What's it all for?

Ok...so I'm one of those people.  When something is important to me, I want to read every book on the topic that I can get my hands on!  This drove Randal crazy when I was pregnant...but I wanted to know EVERYTHING that COULD happen so that I was ready and armed against whatever came out of the blue.  This is how I deal with things, so he put up with it :)  Well, in the past 5 years, I've read a LOT of books about marriage and parenting.  I'm reading a couple right now and they've got me thinking...so that has me typing tonight :)

You name the book, I've probably read it or own it...I've read books about how to be a better mother while trying to be a better wife, books about how to pray for your husband, books about how to be a Godly wife, books about how to speak your spouse's love language, etc, etc, etc.  I've pieced together my own idea of what being a wife and mother looks like over the years.  This may or may not be something that others agree with, and that's ok - b/c I think everyone's family has to function differently, and also that no one has it all figured out.  But here's what's got me thinking so much...of all of these books that I've read, they have all tried to give me a reason to do the things they say.  If you're a better parent, your kids won't be so screwed up; If you're a better wife, you'll have a better family; If you're a better wife, you're husband won't leave you; If you're a better wife, your husband will be better to you, etc, etc, etc.

There is a laundry list of reasons to do the things we do on a daily basis, but my question is, what is it all really for?  I mostly read Christian books, but I feel like a lot of them don't focus enough on the big picture.  Yes, I want my kids and my husband, and my life to be better, but first and foremost, as a Christ follower, my duty is to carry out these daily "routines" to the Glory of God.  Everything about my life is made to give me opportunities to bring Him glory, so that's what it's for.

The fact that my life was formed brings Him glory.  The fact that I am saved from the penalties of my sin brings Him glory.  The fact that a little girl like me can stand tall in face of adversity and fear brings Him glory. The fact that I have peace, even in the darkest times, brings Him glory.  He is a wonderful God and He is the only God that deserves whatever glory we can bring Him.  He is the only God that is worthy to demand it of us, so He does. Because He is that great.

So why do things every day that might make a difference?  I just got done doing the 30 day giving challenge...why take the time?  B/c it would make a difference, that's why.  Because whatever good thatt giving does, it brings Him glory.  I think that's why anonymous things are so much more fun - there's no chance of anyone else getting credit but Him :)

So why work on your marriage or parenting?  Do you do it to help with your insecurities?  Or so that your kids won't grow up to be what you fear the most? Or to deal with infidelity?  Or just to better yourself for the heck of it?  Whatever the reasoning has been, the heart of it should be for Him. 

I make the decision every day to love Randal and work on our marriage.  Some days, it's easier than others.  But I know that making that decision not only makes my life better, it brings God glory to see that from His children. I do everything in my power to protect and care for my kids - that makes my heart warm to see them taken care of, but I know that it brings God glory to see me taking care of His kids and raising them to know their Father. 

I won't even try and trick you into thinking that I do everything with this in mind...in fact, I do a lot of things exactly the opposite and I kick myself after.  I'm stupid, but luckily He gets that and has me covered. 

So that is all.  I just need a re-focus sometimes and I think God puts this on my heart in just the right moments.  Glory to Him! :)

The latest gems :)

I was told numerous times over the Thanksgiving weekend that I do not post on here enough, so here I am, on a roll.  Here are a few things from the recent past:

Madison had the flu really bad a couple of weeks ago and reminded me of what a tough girl we have!  The poor thing couldn't keep anything down and was exhausted, but for the most part was a real trooper (even when we had to do a suppository! I cried more than she did!).  She's a tough kid, and it's probably a good thing with her brother around :) 

She's super close to walking, so we're working on that.  She also has SIX teeth now! Wow! And the girl can bite! Don't get your fingers near her mouth or she might draw blood...just sayin.

Mason is hilarious, as always.  Even during his "terrible two's" moments, he makes us laugh.  Here are a few things that have kept us rolling lately:

~He's been very confused about contradicting relationships lately...for example, I told him one day that Grandma Sue is my mommy and he just told me "no" and walked away.  You can imagine how confused he was when we tried to explain that Randal was my husband.  So randomly over the last couple of weeks, he'll look at me and just go, "He's your daddy, not you husband mommy!"  Last night, as he went to go find Randal in the other room, he kept saying "He's not my daddy, he's my husband mommy"  Hopefully he'll be able to work this out in his head :)
~Another doozy is his favorite toy...it's now a flashlight.  He likes to carry it around the house until we yell at him to stop trying to shine it in people's eyes.  We've decided he's going to be an evangelist, b/c he keeps telling us he's going to "find the dark". 

And those are your laughs for today :) Enjoy! Here's a picture of Mason assisting Daddy & Pampa with the Christmas Lights!

30 Days of Giving: Days 10, 11, etc, etc :)

Ok – so I have not been good about keeping up with my blog the last couple of weeks! The 30-Day giving challenge has been great. I have to admit, some days it’s easier than others, but it’s been really good to force myself to look for even the small ways to give of myself this month. Since I haven’t been good at keeping up on my daily updates, here’s a brief list of some of the ways I’ve given in the last couple of weeks:


1) Cooking for others
2) Toys for Tots
3) Giving change to the Salvation Army bell-ringers
4) Giving up my place in line at the store on my lunch break (this one was hard!)
5) Sending anonymous gifts and words of encouragement (these are my favorites!)
6) Filling up someone else's tank of gas
7) Giving extra time for the kids – our family has been sick a lot over the last couple of weeks, so this was essential and special!
8) Giving friendly, encouraging advice to those that come to me with problems and questions
9) Sorting through toys to give away/donate
10) Giving special prayer time for certain people/projects

It’s the 29th today, so I better make the last two days count I guess! :)  Happy Giving!

Randal Posted this....

 He looks like he just stepped out of the Wizard of Oz!

She went down for a nap...

and woke up with the fullest head of hair!

 The new family car, no more pick up. 

Let's face it I never owned a truck they were always pick ups!

30 Days - Days 7,8, & 9

Day 7 - This day was a kind of crazy one :)  I just got back from Joplin and seeing gma, so I was catching up on things around the house and spending time with my family.  I was scheduled to make a meal for our friends for Monday, so I made it on Sunday and took it to them that evening.  It was a wonderful fit :)

Day 8 - oh Mondays...I don't really like them much.  They are crazy and exhausting, but this one was ok! :) I ordered something online for a friend that I hope they'll love ;)  Guess we'll see! 

Day 9 - I have been praying about sponsoring a child through Compassion International for a long time.  After we had a FANTASTIC sermon on Orphan Care this past Sunday, I decided God was prodding me to finally take the plunge.  So today, I sponsored Melody...she is a 5 year old girl from Uganda (a country close to my heart - my friend Melissa is over there right now finalizing the adoption of their beautiful girl Mercy).  My prayer is that this support for Melody will show the Father's love and bless her and her family beyond my imagination :)

Days 5 & 6

Day 5 - This was a long day.  Trying to find out what was going on with grandma took up most of my day. Unfortunately there wasn't a lot of information and cell reception is not great at the hospital so most of our information back home was very sporaditic and via text.  Needless to say, we were all feeling pretty confused. We ended up talking to mom and dad for a while in the afternoon and determined it would be fine for me to go out to Joplin and see her and represent the grandkids for the weekend.  Thanks to my sister for her beautiful note on the last post, but I really don't see it as that big of a deal...I consider it a blessing and a priviledge to give grandma everyone's well wishes. 

Anyway, my giving challenge was going to be tough...I was going to be traveling for a while, so I was looking for something random that God would present me with along the way.  On the way to work in the morning, I decided to stop off at Starbucks for a little pick me up :) I decided that my giving challenge for the day would be to pay for the person behind me. Not a huge deal, I know, but hopefully it made that person's day a little bit brighter!

Day 6 has been spent at the hospital visiting grandma.  My giving was my time with God as I walked the halls for a few minutes earlier and read some prayer requests and prayed for people in the hospital.  Nothing better than carrying our burdens to Him. 

I have no idea what else God has in store for me over the next few weeks, but I'm excited for it :)

30 Days of Giving - Day 4

Today is a tough one...one of those days when I'd really like to forget about this challenge and just focus on my own problems, but I'm glad I've accepted this challenge and am looking at this day as a huge one for growth. 

Last night, my maternal grandma had a heart attack.  Initially, things looked hopeless.  I felt more helpless than I have in a while.  She was out of state when it happened, so my mom and her siblings had to quickly drive to be with her and my grandpa.  Thankfully, we've had more reports over the last few hours that make things look a little better, but we are still all needing a lot of prayer.  This could be a very long, scary road and we will all be tested as we lean on the Father for strength and hope.

So today, it would be super easy to throw in the towel on this 30 day thing and focus on this.  Granted, I think giving of my time and energy to all of this is good, but the bigger lesson at hand is that other people need me to give too.  I cannot forget that, even now.  The past two months have been the hardest of my life...I could give up pretty easily and don't think many people would judge me for that...but here I am, resting on the only One who gets me through the days, especially this one.  Satan is attacking and my only defense is Him and He tells me to get back up, dust myself off, and plow through - it's for His glory and it will all work towards His good.  I know that...it's just easier to remember on certain days.

So here it is, a chance for something great - what will I do with it?  I'm using today for a big project.  This will not be completed in one day, as I am asking for assistance from other givers and this is a big undertaking.  But I know that He will bless this effort, so here goes! I want this verse to be a reflection of my life, to be unexpected in this world:

Out of the most severe trial, their overflowing joy and their extreme poverty welled up in rich generosity. For I testify that they gave as much as they were able, and even beyond their ability. Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the saints. And they did not do as we expected, but they gave themselves first to the Lord and then to us in keeping with God's will. ~ 2 Corinthians 8:2-5

30 Days - Days 2 & 3

Day 2 was good.  I gave my vote - what a great privilege! I picked out some clothes out of my closet and am going to drop them off this weekend.  I think the best and worst part of all of this for me is finding time to do all of this.  As a mother who works outside of our home, I have to find those rare windows of time to drop off, deliver things, pack things up, bake things, etc. This is going to be a great growth opportunity for me, and hopefully, my entire family.  I spend so much time worrying about the kids, grocery shopping, cleaning, laundry, my job, etc that I sometimes forget about the rest of the world.  Thank you God for a reminder like this one :)

Day 3 was good as well.  I spent some time on my lunch break sending out some words of encouragement to some strangers on my favorite cake baking website Cake Central.  It's always great to see when people post on your pictures of your creations, so hopefully those bakers got a little boost from that :)

Day 4 is still a question mark.  I know that I will be giving some extra time to my husband and am hoping that maybe we can do some giving together :) We'll see what tomorrow holds!

Halloween 2010

Our kids had a BLAST this Halloween! It was so much fun to see them both enjoy it this year.  Big M was dressed as Woody from Toy Story and Little m was a cute little duck :)  They were adorable, if I do say so myself!  M had a great time getting candy and I think he's got severe sugar addiction.  m just had fun with all of the excitement!  She still won't eat anything other than formula (my kids are the weirdest kids on the planet!), so we couldn't give her any sort of treat.  She continues to grow like a weed! She got two new teeth this past week, along w/ her first infection.  She just finished up a round of antibiotics and is a complete trooper! 

Both kids are hilarious in their own little way.  m makes the funniest faces and noises and loves to beat up her big brother.  M takes it like a champ b/c he knows it's fun for her and it's funny for everyone else :)  What a good big brother!  Randal did me the giant favor of previously posting her 10 month pictures (mommy didn't do a very good job of getting them done at 9 months).

He repeats everything we say (we're REALLY having to watch ourselves!) and has come up with his own funny sayings now too.  His favorite is "Me do it".  He is SUPER independent now, which I love, but it forces me to be patient, which I don't love ;) He has also become a very picky eater (I have no clue where he gets it from!) and continues to tell me "I can't like it" whenever I put food on his plate.  I just tell him "yes, you can" and move on. He was hysterical in his costume and would say "yay-haw" and take his hat off.  He was shy when the neighborhood kids came to our house to trick-or-treat and would only say "Happy Halloween" to them when they were close to the driveway!  ha! 

 The kids with Grammy & Great Gpa & Gma

 Our little family...m and I are too funny in this one!

 My two with Molly's boys - brings back lots of childhood memories! :)

My smiling duckie :)

30 Days of Giving - Days 1 and 2

Yesterday, I caught wind of the most exciting thing - The 30-Day Giving Challenge.  A group of women started a challenge - spend 30 days coming up with creative ways to give of your time, talents, and resources.  What a beautiful idea!  I'm overjoyed about participating, even if I did learn about it at the last minute and am a little bit nervous about coming up with 30 creative things to do! If you want to learn more, or join me, check out http://www.30daygivingchallenge.com/!

Anyway, I'll be blogging about this journey as I go and hopefully can get Randal and the kiddos involved too! 

Day 1, since it was last minute, consisted of compiling a list of ideas and trying to find something I could do so quickly.  Luckily, one fellow blogger posted a list of wonderful ideas that I will be drawing from and posted some websites that you can "give" on just by clicking to encourage advertisers to post there, so I did a few of those.  I also made Mexican Casserole for my husband, as it is his favorite meal...but I don't think that counts because I forgot how to make it and it was far from being right.  Because he is nice, he ate it anyway :)

Day 1 was also spent praying for my friend Melissa and her precious family.  They are going through the process of bringing home their beautiful little girl named Mercy and Melissa is stuck in Africa trying to get home to reunite her family.  Please join me in continuing to pray for resolution and safe (QUICK!) travels home!

Day 2 will be spent sorting and packing up clothes that don't fit post-baby me anymore :)  Surely some young professional lady will look adorable in all of my old suits, right?  This experience is so refreshing, because lately, I have not been in a place where I have felt like giving much.  It's really great how often God gives me a kick in the pants just when I need it! 

"In everything I showed you that by working hard in this manner you must help the weak and remember the words of the Lord Jesus, that He Himself said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." ~Acts 20:35