ezekiel is 1

baby zeke is 1. today he looked at me like he was all grown up. as he crawls up in the window and attempts to climb over the chair i realize he isn't a little baby anymore. what a year he has lived through with our family. sometimes i look back on the year behind us and asks myself did all that happen? we had a baby, started organizing to start a charter school, started a house project, started preschool, started a new homeless prevention program, moved into a new and remodeled community center, started remodeling a new affordable house, started to volunteer for Communities First Board... we started a lot this past year and Ezekiel was a trooper through it all. I guess thats why he went on 6 plane trips and a long road trip all by the age of 1. he is by far our most traveled infant and he just goes with the flow. thankful for his sweet and laid back personality this past year. although now that he moves around i realize he is a little explorer and climber. he loves playing with his big brothers and generally gets into everything they are playing with. breaking things they build or helping them play would be the debate each day. i often hear ezekiel don't do that... he also like to play on his own, zooming cars around, yes he already uses sound effects. throwing balls and crawling as fast as he can to get them. putting things in boxes and taking them out. building the best way he can with his chubby hands. looking at books. crawling with his head down and throwing himself on the floor in delight. he finally learned to sleep through the night by his first birthday much to our delight. we are blessed by this little man and we are thankful for the smiles and laughter he adds to our family. we pray he grows in God's strength and God's grace, like his name means. we hope for more growth, discovery, learning, love and joy in this next year.

this is a Psalm i read just after he was born last year:

God, brilliant Lord,
yours is a household name.
Nursing infants gurgle choruses about you;
toddlers shout the songs
That drown out enemy talk,
and silence atheist babble.
I look up at your macro-skies, dark and enormous
your handmade sky jewelry,
Moon and stars mounted in their settings.
Then I look at my micro-self and wonder,
Why do you bother with us?
Why take a second look our way?
Yet we've so narrowly missed being gods,
bright with Eden's dawn light.
You put us in charge of your handcrafted world,
repeated to us you Genesis-charge,
Made us lords of sheep and cattle,
even animals out in the wild,
Birds flying and fish swimming,
whales singing in the ocean deeps.

God, brilliant Lord,
your name echoes around the world.