Field Day

Nothing's better than a cold Popsicle with some friends on field day. My baby is getting so big.

Special Memories

Sharing some special mornings with M. Next year she will be in all day school with her brother and sister. Times are changing. Can't think about it too much, she has been my little shadow for 5 years

Even Better!

Z and I spent our 13th anniversary at the Braves game with our kids and their baseball and softball teams. Z was packed and ready to go when I got home from work. Complete with about 20 hotdogs, chips, drinks, and even some nutter butter bars for desert. You earned some major brownie points for the meal to take to the ball game. A man after my own heart and not to mention the 50+ dollars you saved us. Thirteen years ago I would not have imagined spending an anniversary at the Braves game with my hubby and kiddos. In fact, whatever I did imagine didn't come close to how much I have been blessed, 13 years later. God has blessed me beyond my wildest dreams and spending my anniversary at the Braves game with my family suits me just fine.

Bedtime?

This is what M came down wearing when I told her to put in her pjs! I would hate to know I had to sleep
In that, but whatever kiddo!

Humbled

I have been a Christian for 25 years and just when you think you've got this thing figured out, God just up and shows out again and all you can do is be humbled. For so many years I have struggled about where I fit in Christian ministry. I'm not a pastors wife, a missionary, a Sunday school teacher, a ministry leader or anything of the sort. I am a nurse by profession, but I have always felt the call to something more. I have always felt that I should be more more involved in ministry, but just haven't found a place where I really felt I needed to be. That being said, I have always thought fondly of adoption and at one time, after my middle son though we might adopt a child as our third. I briefly looked into it then dismissed it because international adoption was very expensive. After we were blessed with our 3rd biological child I felt we were done with pregnancy, newborns etc. I was very satisfied with this decision and felt like this was God's plan for me. Along with that decision, God began to move very quietly in my heart that this was not the end of my family. I didn't really share it with anyone it just grew in my heart, deep down I had no idea that I would ever be able to convince Z that adoption was God's plan for us. Then it happened! The miracle that let me know that God was in control of this thing and not me! God began to move in z's heart about adoption. The man that 10 years ago would have been completely satisfied with one child, gave me the go ahead to start the paperwork for adoption, making this child number 4. When God changes s heart, he doesn't do it halfway! I have been able to see that in Z and it has been such a blessing. Now for the changes in this mama! I can't even begin to write about how he has changed my heart since we finally moved in obedience to God. I have learned first hand that when He calls, he not only calls, but he equips. I'm not even talking about material stuff. I am talking about making my heart so excited about our adoption that I can't stand it! Putting this desire in me and making it match the call in my heart so perfectly, that I know it can only be from Him. I don't know how to explain this in words it is just something about God who created my heart and the longing and desires of my heart and my personality to go right along with that. Knowing me better than anyone in this world and then calling me to what he made me for and then me hearing His call and saying yes. The match doesn't get anymore perfect. He created my heart for this call and at the same time planted this desire in my heart. What a perfect God we serve! I'm sure glad God doesn't just call us to things. He creates us, gives us a heart and a desire for what he wants us to do, and then He calls us to do it!! Whooooo! Makes me want to shout!!! So glad I serve a God like that!

Just When We Thought...

Just when we thought we transitioning from babies and preschoolers to much easier, more manageable "school-age" kiddos...just when I thought about taking on more hours at work..., just when we thought this might be the year we begin to catch up on finances...Just as we began to get in our comfort zone... GOD BEGAN!

"I know the plans I have for you declares the Lord. Plans to prosper you and not to harm you. Plans to give you a hope and a future." Jeremiah 29:11

Little did I know that this year God would challenge us more that we have ever been challenged. Put us on a journey that could only be directed by Him and begin a work in us that is so much greater than anything in us. What an awesome amazing God!

Stuff, stuff, and more Stuff!

I can definitely tell my kids are getting bigger and a little more difficult to please. I took them shopping the other day to get some last minute things for there Easter outfits. I didn't make a big deal about Easter clothes, but I do get my kids something new to them for Easter and usually don't buy them any other dress clothes the whole spring, so this makes it a big deal. We are looking for shoes to go with S's dress. M and E both need shoes and that is about it. At the end we came home with a new dress for S. (She already had a dress at home that she told me she loved). Easter shoes for M. Flip flops for S and brown canvas shoes for E. I guess we didn't do too bad, it was just the drama during the search. Tears, 4 stores, back to the first store we started at and the dress that S had to have becasue she didn't get to pick out her first one. It has been almost 2 weeks since the experience and looking back at it, it doesn't seem as bad, but this mama was almost in tears when I was shopping that day. We are in todays terms a large family and we will continue to be a large family. We have a limited budget, sometimes quiet limited, and then I have this new issue my children and theirs wants. That combination is sometimes very difficult to deal with. I am resourceful and am up to the challenge of clothing all my kids with nice clothes on a limited budget--that includes shoes too, but when I throw the kids in the mix and their wants and opinions in combination with my budget it gets a little tougher. This is where I struggle. I want my kids to feel like they are able to pick and choose some of the stuff we buy, but I definitely have to find a better way to do this than taking them all shopping at once. We were making huge sacrifices to get the kids all new Easter clothes and shoes, only for them to leave from shopping with tears and feelings that they didn't get what they wanted. I wanted this to be a fun day, that everyone would get something, we would feel good because we had stayed within our budget and had a fun day. It didn't quite turn out the way I had expected. I ended up over budget, didn't get the shoes we really needed and had to deal with tantrums, and my children being very materialistic along the way. Gonna have to think on this one and do it different next time. I can't blame my kids for their wants, we all do that when we go into shop. We choose the most expensive, the outfit that is not on sale or the one thing the coupon doesn't include, just seems to be how it works. Just gotta find a way to help my kids with the battle of...stuff, stuff, and more stuff. This is a battle we never stop fighting. Satan tries to tell us we gotta have something, we need it actually. It will makes our lives easier and better. We won't truly be happy unless we have this specific thing. In reality we need very few material things. A house to keep us dry. It can be a small house very simply decorated. A few nice clothes that wash well. Food. Everything else is just extra stuff that yes we do need at times and we will buy, but I have found that the more stuff we have the more complicated our lives become. We gotta have a bigger house to store all the stuff, bigger cars to move all the stuff around. More stuff to store the stuff in. Then we gotta have two or three exactly the same "stuff" because we can't seem to share anymore. Yes we have computers, toys, tvs and cell phones--but it you take a step back the more of those things you have, the more complicated life becomes. This is a tough one for me. How do I teach my kids not to be materialistic when it is all around us. Media wants to tell us we gotta have it because that means money out of our pocket and into theirs. I struggle in many areas of my life, but for some reason God has taken the desire for "stuff" away from me. I even grow board of people I know and hang with continually talking about their stuff and their "stress" over their stuff. I have no idea why, because I used yo be quite a shopper before my children were born. The feeling of discontentment in what we have is a huge area for attack in especially women's lives. When I see my children being sucked into this, i just worry and so want to spare them from this area of weakness in their lives. Help me somehow, some way to teach them that life is not about stuff, and how to get ahead to acquire more stuff. Life is about a relationship with Jesus Christ and through Him relationships with others in this world. We can try for feel that deep desire we have in our hearts with stuff, stuff, and more stuff and it will leave us empty every time. Only when we fill up with Christ , will we be truly satisfied and content with who we are and what we have in Christ.