"Sissy is SO. SWEET."

A(nother) tribute.

My older sister recently had her second baby in June.  Her name is Kendall Jane and she has red hair just like her big brother. See here. My sister, brother-in-law and Hunter call her, "Sissy." She is precious. When my sister was pregnant with Kendall my roommate would often ask (in complete seriousness), "Do you think you will love Kendall as much as you love Hunter?" Now I know that this sounds like a dark question but my roommate has seen me talk about, blog about, email and skype with Hunter often. There is not a night in my house that goes by where I don't take out my phone and eagerly say, "Oh my goodness - look at this precious/ridiculous picture of Hunter." He still is one of my greatest delights.

But then came Sissy. I didn't think that a baby girl would behave much differently than a baby boy. But they really do. Sweet baby girls want two things: food and attention...and preferably in that order...which is exactly what adult girls want too but that is neither here nor there. Anyways - as I have spent time with Sissy I have learned one thing, "Sissy is SO. SWEET." (I regularly hear my sister say this to her while I am on the phone.)

So here is another tribute -- to Kendall Jane -- sweet Sissy -- you have stolen my heart!!!

"Oh, and FYI, it's going down this Thursday night."

(I wrote this in late August but didn't post it that night. I forgot that I wrote it until now. While everything below is still true a lot of the sadness has turned into excitement/joy! So lucky to call Kathryn one of my best friends.)

A celebration.

Tonight one of my best friends got engaged to an amazing man. I have been lucky enough to share a room with her the last 3 months as she transitioned from her lease ending on her apartment in Austin in May to moving to Dallas this past weekend. About a week ago I got a text message from her boyfriend that said, "Colleen - call me when Kathryn is not around. Don't tell her I asked you to call me." Every girl knows what this means. I gladly called him immediately, as she was not home, and he told me I needed to find out her ring size. Two things were happening in my head at that point: 1) Part of me was jumping up and down screaming like a 12 year old girl, 2) the other part of me was yelling at him to never call back and throwing the phone across the room. I know some of you are shocked by that -- but it's both exciting and sad at the same time to have one of your best friends move. I've been blessed to have her near for the last 3 years and by my side for the past 3 months. I was sad to lose her to distance but more overjoyed to get to help in the process of her being engaged to a man of great character. This is just a snapshot of things going on in life. There are changes happening all around. Really exciting things coupled with hard things....while engagement is happy, the loss of her here is sad. This same example has transitioned into all areas of my life right now: work, family, church, etc.

Through it all I have been reminded of one thing: Everything has its time. Night after night I keep coming back to Ecclesiastes 3 and reading it over and over. I hope this brings truth and encouragement to you all as well.

Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

To everything there is a season,
A time for every purpose under heaven: 
A time to be born, 
And a time to die; 
A time to plant, 
And a time to pluck 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; 
A time to embrace, 
And a time to refrain from embracing; 
A time to gain, 
And a time to lose; 
A time to keep, 
And a time to throw 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 of war, 
And a time of peace.