June 19, 2009

I really have to get better about updating this more frequently. Since it has been over a month since our last post, I will have to keep this pretty brief.

Lily
Heidi, Ethan, and Lily just got back from Lily's 2-month checkup. So far, Lily is 24" long and not even 11 lbs. She is most definitely a little peanut! She must not have gotten the 'solid Schmidt build' gene from her dad. This seems to be the trend with all our kids so far, though. One thing that has been very different with Lily so far is her sleep pattern. She has been consistently sleeping through the night (which has been a great help for Heidi!), and she has also been very aware throughout the day. Lily has been a wonderful addition to our family.

Ethan
Ethan went to the doctor today for some of his immunizations, too. Over the past couple of days, he has been pretty stressed about it. "I don't want to get a shot. They hurt." Of course, I don't think it helped a whole lot that he was in the room last fall when Aubrey screamed like a banshee when she got her shots for kindergarten. Apparently, though, Ethan was quite a trooper. He was really nervous about getting the shot - until the nurse showed him the camouflage band-aid he was going to get. Then he jumped up on the table and was ready to go! Heidi says that he was really good about the whole thing. For his first shot, Ethan was in the middle of telling the nurse that he didn't need a shot. He was in midsentence when she gave him the shot, and Ethan stopped what he was saying and said, "Ow, that hurt," and that was it.

Here's a picture of Ethan and his band-aid.


Aubrey
Aubrey has been as sweet as ever. Lately, she has become pen pals with her teacher from last year. She will stay up late at night, thinking of all the things she wants to write to Mrs. Brauer. It has been really cute to see her creativity flourish. If you check out Heidi's facebook page (http://www.facebook.com/heidischmidt123), you will see a picture of a bird ring that Aubrey made for Heidi. She did this using various things she found in our backyard and taping them together. She gave it to Heidi, "So you can always be a princess and have a bird on your finger, Mom." How funny is that?

Heidi
Heidi has been really enjoying spending time with everybody. With Aubrey and Ethan at home, Lily still a little baby, and school out of session for the summer, the entire family has more of a chance to hang out. Heidi has also been busy with our church's playgroup. Last month, 10 moms got together to hang out and socialize at church. The kids all had a chance to play together, too. Heidi has been working with another member of the congregation to run the group, and so far it has been very fulfilling for her. She is looking forward to many more enjoyable days with the playgroup.

Jason
I have certainly not been looking for things to do so far this summer. In April, I started umpiring softball again. This is year 5 for me (I think, maybe it's 6). So far it has been a pretty good season, and the extra cash is a good way to finance summer trips/graduate classes. I will finish my first class towards my Master's in education technology next week. If you are in the Omaha area, you are more than welcome to come and check out my class's Multiple Intelligences Fair on the UNO campus at Kayser Hall, room 259, next Wednesday starting at 5:00. It has been a really great course for me to take, and I have learned a great deal. My last piece of exciting news is that I have been asked to do an interview for the WELSTech podcast (the podcast will be available Wednesday, June 24th, at http://welstech.wels.net/wpmu/). WELSTech is a program run by the WELS technology office to talk about technology and its implications for ministry. The focus of the upcoming show is Twitter and practical applications for teachers. You can follow me on Twitter at http://www.twitter.com/jasonschmidt123.

That's all I have for now (for real!). Feel free to leave a comment below.

May 12, 2009

A couple of fun things have happened since our last post, so it's time to update!

Every night at bedtime, we read stories with Aubrey and Ethan, pray, and sing songs. One of the usual requests is "Jesus, Shepherd of the Sheep":

Jesus, Shepherd of the sheep,
Who your Father's flock does keep
Safe we wake and safe we sleep,
Guarded still by you.

For those of you who haven't heard Ethan talk lately, it would be good for you to know that he has a tendency to say his /l/ sound like a /w/ sound. Aubrey has been helping him with this particular issue (and doing a great job with it, too!), and through her tutelage, Ethan has become increasingly aware of it. Whenever we sing the hymn above, though, Ethan feels the need to correct us. "No, Mom and Dad. It's 'safe-llly'!"
We crack up every time, and there is no telling him otherwise.

Aubrey was really funny tonight, too. We had lasagna with salad on the side for supper tonight. In Aubrey's case, though, it was more like salad with a side of lasagna! She had a plate full of raw lettuce, spinach, broccoli, and carrots with a tiny piece of lasagna. When we asked her why she wanted so many vegetables, she said, "I'm a calerpitar!" We thought that Aubrey wouldn't be able to finish all the veggies she had on her plate, but she proved us wrong - then she asked for dessert!
Also during bedtime tonight, we had a surprise visit from Pastor Uncle Steve. He came by with a crib mattress for Lily. While Heidi was carrying the mattress into Aubrey and Lily's room, Aubrey exclaimed, "Lily, your cradle days are over!"

There is more to share, but I think I'll save that for another time. If you are interested, I have started another blog that will serve as my reflections on classes that I take for my master's. I'm hoping to keep that up as long as I'm in school, but we'll see how well that keeps up.

Before I go, though, I have decided to do Lily's update simply with a picture.

Slide Show

May 6, 2009

It's been a little while since I've written anything in our blog, but tonight I finally am taking the time to give a little update.

Things are still going very well here in Omaha. We are surrounded by wonderful friends (and a couple of family members) who are very supportive of us. We are also very fortunate to be blessed with a healthy baby, and two older children who absolutely love their new little sister!

Allow me to explain a little bit for the delay in postings, though.

As many of our Lutheran elementary school teachers would agree, April and May are busy months. This year has been no exception. On April 30th and May 1st, our school performed our school musical - The Granny Awards. The kids worked really hard and did a great job with the performances. Both evenings were great successes!

We also had a track meet today in Geneva (about 2 hours away). At the track meet, I was given the opportunity to make my debut as an announcer. It was a lot of fun, though I was told that maybe next time I should 'tone it down'. You know me - I really throw myself into this kind of stuff!

Finally for me, next week I start my master's program at UNO. I am taking a class called 'Teaching Multiple Intelligences" on Mondays and Wednesdays for the rest of the month of May and all of the month of June. I'm really excited for the opportunities this program will give me to improve as a teacher.

As for the rest of the family, Heidi was just telling me the other day that she doesn't think she could be much happier than she is right now. Lily and the kids have been such a blessing in her life, and she is very thankful to have the opportunity to stay home with the kids.

Aubrey's school year is winding down. Her last day of kindergarten will be on May 20th. After that, it'll be off to big, scary first grade with Mrs. Nunez! Aubrey is very excited to grow up, though. Lately, Aubrey's big thing has been to write books. Currently, she is working on a princess book where all the Disney princesses are locked in towers and someone needs to save them. Aubrey is also very proud of her new pet, Red. He is a betta.

Ethan is learning to enjoy the finer things in life - playing Superman, digging for worms in the dirt, running around on the playground, and, of course, old Tom and Jerry cartoons from the library. Ethan is always very sweet around Lily, and very generous in sharing Fuzzy (his Minnesota Gramma afghan) with her when she is upset.

Lily...what can I say...she's adorable. Her sleep patterns have become somewhat predictable (you'd have to talk to Heidi about that one for sure, since I'm pretty sure I sleep through about 80% of it all!), if not completely through the night.

We are certainly very blessed here in Omaha. Every day, we thank God for our school, our congregation, and the people that he has brought into our lives by calling us here.

Finally, I'm using our blog as a laboratory. I found a neat new resource at Animoto and I am just dying to try it out. I pulled some pictures off of Facebook and was able to put them into a slide show (in about 5 minutes!). I'm pretty pumped - thanks for bearing with me!

April 22, 2009

Well, we've had Lily home for just over a week now and things are going really well. She's super cute, the kids have adjusted well to having another one at home, and Heidi's recovery is coming along nicely.

Ethan has been just as active as ever. This afternoon, he decked himself out in his Spider-Man suit and came out for recess. He spent the next 30 minutes playing soccer with the big kids. At the end of recess, Ethan ran up to me and said, "Dad, Spider-Man won! But I lost." It's so much fun to hear what they have to say!

Aubrey continues to amaze Heidi and me with her artistic ability. A friend of ours sent a care package with all kinds of gifts for the whole family after Lily was born. The gift for Aubrey was a set of markers that change to completely different colors when you blend them (for example, brown becomes light blue). Some of the things that Aubrey has come up with are really fantastic - though I might be just a little biased! I'll try to scan some of them and see if I can embed them in this blog.

Heidi has been really enjoying staying home with the kids. She was just telling me the other day how time really seems to go quickly now that the baby has been born. Before Lily came by, time seemed to drag on for Heidi. But now, it seems as if there just isn't enough time in the day to do all the things that she wants to do! I guess that's better than getting bored!

I'm working on getting into graduate school this summer. The University of Nebraska at Omaha has processed my application, and I have been provisionally accepted into teacher graduate school. I'm just waiting on an immunization clearance and I should be all set. God-willing, I will earn my Master of Arts in Instruction Technology at the end of summer, 2012. I'm really looking forward to the program.

Next week is our school musical - "The Granny Awards". It should be a lot of fun, as grade school musicals and plays always are! It just means a lot of time spent working on the program next week and the rest of this week. I'll blog about it and probably provide a link to it on our school's website if you are interested in checking it out.

Well, that's it for this brief update. I'll be back next week with more tidbits and anecdotes!

April 14, 2009

Well, it's the morning after Lily's birth and I thought it might be a good time to update the blog and let you know what is going on with the new baby and our family. This will be done in a different format from previous posts - hope you enjoy the format!

Heidi
Heidi had a great night last night. Her recovery is going great, the nurses are treating her well, and she is feeling fine (except for a little cold!). The staff here says that she could go home tonight if she wanted to, but she'll probably stay one more night, just to get the extra rest before reality sets in!

Aubrey and Ethan
Aubrey and Ethan both love their new little sister very much. They both are very gentle and sweet when they hold her, and that is all they want to do when they visit her and mom here in the hospital. Funny story - last evening, when we came to visit, Aubrey and Ethan were very proud to talk about their new sister. When the nurse came in to check on Heidi, she asked the kids what the baby's name was. Both of them responded at the same time, "Lily!" Then Ethan added, "Her name is Lily because it's Easter time. After Easter her name gets to be Fred!" Looks like we have a nickname for her!

Lily
Lily is still beautiful, wonderful, calm, and doing great. We could not be more blessed to have such a healthy baby! God is certainly good! According to Heidi, "She's pooping like a champ!" (which is a great sign that everything is going well!)

Jason
As for me, I'm overwhelmed that I have the awesome privilege of taking care of my growing family. There have been times over the last nine months or so where I have not considered what wonderful blessings we have with this newest addition, but now that she is here, I know that I will not forget this great privilege. It amazes me that I can be so blessed to have a God that loves me enough to bless me with a wonderful family, but more importantly to bless me eternally with a risen Savior! What a wonderful time of year to experience these double blessings!

Another reminder, pictures are up on my Facebook page. If you are not my friend (or don't have an account!) sign up and let me know!

Until next time...

Lily's pictures

Here are only the first of many pictures that we'll make available online. You can click on the following link to be able to view some of the pictures that I put on my Facebook profile. I'm going to look into options for better photo-sharing sites, but this will do for now.

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=20634&id=1280887944&l=929006520c

More pictures will certainly be added over the next several days and weeks. Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers throughout the day and always. We greatly appreciate all your support!