Romans 8:37-38

"Seeds of Worship" songs from the words of Romans 8:37-38.

Those are good for when someone dies. (and Romans 8:38-39)

Lucy and I lost a friend, Ms. Irma.  We are among many people who loved her and will miss her.  We had gone to visit her about a week ago.  She was small and still, but was able to visit a bit.  We talked and cried and prayed, and it was hard but it was so good.

Lucy and I talked on the way home about how she was sick.  "Will she die?" Lucy asked.  "Yes," I told her, because I knew it was true.  We talked about how she'd be in heaven, with Jesus, and he would hold her in his arms and say, "Welcome, my precious child."

We were in the car on the day she died.  We had talked about it earlier, and talked again about how we would miss her but that she was whole and healthy and happy with Jesus.

She requested a new verse song--"For I am convinced"  so I played it and she sang along.  She said, "I want to hear this one, and then John 3:16, and then 'Do Not Fear'."  She'd never had such a specific "playlist" of different songs before.  They are on 3 different CDs of the 4 CDs of verse songs we have in at one time, and three of 25 songs or so that she knows well.

"Those are good for when someone dies," she said, with a certain little nod.

Here are the songs/verses she chose:

Romans 8:38-39
For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

John 3:16
For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.

Isaiah 41:10
Do not fear, for I am with you; Do not be dismayed, for I am your God.  I will strengthen you and help you, I will uphold you with my righteous right hand.

Songs about never being out of God's presence, eternal life, and God's presence and provision when we're scared.  Yes, Lucy, I'd say these will do.

the Zoo

 The zoo--thanks to Aunt Bon-Bon, we go a lot!  Always an adventure, and lots of fun!

Bonnie and Lucy feeding a giraffe.  With a purple tongue.  So cool.

"nap" time

This is what I found when I peeked in during naptime.  She did take a nap, but she had to do some light fort construction first.  (Please note that she's sound asleep with "Duckie" stuffed in her shirt.  Very interested in pregnancy and birth these days.  I blame the Duggars.)

Funny things she said today

We went to a church mainly for African Refugees in Cincinnati.  It was SO cool.  Everything was in Swahili and English.  Lots of singing and fellowshiping and praising.  No A.C.  Beautiful.  We met many of the 60 or so people there (of which I was one of about 5 people who weren't African).  Afterwards, I asked her what she thought.  "Pretty good," she replied.  "But I wish I got to meet someone from Africa."

She was late getting tucked in and desperately trying to detain Nana to delay bedtime.  She'd already tried for a story, and no dice.  "Here, Nana," she called out to her.  "Have some lotion."  Nana said she'd get some in her own room.  Desperately, Lucy cried out, "It overthrows wrinkles!"  Ha!

And finally, she got a drink of water from her cup by the bed.  She put it back, then looked over at the nightstand (on what used to be Pap's side of the bed, before we traded rooms with them).  "I put my boogers over there," she confessed.  "Do you think Pap will mind?"

Lucy, you crack me up!

Nana and Pap

yarn twist extension adventures

Okay, so we've struggled with hair a bit.  Lucy does NOT like me to work with her hair, and she also doesn't like water in her face, over her head, so bath/detangle time can deteriorate pretty quickly.  Her hair is a lot longer than it looks because it bounces up and is so very curly.  (It's awesome!).  But she'd love hair that hangs down.  In fact, she has started doing dramatic hair tosses (with no hair actually moving).  Just practicing.  So we decided to try yarn twist extensions.  (I followed the tutorial at chocolate hair, vanilla care).  It is her own hair, twisted in with strings of yarn, and then the yarn extends longer to give it some more length.  It is supposed to be good for hair, because the ends are protected in the twists and the yarn keeps it moisturized.  Without further ado...

I did the first few rows on Friday to get the hang of it, and to get some "buy-in" from my girl who doesn't like to let me mess with her hair.  She bough tin all right.  She did a lot of flipping this hair over one shoulder and then over the other one.  If she touched it once, she touched it 1467 times.

 Up close of the twists.  I thin they look really pretty!

On Saturday morning, a friend and I put in about 3 hours, both of us working the whole time, with a few short breaks.  She did great.  She had buckets of suckers, gum, and push pops.  Usually these are totally off-limits, but I wanted her happy :).  She was such a trooper, but finally just got worn out.  I think it was hard, and I can understand having had a perm before, to hold your neck strong for that long, kind of pulling against the people pulling on your head.  Our solution was to enlist Nana to hold her and let her rest her head against Nana's shoulder to get some rest.  It worked pretty well!

See her face?  She was about done for the day.  (Notice the bribery sucker, still in hand)

The above picture is after Sunday's session.  Our second pair of hands didn't show up, so Nana stepped in and proved herself to be quite the hair twister.  She did great!  We needed it, too, because I was beginning to despair.  This project seemed to have gotten out of hand and was taking longer than I expected.  But Nana saved the day and we got all but the very top done.  We finished that up in about 1 hour on Monday morning, and .... TADAA:

CHECK OUT THE HAIR ON THIS BEAUTY :)

(A closer look at the parts.  I don't think they're super noticeable.  I did box-ish parts (not as precise as traditional box parts).  I love how it turned out!

Notes:

1)  This took about 11 hours hours of manpower, at least this first time.  YIKES!  I sure do love this girl :)

2)  I will be trimming it quite a bit shorter.  That much hair would be overwhelming, and I have knotted off the twists below the length of her actual hair, but maybe 2/3rds as long as it is now.  I can cut the excess yarn off and it will still hang down and swing about, but hopefully be manageable for her.

3)  How cute is this?  What a good guy!  Uncle John got "yarn extensions" too.  (And actually, so did Pap and Nana, but I couldn't catch them on camera!)

4)  Lucy and I stopped in the hair isle at WM today because I didn't have any bands big enough to fit around all that hair, and she picked up this large hand mirror and was walking around WM with one hand on the cart and one arm straight out, holding the mirror out to admire herself.  She's so funny.