Winding Down

I am still wondering where the last six months went, and am so glad we told the kids that they had to give us six months! I can not imagine how we would have pulled this all off in any lesser amount of time!

Less than two weeks to go...

This weekend was um....swamped....let's see...checklist: bubbles and bubble basket-done!

1. Construction of fans-done!
2. Practice hair appointment-done!
3. Mother of the bride dress and some pretty sweet jewelry (a gift from the father of the bride to the mother of the bride)-done!
4. Tux rentals-done!
5. And then there is the essential non-wedding stuff too-painting the kitchen-first coat done!
6. laying and grouting tile in the kitchen and laundry room-done!
7. touch up painting, trim painting-some done!
8. Wash machine fixed and back in the house-done! (good thing, need to do laundry)
9. And now the homework....not so done!

Geeze...no way to get everything done! With all the activity going on around here, it is amazing there is any semblance of order....speaking loosely...how orderly can a house under construction be anyway?

Plan for the week:

1. finish kitchen and laundry room walls and trim-get the washer and dryer hooked back up
2. complete this college class I am in (by tomorrow)
3. clean up, clean up, clean up
4. Trim work painted
5. Living room and dining room touch up
6. floors in the living room and hallway
7. trim where possible
8. pick up glassware and finish centerpieces
9. work on video
10. lingerie shower
11. complete and print photo book
12. meet with event coordinator, settle on number, and pay venue
13. get postcards out to those coming to the grill out and rehearsal
14. Pay for the chairs
15. Maybe go shoe shopping :)

That might be all we have to do this week....just maybe....

Teary-Eyed

I haven't had too many tear moments, although, my daughter tells me I am definitely going to cry when she isn't here. I keep saying, "Nah..." However, we are approaching crunch time now and it is busy! This week, we have to confirm flowers, pick up her dress, finish up on fans, bubbles, and some miscellaneous kind of stuff. One of the things we are working on is the video.

Somehow that is the thing that chokes me up....we sat here the other night browsing through song after song after song. What song to choose? Hmmm...so we ended up listening to a zillion, all, sappy love songs, some parent child, dad daughter, some mushy love stuff, but all VERY EMOTIONAL!

We downloaded a bunch so that the next day I could weed through them. So here I am, cleaning up my bedroom, putting laundry away, and listening to these songs. The tears start bubbling to the surface....not really sad about an empty nest, but my daughter is such a sweet heart. She is so bubbly, so full of life, so ready to laugh, so herself all the time. She has been my sunshine-one of the brightest parts of my life, and I will really miss her.

Browsing through pictures this weekend of her and her brothers growing up, sitting in church behind a couple trying to keep a small child settled down, and watching a baby dedication, all gave me flashbacks. I remember all of those moments. I remember dedicating all of my children. I remember so many precious moments, many we still laugh about. One is our favorite for sure....our oldest son had this thing about hiding and jumping out to scare his siblings. One time he hid under Kat's bed and waited for her...then he grabbed her feet! Another time, he hid in a laundry basket and waited on his brother. He jumped out from under the clothes and about scared him to death! [hysterical]

Yep, eyes are a bit wet...time went by so fast...too fast...in a blink the kids were grown, starting families of their own, and now...it is just about time for the empty nest.

O How Sweet the Taste

My daughter woke up today with a migraine-her very first. I have one every year or so which allowed me to completely identify with the level of her pain. She tried the bath, heating pad, pain medicines and laying very still in bed. Nothing worked and up

till this evening, she was bed bound.

Her headache changed my schedule for the day. I wasn't able to go to the prison ministry, but I was able to pick up a bit and study for my test that night. Studying is a good thing, and I was glad I did when test time came!

However...it changed her schedule today too. She was supposed to go get her marriage license today with her fiance. She wasn't able to do that, but Jon did come over after work. Their engagement has been plagued by one illness after another. She has had back problems all year resulting in multiple steroid shots in her spine. She has had mono, strep throat, sinus infections, and then today...a migraine. ((Ms. Molly's sweet godly perspective is that God is protecting them from falling!) Each time she has been down, Jon has showed up with flowers. Today was no exception. He called and asked if he could see her, and then he came with a single red rose. (In the picture he is cutting the stems to put them in a vase.) She was in bed, all snuggled up under her blankets. He came in, with the flowers and lay down next to her (No worries, everyone was dressed, she was under the blankets and he wasn't, and the door was open). It was such a sweet sight. He so dotes on her and cares for her.

As we finish up these last few weeks before the wedding, I am so comforted knowing how much he loves my daughter. I see it in their eyes and hear it in their laughter. Love...love....not just an emotion, but a choice...and the sweetness of it...O taste and see.....

Building Relationships

My dear friend had a fundraiser last night at the skating rink for the adoption of her son. I thought it would be a good time to get out, spend some time with people I love, and support her cause. So...I called up my family and told them about it. My sisters showed with their kids, Kat and Jon came, and so did Tonia and her family. We had a nice group represented, but best of all, we got to spend some time together building relationships.

Relationships take time to build...and effort. There has to be lots of time sharing our hearts and lives. Without that investment, they whither and dry up, often times resulting in a totally changed attitude towards each other. Somehow when you are spending time together in an honest way just being-hearts and lives are watered and we grow.

We grow when we share ourselves, when we give of ourselves to others, when we make those sacrifices that let someone else know that we really do love them and value them. It was just a few hours of no remodeling, no homework, and no wedding planning, but I am sure glad we took those moments for each other.

Friendship and Grace

I really struggled today with the concept of "grace." Grace-getting what we don't deserve and not getting what we do. That idea is so central to our faith in Christ, but yet seems to allude so many I know...not so much the grace we experience at the point of salvation, but the grace we need on a daily basis, and the grace we need to extend to others.

Today was also Katherine's bridal shower. There she was, my little girl, having her hurrah moment, being the princess, surrounded by two very beautiful women.

This picture of them is only one in a line of many. These girls have grown up together. They know each other, their strengths and their weaknesses...but they love each other-grace. It has been said that you can count the number of true friends you have in a lifetime on one hand. Those are the people that know you completely, love you any way, and extend grace when you least deserve it. I don't know that I can fill up one hand yet with those kind of friends, but I do know there have been some very special people in my life. Only a few, but those few have kept me a float. They have allowed me to vent, allowed me to be unreasonable and demanding, have allowed me to cry; they have been there when I needed them to be and just loved me. They have given me grace and in so doing have taught me how to love, how to give, how to sacrifice.

My daughter is one of those people. She can love; she can give; she can extend grace-and those young women that are sharing her day with her-they too are those kind of women. Toni, Tonia, Kayla...you too have taught me grace. I love differently today just because I have known you. I understand more fully what it is to sacrifice just because I have known you. I know what grace means because you have shared your lives with me, because you have been graceful to me, and you have modeled grace in your lives. Thank you ladies, all of you for being the beautiful women you are!

Trusting

Just a reminder this morning that it isn't how I feel, it is what God says. Sometimes I feel like quitting, other times I feel like I could soar...but either way...God is God, and it is in HIM I am trusting.

July 18-19, 2009

When God Doesn't Seem Just

Deuteronomy 32:1-4

Have you ever felt that a situation in your life was an exception to the promises of Scripture? In today's passage, Moses declares that the Lord is faithful and all His ways are just, but we have all been in circumstances that seemed wrong and blatantly unfair. And because God did not intervene, we've struggled to reconcile our experience with Moses' statement about Him.
Scripture is filled with examples of godly people who faced hardships that seemed totally unfair. Joseph was sold as a slave, David was hunted like an animal by King Saul, and the apostle Paul suffered with a "thorn in the flesh" (2 Cor. 12:7-10).

Situations like these can cause us to question whether God is good and just. If left to fester in our minds, these doubts may give way to discouragement. We can easily start thinking, What is the use in serving the Lord? Look what it has gotten me--suffering!

It's important to remember that what we know about God from His Word is more accurate than what we feel. Scripture tells us that God is good and just, so we can know with certainty that He has a fantastic purpose for us in whatever we experience.
God allows each of us to face some trials that we won't understand to our satisfaction this side of heaven. Our job is not to comprehend everything He does and permits, but to know how to respond. He'll make all things right in eternity. In the meantime, trust the Rock when all else is shaky.

In Touch with Dr. Charles Stanley

Last Childhood Moments

Yesterday was my daughter's last visit to her Pediatric Rhuematologist. We have made that trip to Arkansas every 4 to 6 months for the past two years. Most of the trips have been just her and I. We have to leave here very early to make the four hour drive to the Arkansas Children's Hospital. Yesterday was no exception-we pulled out at 6 am. (Neither of us are morning people!) Now the way this works is she puts on something comfortable, brings a pillow and blanket, piles into the car and goes back to sleep. I spend the four hours praying, pondering, listening to the radio while she sleeps. Hmmm....and then she drives the trip home. Welp...she stayed awake yesterday and worked on wedding music. She played some she had saved so I could hear it, and then she played a Kenny G CD I had to see what she liked off of it. You can't go wrong with Kenny G, and his whole CD made the cut!

We had lots of girl time to talk about just about everything under the sun. We ran through McD's and grabbed breakfast and still arrived quite early for our appointment. We love this hospital, and we love this doctor. The appointment slip has a bar code on it which you scan when entering. It does all the check in for you on a touch screen. It automatically puts your name up on a large digital board with "waiting" by it. The techs call her back to give her an arm band, check her weight, height, update meds...etc...very fast though! We then go to our room to wait.

The rooms are very kid friendly. On the wall are busy beads. There is a clipboard with color sheets and crayons and kid books in a basket. Kat usually picks out a color sheet to color but not today. She waited on the exam table for her doctor to enter. We went through all the normal stuff. Her doctor congratulated her on her upcoming marriage. Then we were done and on our way home.

One of her very last moments as a kid. In just over five weeks, she will no longer qualify for pediatrics which is all she has ever known. She has had the same pediatrician since she was four years old. Her whole world is changing as she makes this transformation from "girl" to "woman." We will no longer be her whole world, we will no longer be providing for her, we will no longer be the ones she runs to when she hurts or falls down or needs to cuddle up in my bed with me and cry. One last moment of her childhood came too quickly and passed by ever quicker.