A Diplomatic Answer

So I'm putting Luke to bed. Singing to him is the last stage before lights-out, so he resists.

"No! Stop singing!" He says.

"But I like to sing to you. I'm a good singer."

He says, "You're a good reader."

(That's a compliment, right?)

Epiphany Lutheran's Toy Sale

We signed up to sell some stuff at Epiphany Lutheran's annual Toy Sale in Elmhurst. I dropped it off last night.

If you're interested, the sale is tomorrow, Saturday Sept. 30 29th, 8am to noon.

It's an amazing event. The Eighth Organizational Wonder of the World. I had to take a few pictures. Indulge me.

Mountains of colorful toys. The volunteer says, "Yes, and when you touch any of them, they talk, sing, or beckon you to pay." And random ones just go off spontaneously.


A field of strollers.

Dozens of everything you can think of, big and small.



You can sign up to automatically donate your unwanted items that don't sell. It's a very cool thing all around.

Morfar's Trumpet

While Kirsten was having Rebekah, Luke's Mormor and Morfar were taking care of him. He had a great time.

Here he is trying Morfar's trumpet. Loved it.

Camera Shy

Rebekah says, "No pictures, please!"

Four-Family Brunch

Had a great brunch with these folks not long after we moved in. It's great introducing friends to friends. So nice how close people are now.

Lots of kids, but not the madhouse you'd expect.

Baby Carly stole the show.


Baby Carly meets baby Andrew. She likes him!


Luke and Carly.

Little Girls' Clothes

Ok, we're very slow on getting more pictures up. Thanks for your patience.

Everybody's looking forward to shopping for little girls' clothes. They say they're cuter than little boys' clothes. Hmph.

Looks like she has some growing to do even to fit into these!

Rebekah Pics

Sorry to deprive everyone of Rebekah pictures! Here are a couple.



She has a full head of beautiful brown hair under that cap (right now at least).

Rebekah's (and Kirsten's) Day Three Update

Update, 7pm: All tests are fine! We checked out around 5pm and are home safe and sound!

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Rebekah will be three days old in a couple hours.

Rebekah is doing great. She's back to her old self: nursing just fine and more alert, just like the first 17 hours. (HA! How many people refer to a three-day-old baby's "old self?" You read it here first!) All her blood tests and stats so far have come back fine (no infection), and she acts fine. We're waiting for one more test that has to stew for 48 hours. Soup's on at 4pm today. We'll see. (Worst-case: If it comes back positive, she's gotta stay seven days and get a course of antibiotics.)

They warned us that baby-docs can be overly very cautious, and might still want to watch her for another 24 hours. Can't blame them, I guess.

Kirsten's doing great, too. Much, much better than last time. She's up and about, and it seems weeks ahead of where she was last time. (Kirsten really gets credit for two births last time, as difficult as that was.)

We just signed Kirten's discharge papers, but we'll stick around for Rebekah.

Thanks for all the prayer! We can tell!

Sorry we haven't been able to call everybody we've wanted to! Hope these blog updates help!

Rebekah Lenore Bell

Little Rebekah Lenore Bell was born at 1:17 pm on Friday, August 31 and weighed 6 lbs 14 oz.

Rebekah shares a birthday with her great-grandma Lenore Dahlstrom and a nose with the many of her Freed relatives.

Rebekah nursed great the first few hours, but quickly decided she liked to sleep more than eat. Her blood sugar level dropped and since Kirsten was GBS positive, it landed Rebekah in the Special Care Nursery (NICU) for a couple days. She is doing great, but we have to wait for the results of a blood culture on Monday to determine if she comes home with us tomorrow.

Jim adds: She was 18-1/2 inches long, and her nose is absolutely beautiful, like the rest of her! My nose is a poor reflection of the perfect Freed nose, and I don't think hers looks anything like either one. But we'll see.

Did I mention she's beautiful?