Our story in His Song: The Weekend of Teya

Teya's first ballet recital, Reverie, with the Cambridge School of Ballet in Lake Nona. Yes, she is a bunny, and yes, they did quite a lot of hopping.

True friends dress up, bring flowers and sit for the entire ballet!

Saturday: Teya's 6th birthday. We continued the festivities with an invitation for tea with Ruth Ann and Elizabeth Leduc. What a sweet time with these kind friends! Teya was uncharacteristically quiet but enjoyed opening her....

....100 cookie cutters! Nearly every time Teya and David have stayed with the Leducs, Ruth Ann has made and decorated cookies with them. We are well-armed with supplies, if anyone ever needs to make cut-out cookies!

The afternoon preparations for Teya's birthday party. Abby, a neighborhood friend, joined us in decorating the cake. Actually, she decorated the cake while I busied myself with making dinner!

The cake, reminiscent of last year's. Teya has a soft spot for her name written all over royalty!

Adrian, Stefan, Claudia, Sam, Maggie and Bev joined for dinner, and the neighborhood kids smelled cake and came running. We managed to polish off the entire cake as Abby and Leo gathered their friends to help us out. If you feed them, they will come.

Teya's first monster truck from the truck specialist Adrian

Pinata time. THE END.

Teya informed me this week (3 months later) that she really enjoyed having her recital and birthday in the same weekend. I'm so glad for that, but I hope we don't have to do it again!

This girl is such a treasure. Very much longed and prayed for, she was a gift worth the waiting. At six, you are a lovely young girl, growing into a person who cares for others and is learning to live before Jesus, even with the limp of the fallen world slowing your pace. You are loved.

A Prayer for a Daughter, Ann Voskamp

Father who breathed into this daughter…

I pray for this girl being formed into eternity….

May the wind always be in her hair

May the sky always be wide with hope above her

And may all the hills be an exhilaration

the trials but a trail,

all the stones but stairs to God.

God, clothe this girl in a gown of grace
Grace, the only dress that makes beautiful,
the style of Your spirit.

Nourish her on the comfort food of the Word,
Word, that makes her crave more of Christ,
have hunger pangs for Him.

Enclose her in communion with You
You, Love who makes her love, who folds her heart into a roof
that absorbs storms for souls,
that makes her tongue speak only the words that make souls stronger.

May her vocation in this world simply be translation

Translating every enemy into esteemed guest
Translating every countenance into the face of Christ
Translating every burden into blessing

When it’s hard to be patient… make her willing to suffer
When it’s ridiculous to be thankful … make her see all is graceWhen it’s radical to forgive … make her live the foundation of our faith
And when it’s time to work… make her a holy wonder.

May she be bread and feed many with her life and her laughter
May she be thread and mend brokeness and knit hearts
May she be dead to all ladders & never go higher , only lower, to the lonely, the least & the longing
Her led of the Spirit to lead many to the Cross
that leads to the tomb wildly empty.