Saturday, August 14, 2010

praying

today i am praying:

that God will drive my dad's car for him.

that God will take away Rick's fears.

for peace for my grandmother.

that hard hearts will be softened.

that God will fill hearts with love and forgiveness, not fear and superiority.

that brothers and sisters will learn to get along.

for reconciliation and recovery.

for all of those Rick is leaving behind.

that i can learn to bite my tongue.

for wisdom.

that God will take away anger and pain.

for motivation.

for safety.

for my parents.

that God will give courage to those who need to stand up for what's right.

that God will help me forgive.

that Rick knows he is loved.

that Satan will lose this battle.

for our baby.

that God will be glorified through our words, our actions, and through Rick's victory.


praise God that we can pray. praise God for always hearing our prayers. praise God for loving us. praise God.

Tuesday, August 10, 2010

retreat

so this past weekend brent and i went to hotlanta for a meeting for bc's work. this was kind of a funny weekend for us because brent's job used to be my job. after i decided to come work at bhcc, my former boss asked brent to come work in his office. it has been an unbelievable blessing for both of us. brent is way better at the job than i was, and we are both loving what we are doing now. God really has been good.

anyway, this meeting we went to is called a retreat. what it really consists of is a lot (and i mean a lot) of work so that this group of people can drive several hours to some exotic location (like atlanta, birmingham, or huntsville) and spend less than 24 hours together. the group seems to enjoy it, though, and it has given brent and me a reason to take a little road trip for the past 3 years.

it was a funny weekend, though, because i am not working there anymore, but less than a year ago i was working with/for all of these people. so i was worried that i would be that awkward girl standing around not knowing what to do. and i was. but that's ok because i got to be with brent and stay in a hotel and someone else made my king-size bed and cooked my breakfast and lunch and dinner and gave me clean towels.

one great part of the retreat was seeing a good friend, leigh. leigh is a lady whom i have known for many years, and her husband and brent work together. when leigh found out a few weeks ago that we were adopting, she called me and was almost hysterical on the phone. she has been so happy for us and supportive of us - she is a blessing in our lives. she is a constant source of encouragement and love.

another great part of the retreat was sharing our news with friends we hadn't seen in a while. i just love telling people about this journey, and everyone has been so supportive.

after the retreat was over we got to go see our two favorite girls in the world...caroline and charlotte! i am so happy to be an aunt, and seeing brent with those two girls just made me giddy about how great of a dad he is going to be. they really are so fun and hilarious. caroline is smart! she says things and you're like, "how the heck did you know that?" charlotte is just a nut. she is funny, funny, funny. she is always happy and loves to play.

so we had a fun time with them and amie and tom...we went swimming, had a tea party, played with the fireworks on brent's ipad, played with woody, jessie, and buzz lightyear (and a bear who has been named as the evil emperor zurg - of course he was invited to the tea party so i don't know how evil he really is), went to their new church, and to top it all off we went to mimi's cafe (in honor of our mimi) and ate din din with buffies and justin.

being in the car with brent gave us a lot of good time to talk. i was reminded this weekend about how much i just love him. even though we are not always perfect together, we really do just love being together.

one of the conversations we had in the car worried me, though:

me: you know, we are really gonna have to make sure you know how to cook some stuff before the baby gets here. i mean, in case i am not home one night and you are in charge of dinner. she is going to need food.

brent: wait, i am gonna be home alone with her?

i really do think he is going to be a great dad, though.