She Passed!

Savannah had her first solo swimming lessons over the last couple of weeks.  Last year we did the ones that I had to get in with her.  I wasn't sure how she would do in the water without me - how she would do waiting her turn, staying on the wall......but she did awesome!  No fear of dunking her head.  In fact, when she was waiting for her turn to float or dive down or whatever she pretty much just bobbed in and out of the water next to the wall the entire time.  We're pretty proud of her.  So, she passed her Preschool I class and in July she will have 8 lessons of Preschool II.  I don't know what we'll do after that because the next available class is for 5 year olds.  Here are some pictures my mom took on the days that she took Savannah for me.

Is this Heaven? No, it's Big Creek.

Have I told you how much my family loves water?  And boating.  And Sunshine. 

We finally got out on the boat last weekend for Father's day.  

Here's Savannah already to go.  She absolutely LOVES going boating.  It's the one thing we will allow her to skip a nap for.  I can't even remember the last time she skipped a nap before Sunday. 

Unfortunately for her, it's the law that all little girls must wear "boat jackets" when they're on the lake.  She got used to it. 

We like to just put around for a while, eat lunch, get our sun block on..... then we usually pull up to the shore so Savannah can swim in the water. She's getting really good at swimming for a 3 yr old.  

Here's my mom trying to push us off the shore by herself.  It was pretty funny.   Travis ended up jumping out and helping her. 

Moment of Chaos! Let me tell you what's going on here : 

Travis just reeled in TWO fish on those poles. 

My dad is trying to get a fishing hook out of the rug before Sav steps on it. 

Savannah suddenly yells out "I have to go potty!!!". 

All at once. 

Right after this picture was taken my dad tripped over the potty chair (full of urine) and Travis dumped over my drink onto the cd player.  It was pretty hilarious. All in about 3 minutes time. 

Savannah was helping my dad fish by using the air pump on his fishing pole.  This was right around nap time - she was losing it mentally. 

Travis' standard boating position.  It's hard work to be out there all day. 

Later in the day we put let Savannah jump out in the middle of the lake with us.  She's really confident and brave when it comes to water, which is both good and bad.  More good I think. This was in about 12 feet of water. 

Here we go - reeling in a fish with Grandpa on her Barbie pole.  This really was the "one that got away" though.  Grandpa and Daddy were more upset about it than Savannah. 

All in all - looking forward to more boat life.  Let's hope the weather evens out here soon!

Belated Father's Day

Happy Father's Day Travis.

 I asked Savannah what she likes about Daddy....

 She said "Danny dogger day night" - Daddy Daughter Date Night. 

LOVE YOU DADDY!

Escape Blog

Here's a little post I wrote for Escape22 blog last week.  Enjoy!

My Purpose - By Wendy Pierce

For what is our hope, our joy, or the crown in which we will glory in the presence of our Lord Jesus when he comes? Is it not you?  Indeed, you are our glory and joy.  - 1 Thessalonians 2:19-20

In 2004, my husband Travis and I started helping with Escape22.  We had just come back to Ames and started attending Cornerstone Church.  We did know very many people, but we knew one thing - I wanted to help young woman live like Jesus, and he wanted to help young men live like Jesus.  We had settled on this as a vision for our lives together a few months before getting married, and here we were, ready to make it happen.  

Since then, God has been faithful to our vision.  We have had the opportunity to be involved in the lives of so many teenagers.  We have had the privilege of watching them grow up and watching some of them catch the vision.  Here are the stories of just a few who's lives God allowed me to participate in. Jessica Anderson was a Sophomore at Ames High when I met her.  She and her sister had been coming to Escape on and off for a few months, probably with some boy Jessica was dating at the time.  Their lives were definitely driven by opportunities to flirt with boys.  One afternoon Travis and I were out running errands when we ran into the girls.  Travis invited them to come over and be a part of our Bible study that week.  They came!  I found out that Jessica had decided a month prior to that to give her life to Christ, but since then had no idea how to follow him. She had never been involved in a community of believers, never had close female relationships, and surely had never thought about reaching out to people who were different from her.  Jessica stayed in my group for the next couple years, and moved on to being a part of the Salt company.  Jessica went to China during her sophomore year of college, and has been since spending a lot of time with international students around campus.  Jessica is now 22 and is loving on people from all over the world as a part of the IFC leadership team.  

The summer before their Senior year of High school I decided to commit to meeting weekly with Nattie Larson and Charissa Ehrhardt.  I chose to go through a book with them called Just Walk Across the Room, by Bill Hybels.  The book emphasized our call to reach others that are right around us and it encouraged us to go a little further than we're comfortable with going to bring people closer to Jesus.  By the end of the summer Nattie had decided to start a conversational English club at her high school and Charissa had committed to weekly mentoring a younger girl from our Bible study. Both girls followed through with those commitments, and can be found today following through with new commitments they've made to just go a little further to bring more into the Kingdom of God.  Today,  Nattie is on the Salt Company leadership team, leading her own group of college girls and Charissa is helping me to lead my current group of Escape girls. Both are leading out and mentoring those who are already right around them. 

See the full gallery on Posterous

In the last year I have had a renewed vision for what I would like God to use me to do.  In January, I started spurring on a few girls in our ministry to start being intentional about reaching out to, and mentoring younger girls. I would love to see our ministry full of students leading other students in the pursuit of Christ!  Right now I have 10 high school girls who are using what God has given them to bless the lives of 10 younger girls!   Titus 2 tells older woman to "Urge younger woman to live God centered lives".  I have (foolishly) always read that passage and considered myself to be the "older woman", but was recently confronted with the idea that I too ought to have an older woman urging me to follow Christ.  In the last year I began meeting weekly with Marie Nesbitt, an older woman in our church.  I feel confident that God will continue to use me to teach other woman to live like Jesus, and I am thankful that he has blessed me with the opportunity to continue to be taught and spurred on in my own walk.  These are just a few stories that are continuing to be written about my crown, my glory, and my joy!

Thing I can't live without - SAVANNAH addition

Just some things my girl is loving these days!

Savannah got these from Dewy's for her Birthday.   Bath Color Tabs.  They're pretty rad.  Sometimes we get crazy and put two different colors in.  Just mixin the bath water up!

Her MOMMAAY!  Whazzup! (Doesn't she look like she's into me?)

That last one was kinda a joke, but this one is SER-EEE-OUS.

This little Beaut has saved all our lives!

It's the Goodnight Night Light.  I bought it off Amazon.  I set it for her bed time (7:30pm) and for the time I want her to wake up (7am).  It turns blue in the middle at bed time, and stays blue (like the moon) all night, letting her know that even though it's light outside, it IS bedtime.  Then at wake up time the whole thing turns yellow (like the sun) so she knows when it's appropriate to come out of her room.  

I knew I needed this when Savannah started waking up with the sun at 5:30am.  Sometimes I hear her wake up before 7, but it's great because she stays in her room until the sun turns yellow! Love it. 

This one was 3 bucks! At Walmart.  

A bubble sword.  It makes humungous bubbles like I've never been able to make before.  Travis is really good at making really big bubbles with it :) But he really is.  Best $3 Grammy ever spent!

McSweetyPie

Just another day in the life of....McSweetyPie my sweety pie. - yeah, I actually call her that sometimes. 

a day on the town.

This RARELY happens.  But this is what a casual, no agenda, morning looks like when it's just us girls and no where to be.  

We wonder down town, get some coffee ( or juice, whateves).  Then Savannah says "we gonna sit and talk a while?" and I say "sure Baby, why not".  A "while"turns into about 3 or 4 minutes, then Savannah's up and running around the Coffee shop.  So we move on. 

Then we head to a park.  If we don't have anything going on then we usually go to an out of the way, random park.  On this particular day we went to a park at University Village (visible from Stange).  It's a GREAT play ground.  I was thinking maybe we'd meet some international students and their kids while we were there, would have been fun, right?  But no, not a single soul joined us that day.  Oh well. Great playground. 

Then we might try to eat lunch at the park.  Eating lunch isn't really Savannah's main thing these days.  Just stopping to eat in general isn't.  She's a big snacker, and a big snack food lover.  I'm trying to change  this.  She's gone to bed without dinner several nights lately.  When all SHE wants is granola bars and fruit snacks and all I want is for her to eat just 4 bites of dinner it just turns in to a flat out battle of the wills.  I'm winning.  

Love these kind of days. 

Oh, did I forget to mention the pool?

Last October I bought a 10ftx3ft  swimming pool for $40 on clearance at Target.  I'd say so far it was totally worth it!

 Anyone up for a swim with the water spider???  

There are a few rules.  No swimming alone.  You must wash your feet off before you get in the pool.  No swimming unless it's 80 degrees or hotter.  So come on by! 

Birthday photo shoot

I've been holding on to these puppies since Savannah's birthday - Saving them for a rainy day when I didn't have anything to blog about I guess.  

One thing I love about Savannah is her sense of humor.   She knows that it's funny to lift her eye brows when I'm telling her something.  She knows it's funny to give me a raspberry on the cheek when I'm checking out at the grocery store.  She knows it's funny to tell me that MY name is "Grandpa".

I also love her ability to day dream and pretend.  She makes up songs.  She plays "nap time" with her babies.  She makes me lunch out of an empty bowl and a balloon.

Savannah baby, we love you.  Thanks for being so awesome.  Thanks for loving us back!