Thankful Thursday!

Thankful Thursday is linking up at Women Taking a Stand this week.  Join us!
This week I am thankful for...

~ my husband and his love, his wisdom he shared with me as we were talking.  He is such a blessing in so many ways.

~ my boy having a wonderful year in 2nd grade.  I am thankful for his school and teachers and the impact they have had on him this year as well as all the many things he has learned. Also that he has been well and healthy physically and having a positive attitude.

~ getting to see the girl who was the flower girl in our wedding.  She is graduating from high school and came by to meet our son.  When I was in college and she was starting school I kept her after school.  It was nice to see her again! 

~ watching ants!  We gave Caleb an ant farm as an Easter surprise in his scavenger hunt.  It had a postcards to order ants.  I sent in the postcard a couple of weeks ago, and they came this week (which was an answer to prayer actually because I knew they needed to hurry up before we are gone on vacation!) and have been fun to watch.  They are busy little creatures. 

~ getting a summer membership for a recreation center.  We went Saturday to the pool and my husband has been exercising before he goes to work.  We are excited to use this during the summer months!

Have a day of blessings!

A-Z Verse Challenge 2012

The new verse is for the letter K. 

Keep your tongue from evil and  your lips from speaking lies. 

Psalm 34:13

Have a day of blessings!

If I Could Keep You Little...

This morning I dropped my boy off for his last Monday of 2nd grade.  As we come to the end of another school year, I can't help but think of all the "lasts" this week will mean for us as 3rd grade will bring us to a new campus. 

As we come to seasons of change, it is easy for me to want to just stop time and stay in this age or grade or stage for a little bit longer...to soak it up and keep things as they are...to keep him little....to not venture into the unknown.  As I think back to various stages of life, there were things I didn't want to ever change.  I remember thinking how would it ever be normal for him to be at school and not be with me at home.  I look back and miss those days... The days before he was a school boy.  Or the days that he needed my help getting dressed or tying shoes.   Or the days we would sit and I would read to him book after book.  Those days are gone, and they have been replaced by a new relationship with my boy as he has learned new things and continues to develop his independence.

When I was at the school recently, one of the books in the display sale was called If I Could Keep You Little by Marianne Richmond. I read it because I like sweet books like that. I don't normally buy them but knew this was one one I wanted to have for my own because it describes so perfectly how I feel about my boy as he has grown.     

I look at my 2nd grade boy (who tells me he is practically a 3rd grader), and I am reminded that when he was born we knew he would grow up.  We prayed for him to be healthy and grow as he should.  I am thankful for that answer to prayer.  Thankful for our happy, healthy boy who continues to grow and be a blessing as our son.  Thankful that I have gotten to enjoy him for almost 8 years here on earth and trusting and knowing God has a plan for his life.  Thankful for our relationship and all he means to me and the blessing of being his Mom. 

If I could keep him little, there are so many things I would miss.  The book reminded me of that...of all the stages we've experienced together and all the stages still out there for us to enjoy.    

Have a day of blessings!

Thankful Thursday

I enjoy participating in Thankful Thursdays each week.  Join us this month at Women Taking a Stand.  Here is my list of what I am thankful for this week:
~ my husband who is so loving and wonderful.  I always feel like I love him more every day!  I told him this week that the way he treats me and loves me has been an example to me of God's love, and I appreciate that so much. 

~ holding my sweet boy.  This week he was super tired, and I held him a while before bed.  It felt so nice to hold my big boy in my arms! 

~ a sweet Mother's Day weekend.  I got to see my Mom and Meemaw on Saturday.  We had a nice visit and lunch.  My Mom brought some magic cookie bars and a fruit pizza.  I wish I'd taken a picture, it was so pretty!  It had strawberries, blackberries, blueberries and kiwi in the middle.   Then on Sunday my boys woke me with waffles for breakfast complete with a flower Caleb had made in art class on the table.  After breakfast he gave me the gifts he had made.  He had worked so hard on them and was so excited to give them to me.  He's so sweet!  His cards were so thoughtful and he made a necklace for me at school.  It is made out of a domino.    (I have tried multiple times to upload pictures of the flower and necklace and it is not working!)

~ 14 months and 21,000+ miles later, our new car is paid off.  :)

~ all the things that happened in my day Tuesday that made me smile...finding books my boy likes at the library (and seeing his excitement about reading them when he got home from school), thinking about how my boy will be with me on trips to town again very soon, yummy lunch at Chick Fil A with my cute husband, a phone call from the girl who was the flower girl in our wedding, seeing our garden growing.

Have a day of blessings!

Book: Broken Wings

Recently a book caught my eye on the "new" shelf at our local library.  It is called Broken Wings by Carla Stewart.  It was the large print edition with this cover, which grabbed my attention.

This is the story of two women who meet by providence.  They are at two very different places in life, yet a friendship develops between them.  Mitzi Steiner spends her days as a hospital "pink lady" volunteer and caring for her husband Gabe who has Alzheimer's.  Brooke Woodson is engaged to a lawyer who is beginning his election campaign to be Tulsa's next District Attorney.  Mitzi shares her story and helps Brooke through her own brokenness.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the characters.  The struggles they face with Alzheimer's and abuse are two big issues to which women readers will be able to relate.  I look forward to reading more books by this author.   
 
Have a day of blessings!

A-Z Verse Challenge 2012

J - Jesus answered, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me."  John 14:6
Have a day of blessings!

Building Character: Obedience

It has been a long while since I shared about one of our family lessons on Building Character.  This Wednesday we were to the topic of obedience.  I thought I'd share with you what we did.  I got some ideas from the Kids of Integrity website. 

We started with a game of "Dad says" (like the game Simon Says) which brought a lot of laughs. Then we sat down and started talking about obedience.  What does the word obedience mean?  One thing that I noticed when I was getting ready for the lesson was that obedience isn't just doing what someone tells you to do.  For one thing, what kind of attitude are you having while you are doing it?  It is really having an obedient heart if you are groaning and rolling your eyes while doing the task? 

Also, obedience is doing a job completely.  Our example was taking out the trash.  If we tell Caleb to take out the trash and then later we go out and find he left it sitting by the dumpster instead of putting it inside the dumpster, he really hasn't been obedient to complete the whole task.  He knows what is required of this chore...remove the filled trash bag, take it to the dumpster outside, and put in a new trash bag.

There are many verses on obedience we can find in the Bible.  One we read was Philippians 2:8 where it tells us Christ was humbly obedient in his dying on the cross. We also talked about examples of obedient people in the Bible.  One was Jesus.  As a boy (Luke 2:40--52) he was obedient to his parents Luke 2:51 even though he wanted to stay at the temple.  Caleb brought up Daniel as an example that he obeyed God instead of the king. 

I've been thinking of other examples. Some were examples to us in their disobedience like Moses when he struck the rock instead of speaking to it as God told him (Numbers 20:1-17).  Another is Jonah who was swallowed by a big fish when he disobeyed God (Jonah 1-4).  

Can you think of others who chose to obey or disobey?      

Have a day of blessings!