This is gonna be a good year because ...

I have a grandaughter (-sigh-)

Holding that sweet little one is like a spa day 
                            beach day
                                    vacation day
                   coffee and cake day all rolled in to one. 

She is sweet, delicious, soft, fragile, and precious! 
Her little knees…
    ooohhh how I love baby’s little knees 
                             and their little “laps” 
Have you ever just looked at a little one's lap? Priceless!

When she stretches, 
               arching backwards with her hands clenched tight and her face all smooshed 
I just want to kiss her face and hold her tight and drink her up.
It’s like a vitamin for the soul, 
                 the best blood pressure medicine you could ever be prescribed. 
Better than a puppy, 
   or a kitten,
   or a walk on the beach when the sun is setting and the temperature is perfect. 
Better than a ride on a motorcycle through winding country roads. 
Better than coffee, hot and steamy and perfectly brewed with freshly roasted beans. 
Better than a huge slice of chocolate cake, home-made, butter cream frosting, most and chocolatey. 
Better than the first slice of coffee bread, warm out of the oven with butter on top. 

This is gonna be a good year!!

Planned Parenthood??

My family ... amazing!  

Perfect??   umm... 

     if my kids heard the word perfect they just might burst out laughing or roll their eyes or walk out of the room, shaking their head in that way that says “you’re delusional”

But I'm the mom - I know

    we are perfectly put together.

These lenses in my eyes allow me to see my kids, my family, very uniquely, perfectly formed by a perfect Creator.

My five kids 

(no we didn’t adopt again

no I didn’t get pregnant again

yes my daughter got married and now he’s ours)

 are definitely amazing!

They are God’s gift to me, to both their dad and me.

We are a perfectly formed family.

Years ago I would hear people talk about their perfectly planned family - 

        3 kids, 

        3 years apart

        star athletes, full-ride scholarships.... you get the picture.

They had it all planned out.

We can’t relate to that. Every time we tried to plan it was shifted, just a little here, a lot there.

The backward glance on my life helps me to see what I once thought as disappointments, difficult waiting times, a seemingly silent God, were actually a perfect plan in motion.

Forming our family has been an adventure, one sweet life at at time finding each other.

Just as God intended

Because 

Before the world began ... He knew us

While I was in my mother's womb, He knew me

While in their birth mothers' wombs, He knew them

While in my womb, He knew them

 He knew my sweet girl, the one who made me a mommy, 

      a woman one who has learned how to live grace and give grace like few 
      others,

 He knew my first boy, a gift of life, 

      one who was created with such purpose, definitely wanted, wired to love 
      fiercely

 He knew my second boy, a life of great worth, 
      one who is divinely appointed and chosen, who will impact his world with a story of 
      life given 
 He knew my third boy, a treasure to all who know him, 
       uniquely gifted with empathy and wisdom beyond his years 
 He knew my dear son-in-law, 
       one who is discovering a Father who has been there always,
       one who has stolen her heart and ours

amazing...

each one of them, perfect, called by name

He knew how much I would blow it as a mom 

           and yet he picked me to be their mom. 

Amazing!

He knew we, as their parents, would be asked very hard questions, a lot of “whys” at such young ages

He knew we wouldn’t always have all those answers 

           and yet he picked us to be their mom and dad. 

Amazing!!

He knew I would love them so much my heart hurt 

          but that I didn’t really understand love like He does 

          my imperfect, learning-on-the-fly, dependent on God kind of love

                                 because He is Love

and yet He planned for me to be their mom. 

Amazing!!!

He knows the answers to some very hard questions that are asked in our home. Some answers I don’t have, but I’m confident He does have.

I don’t have a clue why people are cruel

I don't know why they abandon, or others abuse, why people bully, why there is rejection

I don't know why it some times looks like He’s standing there, with arms crossed, indifferent, while life is pummeling us to the ground.

But I do know He is not indifferent
I do know that before the world was even created that He already knew me, each one of us

The truth is

He has promised to never leave me, He does not abandon

The truth is

We are given a hope and a purpose in a world that is hopeless and purposeless

The truth is
 He hears my prayers

          He answers my prayers

          He knows the story of my life before I know it

So, sometimes with faith that is so small it is hard to even see - I will choose to trust my God

I will surrender to Him my parenting abilities

           I will give Him my plans for the future

I will love my family .... my amazing, God-put-together family!!