Mama knows what mama likes

In the midst of all the cold and snowy weather, I've forgotten the few reasons that I L.O.V.E. this time of year! In the previous 2 years, I was working so hard on losing weight and getting in shape, I didn't enjoy my favorite March goodies, but this year...Bring.It.On!
Any guesses on what it is that has my taste buds all riled up?

#1

In case you live on another planet, those, my friend, are GIRL SCOUT COOKIES! My 2 favorite kinds, Samoas (I knew them as Carmel Delights in my Brownie Years) and Tagalongs (also known to me as Peanut Butter Patties). I'm so thankful these only come out once a year, otherwise I'd be in trouble!


#2.
...and this delightful little guy is a Shamrock shake from McDonald's! I love the minty goodness of this sucker and while I've had a ...ahem...FEW...of those delightful Girl Scout Cookies this year, I've yet to indulge myself with one of these bad boys. I sense one coming up in my near future, though. One time a lady in front of me at McDonald's ordered a Shamrock shake with 1/2 shamrock and 1/2 chocolate...I've not tried that before, but I can't imagine it would be a bad thing!
Happy Spring-ish! :D I'm off to have my blood sugar levels tested now ;)

Boy oh Boy oh Boy!

The Gray's will be seeing more Blue! Our ultra sound last week gave us a very good shot of our new baby boy to be! We wanted to come up with a special way to reveal the sex of our 3rd child, and I loved the way it unfolded. Chris and the boys came with me to the Dr's and into the ultra sound room. First, I have to say, even in the 2 years since we've had Mason, the technology of the ultra sounds has advanced tremendously! We had one 4-D shot, which I've never seen before, and it was amazing! You can actually see the baby's face..the skin, the shape of the nose, the eyes...it's crazy! We asked the technician to whisper to Levi the baby's sex and then Levi told us.
When he turned around and said "It's a boy", I just was overwhelmed. I really thought that I would feel disappointed or discouraged if it wasn't a girl, but once I heard "boy", it didn't matter at all. I think the technician started to worry because the tears just kept streaming down my face throughout the rest of her scans. I was just happy!
I never had a brother and while I was around my some of my boy cousins a lot, I was never close to them. It's such a joy to be surrounded by my own family of men! I'm totally up for the challenges, the surprises, and the action that 3 boys will bring into my life.
We've not decided on a name yet, which doesn't surprise us at all. Levi was going to be named Caleb, all the way through the first 8 months of pregnancy. Then, scouring through a baby book, I came across the name Levi and fell in love with it. It took all the way through the delivery to convince Chris, but obviously, Levi won out. We didn't know if Mason was a girl and, of course, we had the girl name figured out, but the only boy name we thought we might use was Owen. When he was born, Owen just wasn't right. It was nearly an hour after he was born and we were STILL trying to come up with a name! Chris started reading through his list of boy names, and as he was rattling off names, he said "Mason" and I looked at him and looked at the baby in my arms and said, "He's Mason" and so it was.
I ran into the Family Christian Store today and they were having a great sale on some books. I picked up, "Raising a Modern Day Knight" and "Wild Things..The Art of Nurturing boys". Now I just have to figure out when I will have time to read the books, you know, since I'll be so busy raising my boys!!

Productive Disobedience

Oxymoron? Not in this case. Earlier this week I had given Levi a few things that I needed him to do to help me out. The list included things like, getting his dirty laundry IN the basket instead of around it; putting his bed-time buddies (a blanket and dog) back in his bed; cleaning up legos; etc..
He did all of those things, except only 1/2 way or less. When I asked him to put his laundry in the basket he threw 1/2 of it in the basket and the other 1/2 he shoved where I couldn't see it. When I told him to put the bed-time things away, he threw them right in the doorway of his room, not on his bed as I had instructed. Any task I had given him he completed less than fully. I explained to him that partial obedience equals disobedience. (In a 4 year olds language, of course)
That got me thinking. I do that all the time...to God. I justify a lot of sin because I'm not being blatantly sinful. Here are some of the things that God brought to my mind that I've been doing lately that fall short of pleasing Him.

"It's not really gossiping...I'm just trying to explain how I feel about the situation with this other person"

"It's not really gossiping...I'm sharing a PRAYER REQUEST"
*maybe gossip is something I need to work on!-You think?

"It's not porn that I'm watching, it's just the story of one guy falling in love with a dozen girls and spending LOTS of time in hot tubs with them"

"I'm not lying, I'm just making the story a bit more dramatic by adding a few details, but the IDEA is the same"

"I don't think it's stealing, I look at the clerk's oversight of my box of diapers as a "blessing to our finances" !

"I'm not being a glutton, I'm pregnant, therefore I need to EAT as much as I want as often as I want"

There are a lot more examples I could give, but I think I've exposed enough of myself for one day!
Do you ever find yourself doing this? Have your kids taught you any good lessons lately through their disobedience? What's on your mind this week?

Simple Pleasures

You know those things that just make your heart dance? Those small gestures, gifts, moments that leave you feeling secure, loved, cozy? What are they? What are your simple pleasures? Kelly at Kelly's Korner posted about this yesterday and I've come up with a few of my own simple pleasures...

1. A Starbucks peppermint mocha on the day of the first snowfall
2. An unexpected, unprompted "I love you mama"
3. REAL mail! A card, a note, a check..I'm not picky, ANYTHING with real handwriting on it :D
4. A surprise phone call from a distant friend
5. Hearing these elusive words at the dinner table: "wow, honey (or mom) this dinner is really good!"
6. Christmas
7. Clean sheets on a tightly made bed
8. Empty laundry baskets and and empty washer/dryer
9. Vacuum lines on the carpet
10. Long conversations with friends
11. Stolen kisses w/ my man!
12. Laughing till it hurts
13. Re-connecting with a friend I've not been in touch with for a while and feeling like no time has passed
14. A good book!
15. BLOG COMMENTS :)

So, do you agree with me on any of these? Are yours completely different? Share...

A boy and his tacos

My boy LOVES taco night at our house! I love taco night at our house, because it's about the only meal that I can prepare that will bring pure joy to our dinner table. This particular night (about a week ago) I made tacos for dinner and Levi, 4 year old, 31#, little Levi, ate 3 1/2 Tacos! And they were loaded...meat, cheese, tomatoes, white sauce (sour cream) and "tasty red sauce" (salsa).
If he eats 3 when he's 4 years old...how many will eat when he's 16, and what will that mean for my grocery budget??

I think this was #3, and we also LOVE Sonic happy hour...1/2 off drinks!

Mason loves taco night too, he's just not as passionate as his brother concerning the tacos!

Randomings

**I hit the 17-week mark of pregnancy #3 TODAY! So far, everything is normal and we'll be finding out boy or girl on February 9! I am so excited to know, I truly have no idea. Statistically, it should be a boy, but I never liked math, so maybe I'll fail the statistics!

**Chris was in England for 6 days last week. Don't feel sorry for me, though! My mom came on Monday night and spent pretty much the whole time he was gone with us. She's so great at keeping the boys busy and giving me lots of "me" time. I loved it!! I also LOVED having Chris back home on Friday afternoon. The poor guy is pretty jet-lagged and exhausted, but we're just staying home this weekend to help get him adjusted.

**While my mom was here, I had the opportunity to have dinner with my oldest (not by years, but amount of time) friend Jill. We met at PF Chang's in Lansing and had a delicious dinner and great conversation. Jill and I went to school together from Kindergarten-graduation and have been friends since about 4th or 5th grade. (Minus 8th grade, right Jill?) It's so nice to have a friend who has traveled life with you. There is no need for long background explanations about family dynamics or why we make the choices we do, we've been there through it all together. We do not see each other much, but we have one of those wonderful friendships where we can pick up right where we left off. I love that in a friend!

**I have a confession...The Bachelor/Bachelorette shows are one of my biggest guilty pleasures. I was so excited when this new season started 2 weeks ago, you have no idea. I know the show is pretty smutty and not really great moral watching, but I love it. My love may be fading...the bachelor on this season is an airline pilot. He took one of the girls in an airplane and flew her around some snazzy scenery, while in the background, "On the Wings of Love" played...seriously?!?! Cheese, anyone? It was almost too hard to watch..I should mention that the subtitle of the season is "On the Wings of Love", it seems like they are going to play this pilot card for every thing they can...gag!

**Do you memorize bible verses? Do you have a system for doing this? It's something I've really wanted to start doing, but I've always put it off or not gotten very far with. Any suggestions or ideas on how to get started and successfully pull it off? Should I do one a month? Two a month?

**I guess that's all for now. We're enjoying a quiet Saturday at home. My jet-lagged husband is napping and so is my wild little Mason. Both of my boys were awake at 6.45 this morning...we are an 8.00 family, but I guess they didn't get the memo on that today! We kept making them go back to bed, but they never went back to sleep...grrr! Enjoy your weekend!

What holds you back?

I may have mentioned before that I am studying Esther, (Beth Moore's study) and LOVING it! If I haven't mentioned it before, well I'm studying Esther using Beth Moore's study and I love it! This past week, we watched one of the video sessions which focused mainly on when Esther tells Mordecai that she will go to the King and she says, "If I perish, I perish." Meaning, she will literally risk her life and go see the King without an invitation in order to fulfill what Mordecai has already told her, might be her destiny, and save the Jews from complete distruction. (Esther "Who knows but that you might have been placed here for such a time as this?") If you've not read the book of Esther in a while, or ever, go read it!
The most profound thing (to me) that Beth Moore says in her video is that we can let our fear keep us from our calling. Our destiny. I can think of so many examples in my life where I have let fear keep me from doing something that might have changed a path in my life or a path in someone else's life. I firmly believe that none of my choices or times when I have let fear rule over me change ANYTHING about God, His plan or purpose for my life or anyone else's. God is God and His plan will be fulfilled, the issue is whether or not I will let fear keep me from being a part of that plan.
Stick with me here...
Last night Chris and I went on a wonderful date night and saw the Movie, The Blind Side. Such a great, great movie! What struck me the most was Sandra Bullock's character. She did NOT live in fear. From opening her home (a ginormous, beautiful home) to a large, wandering, African-American male, to hunting down his mama in the projects, to confronting a group of men who were threatening her and her family when she was very outnumbered. I kept thinking throughout the movie that this is exactly a case where fear could have kept her from her destiny...and in that case, her fear could have kept Michael Ohrer from his destiny.
I pray for courage like that. I do not want to live in fear any longer. I don't think until this week, I've ever fully realized that fear does have it's hold on me. In.Everyday.Life. I don't tell friends who don't know Jesus about his amazing love, for fear of losing that friendship. I don't try to befriend the other parents at Pre-school for fear of being rejected. I don't always obey the promptings of the Holy Spirit to reach out to a friend or stranger because I fear being misunderstood, seeming too desperate, trying to hard, being rejected.
It's time to kick fear in it's rear and live like Queen Esther, making my motto, "If I perish, I perish." And the reality is, MOST, if not all, of the things in my life that fear keeps me from, will not put me in a position where perishing is even an option!
So, I ask, What is fear keeping you from?