We love Mexico!!!

We are back from two weeks of wonderful family time, amazingly warm and pleasant weather, and some of the most beautiful scenes that God has created. We enjoyed the sand, the sun, and the water and most of all we enjoyed the culture of the people in Mexico. I love how the culture of Mexico embraces children and celebrates them as important. What a far cry from our society of today in America. Everyone we met wanted to spend time with our kids and talk with them. I love the value that they placed on them as people. The highlight of the trip was getting to spend more time with a man named Balentino who my parents and I had met last year. To fill you in on the background of the story....the last night we were in Cancun in 2007, we ate dinner at a Chinese restaurant. Before the meal, we held hands and my dad said the prayer. Our waiter excitedly embraced us and exclaimed in his broken English "You too Christians" He proceeded to share about his life and his struggles and asked my dad to pray for him. It was an amazing conversation. Anyways, we returned their during our first few days and he came running to us and said "You remember me.....you ate here" and pointed to the table where we had eaten a year ago and prayed for him. We were able to tell him how we had continued to pray for him over the past year. My dad had brought him The Purpose Driven Life in Spanish and he was ecstatic to receive it. He invited my parents over to meet his new wife and 8 month old daughter. So my parents ventured to downtown Cancun to visit his home. It was very humbling to see where they lived with so few possessions and no refrigerator! My dad was able to share more and encourage him. My mom had taken a bible and highlighted some verses for him. Balentino was so hungry for the word of God and has such a thirst to grow in his faith. They shared some wonderful conversation and fellowship. Balentino asked for a study bible and wanted help to find some true churches in Cancun. We all were able to meet his wife and his daughter throughout the course of our trip. Balentino's wife was Chelly and the daughter was Maria Jose after Mary and Joseph. This experience has definitely made me desire to learn more Spanish so that I can communicate better the message of the gospel with others. What an amazing experience for my kids as well to see the way God's spirit has moved in the life of someone they met and had been praying for. We definetly look forward to seeing our dear friends again.

Carter

Carter playing in the January snow and my little hero....diligently working on his math!

Ramblings from a tired mommy!

Life has finally caught up to me and I have been under the weather. I am worn out and am dreaming of a 48 hour escape in my bedroom without any interruptions! LOL, not really I would miss my kids! Perhaps just a solid 8 hours of quiet time! Here are a few musings of the past few days from my kids that I wanted to keep fresh.

I tend to be a mothering monkey at times and spend few to many minutes "preening" over my children or as they call it "picking" on their skin, hair, ect. We have a rash of "bumpies" at our house that this mommy monkey can't seem to leave alone. Call it one of my many OCD tendencies. Well anyways, one of the nights this week....Hope had heard me bribe her brother Carter over something. So at the begining of one of my obsessive moments, Hope in her deep little voice completely serious says while I am trying to pick on her...."MOMMMMY....I want a dollar (pause) .........and a penny(pause) .......and a diamond and thennnn you can finish!." I better start praying more specifically for this girls future husband!!! Anyways, I got quite a kick out of it.

On a little more serious note, my sweet Carter has been having some sad moments lately. He is really frustrated over having to stop and check his blood sugar before eating something he is really excited about. He has been saying many times lately that he doesn't like being the only 7 year old boy he knows with diabetes and wants to meet a friend his age that has diabetes as well. He is tired of feeling and being "different" than his friends and standing out. Carter and I have begun to pray for opportunities for him to meet a friend his age that has diabetes. So please join me as I lift up his request and pray for God to bring an encourager into Carter's life and opportunities to meet and know other children with Juvenile Diabetes as well.

"Creative" Two's!!!

I walked into the kitchen the other day to find some strange things happening to my dishwasher! Apparently Elijah decided to help mommy wash the dishes....this is what happens when you put dishsoap in the dishwasher FYI....it does remind me of an I Love Lucy show! I love how creative my little one is...he loves to explore and try things out! By the way, if you haven't figured it out...he is feeling MUCH better :) !