Thursday, December 16, 2010

Moving Right Along

We are moving closer and closer to Christmas Day.  We are doing that sticker countdown with Ada, and it is amazing to me the number of days that have already been marked off.  Everyday Ada asks, "Is it Christmas morning?"  as if she wouldn't know ahead of time.  This has been an extra fun Christmas season for me as Ada is old enough to catch onto the excitement.  It's the most anticipation I have felt since being a child myself. 

Another treat for us this week is that Cake!!


 (Kate, my youngest sister) is here for a couple of days.  She flew into the ATL airport from New York!!!, where she had been visiting with a friend, and we picked her up and brought her here.  My dad is coming today to take her back to Scottsboro for Christmas break.  I have been hearing all about her trip and living vicariously through her.  While she was making her way through SOHO and Greenwich Village, I was changing diapers and forcing John to eat baby food;) 

Really, I am teasing.  I wouldn't give this up for anything.  After leaving Lenox the other night, I kept noticing all these lit up coffee shops and cafes, and I began to "dream out loud" about all that Scott and I could be doing if we didn't have the responsibility of children.  And then I looked at him in disbelief and said, "Really, I would give up these TREASURES for a night at a coffee shop.  I don't think so!!!"  And then I felt strangely content to drive straight home to my suburb and tuck these babies into bed. 

I am, however, dreaming of the day when debt is paid off and I don't have a child quite so attached to me and maybe I can go gallavanting around New York for a few days.  A girl can dream, right?  Right now I am hoping for a night away with Scott in April for our anniversary (oh the wording of that sentence is terrible, but I don't have time to go back and figure it out), which of course depends upon a certain little guy being WEANED. 

The little guy I am talking about is pictured above.  He is playing at my feet as I type this.  NEVER FAR AWAY FROM ME!!!  In fact, a minute ago my post was rudely interrupted when that stinker crawled under the desk and turned the computer OFF.  Luckily, blogger saved automatically because I would not have had time to re-type all of this.

Anyway, I just wanted to blog.  It's my journal, of sorts, you know?  A place where I think out loud and record all that God is doing here in our everyday.  It doesn't always seem like much, and then I begin to read through the older posts, and He is ALWAYS at work isn't he?  Here are my stones of remembrance, right here, for all the world to see.

And now I will close with a quote from the book that I am reading, Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus.  I think it sums up Christmas so well

For the son of God to empty himself and become poor meant a laying aside of glory; a voluntary restraint of power; an acceptance of hardship, isolation, ill-treatment, malice, and misunderstanding; finally, a death that involved such agony--spiritual, even more than physical--that his mind nearly broke under the prospect of it.  It meant love to the uttermost for unlovely men, who "through his poverty, might become rich."   This Christmas message is that there is hope for a ruined humanity--hope of pardon, hope of peace with God, hope of glory--because at the Father's will Jesus Christ became poor and was born in a stable so that thirty years later he might hang on a cross.  It is the most wonderful message that the world has ever heard, or will hear.  (70-71).

Amen and Amen and Amen!!!  And Amen again!!  Do you agree?

2 comments:

rhodes1 said...

Obviously, I'm in the opposite situation. When I find myself wanting what you have, I remind myself of all the things I am able to do that you and Ann can't and find myself much more satisfied with my life. Luckily, I still get your children to enjoy. Can't wait to see them!

Mary said...

once again, I am so late in reading your posts! I have wanted to get that book (Come, Thou Long Expected Jesus) for so long...I am glad to hear you like it, I think I will definitely get it for next Christmas. Do you think it is something my older kids could understand if I use it as a devotional for all of us?