Our beautiful girl turned 7 on November 26th. We had a wonderful month celebrating her birthday. Her birthday countdown calendar included gifts, snacks, a sleep-over, some new Audible recordings., and a few other treats.

We’ve seen Becca grow up this past year. She finished Level 3 of All About Reading. She lost a few more teeth. She makes banana bread on her own and helps with making scrambled eggs. She is a great help to her siblings and is creative in thinking of new games for them to play. We’ve seen her blossom in her Khmer these past few months, and we enjoy watching her play with her Khmer and Jarai friends.

We rejoicing in seeing the Spirit work in Becca’s heart and continue to change her into the image of Christ. Her heart has been very tender toward pleasing God and walking with Him. A few months ago Becca said she wants to read through the whole Bible. We read a chapter a day each morning and are almost through Exodus.

This year Becca wanted to have a birthday party with her new Khmer friends. This was huge for her, since she normally wants a “family-only” party. We spent weeks planning. Becca made a pinata. The neighbor kids talked about coming for weeks.

I made Becca’s traditional panda cake. I was very thankful the Lord provide the time and cooperative children while I put the cake together.

The party was Sunday afternoon (since kids here have school on Saturday), and the kids were all waiting from about 1 o’clock on. However, when 3PM came, most of the kids had disappeared. We had this “AH!” moment until eventually they started straggling in. Becca’s party included playing Pin the Nose on the Panda, a pinata, cake, and water-balloons. Including our kids we had about 23 kids at the party, ages 2-16. All the games were a success and at the end of the day I was exhausted and greatly relieved that we had survived. I think our neighbors are now counting the months until Isaiah’s birthday.

Becca had two special guests at her party. Grandma Jensen was able to come and also help with the party (sadly Grandpa Jensen wasn’t feeling well enough to come). Om Thu (our old house helper) was able to come for the day as well.

We took Becca’s spoon picture several days after her birthday. We thank God for protecting Becca when she was born at 27 weeks.

And Becca got her first haircut!

Last week our Clara turned 9-months. Clara continues to be a sweet little girl. She now crawls but still chooses to alter between regularly crawling and her army crawl. Lately she’s been standing up on her own, so we predict it won’t be too long before she walks.

Clara likes to chew on things (she’s still toothless) and always wants what everyone else is eating. She to spit out anything that isn’t completely pureed, but she enjoys gumming things.

Last week Clara had her first fever, a few days before we flew to the States.  I was quite worried about flying with Clara, since she tends to only sleep in her bed. We made it.

Thankful for our sweet Clara Grace who is full of smiles, giggles, and movement!