Silence, Sleep, and Vienna?

"Why so silent at Ye Kings of New England?" you ask.

Two reasons.

One. Nathanael has been learning healthier sleep habits. (Read: Greg and Kim have been busy helping him learn these habits.)

Two. Greg and I have been working on a lengthy application.

Regarding Nathanael's sleep. We had been hoping to start sleep training shortly after we moved to Kansas, but travels caused us to delay the training. And then around three and a half months - just as the books say - Nathanael's night wakings restarted, likely as his cognitive and emotional developments enabled him to realize that crying out at night would mean cuddles with Mommy. Thus the training commenced. Today was day ten. His naps, though not yet consistent from day to day, have finally begun to improve. He's been a gem at night since day two (with one minor struggle around day four or five). The first night was difficult on me, hearing my darling crying, but ever since then, he's been mostly marvelous at falling asleep on his own, usually with no more than a few seconds of whimpering. (Of course, now that I'm writing this, he just woke up and is seriously crying. Boo hoo!) One development that has made us laugh that has actually helped him self-soothe -- he loves to suck on his fingers. Not his thumb, but two to three of his middle fingers. It's absolutely adorable and is sure to make anyone smile.

Here are a couple pictures from a family nap pre sleep training.

And here's our finger sucker. Not the best picture, but you get the idea.

Regarding our lengthy application. I won't write much about this, but basically Greg is quite interested in a job in German-speaking Europe which would likely place us in Vienna, Austria. The job is a training coordinator position for BAO (Biblische Ausbildung am Ort). Seeing that this would require us to uproot our lives and move, the organization is careful to recruit the entire family, so I'm technically applying as well. Here's something crazy exciting about this opportunity, other than the incredible fit that the job is for Greg -- did you know that Turks are the largest ethnic minority in Austria, with an estimated 200,000-300,000? Now THAT is exciting! If this is the next place God has for us, it will likely be many months (years?) down the road though as we will need to raise the funds for the position prior to moving.

Here's a picture of Vienna I found online: