thanks everyone for your kind words and prayers after my last post. The fog of sadness lifted the next morning, and things have been mostly good since. It's so strange how sadness can dominate a day or week, and then lift almost as suddenly as it came on. I suppose there are underlying reasons, but still it is a little unreasonable, I think...

I have been meaning to post some new pictures of Samuel, who is now definitely our chubbiest baby so far. He can stand by himself now, and even get to that position from sitting. So he'll stand up in the middle of a room and stay there for a while - but without taking any steps yet. He still drops back down to his knees to crawl.

I took him outside to play in the yard yesterday, and he had so much fun. He stood and clapped while his brothers swung on the glider together. He tried to crawl up the slide and settled for sitting delightedly on the end of it for a while. He put a big, dirty rock in his mouth and smiled and spit it out when I asked him what he had. So, I will try to get some pictures of his antics and post them soon.

Again, thanks for reading and praying, friends...knowing you are out there helps keep me going on hard days. You are the Church as I believe Christ intended it. Being one in Him forever with you -and getting to experience some of that mutual love and grace now - is a great privilege.