Perspectives

So, at church on Sunday I made a quick pit-stop in the ladies' room before heading into the service. As soon as I walked in, I immediately realized I was given a front-row seat for a conversation between 2 sweet grandmamas talking about their precious grandbabies (being in the restroom, I feel the need to clarify the "front-row seat" is figurative; don't worry, I had the door closed). Anyway, they were chatting away about the precious children learning how to share. One of them was going on and on about how her precious 2-year old grand-daughter would walk up to her younger sibling (presumably a baby), and announce that the baby wouldn't share, so she would snatch the toy out of the baby's hand and walk around continuing her announcement about the baby not sharing, all the while cradling the toy.

And the 2 grandmamas thought it was the funniest, cutest thing.

However, being the mom of a precious 2-year old myself, my blood pressure rose just picturing that situation in my house! OH! How hard we work at teaching Jack to share, and love on Bebe Will, and to find another toy and how he can have the one Will is playing with in just 5 minutes. And how snatching is WRONG. And it's infuriating when he just doesn't get it (or remember) and he makes another child howl. Maybe HIS sweet grandmamas are a bit more gracious than his mommy and find it cute and precious...I guess it's all about perspectives.

Another example: Anything that didn't happen in the past 30 minutes Jack refers to it as happening yesterday. I can try and try to explain, but at some point I have just learned to embrace it and say, "Yep. Yesterday. It snowed at Jack's house yesterday." (I WISH!)

And at my Beth Moore bible study group last night (that ROCKS, by the way - the incredible ladies and the material - I LOVE it!), we ended up talking some about conflict resolution...and how perspective can change everything. I think sometimes I'm really great at the whole empathy thing...imagining what it might be like for the other person and how they must feel. But at times, I truly suck at it (and what makes it worse, when I get to that point, I sometimes don't really even care!).

So my prayer has become this: Lord, give me YOUR vision for people. Let me view them as you do. Help me take off the part of me that can be an embarrassment to You and a hindrance to others. And show me how to LOVE.

It's all a matter of perspectives.

And oh, what I would give for 5 minutes of THIS right now... (by the way, this house can be yours! Just pay the $249,000 HOA dues for the awesome pool and we'll throw this house in for FREE!)

Quick Recap

Dear readers (all 3 of you...),

I am alive. And I promise not to take a month-long vacation again. It really has been a crazy month, but it's truly pathetic that I didn't even take 5 minutes to record SOMETHING to the bloggity blog. So, for memory's sake, here's a brief recap of the month...and as a heads' up, you might hear more about some of the stories in the next few posts.

May:

9 Mother's Day: I told J not to spend a dime due to the fact that I was about to get the next 2 weekends away...but he still surprised me with breakfast in bed, bottled Coke (otherwise known as amazingnessinaglassbottle), and Buffalo Wildwings...plus getting to spend it with my amazing husband, 2 precious babies AND at church. EXCELLENT day.

11 Jack's last day of Mrs. C's class! So sad! He had an incredible semester in her class and I'm SO thankful for the experience (and a few mornings of grocery store trips without a toddler). :)

12 - 16 BEACH!!!! With several friends...and not a single child in sight (between the group of us, there were 24 little ones left at home with daddies - and they all survived!). One of my favorite parts of this trip (besides the incredible company, awesome conversations, snow crab for every meal, and perfect weather) was that I got to sleep ALLLLL NIGHT LONG. 4 nights in a row....that's literally a first since I was pregnant with Jack (which was over 3 years ago, just for the record). Huge shout-out to J, my mom and J's mom for helping to make this getaway possible!

21 - 23 BEACH AGAIN!! This time, with the girls from my mom's side of the fam...my mom, sister, 2 aunts and 2 of my 3 cousins from that side of the family. Again, great company, lots of laughs, great food and perfect weather...but Will got to come on this trip (I just couldn't leave J with BOTH boys 2 weekends in a row). I tried very, very hard not to feel guilty about the beach time I got without J and the Rocket. But MAN, it sure was nice!

22 Jack almost drowned. Seriously. I will definitely be blogging on this later. Let me just summarize with this: God is faithful. And sovereign. And definitely still working on J and me over the whole ordeal.

So, those were just a few of the things that stand out. There were so many funny stories, laughs, things learned and messages that I felt God was shouting at me all month...sorry I'm too sleep-deprived to remember most of them. For the things that are still running through my mind, I PROMISE to not wait another month to write about them.

Love,

Me.