His Grace is Enough

A couple of weeks ago, we were all taking Braden to school and a favorite song came on called "Your Grace is Enough." Generally, the kids are dominating the music choice in the van, but today, Brent and I had a voice! Amazing!
I ran in a friend's house to drop something off and Brent and Brooks had a nice little conversation about "Your Grace is Enough." Brent usually sings loud enough so that the rest of us don't have to be heard. The boys think that because he sings it that loud, it must be his favorite song. So the guys were discussing whether this was in fact one of Brent's favorites. They both agreed that it could be a favorite. :-)
Later that day, the kids and I were at the zoo. They were starting to get a little tired and they usually kind of slip into their own zone. As we were walking by each animal home, I kept hearing Brooks singing. Finally I said, "Watcha singing there, Brooks?"

"I shingin' my favrit song. Your graaaaace is enough....your graaaaaace is enough....your graaaaaace is enough....your graaaaaace is enough....." and he just kept singing it.

I loved knowing that he is listening and something is sticking. Our prayer is that he will always remember that God's grace is enough for him. It's so easy to get caught up in what we think works to give us significance/purpose in life. I am the first to get all that confused & jumbled. But after a while, it's so clear that my idea of what works, isn't working so well. It's so obvious that there's got to be One Single Source out there to define our worth and what we're about...can't be ourselves, as that is all so relative.

Thank you God for giving us worth through your grace...your undeserved love toward us. Help us to rest in your grace that is enough!

Spots

Brent has had some spots appear on his face within the last couple of years. I'm sure it's just age, but we wanted to rule out any skin cancer possibilities, b/c they kind of looked like sunspots. He willingly let me schedule him an appointment with the dermatologist. Wow...that was amazing. I didn't have to argue with him over it. Men just love going to the dentist & doctor don't they? I think Brent has softened to the idea over the past years. He seems to have gotten over the fear of them...until today.

When I scheduled the appointment, I clearly stated that the spots were on his FACE. When he came home today, I asked him how it went.

"Did YOU schedule me for a full-body check?!?"

Ha, ha, ha!!!!! That was so funny. When the P.A. came in and handed him the paper robe, he said "I just need you to look at my face."

"You SHOULD do this once a year," she responded.

I don't think he cared what he SHOULD or SHOULDN'T do at that point. Thankfully, he knew he SHOULDN'T run out of the office at that moment. He endured it and the spots are enlarged oil glands. Phew!

We'll see if I get fired from my scheduling duties though!

What's in a name?

Of course, names are on our brain lately...names for a baby...boy or girl. That was after we did some talking about adding a sibling to the family.

Braden's original thoughts about a baby: Not interested. "Babies chew on things and they will eat my Legos." This is going to go over really well.

Brooks' original thoughts about a baby: Whatever...he's excited or else he doesn't get it and will be dethroned once it gets here.

So we talked about how God planned this and knows even better than Daddy & Mommy how they will be excellent big brothers. Baby won't move for about 6 months...Legos will be safe until then. A little more peace for the big brother.
Next, we convinced them that they will play a big role in teaching the baby many things...they each could choose something right now.
Braden: He'll read to the baby.
Brooks: He'll teach the baby how to surf. That's crucial.

Now, name picking. Of course, we tried to come up with "B" names for a boy...possibly even more "Br" names. Tough. Mommy & Daddy have our girl name picked out...same one from our last pregnancies. (I told them I really like "Dori," my favorite character from Finding Nemo. lol)

Braden's thoughts: "If it's a boy, I want to name him An-THON-y!" He likes to annunciate that and it's a name of a new friend at school. No girl names...he didn't want a sister during discussion.

Brooks' thoughts: "If it's a boy, I want to name him Cody and Lani if it's a girl!" Those are the stars in his favorite kids' movie, Surf's Up. Can you tell there's a theme here? He prefers a sister. Again...don't know that he understands what's going to hit him if he gets his wishes.

Other names in the running...Billy-Bob-Joe; Katora (that's from my niece); Skyler (that's the name of another niece). Those probably won't make it to the final round.

Any ideas...we're happy to hear them! Early in the game...yes, but I usually can't make decisions to save my life, so we're starting now!

Sendin' a message!

A few years back, Brent's team had a really loud fan in the stands. He was there regularly and sounded a lot like Dick Vitale. (sp?) He made his presence known by yelling "Sendin' a message!!!!" when Darby had a good play or a great basket. You couldn't help but smile and laugh at his boldness.

Well, this story is a fun one about God sendin' us a message. One about His love for us and His desire to make Himself clearly known in our lives.

When Brent and I got married we talked about having 2 or 4 kiddos. After #2 actually came along though, I was willing to reconsider my desire for 4! It was a tough transition. We realized that I had more anxiety that needed to be addressed before even thinking about expanding the family further.

But God didn't remove the desire for more children from my heart...maybe from Brent's, but not from mine. LOL. I have always loved children and played "Mommy" since I can remember. I understood, however, that didn't mean I was made to have many of my own. I did think about this desire daily, especially when looking at other families and wondering how they do it. This comparing issue was a part of my anxiety that God was asking me to give up. (Still working on that by the way!) I was becoming more and more content that God may have a plan for us to be complete as a family of 4. Nonetheless, I still needed to give the ideas to Him each time they popped into my head.

So that was our plan...when we thought, stressed, worried about our family's future, we prayed.

Our prayer: God, please give us total peace & contentment that our family is complete with 2 wonderful boys or give us a very clear sign that we should have more kids.

His answer: He gave us a very clear sign. As a friend put it, God overrode our birth control method. I'll spare you the details, but when it happened, it was a very audible sign...very audible, I will stress. You can read between the lines. Don't want to put thoughts in your head. (especially for our family :-)) But this is not about Brent and me... it is about God and how much He desired to answer our prayer and make Himself known in a very special (and humorous) way.

I knew immediately that we had just received our answer. Brent was confused as to why I was laughing and crying at the same time. "That was our sign!" I explained why I knew at that moment we were going to be expecting. It wasn't so much that I'm "in tune" with my body...just that God sent such a clear message...there was no question.

We are so thankful for this blessing and an answer to our questions about our family's future. It will always serve as a reminder of how God wants us to ask Him for anything and everything, no matter how specific. "Ask and it shall be given"...we asked for a message and God sent it!

Classy

Last night Brent and I were able to celebrate Valentine's Day with some friends, which we looked forward to for quite a while. We spent it in a classier part of town, at Easton. We were hesitant to leave the kids, as one of them wasn't feeling 100%. We prayed he'd be fine for the sitter and all worked out well on that end.

Unfortunately the night got to me though, after all was said and done. I left my mark of class on the sidewalk outside Easton. I guess we had a little too much fun...passers-by were thinking I just couldn't handle all the "fun." Little did they know, there were no drinks involved. More likely a little life inside this belly o' mine was not agreeing with too much fun with friends.

The "wave" came over me while I was talking to a friend in the middle of the mall. I told her I wasn't feeling good and needed to get going. I didn't want to interrupt Brent's conversation with the guys, but I also didn't want to make a scene right then and there. So we headed to the van and barely made it out the doors of the mall. That's so classy...what a welcoming entrance it would be for the rest of the visitors.

Pretty sure it was coincidental that our boy and I were both feeling lousy last night. Maybe a little low-class laziness will help us all today!

Logic...lacking it

We have determined that one of our boys really lacks logic at this stage in life. Don't know when you really determine if someone has the gift or not, but we're gonna have to say "no" right now. These are a few statements that you would hear come from this guy's mouth, ever so confidently.

"I'm going outside, because I'm going to go outside!" (With his hand in the air to explain, in case you didn't understand)

"I'm so cold, b/c it's so cold!"

The other night, he didn't want to eat the sandwich that he claimed he wanted. After one bite, "I'm done with this."

"You said you wanted it, so you need to eat 3 more bites." (The bites are calculated by their age...that's great logic right? )

He put on his best mad face...(he's got a mean one) and said

"I'm SELFISH!"

Huh? How's that fit in? Where did that come from? I busted up laughing and he had a hard time keeping his mad face without cracking a smile, making me laugh all the more.

He did agree (unwillingly) with our bites logic... after a few minutes of laughing!