Torturing Annie the cat

Kansas City Christmas

Picking out our Christmas tree

Decorating it.

Great Grandpa Sherrill & Princess, the dog

Gigi

Present time!!

Daddy's new tool bag

Papa Richard

Santa came!

Christmas day tupperware sorting

Pop Ed swinging Harper around

MERRY CHRISTMAS!!

Wichita Christmas

Alexandria and Jill playing piano (Brad rocking out in the background)

Uncle Jason

New fishbowl toy!

The family


Grammy Janice looking at her new photo book

Harper eating her new shopping cart cover

Auntie Jill

Papa Jeff

Cousins Price and Ellery from Houston

Oooooklahoma, where the wind comes sweeping down the plains!

My sis is moving to Oklahoma in a couple of weeks. She and her husband will be the Bible Belt's newest residents! This is my long distance dedication to them both. Good luck and godspeed!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrSnlLuuKSM

And here is why I love my sister and am actually thrilled that she'll be closer to me. Here is a picture of us from the weekend:

My mom bought us matching Christmas pajamas. We get these every year. Since we are both going to be with our in-laws on actual Christmas day we had our Wichita Christmas on Sunday.

Saturday night, after an evening out, my sister (who is 26 ya'll), ran down to her room to try and find her new pajamas. My mom hadn't put them out yet. She came back upstairs very slowly with a really dejected look on her face until my mom handed us the above pj's. My sister was so very happy.

Then, we couldn't get through the picture because of an inside joke from eight years ago.

And that's the joy of sisterhood. When you get together you still get to be ten-years-old. I'm not sure that's it's wise to capture these moments permanently in photos, but there you go. I get to see my sister a lot more often in the New Year so I am happy!

Merry, Merry, Merry, Merry Christmas!

I know I get off topic here (the topic being namely, my daughter), but sometimes I like to share some other things with you on this blog. Today, for some reason I was thinking about an incredible documentary that Josh and I saw a couple of years ago about Father Mychal Judge, the priest who died on 9/11(he was made famous by the photograph of the firefighters who carried his body away from the crumbling towers in a chair). The documentary about his life is called "The Saint of 9/11." I know it is available through Netflix and I bet you could find it at your local library.

Rather than describe the film I've included the trailer here. It doesn't really do the film justice, but the only thing I'd like to add to the trailer is that it is an uplifting film. Very, very uplifting.



And on the topic of uplifting, here is yet another of my favorite documentaries. This one is about how a small town school found a way to understand the enormity of the Holocaust. Lest you think that I am tempting you to watch a depressing piece of cinema right before Christmas, I will tell you that this movie too is very, very uplifting.



And that folks, is why I share these films with you in the first place. For one, it feels like our precious little country is kinda in the gutter lately and we need to reinforce our generally good humanity. And secondly, the holidays are supposed to be happy and joyous. They hopefully remind us that we need to dig deeper to find new ways to love and understand each other and to embrace each other's differences. These films are pretty incredible at doing just that.

Or, you know, if you're a holiday-hater then these might at least be a welcome break from non-stop cable re-runs of "It's a Wonderful Life." Scrooge.

'Tis the Season to be Charitable

I know that many of you are strapped for cash this year. I know Josh and I are feeling it with a new baby! This, however, is my "soft ask" (as they call it in the non-profit industry) for you to consider a charitable donation to Higher M-Pact.

Lots of you already donate your time and money to causes that you are passionate about. You will be receiving lots of requests at this time of year to stretch a little further for a myriad of other organizations. I know that I choose who to donate my time and energy to based on the issues I hold the closest to my heart. So if children in need isn't your thing, please disregard this post :).

I am the Center and Education Coordinator for Higher M-Pact. We serve low-income, high-risk children and families in the urban core of Kansas City. You can learn more about this organization and our programs here: http://www.highermpact.org/.

At this time of year we do a really wonderful thing. We adopt families who could use a little extra help providing a memorable Christmas for their children. I spend lots of time in the homes of these families and I can tell you--there's nothing more heartbreaking for me than knowing that not only are some of these kids not expecting a visit from Santa this year, but parents are struggling to provide even the most basic needs: winter coats, food, electricity.

You can make one-time donations through our website if you just have a little extra to give. You can also sponsor an entire family if you have a small bundle of money you're not sure how to spend. Even if you can't make a donation you can consider volunteering if you're in the Kansas City area. If nothing else, you should peruse our website. There is a great story behind the founding of Higher M-Pact!

Please feel free to contact me directly and have a fantastic and Merry Christmas! jvansickle@highermpact.org.

Some pictures...

Happy Thanksgiving!

Harper sits on her own!

Ah. With parenthood it's the little things. A couple of weeks ago, Harper started sitting on her own. Now if we could just get her to feed herself...

We seem to have had a lot going on lately. Josh and I have both been busy at work. Josh is doing lots of architecty-type things. At my job we celebrated election season with a whole slew of election-themed activities. We had a mock debate between two youth "presidential" candidates and then a mock vote. We also gathered residents to go to the polls on Tuesday. We were going to provide rides, but turns out that everyone was able to get there on their own. We also had a huge election night party at the community center. I'm glad it's all over now though--the Best household was a little consumed by politics the last few months. Over the weekend, my sister lovingly and not so subtly urged me to get back to baby business on my blog. So this entry is for you Jill. But only because my candidate won. ;)

Here are some new pictures of Harper....

Harper the Dalmation

Harper going for a ride

Family photo

Harper shopping

President Obama

Nothing can beat this day. Nothing.

Baby Tales

My good friends Christy and Aali came in town last weekend from Chicago. They were nice enough to watch Harper for an hour while Josh and I ran some errands. This is what happened while we were gone. They brought out our daughter's "cool." I didn't realize she was already so unaffected by it all. Look at that "baby-could-care-less" expression! She's one tough kid!

After our errands we all went to lunch. It was fun catching up but the visit was too short. We've missed the Shahs (and this was their first time meeting Harper)!!!! Aali is completing his residency in anesthesiology at Northwestern Hospital and Christy is an extremely gifted Occupational Therapist. Josh was nervous about leaving Harper with new babysitters until I reminded him that we were leaving her with doctors. I think he felt better after that.

For those of you who don't know, Christy and I have been friends since middle school and Aali and I met in high school. Christy and I lived together in college and Aali might as well have been our third roommate. I fondly recall Aali's assistance in helping Christy and I get our "band" together (even though we never performed outside of our apartment), incessant teasing about my endless string of questionable boyfriends, and late-night "North and South" marathons (Come on people! You know...North and South? Patrick Swayze? THE Civil War soap opera extravaganza? oh, forget it).

Anyway. I miss them living in the same town and hope that once they finish all that med school they'll move back to KC.

In other news, Harper is well. She just finished fighting an ear infection and possible stomach bug and seems to be back on the upswing. Even her ongoing cold seems to be subsiding.

She also seems to be developing a new skill every day--she's almost sitting up on her own and is starting to hold her own bottle (the latter development means lots of good breaks for mommy and daddy!)

I will update again with new pictures soon. Hope all of our friends and family are well!

Tuesday.

Are you watching the Presidential debate? I am. But that's not why you're here is it? Are you here for Harper? I thought so. I'm not even going to try and pretend that you're here for my wit, beauty, and political intelligence. So without further ado, ladies and gentleman, my daughter...

Who me? You're too kind. Here's what I've been doing the last couple of weeks. Thanks for checking in. Love, HarperHere I am awake.

Asleep.

I tried some cereal.

I visited with Laverne.

And Aunt Terry.

And Cousin Pat and Gigi.

And Michelle Obama. Wha? Wait! Mom! Let it go already!

Thanks for stopping by. It was nice visiting with you. Check in again soon!

I'm Turning 30!

Well, not for another week and a half but wow! I just keep forgetting about my birthday and then it hits me. 30.

Last weekend we went to Wichita for a wedding shower and my family surprised me with a little birthday celebration. We also got to see Jill and Brad and of course, Jason and the kids. We stopped by Emporia on our way home to visit Mima and Papa Tom. As usual we didn't take enough pictures, but I've posted what I did take.

Gigi is coming in town again tomorrow and staying with us for a week. Pop (Ed) will be joining her (and us) next weekend!

Harper has had a cold in varying stages for about three weeks now (thank you daycare!) but she's still happy and active. She is rolling over, playing on her stomach, laughing, and growling. I couldn't figure out where she picked up that last one until a little girl at school crawled over to Harper's carseat one morning, peaked in at her over the side, and started growling like a dog. The girl also had a nice crusty, boogery nose and a cough. I guess it's pretty obvious who Harper is hanging out with during the day.

That's all the news here so now it's time for pictures:

Harper & Aunt Jill (Harper's onesie says, "My Aunt Rocks"

Harper in her new footie pj's

Infant indoctrination: A new Obama onesie from Grandma

Harper and Papa Tom

The Audacity of Hope

There are times in my life when a speech has left me teary-eyed. Most often though, the speeches that have moved me most were not spoken in my lifetime. I read about them in textbooks or listened to them on tape--Sojourner Truth's address to the 1851 women's rights convention, Robert Kennedy's call to resist rioting and come together as a nation in the wake of the MLK assassination (here's a link to listen to it: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89365887), and of course the many moving words of Martin Luther King, Jr.

There are lots of speeches like this throughout history. They move people to act. They offer a sense of emotional relief because finally, someone has said what has needed to be said for a long time--and they did it in a way that was just plain powerful. They did it in a way that makes it very hard for people, even with the coldest of hearts, to resist listening.

Obama's speech last night was not MLK-esque. It may not even be ranked as a great speech in history (although I doubt it). But it was the first time in a very long time, that I have felt hope for our country. It will be remembered because of the sheer historical value of this moment in time. I haven't followed Obama's career for long--maybe a couple of years at most. But had you asked me three, four, even ten years ago, if I thought I'd see a minority president in office, I would have said "I hope so. But I doubt it." It's like the final frontier in gender and race inequality--A Black Man in the White House. A Woman in the Whitehouse (someday people, someday).

But back to Obama's speech. It was direct. It was insistent. It was strong. There was no b.s., no politician-y rhetoric, no unnecessary verbosity. I think it was even powerful enough to defrost some cold hearts ;). To me, it's not even a matter of Republican vs. Democrat, black vs. white. It's a matter of who is going to let "We the People" (not just a select few) have a place in our great Democracy again. Who is going to care for people who can't care for themselves? Who is going to protect our world and our environment? Who is going to regain peoples' trust and confidence?

Maybe it's all lollipops and rainbows. Maybe Obama won't deliver. Maybe our nation's issues (and even the world's issues) are so divisive that we'll never find common ground. But I'm savoring Obama's speech today. For this moment I am thrilled to feel moved in a way that I previously was only able to get from a textbook, or an ancient audio recording of politicians past.

Obama got my vote.



Alright, time for pictures!

The DNC has Harper's full attention*

She thinks Al Gore's jokes are funny.

Vote for Obama!

(*note to grandmas: I swear we're not letting Harper watch TV. It was just this one little time)

Finally Moved In!

Messy Kitchen!

This past weekend we finally got moved back into our condo. It's really beautiful and Josh and I are so excited about our new home (and being first time homeowners!). My parents came up once again to help us get settled and Josh's Aunt and Uncle also pitched in. We had help from our good friends Kim and Andy and without all the assistance, we'd be swimming in boxes right now.



Here are some pictures from the weekend:

Mom, Dad & Harper in front of the new house

Harper being stinky