To celebrate our sweet Jordan today, we went to the cemetery and released balloons.  We will take our annual trip to the Great Wolf Lodge next week. 

We enjoyed our time together.  The boys loved celebrating their baby brother and Joss is starting to get an understanding. 

Happy 3rd birthday Jordan.  We love you and miss you like crazy.  But we know you are celebrating with Jesus! 

3 years ago today, I was sitting in a hospital room waiting to go into labor with our sweet Jordan.  3 years.  In some ways it seems like it just happened. There are so many things I will forever remember about that day. The look on the nurses face when she confirmed there was no heartbeat.  The friends that came to see me and prayed over me.  The nurse who took care of me in anti-natal (while I was on bedrest with Camron and Caden) who came to see me. My dr. who came in on his day off to deliver my boy. My husband and mom who stayed with me all day and into the night and listened to the ridiculousness that came out of my mouth and prayed silently and out loud. The feelings I had as that day progressed.  

When a monumental event happens in your life, it obviously impacts you. Stays with you forever. And while these memories aren't exactly "joyous" ones, they are important to me because they lead up to the short time I got to spend with Jordan.    

In the past 3 years, God has put people in my path who I have been able to minister to through their pain.  I'm so grateful for those opportunities and especially for the friendships that have blossomed from them.  

I miss my son every day. There's not a single day that goes by that I don't think of him.  I often wonder who he would look like.  If he'd have my eyes and Daddy-O's lips.  I rest in the fact that even though he was only in my arms for a short while, he is forever in the arms of Jesus.  He will never know the pain or trials of this earth.  And one day we will be reunited and oh, what a glorious day that will be! 

James 1:2-4

Consider it all joy, my brethren, when you encounter various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces endurance. And let endurance have its perfect result, so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing. 

Nana and Poppi took the boys to the beach "with the awesome playground" for a few days.  They had a great time! Unfortunately I don't have any pictures of the awesome playground but I do have a few of their adventures!  They even got to stay an extra night because the manager/owner liked Jaxon so much! What can I say? He takes after his mama ;)!

 

Here they are getting attacked by a giant crab!

Walking the beach with Poppi! Oh, how I wish I knew what they were talking about....

How stinkin' handsome is he?  Love my little fisherman!

Joss got a lot of attention from Mommy and Daddy-O while the boys were gone! We went on a few shopping adventures ourselves, planted some flowers, and did some cleaning! So maybe the beach sounds like way more fun but we still enjoyed our time here!
  

com·fort·a·ble

  [kuhmf-tuh-buhl, kuhm-fer-tuh-buhl] 

adjective

1.

(of clothing, furniture, etc.) producing or affording physical comfort, support, or ease

2.

being in a state of physical or mental comfort; contented and undisturbed; at ease: 

I don't know about you, but I like to be comfortable.  Comfortable in my home, comfortable in my car, comfortable wherever I may be.  If it's too hot, we turn on a fan.  If it's too cold, we snuggle up under a blanket.  If we're hungry we eat.  You get my point.  But I think we have become TOO comfortable in some ways.  So much so that as we go about our day to day life we miss opportunities to reach lost souls for the sake of keeping ourselves "comfortable".    Maybe it's the book I'm currently reading or many of the discussions lately at church, most likely it's the Holy Spirit moving, but I feel the need to step out of my comfort zone.  Maybe comfort isn't so important after all.   Honestly we shouldn't be "at ease" with the huge mission field we live in each day.  If you leave your house and go out in public, more than likely  you have come in contact with someone who doesn't know Jesus or who doesn't know the truth about Jesus.  How can we be "content" or "undisturbed" knowing this? There's a revival on the horizon people.  It is my prayer that I don't miss any opportunities for the sake of comfort.

What have we been up to?

Spring has been teasing us lately!  It's warm one day and sleeting the next!  Jaxon started baseball so we are enjoying that!  The boys participated in a Tae Kwon Do tournament and did great!  They got 3 medals each!  We've enjoyed some fun days out in the sun, jumping on the trampoline, riding bikes and playing ball.  This week we spent the night at Grandma and Papa's and saw some of our sweet friends.  Sadly, Bailey, our cat of 11 years got out 2 weeks ago and we haven't found him yet.  We haven't given up but we've all been pretty sad about that.  A neighbor called and said he saw him on the walking trail not far from out house.  

Here are a few pictures....

The boys after their tournament

Playing outside at Nana and Poppi's

Easter Sunday.  Unfortunately, Daddy-O had to work

Our sweet Bailey-Boo sleeping with Camron

Women's Retreat 2013

I am honestly not sure if I can put into words what I would like to say about this weekend.  I am typically not an "immediate blogger".  But my heart is just overflowing with what God has done this weekend so I decided an attempt at putting it to words was my best choice.
This weekend was amazing.  I spent time with the most wonderful ladies.  I had a small group who was  truly hand picked by the Lord.  I was blessed to be in a group with some ladies I had never met, some I had met but had always wanted to get to know better, and some who know me better than just about anyone!  Our conversations, both silly and serious, were just a blessing to me!

Here is THE best small group at Mirror Image Retreat 2013 ;)

My roommates were the best as well!  All but one of the girls were close friends before we left but each of them made an impact on me in different ways this weekend.  It was amazing to see God work so intimately yet so differently on each and every heart in our room.

Ok, so we didn't do a very good job on this picture.  Love them anyway ;)

The music this weekend was phenomenal.  Emily, Carrie and Jakenya (not pictured) just brought so much emotion to the surface.  I'm 99.9% sure there wasn't a dry eye in the room Saturday night.

The view from our room was breathtaking.  It was hard to sleep in (yes even with no kids and yes I'm only speaking for myself and not my roomies) because I knew I would miss the sunrise over the ocean.  Looking out over the sea....it seems never-ending.  It just reminds you of the love our Heavenly Father feels for us.  

Our speaker, Lara Williams, was fantabulous.  She let God use her and because of that He moved in a mighty way this weekend.  Hearts were changed.  Chains were broken.  Seeds planted by the enemy were pulled up by the roots and thrown out for-e-ver.  Ladies are going home to bear some fruit.  I am excited to see the way the Lord is going to use us, change us, and work in us. 

Finally, I thought I would share a few pictures that I just liked...for *various reasons!

*We had a beautiful view of the pier.  I wore my Uggs...on the beach.  The "boardwalk" was just about as far as we went.  I rocked my HE>i trucker hat (and probably will a lot more).  Kel and I took shadow portraits and very likely looked like lunatic.  Ang and I were sad that our friend was home sick.  Another sunrise shot.  A lot of shopping bags (but they belonged to 5 different people so cut us some slack).  And the beach as we bid our farewell (and maybe even sang that song from The Sound of Music...more than any passers by would want to hear.)

Green belts

The boys just tested for their green belts in Tae Kwon Do.  I didn't get a pic once they actually got them but I took a few action shots!

The rest were too way too blurry because they were breaking boards!  So proud of these boys!  They did their form wonderfully, broke their boards like champs, and recited both of their yellow belt bible verses!!