Look for the blessings.....

You ever had one of those days where everything seems to go wrong? Well I had one of those days yesterday into today.... Let me begin with the first incident. I was upstairs cleaning and doing some other things around the house and I had the monitor on in the boys room in the basement. They were playing SOOOO good with each other. I was so proud... after about 45 minutes I was going to go down and play with them. So i started going down the stairs and right as I hit the last step i heard the word "I poopy", so i rushed into the room to find that samuel was sitting on the floor and poop was coming out of the back of his diaper, and he thought it was so cool that he put a few cars in it.... EEWWW!!! Ok the moral of this blog is look for the blessings right? Well.... the blessing is I came downstairs right when it happened... so the mess was minimal... a few cars... 2 little spots on a removable car play rug... *whew*.

Then Mike came home from work and said his car started to overheat as he was pulling on to our road, he filled it up with antifreeze.. and we are praying for the best... the blessing here.... well the blessing on this one, is we know that God is in control and will provide. In the meantime, we are able to borrow mike's dads truck which has been a HUGE blessing... mike's car broke down over a week ago and it was a blessing to have that truck to use, and now he is using it again today.

Later on I get home from a womens meeting at church and the boys go down to play. A few minutes later I hear joseph running up the stairs telling me there is a funny sound in the basement.... I just thought it was the subpump and didn't think much about it. What I had forgotten was that the toilet in my bathroom earlier in the day had been stopped up... and something I didn't know was that it was also "running"... well I walk by the door to go downstairs to the basement and i hear a funny sound also. I go down to investigate and sure enough water is leaking everywhere on the left side of our basement under our bathrooms. What is really bad is our old table was sitting there with tons of important paperwork sitting there that needed to be gone through.... so i freak for a minute but then start thinking... i asked joseph to bring me some pitchers and with his help (he was sooo awesome) we got all the leaks going into a bucket. Ok.. the blessing here.... there were too big pieces of plastic over the top of my paperwork so nothing got ruined!! Also I was able to go upstairs and fix the problem (after calling my husband and freaking a bit) and the leak stopped... so today is clean up! But that's ok..... I am pleased that it wasn't that bad and nothing got ruined.

After a night with a sick little boy I woke up and it was freezing in our house. We had been told back in December we would probably need a new furnace eventually, and we were praying ours would make it through this winter. Well after attempting all I knew how our heat was NOT turning on. I thought for a minute "how are we going to pay for this... Lord please let the heat come back on".... i worried a bit and then thought... after yesterday.... i was hoping today would be a better day.... well after about 15 minutes I decided to try and call someone to fix it.... because i had surrendered that God was in control.. and he would provide.... and then (here's the blessing)..... the heat came back on!!!!

We all have days that it just seems like it's one thing after the other, but if we can look for the blessings, it makes life so much easier, and it helps us to be thankful for all the blessings that God gives us in our life!!

Now I am off to clean!!

The Lights Went out.......

About 2 weeks ago, my husband, my stepson, my two boys and myself were sitting in our living room playing a game when the lights suddently went out. I spoke to my boys saying that "mommy is right here, just stay where you are" as my husband went and found a lighter and some candles. I was so proud of my boys, they didn't cry or scream, they trusted their mommy and daddy to take care of them. We were a little worried because it was supposed to be below 0 that night and the temperature in the house began to drop quickly. My 4 year old Joseph said he really wished the lights would come back on and I said "well joseph we can always pray that the lights come back on" and we prayed together. About 10 minutes later I saw joseph laying on the floor with his eyes closed and a few seconds later he popped up and said "mommy i prayed to God that the lights would come back on". I told him how awesome that was and that God heard him. A few minutes later the lights came back on and I looked at my little boy's face. He was beaming and smiling from ear to ear. I told him "God answered your prayer" and he was so in awe of everything, it was so neat to see and be a part of.

Anytime we mention the time that he prayed and God answered him it immediately brings a huge smile to his face and to ours. I hope we get that excited when God answers our prayers!

What I love about being pregnant....

I realized the other day that I only have a little over 2 months left of this pregnancy. My 3rd precious boy will be here soon, and although there are plenty of things about pregnancy that I don't like....heartburn... having to use the bathroom about 4 or 5 times a night.... having to have my husband help me get up off the couch!!! Looking in my closet and seeing all my "skinny" clothes that I know I won't be in to for a LOOONNGG time.. :-) There is so much more that I do love. Last night my little boy was active and i just sat there with my hands on my belly feeling him move all around and I was just in awe. I love dreaming about what he will look like, who's personality he will have and what he will do in his life. I love it when my other 2 boys ages 4 and 2 both sit on each side of me and lay their heads on my belly and talk to their new baby brother.



Having children is such a huge blessing, whether you are able to have a baby, you adopt a baby, or you take care of others children. God gave us little miracles and it's amazing that he entrusts us to take care of them.

One thing I do look forward to however about this pregnancy being over is getting my body back, ok let me rephrase that... "attempting" to get my body back. I had just started losing weight with Weight Watchers when I got pregnant. I try not to be vain, and worry about what I look like, but it's hard in todays day and age when the size all women want to be is a size 1!!! I am just going to eat healthy, exercise and follow Weight Watchers and see what happens. What matters now is a healthy baby boy at the end of this pregnancy.

Innocence....

As a mom sometimes we wish our children's lives away. When they are newborns, we can't wait for them to smile and roll over, then when they accomplish that we are soon on to other things to wait for them to do. Yesterday I read one of the saddest stories about a little girl whose life was taken away by her own parents... and it made me stop and assess my own life. I want to slow down and take time to enjoy each of my children's steps in life. I don't want to rush them through life, i want to hold them a little more, tell them I love them a little more. It's easy to get busy with life and then we look back and realize our little "babies" are growing up and will soon one day not be with us any longer. I am inspired to slow down and cherish their innoncence. So if you are reading this... stop the cleaning for a minute.... and just go and hold your child and let them know how much you love them!

A children's sermon.... speaks to me as well..

When a dear friend of mine started her own blog, I thought "what a neat idea".... to be able to write how you are feeling, what you are dealing with and knowing that maybe, just maybe it could inspire or impact someone else's life.

My husband did our children's story at church yesterday and it was such a great message, I thought i'd share it, only from my perspective. You see last week while my older son Joseph was in pre-school, it was just me and my 2 year old Samuel at home. I went into the other room and maybe about 10 minutes later I hear a little knock on the door and a sweet little voice that said "mommy i colored". Immediately my heart started racing as I opened the door and saw this cute little boy covered in something. I still didn't know what, and so I asked him "what did you do"..... he pouted a little now realizing he had done something he wasn't supposed to do. I said "where is it... where is what you used?" He said "in there".



As I walked into our living room I started seeing marks everywhere, on our carpet, the walls, picture frames......and then I saw what was used. An orange Sharpie permanent marker!!! I got upset of course, but then realized this is a child that I love. I chose to forgive him and started trying to think of how to clean up what he had done. Friends of mine told me to try the magic eraser, so off to the store we went. You know what? It worked! On almost everything this little magic eraser started erasing the marks. The point my husband made was that in John 1:9 it says "If we confess our sins to him, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all wickedness."

The comparison my husband made was just like that "magic eraser" erased my little boys mistakes, God is waiting and willing to forgive us and erase our sins as well. In a way my son Samuel has given me a reminder every day of what God does for me. He forgives me, and not only forgives me, but erases my sin never to be seen again. WOW!