Oh Boy!

Well, I've dangled the fact that we know Baby Stevenson's sex over you long enough...

I am so happy to share with you that in July we will be meeting our SON!! We would of course have been more than thrilled with another girl, but we are just pretty tickled to have both.

Everyone seems to talk about how much fun it is to pick out cute clothing and such for baby girls. And I agree, I've had more than my fair share of fun picking out things to make or purchase for Miss Lucy. However, I am here to tell you that it is ALSO fun to pick out cute things in BLUE!

While in Texas, I hit a jackpot at a brand new baby and children's resale shop and was able to stock up on some inexpensive boy items. I've also enjoyed frequenting the sales racks at Target and Baby Gap as well as digging out Lucy's few itty bitty gender-neutral outfits from newbornhood. It's fun to envision all these cute things on her brother!

Surprises

I have been shamefully absent from The Knitting Hummel for almost a month now! I'm sorry for the long wait for a new post.

A lot of fun things have happened in the past month that would all be fun to blog about... for example: we now know the sex of Baby Stevenson #2 (but I'll be mean and make you wait a little longer before I announce that here!), Lucy and I just spent a week in Texas visiting my family (I'll also make you wait just a bit before I post pictures from that trip), my sister and her husband (in partnership with his brother) are now in business roasting and selling fair-trade coffee from all over the world (www.marksbrotherscoffee.com) and we've been having some nice spring-like weather here in Des Moines that has been oh-so delightful and blog-worthy.

However, before jumping in and posting details of all these, I'm feeling the need to take a few minutes to meditate a bit on the "surprises" that Darin and I have experienced in the past few years.

I put the word surprise in quotations, because I've been thinking about how the things that come as "surprises" to us are no surprise to God. There may be unknowns for us but there are no unknowns for Him!

I'm currently pondering...

... it was a surprise to us that we'd have difficulty becoming parents in the way and timing we had perhaps expected, but it wasn't a surprise to God!

... it was a surprise to us that after approximately 24 months of hoping for a child, that we'd learn with 3 months notice that Lucy would join our family, but it wasn't a surprise to God!

... it was a surprise to us that I would end up pregnant with our second child only 7 months after welcoming our first into the family, but it wasn't a surprise to God!

And most recently, it was a surprise to us that Darin was suddenly laid off from his job three days ago (Monday of this week) but I'm finding peace in the fact that it is no surprise to God. The outcomes of the past surprises we've experienced so far as a family, have been beautiful and better that what we "planned". We believe it will be no different in this circumstance.

We would appreciate your prayers, though, for continued peace and direction for our future.


"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they?"

Matthew 6: 25-26