Emma took her first steps three days before turning one! A few days ago, she learned how to stand up without holding on to anything- she was pretty happy about that. Now anytime she stands up, she claps for herself.
Emma absolutely loves it when we read to her. We are fascinated by how she is drawn to books- I've found her "reading" to herself many times (often with the book upside down).
I recently purchased a second bookshelf for her nursery since we've been collecting more books. When she came in and saw all of her books on the new shelf she got the biggest smile on her face, situated herself in my lap, pointed to the books and said "thaaa!" (which meant "read to me, please").

HUH?!?

We are baffled by this new "setback". When Emma was an infant, she refused a pacifier and didn't suck her thumb. Last week she found this pacifier in her toy basket and stuck it in her mouth. Now she sucks on a pacifier when she goes for naps. . . and- she sucks both thumbs (not at the same time). Maybe it is because of teething??? It has been funny to find her in her crib fast asleep sucking on her thumb. Hopefully if this is her new habit, she won't have as hard of a time breaking it as I did. My mom used to try all sorts of things to "bribe" me out of sucking my thumb- candy, ice cream, stickers, rubbing the nasty-bitter tasting stuff on my thumb (which I figured the quicker I sucked it off, the quicker my normal-tasting thumb would be back)- nothing worked. Let's just say that I sucked my thumb WAY too long- and no, I do not suck my thumb anymore!
Michael is offically in his final year of seminary- for that we are thankful and excited. This year will be busy for him, please continue to pray for his physical strength. Regarding future plans, we are still waiting on the Lord, seeking wisdom and enjoying doing what we have been called to do right now. We've been at Antioch Church since last February, and have grown to love the people dearly. We have been extremely thankful for our townhouse, but we have to be out of it by late spring/early summer. We are excited to see what the Lord is going to do!
Teaching is starting to pick back up in September, but I do not have quite as many students as I did last year. I'm praying for a few more- right now I have 24 , and I'd like to average around 30. Jehovah Jirah!
Emma keeps me busy, but she is such fun. She is in the "open all the doors, drawers, cabinets- stage", so that keeps me on my toes. Yesterday before I even realized what she was doing, I looked over and she was gripping a large corningware dish in one hand saying "OOHHH!" Later I let her play with my cookie cutters in a bottom drawer. She took all of the cookie cutters out of the drawer and then tried to climb in it. She has started signing/saying "thank you" which sounds more like "taain-tu".
Well, that pretty much sums up what is going on here right now! Love you all :)