In Which I Admit I Don't Always Like Myself... and the One Who Does

Lately I haven't liked myself very much.

Maybe it's the hormones. I hear that the hormonal ups and downs of nursing can be just as bad if not worse than during pregnancy.

But hormones or none, I just haven't really liked who I am lately. Do you ever go through times like that? There are lots of times that I like myself just fine. I find myself to be fun, energetic, witty and attractive. But every now and then I hit a wall. And Satan does a great job of convincing me that I'm just horrid. And usually when he convinces me that I'm horrid, I start acting that way and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.  I've heard it said that What you think about, you bring about. But that's a subject for another day.

I guess what I'm hit with today is the fact that God finds me lovely. Tears wet my face when I think that he likes me. And when I dislike myself as much as I do today, it's amazing to me that he sent his son to die. For me.

Those words never hit me the way they do now. I have a son. Just one. An only son.

He's beautiful and precious and perfect. I could stare at him for hours, memorizing his face. I fall apart when I whack his head or his arm because of my clumsiness. The world stands still when he wails and that lower lip quivers in a sob. If we hear him coughing or choking in the night, my husband and I are out of bed and at his side in 0.05 seconds flat to make sure he's alright.

I'd stand in front of a moving train for him. I can't fathom sending him to die for anyone. Let alone someone as unlikeable as me today.

I don't know if this is resonating with anyone, but I hope it is. Do you realize how incredible that is? Do you know the gift that God gave us and the sacrifice He made?

This morning I watched a sermon online called The Gift of Grace, by Pastor Robert Morris. I highly recommend spending the time to view it. I was weeping by the end of it. Here's the link: TheGiftOfGrace

At the end of the sermon is a video of a father and a son. The son is mute and paralyzed and can only communicate through a computer, but he wanted to run a marathon. So the father (who is not an athlete) trained and ran the marathon while pushing his son. He practiced and sweat and worked and endured pain in order to push his son across the finish line. So that his son could experience victory. My victories are like that. They are only the result of the Father pushing, sweating, working, and the enduring pain so that I might live. Truly live.

So may we truly live today? Not just endure the day. Not just check the boxes and get through the next hour at work doing something you don't want to. Not just make it through the next dirty diaper (oh wait, that's my world). But really live.

He is passionately in love with you. More so than I am in love with my little Danilo. More than you are in love with your kids. More than you're in love with your spouse, best friend or family. More than we even know how to love. Just revel in that today.

I pray you are blessed by this. Leave a comment and let me know.

Please pray for this family...

I've recently been following the story of a family that I "met" through the blogging world and I want to ask you all to pray for them. Their names are Lori and Troy. Their sons' names are Garrett and Matthew. Here is a link to Lori's blog:

Earlier this year they adopted Matthew, and soon after, their adoption was contested. They are now in the middle of the biggest battle of their lives to keep their son, to submit to God's will, and to love those who would oppose them through the midst of it all.

Here is the first picture of Matthew David and a few details of how the court battle began.

As I've read Lori's thoughts, I've contemplated what it would be like to be threatened with losing little Danny, and it seems unthinkable. Yet that is exactly what Lori and Troy are threatened with. They live with the knowledge that they may not be able to keep and raise their second son, and their time with them may be as short as a few months or a few years.

Please join me in prayer and write to Lori in her comments section to encourage her. You can also follow her story by clicking on the "Livin' in a Fishbowl" link on the right side of my blog. Thanks everybody! May you be blessed by the presence of His Holy Spirit today!

Most Embarrassing Moment

I may SERIOUSLY regret publishing this, but it was TOO funny to pass up sharing it!

Last week I was grocery shopping at Walmart. The wonderful thing about Walmart is that you can get pet supplies and groceries and pharmacy prescriptions and clothes and lawn furniture and rugs all in one place!

So since giving birth to Danilo, I've healed and recovered quite nicely, but there has been one annoying symptom hanging around and I want it to go away NOW. So I approached the pharmacy counter with a shopping cart FULL of the baby car seat, the baby, the diaper bag (that alone filled three fourths of the cart) oh, and groceries too! There was a rather long line for the pharmacy, and I didn't know where to find the item I was looking for, so I walked up to the portion of the counter that read, consultations. When no one paid attention to me for a minute or two, I decided to ask the woman behind the register, figuring she could quickly point me in the right direction.

"Excuse me," I said. "Could you tell me where I could find, um... hemorrhoid medicine?”

“Sure,” replied the lady kindly. That was the end of her kindness, because then (to my humiliation) she proceeded to turn around and HOLLER to the lady in the back room (for all of Walmart to hear), “HEY SUZY! WHERE IS HEMORRHOID MEDICINE?!?”

She got her answer, and pointed to the correct aisle.

Glad for the opportunity to exit the scene and avoiding the eyes of everyone in the long line, I headed to the correct aisle.

Just when I thought I was home free, I hear (to my horror) the kind woman yell to me again. “EXCUSE ME, MA’AM!?! I WAS WRONG. THE HEMORRHOID MEDICINE IS IN AISLE 8!!! – WELL ACTUALLY – WHAT IS IT THAT YOU NEED EXACTLY?”

By this time I was frantically turning my enormous cart around to get closer to her so she didn't have to yell so loud.

“DO YOU WANT THEM TO GO AWAY OR JUST TAKE AWAY THE PAIN?”

“One moment!” I finally say, trying to squeeze myself and my cart past the long line of people who are now all staring at me.

“Oh yes,” realizes the ditzy idiotic brainless absentminded-at-the-moment woman, “I guess you probably don’t want to talk about that in front of everyone!”

Finally I get close enough for her to quiet down.

“Do you want them to go away or just take away the pain?”

“Well, what’s available?” I ask, now beet red.

“HEY SUZY! WHAT’S AVAIL—?“

“COULD I JUST TALK TO SUZY DIRECTLY, please?”

“Oh yes!”

And as I squeeze once more between two people in the long line, on my way to Suzy, I say to the rest of Walmart, “Sorry! I thought it was a simpler question than that!”

And thankfully one or two of them returned a kind smile in sympathy for my humiliation.

Danilo's First Smile

If bodily-function noises were a sport,

this kid could enter the Olympics!

And usually a half-sleepy grin accompanies the noise, which just makes Alejandro and I giggle hysterically like junior highers in the back of home room.

However, that is NOT what I am here to tell you about today.

What I really want to tell you is that...

Today was Danilo's first whole-face totally unmistakable smile!

And WOW did I swell up and do my own joy leap! I haven't truly caught it on camera yet. Just this blurry glimpse of a half-smile when Alejandro was playing and tickling him.


Once I manage to get a good picture, I'll be sure to pass it on!

This is unacceptable.

MY SON

IS SPORTING
A MULLET.
Soon to come: Danilo's first hair-cut.
He just might set the record for the earliest first hair cut ever.

These days...

...are good days.

Last week, Aunt Lisa came into town and she and I got to know each other.
We had a blast!
And she and my Momma stayed in their pj's all day and talked A LOT. ...but I guess that's good for those grown-ups. They seemed to enjoy it!
Aunt Lisa loves cats, so she got to know Abby too. I don't know Abby very well. Momma doesn't let her spend time with me. She says I have to wait until I'm older so I can pull Abby's tail.
Momma calls this T.K.O. I usually look like this right after the first course of each meal. At least, that's what she says.
Of course we do some errands during the day, and Momma has a two-mile walk around the neighborhood that she's started doing. So I hang out in my favorite chair and snooze. Momma calls it vibration therapy when she walks me in my stroller over the bumpy gravel. It makes my head wiggle.
Every morning we all hang out before Daddy goes to work. We're kinda' sleepy. I guess that's my fault. I still keep us all up for an hour at about 2 a.m. Hey, what can I say? A (little) man's gotta' eat, right?
This was the last time I got to wear this outfit. Momma was bummed because it's her favorite. The pile of clothes I'm growing out of is getting bigger. I grow fast!
I was lookin' for something in my pocket to give Daddy, but all I found was fuzz.
Just a regular day in the life of a little rock star.

Revenge of the Grandparents...

Hey Mom and Dad... Remember when we were kids and Elizabeth and Danielle were over for dinner one evening? (These two lovely ladies are the neighbor girls we grew up with. We practially LIVED at each other's house during the summer time.) Ok, ok, there were many evenings they were over. Well, this particular evening you had shut the door between the kitchen and the dining room, where we were eating. At the time, I thought it was because you trusted us and wanted to give us freedom and fun on our own. I now realize that it was probably to block out the terror and chaos that we were creating. Because that particular evening, we were filling our hamburgers with loads of ketchup and smashing down the top of the hamburger bun as hard as possible in order to see how far the ketchup would squirt across the table! Needless to say, it had us giggling so hard that there was the inevitable occurence of explosive milk-through-the-nose laughter. Multiple times. I am SO sorry to whomever had to clean up after that dinner!

Well, rest easy. Because Danilo has made retribution. He took revenge for you two days ago after his mid-afternoon meal. He was so sweet and calm, as he nursed quietly. After a while, he sighed deeply, and let go. Suddenly, he sputtered a tiny sweet little cough, tilted his head up, and proceeded to SPRAY milk through his nose all over my face and chest! Then he gave me the nicest grin afterwards!

:-O

Well, lest I be mistaken for a woman without a competitive nature... I figure a little retribution of my own is called for. After all. I can't let the grandparents get the last word, can I!?

I
THINK
NOT.

This is Danny's latest cutest outfit:

Do we not agree he has THE CUTEST TOOSHIE in town? Oh, yes.
Oh wait! Check this picture out!
Wait, that's not Danny. WHO is that?!? Why, that's Renee (at 6 months old)! But why, pray tell, is she dressed like a boy? Funny you should ask! Wouldn't you like to know? No matter. I'll tell you anyway. Well, when I was a little booger sweet baby, I had a rather short torso. It made dresses difficult, because I would always crawl on the front of them. Being the sensible mom that she is, my Mom dressed me in pants and shirts. So I often looked like a... well, I looked like a boy. When we were out and about in the grocery store the sweet little ladies would say to my parents, "Aaaaw! What a sweet little boy! What's his name?" And my mom - this is where the sensibility ENDS - would reply, "Andrew."

What!?

No wait... it gets better.

My Dad's answer was, "Alvin," just to see the looks on the poor little ladies in the grocery store who were horrified that such a cute little baby - because I was cute - would have such a horrendous name. (Anyone reading this named Alvin out there, please accept my humblest apologies!)

When it came time to go get my six month old portraits done, my Mom dressed me in my her the favorite outfit, with the favorite hat (given to me by my uncle) and took me on down to the photography studio. The lady said, "Aaaw, what a cute little boy! What's his name?" You guessed it. "Andrew," replied my Mom. And she proceeded to let the photographer take my photo as a BOY!!

Be ashamed. Be very very ashamed.

Yes. I'm scarred for life. Can you tell? ;)

At least we've got the gender-appropriate outfit on the kid now. Here he is, wearing my baby hat (yes, that thing is 30 years old).
Here he is with an old clown toy that was also mine. It has a little bell inside and it was one of my favorites!
"Hey, whoa! That thing is scary! Mom, don't you know clowns are scary to kids!? Sheesh!"
"Plus, it seriously needs to be washed. Gross, Mom."
"Oh, you played with that when you were a kid? Oh, yeah, it's kinda' cool."
"Hmm, what does it do?"
"Cool jingle!"

Guess what I found!

Check it out!  I found the coolest thing last week! 

It tastes yummy...

It's always there...

It's soft and sweet...

  

Now, if only I could find it again!

God's Perfect Timing

A while back, I promised to tell you about God’s Perfect Timing…

But first, I want to let you all know that things in this household have settled down considerably, and we are not quite so sleep-deprived as before. ;-) On Tuesday night (after a much-needed heart-to-heart with a good friend and mentor of mine who is also an incredible mom) I determined that I was going to be in charge of the day’s schedule from now on and that Danny would NOT be.  After all, he is the kiddo and I am the mom and he does not run this house!  (Although it seemed like it was going to be that way for a while.)  Anyway, we truly put "Babywise" into practice and now all three of us are much happier and more rested.  It’s been a GREAT second half of the week, and Danny has settled into his schedule quite nicely.

This little guy continues to just blow my mind with how incredibly I love him!  In fact, I was thinking…  How is it possible I could come to love someone SO much!?!  I mean, I truly love Alejandro that deeply and completely… but we’ve had over 7 years, since meeting each other for that to develop and grow.  My love for Danilo is that deep and wide, but it’s only been one month!  That is mind-blowing for me.

I asked Alejandro the other day, on a much-needed date (yes, just the two of us because Mom babysat) what his favorite part of being a Dad was.  He had trouble putting it into words, but he said, “I guess just looking at him!  Knowing he came from me and you and our intense love for each other and how I just love him more than I can possibly imagine!  …Oh, and the diapers!” he added sarcastically, “I mean, that part is just the best!”

But anyway…  back to the subject of His Perfect Timing.  Most of you know I have a Mary Kay business.  Some of you may wonder what would possess me to take part in a business that involves pseudo-cheerleader-type activities in which I join a group of women who seem WAY too excited about selling lipstick.  And WHY would I want to sell lipstick anyway?!?  Well, hopefully those of you who have taken part in my business have caught a glimpse of the fact that it’s much more than skin care and lipstick… and that it’s really about building up women, pouring into their lives and valuing them.  Some of my VERY BEST friends have come out of my business and I am eternally thankful for them.

One of the things I appreciate most about my Mary Kay girlfriends is that we challenge each other to live BIG and to pursue God through the activity of our lives.  We often set goals for ourselves and then hold each other accountable to those goals and many times we cast a vision for what we’d like our lives to be like…  not just our business.  Prayer is a big part of the process.  So last year, at the beginning of July (which is the beginning of our “Mary Kay year”) I made a goal poster.  I put many things on this goal poster.  But one of the things I put was a picture of a pair of booties:

Alejandro and I weren’t even thinking about starting a family yet.  In fact, we were most definitely “not ready.”  But I really wanted to be intentional about taking steps to get ready (financially, spiritually, relationally, etc.) to feel that we could start a family at any time.

Since we got married, we both said that we wanted to start having kids after about five years.  It’s that question that everyone starts asking as soon as you’ve tied the knot.  “So, when do you think you’ll have kids?” people ask.  “Around 5 years of marriage,” was our answer.  But when our 5th year wedding anniversary started to get close, we both thought, “Nope, we’re still not ready!”

And then God intervened.

In September, we had a “scare.”  All you couples out there know what I’m talking about.  You know… the “oh-my-gosh-I-think-I-might-be-pregnant” SCARE.  Where both of your lives and senses of reality are totally suspended in utter panic for the duration of about a week until you find out that you’re really NOT pregnant.  Yeah.  That kind of a scare.  But an interesting thing happened during that week for me.  At the beginning of it I was definitely panicked.  I mean, I have always been totally excited about having kids, but I just didn’t feel ready then.  But by the end of the week, when I found out I wasn’t pregnant, I was absolutely heartbroken.  In that week, God planted in me a desire for children and He was preparing me for His Perfect Timing.

Then October 18th rolled around – our 5 year anniversary – and Alejandro and I took off for a wonderful weekend at a bed and breakfast to spend together.  It was truly a memorable weekend!  We biked, hiked, ate yummy food, hot-tubbed, slept late…  It was FABULOUS!
A week or so later, we started to suspect another SCARE.  But after the roller-coaster of emotions we had experienced the previous month, and because we had still been preventing, we both mentally said, “Nope, I’m not going down that emotional road again.  It’s surely nothing.”  However, a few days later, we were starting to wonder if maybe it wasn’t nothing, and I remember driving home talking to God about it.  He whispered to me, “Renee, if you are pregnant now, you will know that this is My Perfect Timing for you, because you didn’t make the decision to try.  You’ll know it’s Perfect Timing because it’s MY choice for you.  You’ll never doubt if you heard me wrong or if you tried too early and were financially irresponsible.  You’ll know this is MY desire for your life Right Now.”

Well, praise God, we were wrong.  It wasn’t nothing.  It was definitely SOMETHING. And we were EXCITED!  (Ok, so after 24 hours we were excited…  It did take a little bit of time to sink in!)  I’m pretty darn sure Danilo was conceived one day after our 5th year wedding anniversary!

And wouldn’t you know it, Danilo was born on June 30.  That date might not seem significant to many of you.  But my Mary Kay girlfriends right now are smiling from ear to ear, because June 30 is the LAST DAY of the Mary Kay year.  It’s when all the contests are ending.  It’s when all of the goals that were set the previous July are finished.  Women promote themselves to be directors.  Diamonds and trips are won.  Pink Cadillacs are earned.  Dreams come true.  That day, my dream came true too – the dream I’d put on my goal poster the year before.  I guess God knows what he’s doin’ after all, huh.

 

One more thing…

I DO have another dream that I’d like to share with all of you.  This may be one of the scariest things I’ve ever shared with so many people…  My dream is to promote myself to be a Mary Kay director – this is a position in which I get the privilege of training and mentoring a group of women to help them achieve what they want from their business.  My passion is sharing the Lord and His desire that we live BIG for Him.  I LOVE doing this through Mary Kay and being a director would give me a huge platform from which to do this.  So here’s the scary part:  I’m committed to working toward achieving this goal by March of 2010.  I’m sharing this with all of you because when I make it public…  well, then I really have to stick to it!  So feel free to hold me accountable!  Ask me how it’s going and how close I am!

Not Me Monday... In the House of the Sleep Deprived

This is Not Me Monday, created by MckMama. It's one of my favorite posts on other blogs, so I thought I'd give it a try:

Here goes... 

During my labor, I did NOT become the psycho pregnant woman you heard hollering at the top of her lungs from down the hall.  Nope.  That was not me.  I would never do that. 

Today, I did not give my baby son a pacifier five minutes after vowing he'd go the afternoon without it, simply because he stuck out that (absolutely irresistible) lower lip of his. 

I am not at the moment foregoing a much-needed nap because I am not completely addicted to blogs (both others and mine).  I have not spent the last week reading the entirety of a good friends' blog - like from 2007.  Nope, I didn't do that.  Because I didn't have other important things to do.  I did not read a blog post about contentment and then proceed to fervently covet my friend's gift of contentment, because I have not always struggled with wanting more than I have. 

Yesterday I did not pull out the Bumbo seat - designed for babies who can SIT UP and put my newborn in it!  Think he's ready?  ...Ok, I guess he still has a little room to grow into it! 

I did not choose to eat chocolate cream pie for breakfast last week instead of bran cereal, and I definitely did not serve myself an additional helping of my Mom's cheesy lasagna a few days ago, even though the cheese seems to be making me sick because it TASTED SO GOOD!  Furthermore, I did not mix up a batch of chocolate chip cookie dough without the eggs just so that I could eat the dough, with absolutely no intention of cooking the cookie dough into cookies.  And lastly my husband and I did not spend $9.00 (ridiculous!) on ice cream cones in Manitou Springs last weekend.  Oh, and I didn't get any ice cream on Danny either. 

 

I did not laugh when my baby son looked so cute crying. 

I did not cry today because he looked so adorable asleep and JUST BECAUSE HE'S MINE. 

I didn't catch myself with him in the mirror and ask myself, "Whose is that brown baby?  Certainly he couldn't belong to that pale woman!" 

I did not step on the scale again hoping it showed a smaller number than this morning and that somehow five more pounds had miraculously shed themselves between 6 a.m. and noon (despite the chocolate cream pie, ice cream, and cookie dough). 

I did not rejoice and even brag to my co-workers about 4 the consecutive hours of sleep that I got one night, as if that were a lot.  And I'm not still blogging instead of napping like I should.  ...and like Danny is...

These are things I would never do.  Why not?  Because I mostly certainly am NOT a sleep-deprived, crazy woman living the somewhat totally chaotic but absolutely fabulous life as mom-of-a-one-month-old.  Ok, so maybe I am.    So sue me. 

p.s.  He's four weeks tomorrow!  Who do you think won the resemblance contest? 

Personally, I think Alejandro wins, hands down!