{"id":8782,"date":"2014-12-08T05:20:02","date_gmt":"2014-12-08T10:20:02","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=8782"},"modified":"2014-12-08T05:21:23","modified_gmt":"2014-12-08T10:21:23","slug":"eli-2nd-birthday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/?p=8782","title":{"rendered":"Eli 2nd Birthday"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Happy Birthday to my sweet Eli!\u00a0 I cannot believe you are 2\u2026but you are definitely the coolest two year old little dude I\u2019ve ever known.\u00a0 You are such a blessing and a gift to our family!\u00a0 When we brought you home from Ethiopia 7 months ago, I could never have imagined what a blessing it would be to have you as our son and Emma\u2019s brother.\u00a0 You have brought so much laughter and happiness to our family.\u00a0 I am so grateful to say that we will never be the same since you joined our family.\u00a0 God chose us for you and you for us.\u00a0 The gospel itself is a story of adoption and God\u2019s grace abounds in the fact that before you were ever born He planned for you to be in our family.\u00a0 Our family would be incomplete without you!\u00a0 Even if we could choose all over again\u2026we would choose you again, every single day!<\/p>\n

Sometimes I think about some of the things that we missed about you being a little baby and what your first birthday must have been like.\u00a0 Thinking about that makes me sad because we missed those special moments with you.\u00a0 Then, I remember all of the special memories we have made in the past 7 months and all of the awesome adventures we will still have for the rest of eternity and I realize that I am so happy that you will always celebrate your birthday as a Strange kid for the rest of your life!\u00a0 Eli you are such a joy to Mommy, Daddy, and Emma.\u00a0 We love you more than you could ever imagine\u2026we can\u2019t even describe all the different ways that we love you!<\/p>\n

Eli, you are our little adventurer.\u00a0 If it can be climbed on or jumped off of\u2026you are all over it!\u00a0 You love to throw all kinds of balls with us and your favorite way to get around is to run.\u00a0 On pretty days, we love to go for family bike rides and you ride in your seat on Daddy\u2019s bike.\u00a0 Some days you also like to try out your tricycle that Emma proudly handed down to you.\u00a0 Emma turned 6 a few weeks before you turned 2.\u00a0 You think that you are 6 and you try to do everything that your big sister does.\u00a0 Emma loves you like crazy and has from the moment she laid eyes on you in May.\u00a0 When she and I are driving back and forth to school each day, she always wants to talk about you and all the cool things you are doing.\u00a0 You always light up right when she walks in the room.\u00a0 From the very beginning, Emma wanted you to know that she would take good care of you forever.<\/p>\n

You love to give hugs and kisses.\u00a0 You also love to giggle like crazy when you are pretending that you don\u2019t want to give hugs and kisses.\u00a0 This time of year you have been wearing your footed pajamas and you are just way too cute!\u00a0 So far you aren\u2019t too much of a snuggler unless you are completely asleep.\u00a0 You are too busy all the time when you are awake to have time to stop and snuggle!\u00a0 You also love playing in the bathtub and would stay in there all night if we let you!\u00a0 In the summertime you love to play in the pool, in the lake, and on the beach.\u00a0 When we took you to the beach this past summer, you tried to eat all of the sand!<\/p>\n

You have awesome grandparents and lots of special aunts, uncles, and cousins.\u00a0 Your favorite cousin right now seems to be Nora since she is just about your age.\u00a0 Her twin brothers were born two months ago and I am sure you will love growing up with James and Simon too!\u00a0 You also have a lot of friends at North Cobb Christian School, Cedarcrest Church and your school\u2026Primrose.\u00a0 You love running errands with us and love to look at things at the store.\u00a0 When we eat, you always clean your plate and you are growing so fast!\u00a0 You got to bed at 7:30 each evening and usually sleep right at 12 hours each night\u2026you even nap for up to 3 hours on the weekends after playing hard!\u00a0 Your favorite part of getting dressed everyday is putting on your shoes\u2026you love your shoes!<\/p>\n

Eli, God has amazing plans for your life.\u00a0 Each day when we sit down to eat, we all hold hands and pray together.\u00a0 As we are praying, I pray that God will raise you to be a mighty man of God that will do amazing things for His glory and the good of others.\u00a0 It is an honor and a privilege to be your mommy and I can\u2019t wait to see what adventures lie ahead for you little guy!\u00a0 I love you!<\/p>\n

Happy 2nd<\/sup> Birthday Eli!<\/p>\n

Love always,<\/p>\n

Mommy<\/p>\n

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  Happy Birthday to my sweet Eli!\u00a0 I cannot believe you are 2\u2026but you are definitely the coolest two year old little dude I\u2019ve ever known.\u00a0 You are such a blessing and a gift to our family!\u00a0 When we brought you home from Ethiopia 7 months ago, I could never have imagined what a blessing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,22,37,12,16,32,18,26],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-adoption","category-cedarcrest-church","category-eli","category-emma","category-family","category-marriage","category-north-cobb-christian","category-travel"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8782"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8782\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/meganstrange.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}