Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!

Joy to the world! The Lord has come.

Let earth receive her King.

Let every heart prepare Him room.

Let Heaven and nature sing.

Petey had a very special first Christmas, celebrating our Savior's birth with us, his Honey & Ozzie (Matt's parents), his aunt, uncle and four cousins. All twelve of us celebrated Christmas Eve at church last night. Here is a photo of the Osman family taken before the service began:

We began Christmas morning at our house and Noah was so sweet helping Peter open his presents:

We then joined the rest of the family at Matt's parents' home, where the festivities continued until bedtime. The best part of the day was seeing all the cousins playing together all day long. It was a day filled with special memories, and my heart overflows with joy!

Dedication

Train up a child in the way he should go;

Even when he is old he will not depart from it.

~Proverbs 22:6

Today at church, we had the honor and privilege of dedicating Peter to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. 

Here is the prayer that Matt prayed during the dedication:

Zephaniah 3:17

The Lord your God is with you,

he is mighty to save.

He will take great delight in you,

he will quiet you with his love,

he will rejoice over you with singing.

Dear Father in Heaven,

We take great delight in Peter, just as You take great delight in him. And we rejoice over him becoming a part of our family, just as You rejoice over Your children.

Lord, thank You for saving us, and please work in Peter's heart as he grows older and gains understanding, that he, too, would  find a saving grace in You. Lord, please bless us with wisdom and insight to raise him in a godly manner consistent with Your plan for our lives.

Lord, we also pray for Peter's birth family, in particular his birth mother. We pray that somehow, someway, she would find a peace that passes all understanding and know in her heart that Peter is happy and loved and that we, his forever family, will care for his every need.

Thank You Lord for blessing our family with Peter.

In Jesus name we pray, Amen

The ceremony began with a renewal of marriage vows. Here we are praying, following the vow renewal.

During the ceremony, Pastor Robbi talked with Noah about being the kind of big brother who exemplifies Jesus.

Then, Pastor Robbi anointed Peter with oil as we dedicated him to the Lord, promising to raise him according to God's word and way.  

 What a special and blessed day for our family. 

Tactile Play

I'm writing this blog post in hopes that it may help another little guy or gal as these activities have helped Petey. At the suggestion of Petey's speech therapist, I have increased tactile play activities in order to increase his attention span, which is usually about 30 seconds. He loves manipulating his hands around in various textures (mostly slimy). Everything I've used is non-toxic and many are food items. Here are a couple examples.

I started with pumpkin guts and he played with them for 37 minutes the first time and 50 minutes the second time. Absolutely amazing!

An unexpected bonus when Petey played with pudding was that he succeeded in using a spoon to feed himself for the first time! (He has fed himself independently since a few days after he joined our family, but always with his fingers.)

In related news, Petey also learned to use a fork to feed himself yesterday. Granted, he only ate about 10% of the food with the fork and used his hands for the rest, but I'm so proud of him for learning these new skills.

~Allie