Faith journey, The Shack, SAMmy's and Parenting - Part I

I've been contemplating this entry for a very long time.  Somehow, I am going to make the bridge between my faith journey and my parenting style, even if it takes me multiple posts.  :) .

So here we go.

Almost two years ago, I lost a daughter.  A tragic and hard time in my life, but for me, it marks the start of what I consider to be my faith journey.  In reality, this journey probably began long ago when my parents decided to have all of us girls begin our education at a Catholic school.  I was taught religion and went to church.  By the time we transfered up to public schools I think most of us could recite the mass just as well as the priest overseeing the service.  It really seemed disconnected for me.  Was there a God? Yea, I guess.  That's what I'd been told and I'd talked with Him plenty of times.  But really, I never understood (and still don't really or fully) what it meant to be in relationship with Him and Jesus and the Holy Spirit.

Speeding the 'rewind' segment up, two years ago my life and my perspective changed.  My attitude and my ability to experience life changed and my journey began.  As many know, my pregnancy with Madison was not planned.  It was full of stress and worry about how having a child at 23, not married (heck not even engaged at the time), living far from family, and without a kick-butt job would ultimately change my life.  I didn't lean into God.  I leaned into myself and the people around me trying to do things the way I thought our world expected me to.  God knew better.

It's hard to describe the immediate change I felt.  I guess if I had to pin-point a moment, it would have been when we were driving back from the hospital.  I believe down to my core, that I was filled with God's graces and the Holy Spirit on that drive (it felt like a warm bubble..and while I was sad, I was okay).  It was the first time in my life I had felt that way and recognized it as such.  And so, the faith journey began.

Now I hope I don't get too confusing here.  I didn't know it was the big H.S. at the time.  I just knew it was God and for the first time in my life I just knew.  He was real and He was here.

Now bring in The SHACK.  It's interesting looking back and seeing how things have been placed in your life to lay a foundation for later.  This book was one of those.  I read this book about a month before losing Madison.  At the time, the themes that really shined bright were the ones relating to relationships.  I, of course,  kept relating it back to my relationship with Broghan and thought of it as a guidepost for us to look at.  However, it played a pretty pivotal role in my ability to cope with my loss.  The ideas of good and bad and how we're all God's children and how He wants to relate with us as such didn't seem important until looking at it in hindsight.  (I'm hoping that if you have yet to read this, you'll be intrigued enough to go out and find it and read it).

Moving forward I began leaning more into God and my faith for comfort and recognizing what blessings I'd been given.  Madison was a blessing.  Broghan has been and continues to be a blessing.  I leaned hard into him and into Him and survived particularly well in my opinion.  I re-read The Shack and those other themes really stuck out and really stuck inside my head.  Broghan and I began attending an amazing church and real understanding of the Bible began.  Slowly, it began.

As I'm sure many of you know, my life has been put into fast forward for the past two years.  Two babies (and one on the way), a wedding, a move, a new home, change of cars, change of lifestyle, new friends, new jobs, new interests and educational pursuits.  It's been a lot.  But I've also taken quite a bit if time and focused on my faith.  Broghan and I began searching out a church home when we moved to Eau Claire and we spent a few months doing what I like to call "church hopping".  We'd attend one, then another, then another, then go back to one of the other ones.  We finally settled on one and have enjoyed the services when we've been able to go.  

Also, last year after Keller was born I was invited by a friend to attend a local Christian mom's group called SAMmy's.  It allowed me the opportunity to not only connect with mom's (such a blessing!) but to also have a safe, friendly, and low-pressure environment to test out my "God wings".  (haha a term I just conjured up..but hopefully you understand what I mean)

sorry to end it short and in a weird spot...tired & the game is on..soooo to be continued!

Fun Fall days!

So as the leaves have now officially started falling off of our maple (I think it's a maple??) in the back yard, raking leaves season has begun as well.  Two days ago I made the big attempt of using our blower to get everything into a big pile and really, it wasn't a pretty sight to watch.  As I blew leaves and dirt and mulch one direction, God and his almighty wind attempted to blow it the other...meaning right back in my face.  Bleh.  But eventually I did make a decent enough pile that it didn't blow away over the next two days.

Yesterday, I spent some time in the morning being crafty (I'm not really all that crafty that often) and made our very own 'scarecrow'.  He's not very scary...at all.  But he's sturdy! So I don't think he'll be blowing away anytime soon or falling apart, which is really the main goal.  This things got to last through Thanksgiving folks..

  I also used some old socks and balled them up, covered them in $1 fabric I bought from our local 'goodwill' type store and made little hanging ghosts!  Ah...so festive! haha.

 Combine those with the corn stalks our neighbors had given us a few weeks back and I'd say we're pretty close to being fully decorated for this fall season. :)  All we're really missing in a new flag out front (we currently have the American flag...which is good, but really, it's football season...so a GBPacker's one is really what needs to be waving out there).

Anyways, today I finally got around to bagging the last of the leaves and captured a few (and by few I mean two) good pictures of Keller.  The other ones I got are okay, I mean, it shows him in the leaves and all...but he's not looking at the camera or smiling...so these were the best! And some video of Keller walking all around like he does, and Marvin being a bit of a spaz like he is.

Update in Video format..

I try to get as much onto video as possible.  Sorry that the quality isn't any better but I'm usually taking it on our digital camera and it can get tricky.  Enjoy!

Hanging in the yard..

This is what we like to call a Kiss Attack!

This is his awesome new skill of being able to climb off of things...like the couch.

Keller playing in his new Fire truck!

Update in Picture format.

So once again I've managed to go more than a month without updating on what we've been up to.  I don't really have the motivation or time to detail it all in words but hopefully the photo collage will be good enough :) I know many of you are just looking for fun pics of the Keller-man so I'll do what I can!!!  Enjoy!

Preggers!

So it's finally been made public knowledge, but I'm pregnant again! Something we're very excited about and happy to be able to share.

Technically we took a pregnancy test way back in early September that came back positive but because of the way the scheduling with doctors work, we didn't have an appointment with a medical doctor until October 4th, where we were lucky enough to hear a heart-beat! it was hard to find, as it always is with my children, but the nurse finally got a good tone and said it was somewhere in the 160's.  That's 100 beats per minute FASTER than my own heart-rate.  Crazy..

Anyways, we weren't able to make an ultrasound work that day, so we scheduled it for a week out.  This past Tuesday the 12th.  Honestly, it was the fastest ultrasound appointment I'd ever had and I loved it! We checked in, got called, walked right into the room, did the ultrasound and back out.  Awesome.  It showed that I was 12 weeks, that day, and that my due date is April 26th of next spring. (obviously). We also got a more accurate sound-bite of the heart beat and it was at 169!  Broghan is already thinking girl....but I guess we'll see in about 28 weeks!