Comparisons

Recently I overheard someone describe me as being a creative person! I remember being surprised, as I really don't consider  myself to be particularly creative, at least compared to other people.

Exactly, that's it, we spend so much time comparing ourselves to other people that we can't see who we are? We can't see the unique person that Christ has made us to be.
It seems it is much easier for us to see ourselves as other things which aren't always positive.
Inadequate, unlovable, worthless, failure, weak, small, boring, unattractive, stupid and the list could go on! When we think on these things and let them take root in our lives, we start to believe them! As we continue to compare ourselves to other people around us, we become disillusioned  with ourselves and other people.
And when we believe these lies we feed ourselves,  it affects  our relationship with others and more importantly with God.

 Thankfully God reminds us in His word :

"I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
   your works are wonderful,
   I know that full well.  " Psalm 139:14


Therefore if He has made us then we can't be all these things, because we are made in His image. It is so easy for each of us to fall into a negative pattern of thinking that does nothing for ourselves but drag us down and takes our focus of who God is and the purposes He has for each one of us.
One of my favorite verses is

"Finally, brothers and sisters, whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."
Philipians 4 :8 

I write out of personal experience, but I am thankful that God uses His word to speak truth into my life and to know that none of that stuff is true about any of us!

 A picture of me helping my son be creative decorating his gingerbread house at school

My mum came to visit

Last week I was truly blessed to have my mum come to visit for a week. Time with my mum is always treasured since we live ocean's apart :) Mummy visits always consist of a suitcase filled with goodies for our family, lots of extra cups of tea and a shopping partner for me. Yes my mum loves to shop as much as I do, although she tells me she hardly ever does it at home! Not sure I believe that? :)

I am always thankful for the time to talk with my mum, to laugh, hash out different topics, figure out life and do the things that I can't do on a regular basis. The boys were in school while she was here, so we had extra time to chat and catch up.
I love that when she is here I can be real and open, yes we sometimes get irritated with each other, but one of the things I appreciate about my mum is how she is honest with me. She tells me the things I need to hear even if it is hard for me to hear them. She is usually right and you know what mum's do know what is best and my mum knows me well :) She is kind, loving, fun and thoughtful. My mum is a busy lady always putting other people first, especailly her family, when she came here we really wanted to make sure that she would relax and enjoy her time here and I think she left feeling that way! The week went in too fast, but again I am thankful for the time with her and look forward to when we can do it again, either here or over in Northern Ireland.

I hope and pray I can be the kind of mother to my boys that she has been me :)

Thank you God for mothers :)

Pumpkin Patch kindergarten fun

M started kindergarten at the end of August, this past Monday I got to go with him on his first field trip. We went to a pumpkin patch at a local farm :) Our bus was full of very excited little people :) When we got to the farm it was raining but the kids didn't seem to mind at all. One of the first things they got to do was run around the corn maze.

 After a yummy snack it was time to head out to the much anticipated pumpkin patch, we all piled onto the tractor, it was pretty crowded and we all ended up with soggy bottoms from sitting on the wet hay but again no one seemed to mind :) Once we got to the patch, M set off on his mission to find his perfect pumpkin!

Is it this one? No, I think I will need something a little bigger if I am going to decorate it :)
So as the rain started to pour down M set off and finally he found the one

Once we got home M was very anxious to carve his pumpkin so we started the fun task of taking the seeds out so we could bake them in the oven :)

 M seemed to have in mind exactly what he wanted to do with his pumpkin, it wasn't mom's idea but we had fun doing it!

He is very proud of his creation and was sure to show it to his friends and anyone who came to our door, including the Edward Jones lady who came to our door to tell us about her new business in town!

Ask God!

This morning I went for a walk, I often call it my think and prayer time. I had spent most of my walk listening to a preacher on the Christian radio, but as I was getting closer to home, I turned it off and started to pray.
I was praying for my children when God brought to mind something that had happened yesterday with E.
I had picked up my boys  & our neighbor kids from school, E had been playing with his Nintendo DS but when we got back home it came to my attention that the little pen that goes along with it that you use to touch things on the screen had gone missing. M had been using it and in his excitement to go show his little friends his pumpkin he had got the day before, he lost the pen as he was leaving the van. E and I started to look for the pen, trying to get M to help. It wasn't very successful and I found myself getting more and more irritated and very frustrated. In the midst of my ranting and raving, I heard E say "ask God", ask God", but I was frustrated and wasn't paying very much attention and instead I chose to rant more. The more I ranted the "ask God" got louder, then he said loudly "Ask God, He will help you, remember at Sunday school they tell us to ask God he will help you". As I write I have tears in my eyes for many reasons. We have often told E when he is in a situation where he needs help, that he can stop and ask God to help him. One of the times was when he couldn't find his shoes, so we often hear him say when we ask him "Where are your shoes, he replies, " ask God". But he also obviously has heard this at Church too :)

This morning as I was praying and God brought to mind this incident yesterday. I am humbled, but thankful to God for reminding me through my own child that we should "Ask Him". I was also just really in awe of how God is working in my little boys heart. Very often he seems so distracted, focused on his own little world that we never are really sure of what he hears or comprehends, but Praise God this little boy is hearing and comprehending and God is using Him to speak to my life. I am also reminded this morning though of how often we get angry, loud, we rant and we rave when things are difficult, things aren't going our way, we go to others first to ask for help! Wouldn't life be so much more simpler, if we just "Ask God"!!

Friends

I am linking up again today with The Gypsy Mama and five minute Friday

1. Write for 5 minutes flat – no editing, no over thinking, no backtracking.
2. Link back here and invite others to join in.
3. Go a little overboard encouraging the writer who linked up before you.
OK, are you ready? Give me your best five minutes:

GO!
On Friends.........................

A friend is someone you can
play with
cry with
laugh with
share with
pray with
love with
forgive with
trust with
respect with
talk with
hug with
pour out with
check in with
dream with
honor with
admire with
hope with
blessed with
be thankful with
be funny with
praise with
rejoice with
mourn with
heal with

I am blessed that  God has given me friends to experience all of life's "with's"

STOP!

I love that my boys are friends and can experience lots of "with's" together

 

 

 

A trip home

This Summer we were blessed to be able to go back to Northern Ireland to visit my family. I was pretty anxious about the long trek back there, as I was going to be traveling with the boys on my own without daddy there to help and support!

After a delayed and missed flight we finally made it there! As our plane was making it's descent into Belfast International Airport, I took this picture :) I was home, it had been over 4 years and I had a feeling of excitement and anticipation, looking forward to seeing my parents smiling faces, hearing familiar accents, smells and sounds. It was all very exciting, we were tired and worn out from travelling for 2 days, it was raining but I didn't really care, I was "home"!

I was really struck again by the beauty of the Emerald Isle, one you don't always think about when you grow up there.  I found it very refreshing and enjoyed the spectacular sights. I had a hard time not taking scenery pictures as I wanted to have lots of picture memories when I got back to the US, my other home!

 Our days were fun filled times with family, lots of cousin time for the boys, catching up with friends and just really enjoying the Northern Irish way of life again :)

We were there for 3 weeks, on our last week Sabin was able to join us

  I always enjoy seeing Sabin take in and enjoy my home country's culture and history. One of our favorite days was spent on Rathlin Island, a small working island.

We enjoyed hiking, geocaching and just taking in the peace and rustic nature of the island. It was just a really beautiful and great day!

Sadly it was time to head back to Oregon. But we returned with suitcases full of goodies and a heart full of precious fun memories. We look forward to when we can return again, hopefully sooner than 4 years time.

My heart!

This is probably one of the most difficult blog posts I am about to write. I have written this post in my head many times, but this is the first time I have sat down and decided to type, to try and  put those thoughts that have been in my head for a while now, on paper so to speak!
I just want you to know I am going to be sharing something very near and dear to my heart and so I want you to be prepared for what your about to read! I want to share this with you, because I know many of you have been through this similar journey or know someone who has been through it.

Back in December of 2010 I learned I was pregnant with our 3rd child, yes what great news! I remember being a little surprised but also excited.  A few days later those feelings of Joy and excitement turned to fear and sadness as I started to miscarry our precious baby.

Yes I was pregnant for a very short time, but I had no idea how that short time was going to affect me or impact my life for months  to come! I grieved terribly for my baby, I longed to be morning sick and have all those early feelings of pregnancy that we do not like or enjoy, because in my mind if I felt that way then I was still pregnant. I hoped that it might  be a bad dream and I would wake up from it and everything would be ok or maybe the dr. was wrong?  But however that was not going to happen. In the past months since our miscarriage God has taught me so much about Himself, about myself and also how much He loves me. I went through a wide range of emotions over the last few months and at times I was very angry with God and bitter, but I also realized that for me to stay that way was of no benefit to me or anyone around me! It was not helping me heal and was not honoring God or my little one either!

The reason I write this now is because my little one was due around this time, mid August :) I have found myself this past week thinking about our little one a lot, what they would have looked like, thinking about how their tiny body would have felt in my arms, how my husband and I would have greeted them into the world and what the boys would have thought of him/her. Experiencing a miscarriage has been one of the saddest times of my life, but through it all I still have hope.  I know that although I won't get to hold our baby here on earth, they are in Jesus arms and one day we will most definitely be reunited and what a glorious day that will be :) 

Since my miscarriage I have talked with many women, many of them  whom I did not know had gone through the same thing. Everyone's story is a little different and yet the same in regards to how they felt and dealt with the loss. I feel that in writing this maybe I can bring some hope, but also help other families. I heard 1 in 3 women miscarry, something I was not aware of until this happened to me. Most people don't talk about it or share their story, miscarriage and infant loss is a taboo subject it seems. I think partly because none of us really know how to respond and sometimes when the news is shared the response from others is not always helpful in our grief.  I have been cautious in how I have shared it, but I feel it has been important for me to write this down. Our baby was not with us for very long but, he/she has left a lasting imprint on our hearts and we will carry that with us forever! One of the verses that gave me comfort during the early days was:

Isaiah 55:8-9 

 ⁸ “For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
   neither are your ways my ways,”
            declares the LORD.
⁹ “As the heavens are higher than the earth,
   so are my ways higher than your ways
   and my thoughts than your thoughts.

I may not understand why this happened, but yet I know I have to continue to trust and lean on Jesus.
For those of you have walked with me through my time of grief and have been there for me when I needed to talk, needed someone to pray, a hug or just let me cry, I want to say a huge thank you!