Julian's got a belly button!

After losing my cat Rio last night, I let our other cat (Buca) sleep upstairs in our bed. He was really distraught yesterday and didn't go anywhere near Rio not even to go to the bathroom or eat. I had to carry him to his food area so he could do his thing. He was purring so loud sleeping with us and he stayed there all night. We haven't done that since Julian was born because he used to wake us up. He has been my little shadow around the house which has helped me deal with my sadness of losing Rio.

Julian is too little to know that Rio was sick and now isn't with us. For a while he seemed to think the word for cat was Rio. Then I think he finally got it that Rio was her name. Most of all, he loved to pull her tail and I was surprised by how good she was with him. She pawed at him once but I never saw her try to nip. That was restraint for Rio!

It was so beautiful this morning and at 9:00 I wasn't sure what to do so I asked Julian if he wanted to go to the park. He got so excited so we went and I took the long way so I could get some exercise too. We had the park to ourselves for the half hour we were there. We went down the slide and played on the jungle gym. He loved going in and out of this little tube on the jungle gym. For me, it was nice just listening to all the birds and enjoying the sun.

Today I read 2Samuel 16 and 17. David continued on the run from Absalom (his son). On the way, he ran into a man of Saul's clan who started cursing him and pelting them with stones. David wouldn't allow his men to hurt him saying maybe the Lord would see David's distress and repay him with good. Absalom sought advice from two different counsels about how to attack David. The counsel he followed was really from a friend of David's who was risking his life to mislead Absalom and help David.

In my study of Esther today, she had become queen of the most powerful nation on earth. We see that she attained royalty for the purposes of God. Haman was a man elevated to second in command under the king. He was an evil man and was enraged when Mordecai (Esther's cousin and "adoptive" father) wouldn't bow down to him because of his religion. Haman was so enraged that he hatched a scheme to destroy all the Jews. Unfortunately, the king approves this while he is not aware that his queen is a Jew.

Today for lunch the only thing Julian would eat was yogurt. He calls yogurt "Dora" because that's the brand we get. It has a picture of Dora on it. So when he asks for Dora, I know what he wants. I offered him chicken fries, ham, cheese, hot dogs, peanut butter sandwich and finally gave up. He fed himself and ended up with yogurt all over him. In the afternoon, I had some errands to run. The lady at Walgreen's offered him a balloon since he was pointing to them. He kept saying "yellow" though so she ended up giving him a second balloon. We played "balloon basketball" when we got home. He wasn't too happy that I didn't let him bring the balloons into the next store.

It was really funny, Julian was fascinated by his belly button today. It dawned on me that today was one of the first times that I didn't have him in a onesie! I usually have a onesie on him beneath his shirt, but today I put an undershirt on. Throughout the day, he'd lift his shirt and look at and touch his belly button. Then he'd go up to me or daddy and lift our shirt wanting to see our belly button! This is how enthralled he was: He loves to read placing an open book on the couch while standing in front of it. Today he'd be "reading" aloud when he'd step back, check for his belly button, then go back to reading. It was so cute.

He took a short afternoon nap and had fun coloring while I made dinner. He had fun saying "tacos" whenever I asked him what we were saying for dinner. It was so cute how he said it. Daddy played with him for a little bit until he left for a men's get together. I read about four books to him during our night routine. Usually it's one, but tonight I kept going. This ended up being a pretty hard week for me. I'm glad the week is over and I can relax.