Well, I actually had a couple minutes today and was able to get the pics from the camera to the computer! So here is the promised pic of J’s haircut and a few bonus ones of her special find from yesterday.
Her little friend, who she caught all by herself. She was so proud! :o)
Now, to see if I can get a couple more minutes finish my other post…. Over a week in progress is a bit much! ;o)
Here is our newest little man….. This first pic is shortly after he was born
Poor little guy has a bit of a black eye from his entrance into the world :o(
I love this pic! He looks so much older than 3 days though…..
His adorable hand….. I just ♥ baby hands! :o)
Hoping to get a pic of all 4 kids soon and will post it too. They are such a good looking crew! And yes, I’m sure I am not at all biased ;oD
I have not been in the mood for posting pics, updating my blog, or really much of anything lately. My due date was on Sunday and I am still HUGELY pregnant. I never got this big with any of my others……. My head knows all the “right responses” to this but that is as far as it goes. I am VERY tired of being pregnant!!! Much as there is a lot about pregnancy that I loveand will miss, there is also a lot that I don’t love and am ready to be done with. Truth be told, I would have been happy to have this baby 3wks ago!!! To make it worse I am teased frequently with false alarms…… nights of no sleep because of contractions, only to have them stop when all hope for sleep is past! :oP Oh well, though I have my doubts on the validity of these statements, I am told frequently that no one has ever been pregnant forever……….. my first thought is always “Yeah, well there is a first time for everything!” ;o)
On the housing front, we will not be moving for a couple months. Some friends are staying at our house and using their wonderful skills to help us finish all those mundane little detail that would probably never get done otherwise! :o) It will be so nice when they/we are done with it! I just love the stuff they are doing and can’t believe how much nicer the house is now than it used to be!!! If it only had a larger play area for kids it would be just about perfect! :o) We will be staying with my folks until our friends no longer need our house. The kids are glad because they LOVE, LOVE, LOVE living with Papa and Grandma. I am thinking that Papa and Grandma will be happy to have some peace and quiet restored to their lives once we move out. ;o) They have been so very gracious and generous to let us stay here for so long. We will never be able to repay them for all they have done for us. I just LOVE that we have such a great relationship with them and that we have been allowed this special with them.
O.k., so my little update got rather long and it is way past this tired mamas bed time so I am will sign off. Hopefully I will be able to update soon with a little baby info! :o) Unless of course I end up being the exception! ;o)
I have been a part of a morning e-mail accountability group for about 6wks. We have a daily e-mail that goes around the group and we each share what we read in God’s word, how it spoke to us, and prayer requests. There is a bit of chit-chat too :o) This has been soooo good for me. Knowing that I have accountability from these sweet ladies makes it easier for me to put aside other things and make time for my Bible. Before it was, sadly, one of the first things to get moved until a later time and, thus, often didn’t happen. All this to say that through His Word God has really spoken to me lately. I am taking time to read and really think over what I read….. not just speed read and feel good because I got my reading in. Last week (Thurs. I think?) I read in Mark chapter 4 about Jesus calming the storm. I could so empathize with the apostles, I have been in that position so many times! I was writing to my group that I felt like it was a direct challenge to grow in my faith through our current circumstances, not to let the storms scare me, to have faith that He won’t let me drown regardless of how hopeless things seem. THAT VERY DAY I was hit by storm after storm, phone calls and e-mails full of bad news, wave after wave “swamping my boat”. I sadly did not pass the test. I found myself crying out “Lord, don’t you care?” like the apostles, wondering why He was sleeping through all of this, but instead of Him stopping my storms I just felt rebuked for my lack of faith under trial. Then I found myself angry with God. I felt like He had abandoned me, I felt alone and in danger from the wiles of man, I felt unloved and forsaken. I, sadly, allowed myself to wallow in these feelings and didn’t read or take part in my group the rest of the week. I prayed, I cried, I poured out my troubles to him but still felt overlooked in the grand scheme of things. Sunday morning while in the shower I started thinking (now you Mom’s will understand that shower’s are the best places to do deep thinking because it is often your only uninterrupted moments – if you’re lucky! ;o) and I think the Holy Spirit really spoke to me. Essentially it boiled down to one of my pet peeves….. I had fallen into the very thing that drives me nuts about certain “Christian” groups, I had let my feelings take precedence over fact! Not just for a fleeting moment, not for a day, but for 3 whole days I had wallowed in my own arrogant “wisdom”, relying on my feelings. Though I am ashamed of myself I am thankful for what I learned. I *felt* abandoned and forsaken yet God promises in His Word NEVER to leave me or forsake me, I *felt* unloved but He continually reiterates His love for me throughout His Word, I *felt* like God was sleeping and yet He is a God who never slumbers, I *felt* afraid of what others would/could do to me and yet God says not to be afraid because with Him on my side what can they do to me? I relied on my feelings and yet God says that the heart is deceitful and wicked. My feelings don’t mean diddlysquat, they vary and shift constantly while God promises to never change. I need to spend more time in His Word getting to know Him better so that when these trials come up, as they inevitably will, I will not let my feelings get in the way of fact. God’s Word is true, it is fact, it never changes! It is the only trustworthy thing there is and I need to utilize it more in my walk. Though I know there will be more trials and I will not always handle them as I should, I am thankful that He has seen fit to walk me through and speak to me, to show me His love in a new way and to help me grow in Him. What an awesome God we serve!
It appears that my blog life must remain quiet for awhile…… We are in the depths of getting ready to move. I hate moving! :oP Because we were only going to be here a month (that was 9 months ago!) we didn’t take the time to sort or purge as we packed. We had a BIG time crunch and so everything got tossed in tubs. Fast forward to now, said tubs were fairly brittle and a lot of our stuff was exposed to moisture as it sat in my folks garage. I am in the midst of going through box by box and tossing everything with mold/mildew, purging our belongings to try and bring some simplicity to our lives, and washing EVERYTHING fabric that has been stored. It all STINKS! :oP To complicate matters my children are in *LOVE* with everything that has been packed away and so almost every decision gets a subtle guilt trip. *Sigh* I have no idea where they get their packrat tendencies! <rolling eyes> I am trying to be ruthless in my purging but am not sure that I am succeeding. I am making progress though and still avoiding pre-term labor and bed rest! I am hoping that by pacing myself I can keep my contractions to a minimum and get moved before baby. Still not happy with the new housing situation but am working on submission to God’s will and trying not to hope that He will do a last minute miracle and provide us with some room for the kids to play lest I set my heart on it and get disappointed! ;o) Once we have moved I am not sure when/if we will have internet :o( or how long it will take to get settled. Anyhow, I could be gone for awhile but it shouldn’t be forever so, my faithful few readers, don’t give up on me! :o)
I have some amazing pics to post of the kids but am not sure when that will happen…….. Maybe I can sneak it in before the move? We’ll see
