Season of Joy

My, how time flies.   I get so busy in the day to day, November 1 mentally brought me to a halt and began to herald the beginning of the closing of the year and the holiday extravaganza to come. 

In the course of the last month, babies are continuing to grow and develop new skills and aspects of their personalities.  Everyone is talking.  Isabella continues to expand her vocabulary to include "Bye-Bye".  In fact, all the babies can say "Bye-Bye", "BuhBuh" (which I think may mean brother), "MaMa", and "DaDa".  Eliana has a unique contribution to the jabbering chorus.  I can't believe this is part of her first words... but she says "poop"...  Thank you big brothers!!!  I can't wait to write that one in the baby book.  Andrew and Elijah continue to learn, grow, and teach me simultaneously.  We are moving through our school curriculum at a slow but steady pace.  I thought I would share a few pictures from around our home, as the days grow shorter, yet more full. 

 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven:
 a time to be born, and a time to die;
 a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted;
 a time to kill, and a time to heal;
 a time to break down, and a time to build up;
 a time to weep, and a time to laugh;
 a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
 a time to cast away stones, and a time to gather stones together;
 a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing;
 a time to seek, and a time to lose;
 a time to keep, and a time to cast away;
 a time to tear, and a time to sew;
 a time to keep silence, and a time to speak;
 a time to love, and a time to hate;
 a time for war, and a time for peace.
He has made everything beautiful in its time.
Also, he has put eternity into man's heart, yet so that he cannot
find out what God has done from the beginning to the end.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8;11 ESV

Life moves from season to season, one time to another, always changing.  God teaches me (many times forcefully) through times and seasons to appreciate the variances in tasting the bitterness of tears and hearing sweetness of laughter.  This Thanksgiving season and in this time and space, I am grateful for merciful, discernible joys.