the sweetest sound

I've been meaning to update you on our life happenings, and tonight was a very important reason to! I had one of the best moments a parent has with a little one. I was reading to Everly one of her favorite books, "What is Christmas, Anyway?" I know it's not the season, but she loves to look at the pages. It goes through the different traditions of Christmas--making cookies, singing carols, the tree, Santa, etc.--and then gets to Jesus. Now, every time we get to the picture of Jesus being held by his parents, Everly points at him and says "baby." She knows that He is important, and I thought that maybe she thinks because she is/was the baby and life might seem like it revolves around her... atleast in her mind. Nevertheless, she points out baby Jesus on all the pages and I tell her that she's right--that He is important. Well (here's the exciting part!), tonight she didn't just say baby, she repeated after me- "Jesus", in her own little baby talk. :) It made me tear up, to hear my baby say the name of Jesus for the first time. We've been working on getting Everly to learn the names of those we do life with and she doesn't always want to repeat after us, she's a little stubborn! So it was awesome to hear her choose to say the name of Jesus. I had to stop and say a prayer that she would say the name of Jesus for the rest of her life, and then I sang "Jesus loves me" to her. I think it's going to become a favorite song now too. :)

alright, it's late so I'll put some more photos and updates on soon!