3 months old! Benjamin is growing like a weed and usually smiling. The last three months have been such a learning experience, but I had no idea how incredible of an experience motherhood would be. Benjamin is being a stinker with night time sleeping, but everything I read says it could take 4-6 months to get on a regular schedule. I'm trying to be patient!

Benjamin is "talking" more, grabing for toys, sucking on his blankets, and so expressive with his eyes. He has some amazing blue eyes that are going to be dangerous! He loves a bouncy seat that I stole from Nanna's house, and strongly dis-likes "tummy time. Oh, and he found his thumb. :)

Benjamin is being so good during the evening when we are usually getting together with people, sharing about the ministry. He seems to have a very small window of bed time opportunity. If I catch it, the evening is a breeze but that gets hard when we are meeting with people. So we usually try to scoot home no later than 8!

I'm afraid that he's becoming a momma's boy. In month two he was awesome at going to sleep on his own, or laying on a blanket kicking away. The last week he likes to be held...A LOT. I'm hoping its a phase, that I hold him enough to make sure he knows I love him like crazy, and not enough to make it a habit for the next year!

Well, I hope you all have a great end of the summer. I can't believe it's almost over. We're excited to spend a week or two up in MN with the Lewicki family. We'll be sharing information about the ministry with a lot of individuals, as well as hanging out with family and getting ready for our Little Buddy's arrival in Aunt Anna's family.

Benjamin seems to think I need to be holding him now, so I better scoot!

Here is Benjamin with two of his 10 cousins. I don't know how we have such handsome boys! (there are 6 more boys on Joel's side!) Although its exciting to be so cute, it's sad that Benjamin has had a couple bad nights in a row. Supposedly he's supposed to be getting 14-16 hrs of sleep a day. I think we are only getting 12ish. Mom is getting tired!

Life at the Lewicki's

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Our new favorite thing at the Lewicki house, is homemade guacamole. Each time Joel makes it, its just a little better than the last. On sunday he started experimenting with homemade torilla shells. He did a good job then, but last night they were amazing! Here's some picures of familiar sights at the lewickis: our "desk" getting ready to mail out Navigator info, empty guacamole bowls,yummy tortillias and a happy baby Benjamin.

Home for two weeks!

My 12 week old has now been to Minnesota,Colorado, Nebraska, Wisconsin, and Illinois! In Iowa, he's been to Sully, Urbandale, Ft Madison, and Dubuque. Joel turned to me on our car ride home from Chicago and said, "Would you mind sitting in the back seat? I kind of feel like we could be charged with child abuse if we put him back there by himself one more time!"

Benjamin has been a great traveler; he's almost done better than mom. Last week when we were traveling to one of our 5 destinations. He filled his pants, which he does about 6 times a day, and of course there was no good place to change him. I stretched my legs out and made a make shift bed so I could change Benjamin's stinky pants. We didn't have pampers, and he had a pretty massive blow out, and to make a long story short, I ended up with poo all over. YUCK!

On our way home from CO we stopped at a gas station to feed Benjamin and change him. The bathrooms were itty bitty without a changing station so I used the car. That time, I ended up with poo everywhere right before he sprayed us both all over. Thankfully there is always a suit case in the trunk and spare clothes are never far away!

God has showed us in so many ways, His power, provision, and His love. Many of you know the first story of God providing us with several unexpected gifts equaling $450 right before our car needed fixed, costing us $450. Our second story of God showing us His character was just the other day at the store. I swallowed my pride and went to Aldi to grocery shop. I have it in my head that inexpensive is low class, and that cool people shop at Hy-Vee. I thought I was doing good by shopping at Fareway to save money, but the day has come for me to check out Aldis. (I can now say that the food is really just as good, and I plan to shop there in the future. I now believe super cool people shop affordably :) So I got to the check out counter and realized that my cash had run out, and I was going to have to use my card. I try very hard not to use my debit card. Especially now that we don't currently have an income, I figure its best if only one person uses the card and knows whats in our account and what's coming out. But we needed food so I was going to have to break my rule! (Joel's never told me not to use it, I just make silly rules for myself. I really like rules!) So I opened my wallet and found $58. I forgot about money Joel had given me the day before, and I was so excited. I thought this money would cover some of the groceries and I would just use my card for the rest. Well, the bill was $57.30. I had the exact right amt of cash. I dont know that God doesn't want me using my debit card, or that He only wants me to shop at Aldis, but I do know that I don't need to stress about our provision during this time of not having an income. He's a pretty big God, and He seems to handle taking care of us pretty great...and pretty exactly!

Last week was a week of first for Benjamin. He laughed for the first time, and has duplicated it often. A sure way to get him to giggle (a very low giggle) is to hold a pillow over his tummy and wiggle it. He cracks up! The second first, was sleeping through the night. This hasn't been duplicated, but it was appreciated none the less. I haven't exactly figured out a schedule for Benjamin yet, and I'm ok with that. We have a pretty regular time to go to bed at night,8:30ish and get up usually around 7:00. On average he gets up once in the night, takes one morning nap and two afternoon naps. Nursing is going well, but I think I might be done in October. We'll see how long it takes him to hold his head up, and if I feel like being done then.

I hope your summers are full of sunshine, grilling and more. Its been great getting to see so many of you and catch up! Great friends and family are pretty priceless!

Love you all!

Supporting the Lewicki Family! - An entry from Joel

Hey everyone! Joel here -

As you may know, Tori and I are starting our adventure with the ministry "The Navigators". We will be full-time (or rather, full-life) missionaries starting this fall at Iowa State University as part of the EDGE Corps. We'd love to send you some information on what we are doing, just call or write and let us know. Or even better, we'd love to meet with you and talk about what we are doing and ask you to pray for us and consider becoming financial partners.

If you want to help support what we are doing, gifts of all sizes are needed, and GREATLY appreciated! You can even make an online donation at this link: The Lewicki Family

Again, thank you for your prayers and support! God bless and we hope you are having a great summer!

Happy Anniversary to Us!

Just four years ago I woke up at 5:30am anticipating a very busy, very exciting day. My wedding day!
I remember sleeping in the sun room of my parents house and nudging awake Amy Massner, my personal attendant, my hair stylist and friend. I suddenly decided that I wanted my hair down vs up. The wedding wasn't untill 7:30 so I had a long day ahead of me.
One of my bridesmaids, Abigail Luhrs, had planned a brunch for all the women in the wedding party. It was so thoughtful! I wish I had let myself enjoy things like that, but instead I stressed about the details of the day, and scurried around like a chicken without a head. We then headed off to the Pavillion to get ready.
Pictures were outside on Central's campus. It was the second hottest day of the summer I believe, and no one was happy with me that I had everyone in black!

Specific Memories:

• Our DJ was...musically handicapped. I would say it nicer if I could, but that would be lying. He couldn't fade in and out of songs, he let the song, "Baby Got Back"play rather than Frank Sinatra, etc. We payed him way to much!
  
• Auburn didn't have her ears pierced so Tara "helped" fix that. OUCH!
• I BAWLED when people started arriving. I thought they were talking too loudly and they shouldn't be. Can we say "BRIDEZILLA"?
  
• I weighed much less at the time, and didn't have a huge appetite, but managed to eat about 4 sub sandwiches after pictures and before the wedding,making breathing in my dress a struggle. Eating always has been a nervous habit!
• A lot of the flowers died when the stored them in a glassed in room for multiple hours on the hottest day of the year. Not the brightest idea of my florist!
  
• I was so happy to have the day over with that after all the "mandatory" dances I found Joel and asked if we could leave early. We didn't wait for anyone to line up and say farwell, we just left!

The past four years have been such a growing and amazing experience. We have learned so much about becoming selfless and the specific roles God has given us. We have had more fun, than ever imaginable, and we suprisingly continue to learn things about each other. Now as we enter parenthood we realized we have just touched the tip of the iceberg when it comes to learning and dying to self, but we are excited for the adventure. It will be an amazing ride, and its exciting to think of where we will be at the end. God has smoothed out a lot of rough edges in the last four years, but still has a lot of refining to do!

Thanks for praying for us during our relationship, and please continue to do so as we attempt not only parenthood but our re-defined calling to ISU campus as missionaries. We love you all. Thanks to those of you who exemplify Godly marriages for us to imitate!