but not

Yesterday's sermon was very interesting. He is starting a series about having an unbreakable faith. I had never thought about it that way before. But God does want to equip us to be unbreakable even when the world and life and the griefs and tragedies of this life come crushing down on us.

One of the things he brought up was the loss of children. And he speaks from first hand knowledge as they've experienced this unique loss. God has worked to heal their hearts and now they can turn and minister to others faced with the same circumstances. He used 2 Corinthians 4 and the two words that stood out to me were but not. All these things are going on but we are not crushed, but not driven to despair, but never abandoned by God, but not destroyed. But not.

I loved those words because they say so much. Yes life is hard. God never promises otherwise. Life can feel like it's caving in or like it will never be the same or we will never be happy again or whatever.. but not. We are never abandoned... never destroyed.

I remember at Bub's memorial, people kept telling me how strong I was. (and I'm not saying this to brag because...) I didn't feel strong. I knew I wasn't strong. God was the only thing keeping me together, pushing me forward and giving me peace and strength. I was grieving and feeling like life as I knew it was over but not. But not destroyed. But not without hope for Bub... for us. But not.

"Through suffering, our bodies continue to share in the death of Jesus so that the life of Jesus may also be seen in our bodies." vs 10 So that even though our hearts and bodies are weak and unable... Jesus may be seen as He works in our lives. He is the only thing that keeps me going.... the only reason my heart is healing/healed. I know there have been times of thinking unhealthily in regards to Bub's death and it's at those times I realize this is not God's work in my life... but me letting go of Him and trying to run things myself. During those times I AM crushed, in despair, feeling abandoned etc. But He did not abandon. In those times, I am the one that abandoned. I'm so thankful He brings me to see myself and see my need and run back to Him.

At those times, I can realize that even though I still might have difficult moments in regards to Bub and mental images that pop up at the worst times... but not. I'm so thankful for but not.

"We now have this light shining in our hearts, but we ourselves are like fragile clay jars containing this great treasure. This makes it clear that our great power is from God, not from ourselves." vs 7

it's my birthday

I got a little bloggy makeover today for my birthday!

So happy birthday to me!

I was getting a little bit tired of the other one and found something cute... and free. The best price ever!

So I hope you like it. If you see anything I need to change, let me know.

Happy weekend, all! Hugs! : )

queso and peppers

Yesterday was a good day. But you won't believe what happened.

My friend wanted to eat at Chili's. I laughed when she told me that, because that was Bub's favorite place to eat. I told her about when we had five day a week chemo all day long, the nurses would come around and take orders from the kids for what they wanted to eat and they'd order it from the hospital. They didn't order anything for the starving parents by the way... I can't count how many days I didn't eat 'lunch' until 3pm! Anyway... they came to Bub and asked him what he wanted to eat and guess what he said!!!

Chips and queso! LOL

I found it sort of ironic that we ended up there on his birthday. But it gets more ironic as we're seated. The waiter explained the Create a Pepper campaign for St. Judes and asked us if we wanted to color a pepper. I thought that started in September. Freaky!

So I sat there sort of stunned for a second and then told him I'd draw a pepper. He brought one for my friend too. So we both colored peppers. I felt weird doing this with my friend... when this is usually something I do with my hubby every year. In a strange way, it felt very personal doing it with someone else. It wasn't my best work, shall we say.

I almost told him no, but then I knew he would try to sell me on it and since I didn't want to go into it with him, I went on ahead and said yes. He scanned my paper... that included a note in memory of him and said that it was his birthday and I drew balloons and stuff like that... and I think the color drained out of his face a little bit. Sometimes they say something when they see it, but this guy didn't say a word. (don't think he was very socially minded anyway just from the small amount of relating we did with him over our order)

Ya know.. in the end, I was just thinking whatever... let me draw it and move on. My friend moved them aside when we finished and we went on with our lunch. Of course, we had a huge list of things we'd been meaning to talk about... I know that's a shocker... two girls... and we gabbed away and had a nice lunch and a nice day.

another birthday

Today is another birthday. He would be another year older.

twelve.

But as I've said before, he is always four to me.

I will spend the day hanging out with a good friend and going out to eat and just being.

The anticipation of these days is sometimes worse than the reality.

We didn't know when we had our little man twelve years ago just how much our lives and our hearts would be changed... and stretched... and broken... and healed in the coming years.

Thank you Jesus for my little sweet one in heaven. I'm so blessed to be his momma.

Julie & Julia

So I went to see Julie & Julia. I actually went by myself. I know that sounds strange. I couldn't work it out and I didn't want to wait another week to go with a friend. And it was the first day of school and I was just itching to see it, so that's what I did.

For the record, I've never done that before. And I don't know that I'll do it again. Going by myself was sort of a lonely experience. I didn't realize how much I missed having somebody to giggle with during all the appropriate times.

But then again, I'm glad I went by myself, since none of my IRL friends know about my blog. And there are some references to blogging that are pretty cute and they might wonder why I thought that was so funny. So it's probably a good idea that I went by myself anyway, huh?!

So to answer the obvious question.. yes the movie is good. Very good. Even delightful, actually. I loved it. I wondered if this movie would feel like it was dragging along since it's 2 hours and ten minutes long. But it doesn't. As a matter of fact, I was sad when the movie ended. Yes, it was that good! ( my biggest negative was the language, which is sad, but expected in a PG-13 movie)

So there ya go... my 'review' without actually giving away anything about the movie. My advice: Go see it. Right away! You'll be glad you did. : )

And in honor of seeing the movie, here are some of my pics from the Smithsonian... Julia Child's kitchen. Imagine all the butter that got melted in THAT kitchen! Mercy me!





Bon Appétit, indeed!

rattle and ramble

I guess I need to tell you the flip side to the awkward inward moments I had in class Sunday.

Here's the deal. We're at a pretty big church and everyone has to share space. So the classes share rooms and the times are juggled so they can all meet at some point. And of course, many of them are split out by age groups.

And we wanted to try the class with our age group... not just the young adult on up class.

So we tried this sweet little class. And by little I do mean little.

There were less than an dozen people in there when we arrived. And less than 15 TOTAL when everybody arrived. And when I'm in situations where I don't know people, I either shut down, or rattle on too much. But with such a small group, shutting down really wasn't an option.

So rattle on, girlfriend!

Anyway.. they wanted to know how we came to know about the class. So I went into way too much detail about how the other class we tried stopped meeting this hour and we really need a class that meets this hour and the OTHER class is for all ages and we wanted to be with our own age so we ended up here.

His response... gee you make it sound like you're scraping the bottom of the barrel to come in here.

Awkward. What can I say... well....! It's not necessarily that we're scraping the barrel, it's just that there isn't another option. But I ended up going on and on while I got a lot of blank stares back.

allrightythen. cya next week.

I say that and yet they were very friendly and we will be back next week. Maybe I'll be a little more relaxed and not quite so rambley. We can only hope!

just the one?

We went to a new Sunday school class yesterday.

My 'from the wall' status was in all its glory. And if I'm from the wall, my hubby is from behind it!

We don't exactly do well in strange social situations.

But I think it went ok.

It was a very small class. So there wasn't a back of the room for us to hide in. Because I asked. There was a huge table.

And we sat at the head of it. great.

But they were very friendly. And since we were the only visitors, they could ask us allll the questions from where we're from to how many children we have.

Just the one? That's the way it worked out. I didn't go into it. I hate to make people feel bad for saying something like just the one?

But sooner or later, I will tell them. I just hate to go into it right off the bat when I meet someone new. It will come up at some point in discussion in class. And that's ok.