Chris went looking for him, but he eventually gave up and came back. I was all positive, and said, “Maybe he’ll come back!” But Chris was pretty sure his nose would keep him chasing stuff permanently. Our biggest concern (besides not wanting Chester to suffer or something) was how Isaiah would take it.
It didn’t take him too long to ask, “Where’s Chester?” We already had a speech prepared, so Chris told him how Chester went to play with the other animals and that he might not come back if he made lots of animal friends. Isaiah had my positiveness. He said, “Chester will come back.” A little later he told me, “Chester want to come back, be with Mommy, Daddy, Isaiah, Baby Sister!” I tried to tell him Chester might like his new animal friends better.
So that was when I started looking online at dog breeds. At first Chris had said we would wait a while before we got another dog, but with Isaiah being so concerned, we started thinking we might need something to distract him. I shied pretty clear of anything houndish or big. The last thing we need is a dog who loves his nose more than his family.
As I was searching for something small, low maintenance, good with children, and not butt ugly, Chris heard a bark! He ran outside, but if it was Chester, he was super far away. We put Isaiah down for his nap and then heard more barking that was definitely Chester! Chris decided to walk along the road in the direction it came from.
About 20 minutes later he came back and announced, “The prodigal has returned.” He had found the dog by following his barks. All in all, Chester had been missing for about 3 hours. When Chris found him, he thought Chester was hurt at first because he acted all droopy, but it turned out he just felt guilty. He knew he’d been bad.
So it turned out OK. I had helped Isaiah pray that Chester would come back safe and I guess Jesus couldn’t refuse the prayers of a sweet little boy… and girl, because if Leah had understood, she would have been praying too. She loves Chester better than any of us!
Isaiah is so full of conversation and new expressions. The other day I asked him to do something, which he didn’t hear. He came over to me and said, “What did you say?” Whenever we say, “Isaiah,” he answers, “Why?” It’s pretty funny. He has also started saying “well”. He’ll be telling me something about his trains and he’ll say, “Well… Percy is over here.” He’s also really into “scary” stuff, like dinosaurs that roar and suspenseful moments in his little movies.
Leah finally figured out solid food is a meal, not appetizer before nursing. She likes bananas and oatmeal the best, but has also tried applesauce and carrots. She is working on her sitting up skills and she looks like she will crawl soon. She talks and screams a lot!
We’re really enjoying PA life! Especially as it’s finally warmed up! We’ve been to downtown Pittsburgh a bunch now, but always for events and stuff. We still haven’t gotten to explore the city the way we want to. Chris’ brother is coming to visit us next weekend, so hopefully we’ll get a chance to look around it with him.
God’s doing a lot in our church. It seems like every week the atmosphere is different. It’s wonderful to see how the Lord brought us all together with this church to accomplish great things for His Kingdom!
Something else I like about living in Pittsburgh is that we get a lot of cool speakers and events into our area, because it is more conveniently located than CA was. We got to go hear Lila Terhune (one of our teachers from BRSM) this weekend. It was great to see her again and hear her laugh! It was cool because some of the stuff that she was teaching in her session was the same stuff our Pastor preached the next Sunday and he hadn’t heard her speak!
