Runnels Rhapsody

Supersized Blessings

I notice the last time I wrote that I hadn't birthed our son yet. Well, on December 5th (11 days overdue) he finally arrived. And get this - he weighed in at 11 POUNDS 4 OUNCES! He is huge! Now at a little over 2 months old, he is over 15 pounds and in 6-9 month clothes. He is one BIG BOY!

The last two months have been typical of life with a newborn - very little sleep, hormones out of control, jealousy issues with DD as she adjusts to not being the center of the universe anymore. Until the last week or so, I haven't felt on top of my game, but rather have felt behind on everything. But DS has just now begun sleeping for more than 2 hours at a time, so I too am getting a little better sleep now.

We are just thanking God for this blessing. A year ago we had no idea if we'd be able to have any more children, if we would forever be a family of three. But here we are now, with a big bundle of joy in our arms. We had new family pictures taken last week - now have our family of 4 shot hanging on the wall. What a joy! How blessed we are. And how we continue to desire more children, but certainly feel that we have been blessed and could be content with our DD and our DS if they are all the babies we ever have. God knows the future. And we know He has our best in mind.

God is good. All the time!

Due Date

It's been a long while since I've written, though I have been online enjoying others' blogs.

Today is my due date. No baby yet, but we are more than ready. My hormones and emotions have been out of whack this week. I feel disappointed that the baby hasn't come yet. For the last 4 months I've been measuring big and heard from doctors, midwives and every person I meet on the street that I look huge and there's no way I'll make it to my due date. Well... here I am, as huge as ever and still pregnant on my due date. One of these days...

Until then, life continues on as normal. DD just finished lesson 50 in the "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" book. She continues to do very well grasping the new concepts. It is amazing to watch, really, as things "click" in her little mind. My husband and I also got more serious in the last month or so about family worship/devotions in the morning. So we've purchased a few books - one on scripture memorization and a one-year children's Bible that we're working our way through. That is going fairly well. And again it has prompted good questions from DD about the Lord and has led to good discussions about His character, etc.

A friend and I canned some grape jelly recently, which I greatly enjoyed and hope to do more of in the future. We have plenty that will be given away at Christmastime this year.

My sisters-in-law and I do a lot of Christmas baking and then exchange our goodies to put together trays for friends and neighbors. We used to spend Thanksgiving weekend together baking for 2 days straight, but this led to a lot of stress and basically made us not want to see each other again until Christmas!  So now we each have our "assigned" items (the ones we make the best) and a date to get together for the exchanging. It seems to work out ok, though I need to get cracking on my baking - and when the baby comes I'm not so sure I'll be up to much.

That's life on our home front. Homeschool continues - and I'm trying to find a Kindergarten curriculum I want to implement next year with DD. Currently I'm leaning towards Sonlight because she likes to read, but I am a bit concerned about the cost of their program.  Pregnancy continues - though obviously not for much longer!  Life continues on and soon we will be a family of 4 instead of 3.

God's blessings!

Teaching/Learning to Read

My daughter is now 4 and my goal is to teach her to read. This is my first time, so I've honestly never thought much about how one learns to read. I purchased "Teach Your Child to Read in 100 Easy Lessons" and so far this is going very well. Granted, we're only on Lesson 7, but DD is doing very well and definitely grasping the new concepts as they come.

At this point, our "homeschooling" consists of the Reading Lesson (only about 15-20 minutes per day) and every few days we'll add in a little bit of piano lessons (very basic, beginning with concepts of teaching right/left hands, numbering the fingers, hearing high and low sounds on the piano keyboard). Then DD usually calls for "recess" - and we head outside where she rides her new bike with training wheels (a step up from the tricycle) and I sit on the porch to watch her and crochet. Obviously, we'll add more to our schooling as we go, but for now this is it and it's going very well.  

Our Homeschooling Day

I only have a few minutes, but want to share two things that just happened today.

I've been working with DD (age 4) on the sounds letters make. She's doing very well and I know that I need to continue to work on phonics with her and she'll pick up reading very quickly. Today we were arranging our magnetic letters on the fridge to spell simple words - PAD was one. Then we changed the P to a B, to an F, to an R. When we read RAD, she said she wanted to spell the word "rattle." So she went and got the letter L and added it to RAD to spell RADL. I was impressed. She's definitely getting the letters and their sounds down!

The other thing that just sort of happened took place when we were eating some green seedless grapes. She asked what would happen if we squished the grapes. So we started squishing grapes into a grape juice / grape sauce mixture. She thought this was great fun, enjoying the experiment and even drinking the juice when it was all done.

I love to see learning take place as we just go about our regular living. What a great homeschooling day!

I am blessed

Thought I'd take some time to count my many blessings, naming them one by one.

1. I am so thankful for Jesus Christ who died for me and who, by His Holy Spirit, enables me to live and grow each day.

2. I am absolutely blessed with a wonderful husband. So many women complain about their husbands doing or not doing this or that. My husband is wonderful and he is a dear friend. I truly know him and he knows me. We share a great friendship and are blessed to agree on those things we value and hold most dear. He is a responsible provider for our family and he also works so hard around our home on remodeling and home improvement projects. Not to mention, he's a fabulous father! I'll stop now... clearly, I could go on and on!

3. My 4-year-old DD is a blessing and helper to me. Today has been a good day so far, with good attitudes. She's helped me bake banana bread, play with some math manipulative rods, and we scrubbed our kitchen and bathroom floors on our hands and knees. All of this she thought was great fun, while I thought we were getting things done!  To rediscover the world through a child's eyes is so refreshing and makes mothering rewarding.

4. My church family is a blessing to me as well. It was only about 4 years ago that we moved to this area and had doubts about whether we would stay with our church or shop for another. It's hard to believe how much we've grown to love the people and the ministry there in the years since we decided to stay. I'm the part-time (very part-time) secretary at the church, I'm involved in the Outreach ministries and my husband coordinates the media ministry (powerpoint-type programs handling song lyrics and announcements on the screen upfront). When the church is open, we're there. And we're blessed by serving in numerous ways there.

5. My DH's family all live nearby and his parents watch my DD for one morning each week. Although sometimes it's both a blessing and a curse to live so close to family, there are many ways that his parents help us out. For instance, his mother is a packrat. But this works out to benefit us in the sense that she has saved all of her grandchildren's clothes since birth. Her oldest grandchild is now around 12. So far she's had all granddaughters. So my 4 year old has never had a want of clothes. When she's hit a growth spurt, we head to grandma's and pick up the next size up clothes box (or usually, boxes) and bring them home for a fashion show  Sometimes the pack-rat tendancy drives us nuts, but at least in terms of clothes, it's saved us hundreds of dollars over the years as we have very rarely ever had to buy DD any clothes except special things for special occasions.

6. Our house is a blessing to me. Although our house is probably average size and is older, there are many benefits. When we first moved in, my husband remodeled the kitchen and bathroom and laundry room. I was without a real kitchen (and a kitchen sink!) for one year.... with a baby! We had a "pretend" kitchen set up in the living room with a microwave, an electric skillet and a toaster oven. This is what I cooked witih for a year! And I did my dishes in the bathtub. LET ME TELL YOU... I appreciate my kitchen! It's a beautiful kitchen now and I often recall those days without and they make me appreciate all that I have. The laundry room took nearly 3 years to complete. And we did our laundry at the in-laws home. So again, I've never been so anxious to do laundry as I was the day we got our laundry set up and functioning!  All of this remodeling also made me appreciate how women used to "keep their home" and the work it must have entailed before we had so many wonderful conveniences. How truly blessed we are!

My time has run out. I have so much to be thankful for. What a good God we have and what a high calling as mothers to teach our children to be thankful. Yet another reason I am glad that we do not own a TV is that of the exposure to greed that is behind almost every commercial. Every commercial out there is aimed at making the viewer want something. As much as we can mute the TV or recognize that a commercial is silly or dumb, it is nonetheless teaching that greedy, I need more attitude. I am so glad that we can avoid it from at least one venue. We're greedy and selfish enough without feeding that monster within.

Blessings to you. Take a minute to write out some of your blessings and improve your outlook on the day!

Turning 30

So I turned 30 this week. I always like to ask my mom about the day I was born and never seem to tire of hearing the story. It was a Sunday morning. The doctor didn't make it to the small town hospital in time, so my dad and a nurse delivered me in the hallway between the labor and delivery rooms (back when those were 2 separate rooms instead of one like now). My dad has always said that it was one of neatest experiences of his life to be able to be there helping deliver me. When the doctor did show up, he was in his slippers!

My daughter also turned 4 this week. I'm always amazed at how quickly time can pass. Although those early days with a baby are so long, looking back it's hard to believe it's been 4 years. I'm sure my mom is saying the same thing - hard to believe it's been 30 years! I always recall C. S. Lewis saying that we know that God has set eternity in our hearts because of how none of us can really grasp the concept of time (how quick it goes, how slow it goes, how it slips away, etc). Time itself as a creation of God... hard to grasp, but how I long for the days of timelessness in heaven with Him!

I'm about 25 weeks along with my pregnancy. All is going well so far. At my next visit I'll have some blood work done - which I dread - and the glucose test for gestational diabetes. With only 15 weeks to go, I realize I've got some more things to get around for the baby - need to clean up the car seat and get that ready to use again, need to clean out the cradle that has become a catch-all in recent years of non-use. We continue to prep DD for the arrival of the baby, whom we believe is a boy. I purchased a baby boy doll for her and a few books about being a big sister. She's a great helper to me now, so I hope that will continue after the baby joins us.

My hubby is taking a week off of work to finish off our third bedroom. Once done, we'll move DD there and use her current room for the baby's nursery. Unfortunately, this has been one of the hottest weeks of the year in our area and this bedroom is upstairs with no venting yet. So it's sweltering and definitely in the 110s-120s up there. But he's been a trooper, working steadily away at it some each day.

I recently finished up one of my part-time jobs that I'd been doing from home since DD was born. It wasn't a major time commitment and the income was definitely a plus. But along with that comes the stress of the work and the pressure to find time to do the work on a regular basis. I wanted to be done before the baby comes. And the company was moving towards automating the processes I had been doing from home. So we agreed that July 31 would be the end of it. I do feel some freedom. And have enjoyed taking a few naps in recent days since I don't spend my DD's afternoon quiet time on the computer working.

That's the news from my life these days. With life being busy with keeping our home and taking care of DD and the baby on the way, I don't feel old... or even 30. I still feel like I'm in the early stages of life and parenting. Maybe 40 will hit me harder. The thought of having a teenager scares me to death now, but we grow up as our kids do so by the time we reach that stage of life, I'll be ready to handle it, I reckon... with the Lord's continued help.

Off to do some more living. I'll write again when I have some spare "time."

First Time Photos

I'm going to try to insert a few photos here. I always enjoy the photos on the blogs of others.

Here's a shot of DH and DD gone fishin' in the backyard.

Here's a picture of DD "reading" by herself on the couch. I'm so glad we don't have a TV - she loves to read and look at books instead!

2nd Time Around

So I am currently 15 weeks pregnant with my second child. Been thinking a lot about the differences between the first pregnancy and the second.

1st time around - some morning sickness, mostly in the mornings.

2nd time around - very sick with morning sickness, all throughout the day, averaging throwing up once a day and it's still going into the 2nd trimester

1st time around - worked full-time throughout the pregnancy and hid the fact that I was pregnant until about 14 weeks when I told my boss and co-workers (not because I looked pregnant, either, but simply because I thought I'd burst to keep it a secret any longer)

2nd time around - staying at home full-time and am thankful because there is no way I could hide this pregnancy from anyone

1st time around - my husband came to almost every doctor appointment with me, to show his support and to share in the excitement

2nd time around - my 3-year-old daughter accompanies me to each midwife visit. I'm hoping my hubby can come to at least see the ultrasound

1st time around - my hubby talked, sang, and read to Itty Bitty (our in-utero baby name) almost daily

2nd time around - Tink (our in-utero baby name this time) hears from daddy occassionally as he says HI or GOOD BYE or GOOD NIGHT

1st time around - I grounded myself at about 7 months along and declared "no more traveling for me" (traveling = making a 2 hour trip from our then home in Chicago to my hubby's family's place in Indiana)

2nd time around - I don't do any traveling to be grounded from!

1st time around - I began wearing maternity clothes whenever I felt like I needed to and I was proud of it!

2nd time around - I feel like I shouldn't need maternity clothes yet and it's too early to start wearing them - but yet I have to when there is simply no way to squeeze this belly into my regular jeans any more

1st time around - we marveled at the miracle of a baby growning inside

2nd time around - we continue to marvel at this miracle baby and even though it's not the first time and the experience isn't "brand new" we are so thankful for this baby - how incredible is the gift of life, whether experienced with a first child or a 10th. God is good and He is a Giver of good gifts!

Garden

Media and Culture

We do not receive the newspaper at our home. And we do not have a TV at home. Generally, my husband and I rely on word of mouth and occasional peeks at news websites to fill us in on what we need to know. I also try to listen online to Focus on the Family almost daily and I'm thankful for the way they broadcast relevant information about the media and culture.

I have to admit that I'm concerned about where our country is heading... and how the mainstream media is not reporting the serious nature of what is really going on. Events in the middle east, Islamofascism, and the liberal bent of America are all very concerning to me.

So we continue to pray. We know that God is in control. And it sure appears that many biblical End times prophetic events are drawing nigh. I can't get over the sense that we are so near to the end of the world as we know it.

But praise be to God, Who leads us in triumphal procession in Christ. We can have hope for the future only because of Jesus Christ. And no matter what comes in this life, we know that ultimately we have the hope and promise of eternal life with Jesus forever. What peace for today and bright hope for tomorrow!

Wisconsin Weather

I grew up on a dairy farm in Wisconsin. I lived there until I moved to Indiana at age 19. I absolutely love Wisconsin - it's beautiful, espeically the area where I am from and where my parents and siblings still live. Anyway, this past winter I received this email forward that just made me laugh and laugh... because it is so true about Wisconsin weather! If you're from Wisconsin (or probably anywhere far north), you can appreciate this too.

Homemade Laundry Soap

I made homemade laundry soap a few days ago for the first time. I'm amazed at how much you can make for so little money! The Fels Naptha Soap, the Borax and Washing Soda - adds up to only $5 or so. And just a little of each of the three ingredients goes a long way - filling 3 big detergent bottles. And the cost of just one big bottle of Tide Free (which my family must use, due to sensitive skin issues) is between $8-10 each. So the cost savings is really incredible. Thanks for those who have shared the laundry soap recipe! It's worth it to give it a try if you haven't!

Pregnant and Praising God

After nearly 30 months of trying to conceive, I'm oh-so excited to tell the world that I'M PREGNANT! I'm 12 weeks along right now and everything is going well so far.

Our struggle with infertility has definitely been the biggest test of my faith I've ever experienced. I will paste below the oral testimony I shared with our church family recently to tell them not only the good news, but the struggle in getting to this point.

God is so good. All the time He is good, whether we receive the desires of our hearts or not. But we humbly and gratefully accept this new little blessing who is from His hand. He gives and He takes away, but our hearts will constantly choose to praise Him and Bless His Name!

_____________________________________________________________________

We’re up here today to give God the glory for something He’s been doing in our lives for the last 2 years or so. These 2 years I’ve been going through the most difficult test of my faith I’ve ever experienced.   

Since our daughter turned 1, we decided, as many couples do, to start thinking of having other children. She was a year old. She was cute. Let’s do this again J You just naturally assume that things will work as they should. You assume that you’re in control. But for the last 30 months or so, we’ve been trying to conceive but haven’t. We’ve prayed. We’ve prayed together. We’ve prayed with a few others. We’ve shared our “unspoken request.” I was prayed for last year in March at a conference on healing. I thought the Lord might have touched me then. But that was over a year ago now. I was prayed for last September at another conference. I’ve prayed with a few close friends about this over and over and over again.

Throughout this time, nobody that was praying with us or for us necessarily felt the Lord was closing the door and saying “no” to our desires. Rather, the sense from numerous people on different occasions was that His answer was “wait.” Sometimes “wait” is harder to hear than “no” because there is no finality and closure to it. Just more waiting.

We did consult with a fertility doctor this past January. He even encouraged us to not put too much hope in the medical field. It was as though God was again, saying that He is the One who opens and closes the womb. A medical intervention couldn’t get us around God’s will for our family. He was and is still in control. 

The more time that passed, the more I grieved the loss of my dream of having a large family. The more time that passed, the more we started to talk about the future as being only the 3 of us. And as much as that isn’t the path I would’ve chosen for us, I did reach a place where I realized that would still be “ok” if that’s what God wanted for us. We also had some discussions about foster parenting or adopting.

God just seemed so distant. I felt like I was wandering in a desert all alone. Because infertility is such a personal struggle, you can’t make a public announcement about it. But by not saying anything, you are all the more isolated and alone in your pain. I wondered if God cared. I’d hear others talk about feeling so special in God’s sight. I couldn’t relate to that. I felt forgotten by God. Others prayed and were healed. Others received the desires of their hearts. Here I was. Waiting. Wanting. Feeling forgotten.

But I’m up here today to give God the glory because… I’m pregnant. The night that I took the pregnancy test at home and told my husband, he held me and said “Do you know what this means?” We were both crying. Through my head go all kinds of answers to that question – it means maternity clothes, it means Naomi gets to be a big sister, it means we have to set up a nursery again. But more than all of that, this thought came to mind: Yes, I know what this means. It means that God does hear. He does care. We’re not forgotten. Our prayers didn’t fall on deaf ears. He’s still working in us and through us. He hasn’t forgotten.

So praise the Lord. He’s still in control. He still heals. He still does miracles. And He’s still the Giver of Life. And Lord willing, we’ll welcome a new little one into our family around Thanksgiving time.

Let It Snow!

Just for Fun

I have never taken the time to do one of these before, but I'm in the mood for something different and fun tonight.

My two favorite animals: I've always been fascinated with kangaroos and elephants

My two favorite drinks: I love milk - grew up on a dairy farm - and I always enjoy a good chocolate shake in the summer time

My two favorite colors: Don't have two - just love PURPLE!

My favorite season: My entire life I've loved summer the most, but since having a toddler I've found myself looking forward to the snow of winter time more than ever

My favorite way to spend a few extra hours: either sleep, scrapbook or just play time with the family

My favorite ice cream flavor: Chocolate chip cookie dough!

My favorite song: Fill Me Now - not sure of the artist - but on a CD my Pastor recorded for us recently - gives me goosebumps every time I listen

My favorite magazine: Above Rubies by Nancy Campbell

My favorite TV show: None - don't have a TV and don't want one

Last books I read: Last week I finished up To Train Up A Child by Michael and Debi Pearl and The Wide-Eyed Wonder Years by Lorilee Craker

Current Bible verse I'm clinging to: Psalm 66:8-12 Praise our God, O peoples, let the sound of His praise be heard. He has preserved our lives and kept our feet from slipping... You let men ride over our heads; we went throguh fire and water, but you brought us TO A PLACE OF ABUNDANCE.

Fun. And will be a good thing to look back on in the future.

Blessings!

Out with the Old and In with the New

So 2007 is just around the corner now. I've been blogging for nearly a year. Wow!

I'm ready for a new year. There's just something about a clean slate, a fresh calendar, that gives hope and excitement about what is to come. I sense the Lord leading me to focus my heart even more at home. I work 2 part-time jobs, almost entirely from home, and I'd love to give them up. But financially we can't do it quite yet. So I am challenging myself to truly give my best energy and time to my family and to the best of my ability not let the work-related items consume me when I'm not on the clock. I've been taking steps in this direction for a few weeks already, so it's not entirely new. It really does wonders for my attitude (and DH's and DD's) when peace reigns in our home, when I can serve up tasty and healthy meals, when the house is tidy (not perfectly clean, but tidy). Life is just simply better.

I also resolve to laugh more in 2007. When I look back over my days, I think I take life too seriously and find it's a rare thing for me to enjoy a good belly laugh (and even rarer for me to laugh at myself!). Definitely, I need to laugh more.

I am realizing I should work on my 2006 Year In Review. For the last 5+ years I've written a few pages at the end of the year with highlights. This is just for our personal archives, not for a newsletter or for public viewing. I usually include job info, salary info, trips we've taken, friends we've had over, spiritual victories or defeats, etc. Anything that comes to mind that we would like to look back on years down the road. Even now, I enjoy looking back over previous years and am reminded of things I have forgotten.

Well, I should head to bed. Happy 2007! May God have His way among us!

Long time

It's been a long, long time since I've blogged.

Life goes on. Both my husband and I are working very hard to make extra money these days - to pay down some of our debt. We've made a lot of progress this year and feel some good traction moving into 2007. But that also means very little "free" time for fun things like blogging and sleeping  and such.

We continue to battle our infertility issues. We both have doctor appointments in the next few weeks to start that ball rolling - to see if the docs can help us find out what the real issue is. It's been 2 years for us and thus far we've simply prayed and done our best to discern the Lord's will in this for us. It may be a spiritual thing for us and there may be no physical reason we're not conceiving. Or maybe there is a physical thing going on. Maybe the extra pressure we've put on ourselves (see above paragraph) is causing one or both of us to not be in the best shape for conceiving. Who knows. We're still trusting God. Still believing that our family isn't complete with just 1 child. And we are enjoying life with our one daughter as she grows like a weed. She's 3 now, so this Christmas should be a fun one as she asks questions and tries to understand American life and its strange traditions. [We don't do much for Christmas - no tree, one gift per person in our family, no other decorations - but our extended families go all out, so we have some explaining to do to our little one! ]

In the meantime, I'm taking steps forward in better home management, anger manangement and overall better attitudes. I've been enjoying the blogs of a few others on a regular basis. And I purchased CREATED TO BE HIS HELP MEET and am in the process of reading that. So many folks highly recommend the book, so I look forward to digesting it, learning and growing to express my love to my dear hubby more and more. My heart is definitely at home and becoming more and more turned toward home every day. This is where I belong and I'm loving it more all the time!

That's all for now. Blessings and Merry Christmas to you!

Why We Don't Own a TV

I saw this article recently and can really relate. Both my husband and I grew up in homes like the one described here. And this is a big part of why we have decided to live without a TV in our home. Over 6 years now and going strong! There have been only 2 occassions (presidential inaugaration and 9/11) when we missed having a TV at home. And now with our daughter, not owning a TV is one of the best things we can do for her mind, her innocence, her faith, her emotions, her health, and for our overall family relationships. 

OUR HOUSE GUEST (author unknown)

A few months before I was born, my dad met a stranger who was new to our small Tennessee town. From the beginning, Dad was fascinated with this enchanting newcomer and soon invited him to live with our family. The stranger was quickly accepted and was around to welcome me into the world a few months later.

As I grew up I never questioned his place in our family. In my young mind, each member had a special niche. My brother, Bill, five years my senior, was my example. Fran, my younger sister, gave me an opportunity to play 'big brother' and develop the art of teasing. My parents were complementary instructors - Mom taught me to love the Word of God and Dad taught me to obey it.

But the stranger was our storyteller. He could weave the most fascinating tales. Adentures, mysteries and comedies were daily conversations. He could hold our whole family spell-bound for hours each evening.

If I wanted to know about politics, history or science, he knew it all. He knew about the past, understood the present, and seemingly could predict the future. The pictures he could draw were so life-like that I would often laugh or cry as I watched.

He was like a friend to the whole family. He took Dad, Bill and me to our first major league baseball game. He was always encouraging us to see the movies and he even made arrangements to introduce us to several movie stars.

The stranger was an incessant talker. Dad didn't seem to mind, but sometimes Mom would quietly get up - while the rest of us were enthralled with one of his stories of faraway places - to go her room, read her Bible and pray. I wonder now if she ever prayed that the stranger would leave.

You see, my dad ruled our household with certain moral convictions. But this stranger never felt obligated to honor them. Profanity, fo example, was not allowed in our house - not from us, our friends or adults.

Our longtime visitor, however, used occasional four letter words that burned my ears and made Dad squirm. To my knowledge the stranger was never confronted. My dad was a teetotaler who didn't permit alcohol in his home - not even for cooking. But the stranger felt like we needed exposure and enlightened us to the ways ofl ife. He often offered us beer and other alcoholic beverages.

He made cigarettes look tasy, cigars manly and pipes distinguished. He talked freely (much too freely) about sex. His comments were sometimes blatant, sometimes suggestives and generally embarrassing. I know now that the stranger influenced my early concepts of the man-woman relationship.

The stranger began to discuss personal issues and ailments without regard to the tender ears that might be listening or the fact that it was mealtime. Some of the topics caused mom to leave the table! Time after time he opposed the values of my parents. Yet he was seldom rebuked and never asked to leave.

More than 30 years have passed since the stranger moved in with the young family on Morningside Drive. He is not nearly as intriguing to my Dad as he was in those early years. But if I were to walk into my parents' den today, I'd still see him sitting over in a corner, waiting for someone to listen to him talk and watch him draw his pictures.

He never told us his name - we always used his initials: T.V.

God isn't a tame God!

Our Pastor has used this phrase a lot lately - God isn't a tame God. I think he pulled it from the Chronicles of Narnia when Lewis writes that Aslan isn't a tame lion. He is loving and He is good, but He is not tame.

My experience of the Lord lately has been like that. It's always good to be reminded that God isn't our "sugar daddy" in the sky, a big Santa Claus who will give us absolutely anything we ask for. And He can't be manipulated by me saying or doing certain things. He simply is God. And I am not. He has a perfect will for how my life (as His follower) should go. And it is my place to accept that will, even when He leads in ways I would not have chosen for myself. If I call Him "Lord" I can have no other response.

I've been very disappointed with the Lord in recent months for not allowing us to have a second child. This is medically referred to as Secondary Infertility - when the same man and woman have conceived a child in the past and yet, for whatever reasons, cannot conceive again after a reasonable amount of time trying. For us, that reasonable amount of time has been nearly 2 years. As our only child soon turns 3 years old, we've heard from everyone it seems about how it's time for another one, etc. Of course, without knowing our situation they don't have a clue how painful their constant reminders can be.

We've always desired a large family and had made it known to family and friends that we hoped for 4, 5, 6 or even more children. And the Lord graciously allowed our first child to be conceived fairly easily and He granted her good health. She continues to bring us so much joy! And yet we don't feel peace about our family being complete with just the three of us. It is my heart's desire at such an incredibly deep level to bear more children, to raise more children for the Lord's glory and honor. And yet here we are, finding ourselves unable to conceive up to this point, constantly praying for the Lord's hand upon us. 

For me, this has been my first real disappointment with God. For certain, there have been other smaller issues that He has cared for in ways that I didn't especially like in the past. Sometimes looking back you can see why He did or didn't allow things. And other times you are left unknowing and simply trusting. But this is the first really big issue in which I am struggling so much with leaving in His hands.

I read recently about the idea of "double grief" and the concept really hit home with me. I am facing double grief over this issue. First, there is the grief at the child(ren) that we are not being allowed to have. That is painful and yet not as painful as the second part of the grief - the grief over the fact that my loving Father is choosing to withhold from us something that seems perfectly reasonable and good. Oh, how painful this is! It goes to the core of what I believe about God, His nature, His goodness, His love.

I always come back to the matter of trust. I want to trust Him with all that I have, not just in my head but with my life. Larry Burkett used to say "Do we just say we trust God or do we really trust God?" There is a difference between just saying we do and then really doing it. Someone else once said to "Trust God's heart when you can't see His hand." I'm so there - wanting to trust His heart of goodness and love when I can't see His hand at work on my behalf, in my situation.

What a struggle! Yet He is not a tame God. And I can't just pray a certain prayer and expect Him to immediately respond like a servant to my call and give me my heart's desire. He can't be manipulated. But at the same time I do call out to Him through the pain and disappointment and anger and make my desires known, praying for Him to grant them in His time and in His way. Or for Him to take away the desire rather than leave it unfulfilled.

And so I am once again brought to the cross, to Jesus and the love He has for me. Once again, laying down my feelings and my sins and my desires and all that I am. Once again, praying for His will and not mine to be done. Once again, longing to know Him more that I might gain understanding and gain a heart for others that can look beyond my own sorrows and hurts. Once again, I try to focus on Him alone. It's all in His hands anyway. Lord, help me to leave it there and trust You completely with what You have in store for my future. I do love You and want to welcome whatever You desire for me. I want to give You free reign in my life. Have Your way, Jesus! It's not about me. If it ever was, I'm sorry, Lord. It's all about You!

Toddler Phrases

Once again I don't have much time, but I wanted to journal a few of the sweet things my toddler says these days. She can't say the word ELEPHANT, but pronounces it EPHELEPH. Same with KETCHUP - it comes out KEPUTCH. It's too cute.

I am so blessed to be at home with my daughter, spending time with her day in, day out. Teaching her. Modeling life for her. I wouldn't want to miss these sweet moments for anything the world has to offer. These are the precious moments of life that money can't buy.