moving on up

The exciting news for this week is that Wesley has jumped up in diaper size to #1. It is interesting that until a few weeks ago I did not know there were various sizes of diapers. It defineitely makes sense, but there are all sorts of things you learn when you have a kid. Hillary brought Wesely to church yesterday and that was the first try of attempting to get to a certain place at a specific time. It was challenging. We don't keep much of a schedule since our plans plans are easily foiled by a hungry or sleepy or cranky baby.

Outside of baby stuff a highlight from my week was attending a graduation party for one of our students. It was unique in that only guys were invited (no girls except immediate family). We hung out and ate for a bit and then took time to encourage this student. Different men from his life talked about what they had seen and hope to see in him and many gave great advice for the next stage. It was interesting to be at this graduation party and think that I would be doing something like that as a Dad one day.

a little fussy

Wesley is clearly a cute baby, but he is following the path of most infants - not sleeping when he is supposed to. He is all swadled, being rocked, comforted, and all that good stuff and then he just looks up at you with these wide open eyes. Sometimes it is really funny, but when it gets to be the early hours of the morning my sense of humour seems to run out. Overall it hasn't been that bad - I can't imagine having a baby who just cries. I just think we were a little spoiled early on when he would eat and then go right to sleep. We are figuring him out a little bit more each day, but he continues to grow and change so sometimes it is hard to know what to expect. It is really interesting at moments to think, "Wow, I was a squirmy little baby just liket this and one day Wesley will hopefully be grown up with kids of his own." Those are my thoughts as I change diapers at odd hours of the morning.

first night home

We brought Wesley home from the hospital yesterday and are getting used to life together at home. It is great to have Wesley here and for some reason the adjective "fun" keeps coming to mind. Even though he basically eats, sleeps, and dirties his diapers it is a lot of fun to have him around. It is such a strange and wonderful thing that the mere presence of this person, even though you barely know him and he contributes little, can add so much to life. Now that he is here though, we are trying to get into a rhythm and figure out who does what and when we sleep. I'll try to get some more pictures up this week.

Wesley Anderson Allebach

the waiting game

Right now we're just waiting. The crib is together, the bags are packed and there's this lull. Hillary has been on top of various tasks, getting things done around the house and finishing up various projects. Last week we were talking and she was saying, "If the baby doesn't come soon, I won't know what to do with myself since I've tried to clear everything off my plate." It is a little strange for me also, since I'm trying not to make major plans and keep my schedule open. I'm not exactly sure how to stay focused and keep up with everything while also being ready to drop it all in an instant.

lots of time and an awkward moment

This past week many of our teenagers had spring break, so I was able to have lunches, hang out, go to an art museum, attend a track meet and a few other things because kids were around during the day. It was good to be with the teens and connect to what is going on with them. One of the things I have been thinking about is what my job would look like if we had 50 teenagers at our church instead of 17. I wouldn't be able to spend as much individual time with kids and would need to invest more in leaders and groups of kids. With each set of circumstances there are benefits and difficulties. As I think about how I spend my time and even how ministry is structured here I need to be open to doing things differently. I want to broaden our connection with kids in the community, and need to regularly reevaluate whether I am using my time and energy effectively. An area which continues to come to mind is multiplying leaders. Helping others grow and develop so they can serve is so important and I need to keep that in the forefront of my mind. I know this is more of a philosophic sounding post, but it is incredibly practical when I think about what I will do each day. Oh yeah, the awkward moment. When I took a few teens to a local Art Museum we were on our way out and there was a shelf of post cards and advertisements for different openings. We were pulling ones out and a teenage guy said, "I wonder what this one is as he pulled it out." All you could see was a woman's face, while the card was in the rack but pulling the post card out, it was an unclad women. He and I looked at each other and the the two girls with us (one of them being his sister) let out an awkward laugh. We all laughed a little and made various jokes on the way to the parking lot.

coming together like

Probably from this week until mid-summer every blog entry will have something to do with Baby A. It is getting pretty close, right around 3 weeks. This past week we were able to finish a few more projects and everyting is getting ready. Saturday we put together the crib, with the help of our neighbor Max. It only took about 30 mintues which was great. This this week we'll put some finishing touches on the room. Otherwise, there are three exciting things happening this week. First, a bunch of our teenagers are on Spring Break, so I'm getting to hang out with people a bunch. Second, there is a theological conference that I'm going to this weekend. It's hosted by a few local churches, but is brining in some great speakers to talk about the life and legacy of John Calvin. Finally, I'm probably going climbing outside this Friday. I got a guide book to CT Climbing for Christmas and if the plans work out I should be able to take one our teens to Pinacle Rock in Plainville, CT and do some climbing.