You might be a PK if...

You have a morning "jam" session with your dad and you turn to your baby sister and say, "after we worship Haven, we're gonna baptize you."

6 months old!

I can't believe it is already 2012 and what I really can't believe is that our baby girl is half a year old already! Where does the time go? Haven is such a sweet baby, she continues to love her siblings and is a content sweet easy going girl. She is starting to really enjoy her rice cereal and this month we will start introducing her to some fruits and veggies. She doesn't even know it yet, lucky kid. In honor of her 6 month mark, Haven has decided to start crawling. Yep she is a fiesty one that one. She is so strong and has been scooting for the past few weeks. Her "crawl" is not perfected by any means but she can certainly get from point A to B. She is almost sitting up all by herself as well. She does have two older siblings to keep up with after all. She will go for her 6 month doctor's visit next week sometime so I don't have any stats for you eager family members out there. But, I can tell you that she is a petite one. Small and strong and sweet...all "s" things. And six months old another "s" thing. Okay so can you tell I am in a letter teaching phase of life? I will try and post a video of our little crawler when I figure out how to get it off my new phone and on to the computer. Please stay tuned you won't want to miss this!

Isaiah 30:15

Our sweet little Haven was baptized this Sunday. At our church we have a tradition that father's give a blessing to their child. Below is the blessing Tyler gave to our precious baby girl.


-HAVEN, one of the things that I love most about you is that you live by faith. You are a fantastic example of what it looks like to put your trust in those who love you more than you love yourself. You really haven't known your mother and I all that long, and yet you fully trust us to provide for you, and care for you, and work out-on your behalf- all the things you can't do for yourself. And what's amazing is that you are- for the most part- extremely content and at rest with this state of affairs! At this point in your life, you seem perfectly fine with us doing "everything" for you-and we delight to do it! Haven, the Holy Spirit has taught me a lot through you. He's taught me a lot about how we are suppose to live by faith in the salvation and provision of our Heavenly Father; accepting His invitation to REST in the work wrought by our High Priest and King Jesus Christ- a labor of unparalleled prodigal love- a work of complete perfection, to satisfy the Only True and Living, Infinitely Holy God--an utterly indispensable work which we could never perform for ourselves. Haven, your names means "rest" or "refuge." Our prayer for you is that the Holy Spirit would incessantly prompt you to make every effort to enter the REST available to you in abundance in the work- the life and death- of our King and Savior Jesus Christ. Our prayer is that you will fight against any and all unbelief that might deter you from giving your full attention and faith to the promise of God in Isaiah 30:15 Where the Lord God, the Holy One of Israel says, "You will be delivered by RETURNING and RESTING; your strength will lie in quiet confidence in what has been done for you."

RUF Christmas party

Just how many peeps can we fit into the Dirks little home? Well, we aren't exactly sure, but we did fit 40 or so students in for a Christmas party last week. It was a blast and the tacky Christmas sweaters were fabulous.We did a white elephant gift exchange.
Some gifts were great.
And others not so much...
I wish I had a picture of us all squeezed into this tiny room for the gift exchange...the volume practically tripled. It was sort of amazing, not sure how we did it.
Our fabulous intern Katy with some awesome students.

Jesus Christ is Lord!

This moment brought tears to my eyes this morning as my children played with the nativity. As they finished telling the story and acting it out with these little nativity figures the finale' was bowing them down before baby Jesus. My prayer is that this Truth would settle into their sweet little hearts and that they would continue to recognize the real meaning of Christmas. That He is King of Kings and Lord of Lords and the most amazing gift a Father could give his helpless children.
"every knee shall bow to me, and every tongue shall confess...
-Romans 14:11

Random Christmas fun!

We are gearing up for Christmas here at the Dirks abode and like many of you we are enjoying some family time.
Like baking with our Grandma. (Don't worry this ones not a messy recipe hence why it is occurring on the couch).
And snuggling with our Poppa.
We've hosted two Christmas parties, this one with our supper club (love these ladies). And (post to come) one with our RUF students.
We have thoroughly enjoyed checking the mailbox all month long for Christmas cards and occasional packages from Kansas. In one of our packages the kids got their yearly hallmark Christmas ornaments from Grams. They were a big hit (Henry got cars, Haven got her "my 1st xmas ornament" and Maggie Grace got a ballerina). They immediately went on the tree, thanks Grams and (Melodee too) for the packages.

Tree Lighting at JWU

We headed to Gateway Village for the annual tree lighting. The kids had a great time, but we missed having our Daddy with us. He was in Dallas for RUF training, Christmas time is way better with Dad. The tree was beautiful and the kids were being really sweet.
Haven met Santa for the first time but was way more into the Christmas rock music being belted out on the stage to her left.
And this was the first year that Henry wasn't terrified of Santa. So, I feel like that is a pretty big deal.
However, the Grinch was still a no go for him. But, Mags is always a fan.