Awesomers

Our life group from church is called the Awesomers. We needed a name for our group, so somebody came up with that name as a joke, and it stuck, beacausr we are awesome, of course.

Anyway...this past weekend, the Awesomers (minus one family) went down to the Lake for a restful retreat. We just hung out, ate, went on the boat, threw rocks in the lake, the kids went "fishing" and we took about a million pictures. Oh, and Benny Boo went for a little swim, (dont ask).

Then we came back home in time to attend the Fall Festival at church. That is our Halloween party with candy, costumes, hot dogs and fun. The boys really enjoyed dressing up like firemen!

(sidenote: I am blogging from my phone because we got rid of our crappy Internet at our house, and I have no control over the order of the photos, so the order makes no sense, and I'm sorry about that. I also can't write captions. Don't get me started.)

Enough chatter, here are the pictures of our weekend. Clearly, a great time was had by all:

Truth

Sometimes truth is found in the funniest places.

For example, Benny's horoscope today :

"You know what you want. You're just momentarily afraid to say it out loud or admit it to yourself."

(sidenote: I don't normally read horoscopes, but this was just too funny.)

(another sidenote: apparently Boo is a Taurus, the Bull...this is very funny to me.)

Benny boo is in the most irritating stage of toddlerhood...that time when the kid knows what he wants, but can't talk or express himself very well, so he throws screaming fits. Not awesome.

But with a face like this, what you gonna do?

Planning

Long range planning is not really my thing... I was reading my Bible tonight and came across this passage:

Come now, you who say, "Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, and spend a year there and engage in business and make a profit." Yet you do not know what your life will be like tomorrow. You are just a vapor that appears for a little while and then vanishes away. Instead, you ought to say, "If the Lord wills, we will live and also do this or that." But as it is, you boast in your arrogance; all such boasting is evil. Therefore, to one who knows the right thing to do and does not do it, to him it is sin. (James 4:13-17 NASB)

The world tries to encourage "making a plan." If I had a dollar for every time I have sat in a business seminar where I heard the "to be successful, you must have specific goals, one year, 5 years, 20 years down the road." I wouldn't need to sit in another seminar because I would be super-rich. I recognize the exaggeration, just work with me here...

The idea of having a 5 year plan, or even longer that that, has never really resonated with me. Not that it is wrong, I think it is a fine way to conduct your business and your life, as long as you are flexible and sort of mold your plans as life circumstance change. It just doesn't resonate with me, personally. I think maybe it is because of this passage.

Because of my personality, I am a bit of a perfectionist, and a control freak. If I were to set specific goals today for the next 5 years, I fear that I would stick to my guns too much and not allow the Holy Spirit to move me in whatever direction I am supposed to go. I don't know about 1 year from now, for sure. What I do know is that tomorrow, and the next day, and for the foreseeable future, I need to focus on doing the best I can at the roles I have; work, mothering my baby boys, loving my husband, etc.

Nope, long range planning is not really my thing.

Pumpkin Patch

Nothing really to say...we went to the pumpkin patch today, and had a great time!!!

Closet talker

Benny Boo is a closet talker.

Normally, he just goes "eh eh" and points when he wants something. Or he screams, or he climbs to the highest point and tried to get it himself. It's annoying, and a little frightening, but I guess it works for him. I have no concerns about his hearing or comprehension, because he follows directions well (when he feels like it).

However, there is some evidence as of late that he actually CAN talk. In fact, when I picked him up from the babysitter the other day, she told me he was a closet talker. I had suspected him of that too but didn't have much evidence.

Kelly (babysitter) said that he has been counting and saying "Hunter" clearly. I've never heard him do either one. This weekend, I was trying to distract both of my kids so I could get something done, so I used television (very effective babysitter by the way). I said "Who wants to watch bubble guppies?" Benny Boo dropped his toy and ran over to the tv, and said, clear as a bell "BUBBLE GUPPIES!!"

Raising children never ceases to amaze me.

Miracle

I haven't posted in a while (except for some test posts I tried yesterday from my phone) because so much has been going on, and I am not sure what to say.  Obviously, this is a public blog, so some things going on in our lives are not going to be appropriate to talk about here.  We have some of those things going on right now, and I will definitely be blogging about those things as they become more appropriate to talk about. Does that make sense?

Anyway...right now I am in a hotel room in Las Vegas, for a conference.  Getting here was interesting yesterday, I got to the airport and didnt have my drivers license, so had to go through security without ID (there wasnt time to go home to get it). That was fun. Also, Vegas is not really my scene - there are MANY things about this city that I do not like.  But, it is an important conference, and I am getting some good alone time to just read and relax in my hotel room...so the glass is definitely half full, really more like 3/4 full.  My husband is home with the boys.

Justin sent me this photo this morning - Just the boys saying "Good Morning"
I know I have mentioned it before, but these boys are really quite awesome.
And cute, and perfect. 
Just an aside.

So, I do have something I want to tell you about...we witnessed a Miracle this past week.  Justin's best friend, Brent, has been battling Lymphoma for about a year now.  Battling hard.  It is an amazing, long story, which you can read about on his own blog:  docfeelbad.blogspot.com.

He just got a bone marrow transplant, and has been out of the hospital for about a month.  He is definitely not fully recovered from that ordeal, and is still a little more physically weak, than he would like.  Last week, Justin got a call that Brent had found swollen lymph nodes again.  This indicated a strong possiblity that the cancer was back, or still there, or whatever.  This was devestating news to all of us, to say the least.  He went in for a PET scan, which did not look promising at all, and had planned to have a biopsy this week.  We were all preparing ourselves for another bone marrow transplant (by the way, this is an amazing medical procedure, but also much more difficult than I was aware of).  Anyway, he went in for his biopsy, but first they were doing another PET scan (or CT scan...are they even the same thing? whatever.)  and his lymph nodes were no longer swollen! The cancer is most likely NOT back after all.  Call it a false alarm, try to explain it medically...I am calling it a MIRACLE.

We prayed and He answered.  I believe He always answers our prayers, sometimes not in the way we expect or want Him to. This time, though, He answered with a resounding YES!! Who knows what the future holds for any of us, but for today, we are celebrating.

At the same time, I know there are so many out there who are still suffering. A dear friend of mine's cousin's baby got his angel wings yesterday after a valiant fight, Steve Jobs lost his battle with cancer yesterday, we have all had suffering in this life that we "shouldn't have to" experience.  I don't have it figured out, but this was a reminder to me that our God is able, and that He is faithful.

My original reaction when Justin called me at work to give me the good news, was to question it.  I had prayed fervently for this phone call to come, that Brent was not going to have to go through another transplant this soon (or at all, preferably) but when it came, my first reaction was to question it. "It can't be" "When are they going to re-test?" "Are they sure?" "If they are wrong, and they don't retest for another 6 weeks, how much does that set back his recovery?"  I finally came to the conclusion that I just shared with you, that we have just witnessed a Miracle.  While these are rare in our lives, maybe they are so rare so that when they do happen, we are surprised, and give God the glory He deserves.

This is us with our friends, Brent and Brooke, on our trip to the Bahamas last May.
 Let me just tell you that these four people are VERY happy right now.

Praise be to the Lord!

Another test

Still messing with blogging from the phone...

Pictures

I'm blogging from my iPhone. This is a test.

Some fun pics from the last few days...