Glory

Be exalted, O God, above the highest heavens. May your glory shine over all the earth. Psalm 108:5
For the Lord is high above the nations;his glory is higher than the heavens. Psalm 113:4
Not to us, O Lord, not to us, but to your name goes all the glory for your unfailing love and faithfulness. Psalm 115:1
Let them all praise the name of the Lord. For his name is very great; his glory towers over the earth and heaven! Psalm 148:13
They were calling out to each other,“Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of Heaven’s Armies! The whole earth is filled with his glory!” Isaiah: 6:3
“Glory to God in highest heaven, and peace on earth to those with whom God is pleased.” Luke 2:14
For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory. All glory to him forever! Amen. Romans 11:36

I can't do anything...

...except sit here and pray that this headache goes away. A headache that has been wiped me out for 4 days, put me in a fog and caused every single part of my being to hurt. I feel like curling up in my bed and dying. Last night on our fabulous date Hubby and I were talking about heaven and I was saying how homesick I was to just be with Jesus forever. Yikes! Maybe the Lord is giving me my wish. Ok, sorry that's not funny.


Appreciate your prayers. I'm off to find some more drugs (don't worry, over the counter). Although nothing has helped with the pain, maybe I can find something that will knock me out. Good night!

Date Night

Guys, have you taken your lady out on a date recently? Well, time's a wasting! And it's one of the best things you can do to strengthen your marriage. And IT DOES NOT have to be anything fancy or expensive. Let me tell ya, a nice walk in the park, holding hands and getting ice cream is one of the best dates ever.

So tonight Hubby took me on a date. We have SO many new restaurants in our town and I know he's been wanting to try one but wouldn't tell me. I was pleasantly surprised to find us at Toyko Japanese Restaurant. The local paper recently had a review and it got 4 out of 4 stars. Although I don't like sushi and I'm a little picky so I was a little nervous.

The restaurant is tiny so it was a little uncomfortable waiting for a table, having to stare at everyone eating. We had to wait about 20 minutes for a table which is really good in our town. I ordered the Hibachi Steak, Hubby ordered some Box thing and we also ordered bacon wrapped asparagus appetizers. We both got soup and salad with our meals and I did not care for it at all. Then my Hibachi Steak came which was kind of weird because we hadn't got our appetizer yet. My meal was wonderful. The steak was tender and cooked perfectly. Eventually the rest of the meal came. Hubby had like 5 different things, the only one he knew for sure was salmon. I thought that was funny, he had no idea what he was eating but he said it was really good.

Even though it was pretty crowded and I didn't care for the soup and salad it was a very nice meal, almost romantic even :-) Then instead of taking the interstate home, we took the long way and drove through town, listening to worship music blaring, every once in awhile turning it down to talk. Had to stop and get ice cream on the way home of course!

As we drove through town we could see the full moon across the clear sparkling sky in front of us. As soon as we pull into the driveway our new neighbors pull into their driveway. They actually don't move in until Monday so it was the first time we've seen them. We had a nice visit and got to share a little about our family.

Thank you Lord! What great date with my great hubby!

Each of you must love his wife as he loves himself, and the wife must respect her husband. Ephesians 5:33

My wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system

Rated M for mature audiences! :-)

We've decided to tackle my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system again.

Way back in college, about 1994, I had my first experience with my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system. I woke up to excruciating pain and went into the bathroom. I passed out as I got out of the shower (even put a huge hole in the wall where my head hit!). Anyway my roommate takes me to the ER where they find out I have grapefruit size cysts on my ovaries. I go into surgery after they tell me they may need to take my ovaries. Oh gee, that's comforting! Thankfully that didn't happen but one of the cysts had ruptured causing internal bleeding so they couldn't use a scope, they had to cut me open....which started this whole big mess with my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system

Long story short, I've battled cysts and pain every month since then. In addition, since that first surgery scar tissue has grown and grown around my ovaries and created all types of havoc. My first husband and I battled infertility and saw numerous doctors all of them telling us they didn't really know what was wrong, I have scar tissue and that's probably what's wrong, the only way to get pregnant is to do invitro.

So when hubby and I got married I knew we'd have this battle again. We've also been to numerous doctors, all of them saying the same thing. We've never pursued invitro, just never having peace about it and feeling we'd rather spend $10,000 on adoption. However, I've heard of other "methods" to treat infertility and we've never looked at those options. I would make an appointment or actually see a different doctor but then give up after a few months. Not sure if I'm just lazy, or doubtful, or sometimes I think I convince myself that God doesn't need these doctors for me to get pregnant. I know that's true but I also know my body has a wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system and that God can use these doctors to help bring healing. I don't want to look back 10 years from now and regret not looking into other things.

So yesterday after once again having to deal with my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system I started to do some research and ask close friends about their experiences.

On Friday I have an appointment with a doctor/chiropractor/massage therapist/acupuncturist. She's had specific experience with infertility and even if I don't get pregnant I would love to find some relief from my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system. Then next Tuesday I have an appointment with a family doctor who works alot with infertility and who works closely with the Creighton Model. My first question will be if my tubes are messed up or I have all this scar tissue and fibroids, then will the Creighton Model really do anything? And then just in case the family doctor wants me to see a OBGYN specialist I made an appointment with an OBGYN (3 weeks from now) that specializes in wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive systems and infertility.

I can't say that I'm looking forward to having a gazillion needles poking me but I'm told by some dear friends that it's not that creepy and that the acupuncturist doctor is really great. She is a graduate of my alma mater's rival so that brings me great concern. Go rabbits!

At the same we still feel called to adopt so we're going to proceed with our adoption plans. We have orientation on October 6th with the agency that will be doing our home study and possibly our adoption. (We haven't decided 100% yet if we should do an agency or private adoption.)

Hubby is so patient as I deal with my wacked out, psychotic, hormonal, pain inducing reproductive system and for that I'm very grateful. He's promised that he'll encourage and support me through another round of doctoring. One of my friends said it's pretty much a part time job charting all that needs charted for the Creighton Model but if it can bring healing and maybe even a little one I'm ready for the challenge!

Prayer

A couple of prayer requests...

I shared with you earlier this week the story of Copeland. She went home to be with Jesus today. Please continue to keep her family in your prayers.

And also you can pray for the Piper family. You can read about their sorrow here.

Pressure

I was on my way to work this morning thinking about my blog. "I wonder if anyone reads my blog." I thought to myself. "Hhmmm, I better come up with something way better than 'Life with Charlie'."

Talk about pressure. Does anyone else feel this tremendous weight on their shoulders to come up with witty, informative, inspirational and life-changing blogs? I've noticed that a good majority of blogs are written by women. No offense, guys, I've seen some good blogs written by you too. But the majority of those that I read are written by women. And the majority of the ones that make me laugh so hard I wet my pants or cry so hard my husband thinks Charlie died, are written by women.

Women. We do it all don't we? Among other things we pay the bills, buy the groceries, keep the house in order, kiss the kid's owies, make marvelous meals and keep our hubbies happy. Ok, we don't really do it all. As a bible believing Christian woman that would be disrespectful of my fabulous husband to convince you of this. But I do have to say, us womenly folk do alot.

And now, thanks to blogland we have the added pressure to create masterpieces of wit and charm, bring encouragement and comfort to complete strangers and convince about a gazillion people that we actually know what we're talking about...


I stand corrected. The title of this post should be privilege.

Life With Charlie

This is a little late but happy birthday Charlie! Charlie is my puppy that just turned 10 on September 16th. No, I haven't lost my mind - I know Charlie can't read but he's part of our family so I have to blog about him. He's getting up there in age and it makes me sad to think we only have a few years left with him.

Charlie is so cute. Even when he's soaking wet, he's cute as can be. And he's secure in his cuteness. Like today it rained. There's Charlie sitting on the deck getting wet and wilty and stinky. But he doesn't care. He knows we'll let him in the house and help him dry off. And he's got the cutest little face. He actually looks just like an Ewok, especially when he's due for a haircut.

Right now he's sleeping. How can dogs sleep all day and then be so tired that they have to sleep all night. It amazes me. I think I would like that life (at least for a few days). And then within a matter of seconds he'll jump up and be ready to wrestle with our other two dogs. He is horribly abused because he's short. Ed and Alie will tower over him and bite his ears. He gets them back by knawing on their legs :-)

He's also a begger (that's what he's doing in the picture). He'll sit on his hind end for hours if we let him and beg away. He doesn't beg to Hubby because he knows he'll get scolded (poor Charlie). But he knows full well who Grama and Aunt Laurel are and will beg like crazy to them, again knowing full well that it will be worth his effort.

Oh Charlie dog, you're such a good friend!

Grasp The Love

Yes, that is the title of our blog. But it's also what this family has been able to understand through their pain and sorrow. Please take a moment to pray for them today.

Peace

I haven't written much lately about our adoption. It's not that I haven't had anything to say. Maybe I've had too much to say and didn't know where to start.

The Lord brought such healing and peace to our hearts through the not-adoption of the twins. Our church family is amazing and we felt their prayers. We still pray for the twins and think of them and their birth mom often. It's amazing how you can become so connected to people and not even meet them. My prayer is that some day I can meet her and pray with her and encourage her.

Going through the process with the twins made me question my views on adoption. I know everyone has their opinion and their is no "right" way. However, after a number of past experiences Hubby and I had decided closed adoption was the best option for our family. This was one reason the twins seemed so perfect because it would have been a closed adoption.

However as I heard about the twins being in a room by themselves at the hospital and the birth mom or her family not even being able to say goodbye, or they not even meeting the family that would raise and love the twins my heart just broke. I can't even begin to imagine how the birth mom and family is feeling. So I'm doubting my feelings of closed adoption and wondering if we wouldn't have more peace with a semi-open adoption.

We've also been praying about adopting a sibling group, a 1 yr old and 2 yr old. We felt real peace about it so we sent in our profile. We then found out it would be just the 2 yr old. I really had my heart set on both of them and there were some other things that caused us to have uneasiness and loose that sense of peace. Hubby talked to the social worker and we came to a decision that it wasn't God's will for us to adopt any of these children. And the Lord gave peace.

It's amazing the wisdom of my Hubby. I'm totally emotional and it's like "any kid, doesn't matter, we'll take 'em!!" He's just a little more rational (thank you Lord). But he's also so patient and doesn't force anything on me. He'll wait patiently for me to come to the place where the Lord wants us to be. For that I'm so thankful. Hubby definetly doesn't wear his feelings on his sleeve so sometimes I doubt his excitement of this adoption. But to see him cry and hear him say, "I envisioned the twins, what they would look like, what our family would be like," just broke my heart and gave me peace that he wants to grow our family as much as I do.

As you can see, the theme today is peace. That even when my heart aches to be a mom and have little ones in our home and the pain is great as we think about the twins that won't be in our family, the Lord miraculously brings peace. It really is a peace that passes all understanding.

Everything

Jena 6 Update

I shared with you the other day some disturbing news from the small town of Jena Louisiana. It looks like the whole world is finally taking notice. Here's an update...

A Word From Pastor Paul

Pastor Paul is my boss and a pastor at our church. He sent all the staff this encouragement today.



What a beautiful picture!

Think of this as someone who is intimate with God.

This magnificent garden did not get that way by sitting idle.
Weeds would have come up.
Instead, it got that way through loving care and cultivation over time.

Think of that as the discipline and the time God desires to spend with us on a regular basis.
Let Him cultivate the weeds out so His new creation can shine in all it's beauty!

Terrible Tuesday?

Nope! This is the day the Lord has made. I will rejoice and be glad in ...

1. It rained today. A nice cool fall rain that makes you want to curl up in a blanket and read a good book.
2. Hubby asked me if I wanted to go to Culver's tonight to get ice cream. Oh ya!
3. The flowers a friend gave me over the weekend have not wilted.
4. I have amazing co-workers that are caring, prayful and outrageously crazy weird (I love you guys!).
5. I learned today that Jerusalem gets almost twice as much rain annually as the Sea of Galilee does.
6 I fit into a size smaller pants. Life is good!
7. Princess's new bedroom is really, truly, honestly, completely and finally done!
8. The beautiful, amazing redish orange sunset that filled the sky with a bright glow.
9. Our puppy dogs. Although they are under feet way too much they are always happy and glad to see us and ready to wrestly and have some fun.
10. Another day. Another breath. Another minute to live for you Lord. Thank you for this day.

Disturbing News

Check out this article about a small town in Louisiana. And here's a really powerful documentary about this same story.

When I read this and watched the documentary I felt outraged and helpless. As adoptive parents open to children of any race this could very well be something we will have to face in the new future. My heart is so burdened to think of our children facing this type of prejudice. We all have to continue to examine our hearts and change the world one prayer at a time and one person at a time.

1 Samuel 16:7

The Transformers

I laughed hard tonight. It was the first night of Life Groups. Life Groups are our high school youth small groups. They meet every Sunday night in homes. I have the priveledge of being an adult leader and it's one of the most rewarding things I do.

We have two student leaders for each group and they pretty much do everything. They plan the lesson and the games and whatever else we do. I'm just there to provide help when needed but these kids are so awesome - they need help very rarely.

Since it was our first night tonight we just hung out and talked and laughed SO MUCH! We talked alot about the name of our Life Group. Last year we were PowerHouse (taken from Eph 3:17-21) but we have a new group of kids so they wanted something different. Oh my goodness, they are so funny. The final vote came down to...

Circle of Friends
GPS (God's Postal Service - delivering His Word)
Global Warming (something about the fire of God ??)
Revolution
Transformers

The winner was Transformers and our verse is Romans 12:2.

These kids are so awesome. If you aren't involved with kids, whether it be babies, toddlers, preschoolers, elementary, middle school or high school I really encourage you to pray about how you can be used. It is so rewarding and I learn something from these kids every night. They really aren't all that scary :-)

I'm not sure what the names of the other Life Groups are but I do know we have the most amazing group of Transformers and I count it all joy to spend my Sunday nights with them!

You're Not So Cutesy Funny!

Here's a picture of our cool red furniture. If only we had it to enjoy - I know - be patient! :-). Oh ya, I forgot to tell you what a flirt my hubby is.

So we're looking at furniture and the sales lady is very outgoing (that's putting it nicely). Hubby has this problem of thinking he's funny and so he keeps making these ridiculous jokes. I would love to tell you one but they are so ridiculous I can't even remember.

So I shoe away the crazy sales lady and tell hubby he needs to stop flirting. "I'm not flirting," he says. "I'm just trying to be funny." Uh, well you're not. And I go on to give him a lesson in Women 101 and explain that when he jokes around and is all cutesy like, LADIES THINK YOU'RE FLIRTING and so he better just knock it off.

Kudos to him, he did stop being all cutesy funny but unfortunately the sales lady thought she was cutesy funny too and just kept going on and on. I won't even go there!

How Could I Forget?

After all the silly posts about our basement and the horrible pictures I can't believe I forgot to tell you IT IS FINISHED! Completely, entirely, all together finished.

Ok, not really but kind of. ?? We have all the major stuff done and all the necessary inspections are done so we can actually move stuff down there, although we don't really have anything to move down there yet. Now we're just finishing little stuff like putting up blinds, getting stuff for the bathroom. We bought our furniture (It's red! That's my hubby, living on the wild side) and a bed for Princess but that won't be here for a week!

I'll post some more horrible pictures when it's all done...really completely and entirely! And we'll throw a little "Yay, we've finished the basement and managed to go into even more debt but we have really cool red furniture" party!

A Day Spa for Women

Today my mom and I traveled to Marion, SD. Not the biggest town you'll see :-) but for sure some of the nicest people.

So the Day Spa is a women's retreat my mom and I started last year. There's worship and we talk about our really amazing God and we eat of course. And then we do "prayer stations" where the women journal and pray and one of the stations is foot washing/massage and hand massage. So it's not really a "spa" but it kind of is - it's a God spa.

We were invited to do a 1/2 day spa in Marion for a ladies church conference. Given all that has happened in the last few weeks I was not looking forward to going. In fact on Wednesday night I had decided I wasn't going to go. One of my dear friends and co-workers said, "Oh you ARE going Missy! It will be good for you." And she was so right. It was so refreshing and encouraging - I just love sharing with other women. The Lord laid it on my heart to share a little about the experience of the last few weeks.

At the end a couple ladies came up and said they wanted to pray over me. That is what is so cool. These ladies who we'd just met and they were reaching out to me and sharing the love of Christ - when we had come to minister to them. Isn't God cool. We said that alot today and it's so true.

I was able to stay home on Thursday and the Lord brought such great peace to my heart - just like His word says - a peace that passes all understanding. Don't get me wrong I'm still sad about losing the twins but we are trusting in God's plan and look forward to the next adventure.

For those in the area we're doing a Day Spa at Linwood Wesleyn on October 13th and one at Abiding Savior on November 17th. If you're church would like to look into hosting a Day Spa for Women let me know!

High School's Best Pocahontas

Here she is, our Princess as her high school's best Pocahontas.

Ok, they didn't really vote but she said EVERYBODY told her she was the best Pocahontas because she had the necklace and the tatoo thing on her arm.
I told her we could find copper colored washable marker! Let me tell you it was worth the midnight trip to Wally World (NO, we didn't really go to Wally World at midnight - it just felt that late).

All and all it's been a successful Homecoming week. Today they get to eat pizza and jump on big inflatables outside in the cold 50 mile an hour wind. That should be fun!

You Are Good

For the life of me I can't figure out how to attach a song to this blog. So you'll have to do a little leg work yourself to actually listen to...

But anyway on Sunday I was of course feeling pretty down. Frustrated, sad, angry, questioning yet trusting that God's will is perfect even through this latest let down. I so didn't want to go to church but I didn't have much of a choice because we were having a big event and it was important I was there. Believe me though that I don't put on a happy face - I'm honest with people about how I feel and what's going on and then the floodgates open and I cry, cry, cry.

So I'm on my way to church wondering how many are going to ask me about the adoption and how often I'll cry and how horribly puffy my face will be by the end of the day. A song comes on the radio and it was so perfect. It's a new song by Point of Grace and it's called "You Are Good".

Like I said I can't figure out how to attach it here but you can click on the link below to listen to it. Needless to say it's exactly how I was feeling and it was just the encouragment I needed to get through another day.

God is good.

You Are Good by Point of Grace

Snow White or Pocahontas

Wednesday is "Disney Day" at Princess's school. Huh? you may ask. It's homecoming week and every day the kids have a different theme. Today was "class color" day, tomorrow is "support the troops" day and Wendesday is "Disney Day". Not sure what Thursday and Friday are but that doesn't really matter...back on topic...

Princess: I think I'll be Pocahontas on Wednesday.

Missy: What!? Why not Snow White - she's your favorite.

Princess: I know but Snow White will be so hard - the big poofy dress and poofy sleeves and my hair isn't right.

Missy: We could find a short black wig.

Princess: Nah - I'll be Pocahontas, I already have the hair.

Missy: You have a Pocahontas wig?

Princess: (rolling eyes) Uh no, I have long dark hair.

Missy: Ooohhhh

10 minutes later...

Missy to Hubby: Princess is going to be Pocahontas on Wednesday.

Hubby looks confused so I go into the long explanation of homecoming week...

Hubby to Princess: What about Snow White?

Princess: Snow White will be so hard - the big poofy dress and poofy sleeves and my hair isn't right..

Hubby: Well you could pull it off.

Princess: I KNOW I could pull it off - I just want to be Pocahontas.


That's our girl!

God does answer...but sometimes He says "no"

I've dreaded writing this post. We heard from the family that they decided to go with another family - we will not be adopting the twins.

Continue to pray for us as we pray about our next step in this journey of adoption. Pray also for the birth mom and the babies, they'll be born via c-section on Monday.

Are You Ready For Some Football?

Yes, it is upon us once again. Football. The NFL season started tonight with a game between the Indy Colts and the New Orleans Saints. Here is a list of Hubby's favorite things on earth...

1. Jesus
2. His family
3. Football
4. His Jeep Wrangler
5. Football
6. His Jeep Wrangler
7. Football
8. His Jeep Wrangler
9. His dogs
10. Oh ya, did I say football?

Favorite Teams...

Hubby: New England Patriots
Princess: New England Patriots (can you say "daddy's girl"?)
Missy: Green Bay Packers, Washington Redskins, New Orleans Saints, really whoever is playing, I just hate to see anyone lose!

Goodbye Monday nights and Sunday afternoons!

Run, Princess, Run!

Our Princess is a x-country stud. These are pictures from her latest meet - makes us tired just looking at it.

One More Week!

Hubby worked hard this weekend to get the trim done on the two bedrooms and he'll finish up the family room this week. My dad is coming tonight to get the bathroom finished and the carpet will be installed in ONE WEEK! Ya!!!

Then Princess can move into her room and get settled and then we can start decorating the nursery! We told Princess that she has to promise to come upstairs at least twice a week to say hi to us! Good thing we all eat supper together every night, otherwise we'd never see her. She's so excited to have her own room and own bathroom, pretty much her own floor :-) Just what every 16-year old needs!

Speaking of bathroom, the first picture is of Princess's new bathroom in the basement. Nice color choice, huh! I think it'll look nice when it's all done but it sure is bright!

No news on the adoption. Still waiting to hear from the lawyer. The birth mom is scheduled to be induced 3 weeks from today if the babies don't come before! The second picture is of hubby with a few of our weekend purchases :-)

Stockin Up

Ok, maybe we're crazy but we decided that if we are blessed with two little ones in just a little over three weeks (yikes!) we need to be prepared. So we decided that at least once a week when we go to the store we'll buy a back of diapers. If it's not God's will that we adopt the babies then we'll just give the diapers to our local pregnancy crisis center.

Tonight we had to run to Wally World and found ourselves in the baby section. Ok, so we didn't get just diapers! Princess was with us and she's so sweet, she's so excited about possibly getting a little brother and sister. So we had to look at all the clothes and they had a bunch of newborn clothes on clearance. We picked out the following for each baby: a pack of onesies, a sleeper and a little jumper outfit.

I assured Hubby we wouldn't buy any more clothes, just diapers. :-) Oh, Lord please let it be your will that these little ones are to be a part of our family!