blessed beyond measure

Trey loves going to Kroger, which makes me love it too. He is almost always well-behaved. He says hello to everyone we pass (no matter how many times we pass them) and will sometimes grace the entire store with a high-volume Bible song. It's so great. We were in the store last weekend. Lately, Trey wants me to hand him the groceries so he can put them in the cart. I had picked up a box of cereal and handed it to him. He started trying to open it. Trey : Open it? Open it? Mama : No buddy, we have to pay for it first. Trey : (Hugging the box to himself, he closes his eyes and bows his head) Thank you Jesus for the cereal. A-MEN! (Looking up) Now, open it??? Bless his heart. If only we could get all our groceries by praying for them, rather than paying for them.

Tonight ABC will air "It's the Great Pumpkin, Charlie Brown", kicking off my end-of-year season of celebration. Like many people, the fall/Thanksgiving/Christmas season is my favorite, and I look forward to it all year. But the associated feelings of warmth and nostalgia cannot officially begin until Charlie Brown, Lucy, and Linus (my favorite) have made their broadcast appearance. What am I looking forward to over the coming weeks?? - Trunk or Treat at church this Saturday. Pics of a cute little Trey-animal to come! - Mini-reunion with my best girls from high school in two weeks. - My mom recovering completely from her surgery. Thank you to everyone who prayed - she is doing well. - Thanksgiving. Family togetherness, cool weather, and gravy. May there be plenty of gravy. - Decorating, though I'm a little nervous about Trey and the decor. He's much more curious and harder to control this year. - Watching my all-time favorite Christmas cartoons. My super-du...

Over breakfast this morning... Trey : Daddy is not here. Mama : No, Daddy is not here. Do you know where he went? Trey : Go to work, make milk money. At school. Mama : That's right. Do you know what Daddy does at school? Trey : Make the boys and girls happy. There are probably only a select few of Brandon's students who would disagree with that. How many of your teachers would sing the theme song to Blue's Clues and teach entire lessons as Gomer Pyle on any given day?

Being sick stinks. We'll just say that now and get it out of the way. The swine has passed, and praise the Lord neither Brandon nor Trey caught it. Poor things just had to deal with a wife and mom who laid flat on her back for what seemed like forever. Bring on the daily cycle of Chef Boyardee and frozen chicken nuggets. News flash: I'm not hungry and I'm not cooking! The large amount of time I spent away from Trey, while devastating for me, had absolutely no impact on him. When Brandon finally brought him home, Trey said, "Hey Mama," gave me a quick hug, and ran to play with his toys. Yes, he missed them more than me. Oh well. May I brag on my husband for a moment? He has always talked about the importance of being a clutch player, coming through in dire situations. This is his logical explanation for procrastinating. Apparently people perform better under pressure. And he does. Every time I get sick, no matter what he has going on, he is ready and wil...

So I had a sore throat on Sunday. It got worse that night, and so as I laid awake in the wee hours of Monday morning, I decided that I couldn't go to work and that I needed to go to the doctor. Side note - I hate going to the doctor. In the handful of times I've gone over the last several years, I have waited well over an hour before being seen, and have only been seen by "my" doctor once. I'm thankful the place is there, but frankly, I despise it. But I was compelled to go. The doctor I saw asked me all the swine flu questions - I had a sore throat, slight fever, slight cough, and that was it. She said, just from looking at me, she would definitely not suggest flu. More likely strep. And wrote me a prescription for amoxicillin. As she was walking out of the room at the end of the appointment, she said it would just make her feel better to do the swine flu test. They stuck a q-tip up my nose and I waited 10 minutes. The nurse stuck her head back in the ro...

Today my precious Mama is in New York for special surgery on her hip. If all goes well, Lord willing, this will fix a very painful problem that she has dealt with for years. The prayer offered in faith will make the sick person well. The Lord will raise him up. James 5:15 I am on my knees, praying in as much faith as I can muster, that the Lord will work a healing miracle through this procedure.

The night didn't go as smoothly as expected. Here are the pictures, and you'll notice a recurring theme of a particular facial expression missing from the usually-jolly Trey. Trey pretending to drive a custom designed lawnmower. Most of our short evening was spent here. The mowers that didn't have their keys made him a bit angry. This was the second of three bites of dinner he took. If you know Trey and his obsession with chicken nuggets, you know how odd this is. I had been showing Trey last year's pictures of him riding the train, just to get him fired up for this year. And it worked - all he talked about once we got there was riding the train. Sat him in the seat, took the picture, conductor took off, Trey screamed and stood up, reaching for me to get him. No train ride. Hayride time. Trey was utterly crushed that he had to sit in the wagon instead of riding on the actual tractor. Thirty seconds into a six-minute ride, he was shouting, "Get down! Get do...

To best describe my blog-spiration of late, stale seems to be the best word. I keep thinking, I should put something on the blog. Of course we all know that not much would beat the last post. And to be honest, if that's excitement, bring on the stale! So we'll just update a little here. Speaking of certain slithery creatures, my dear Dad was kindhearted enough to tell me that the proper way to remove the snake would have been for me to trap its head with the scraper, pick it up (!) by the tail and snap it. Yeah. Thanks Dad. Insert full body shudders again. Let's move on. So fall is here, and if our schedules weren't full before, they are now. We worked together last week to fill out our brand new dry-erase calendar on the fridge, which at this point I'm not entirely sure how we lived without before. There might be six or seven days with nothing special written in. I'm tired just thinking about it. It's all good stuff though. Trey is as wonderfully...

This will be a long one. Remember the lizard incident? Well, the vacuum has proved valuable once again, only this time, not with a lizard. Nope. A snake. In the house. Yeah. It goes like this. Trey had been napping for about an hour, and Brandon had been in and out a few times saying he was going to mow the yard. After not hearing from Brandon for a little while, and not hearing the mower, I decided to go check on him. Looked out the windows all around the house - didn't see him. Opened the door to the basement den - didn't hear him. Walked down the stairs and across the room, which was rather dark, as the shades were pulled. Just outside the door to the unfinished part of the basement, I saw what looked like a shoestring. Hmm. Why would a shoestring be there? (Fear settles in.) Oh help, that's too short to be a shoestring. Gotta go get my weapon. Dashed up the stairs to the pantry, where my weapon is kept. It is a scraper that we used when taking up the vinyl ...