“And the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. What you have learned and received and heard and seen in me, practice these things, and the God of peace will be with you.”

Our pastor preached from this scripture reference yesterday and it really touched my heart. I don’t always think of things that are commendable, lovely and worthy of praise. I sometimes let thoughts creep in that want to consume my thinking; things that I simply cannot change, things that are simply too big for me to be the one to try and fix, things that I need to let God handle altogether. I have put my thoughts under the obedience of God in the past and I can testify that it works. I guess it’s with anything else, practice makes perfect. If I find myself thinking on things that aren’t worthy of praise then I need to stop thinking about them and think on things that ARE worthy of praise, things that are lovely and commendable. It makes for a much clearer head. And a clearer head makes for clearer ears…to hear the voice of God. And the Word says to practice these things and the God of peace will be with you. And who doesn’t want peace?

I’m thankful for the reminder I received on Sunday to keep my mind in subjection to the obedience of God…

My husband’s grandmother, “Mommom,” passed away yesterday morning.  I say “my husband’s grandmother” but she was my grandmother too.  I never had maternal or paternal grandparents growing up and I claimed her as my own.  When I first met my husband’s beloved grandparents, “Mommom and Poppop,” I was immediately in love.  I have a soft spot for the elderly anyway, but knowing that these two precious people were MY grandparents too (even if it was by marriage) was a real blessing.

Our sweet “Poppop” passed away just six months ago and his lovely wife, “Mommom” decided it was six months too long not to see her beloved.  So she decided to go home too.  These two people have been an unbelieveable inspiration to me and my husband.  They truly let the love of Christ shine through their everyday lives and they touched so many with that love.  Knowing them, you would swear that there were angel’s wings tucked under their shirts. :)  Yes, they were that amazing.

As a woman, “Mommom” inspired me to be a better person altogether.  She was a wonderful mother, mother-in-law, grandmother and great-grandmother.  She always saw the good in others even though the bad might be smack dab in her face.  Being in her presence and hearing her stories “of old” you knew that this was a woman of infinite wisdom.  She was 90 years old when she passed away.  I can only imagine the things she experienced in those 90 years.  She would share the stories and I would sit in awe of her.  She’d freely let her tears be seen and it would touch my heart deeply to see her so vunerable.  She always brought God into the story and told of how good He was even in the midst of their hard times.  She was a virtuous woman, just as the Bible speaks of.

We said our good-byes to “Mommom” on Wednesday evening, September, 24, 2008.  She was in the ICU and was struggling for breath.  As she lay there with her eyes closed and her labored breathing, I couldn’t help but think that Jesus was patiently waiting to call his child home.  He knew it would be only a matter of hours and how excited He must have been.  I can imagine Poppop inpatiently waiting to see his bride.  For him to introduce her once again to their beloved daughter who had gone before them so many years ago.  What a heavenly reunion.  I know without a doubt there was a huge party going on up yonder in honor of our Mommom.  She was finally home!

Dorothy Byron lived an amazing life.  One filled to the brim with love.  So many loved her and she loved so many.  I am humbled and honored to be called a Byron.  The legacy that “Mommom” and “Poppop” have left behind is one that I strive to continue in for my own family.  It’s a daily journey and I pray the good Lord will grant me the same wisdom as the years pass as he bestowed upon our sweet “Mommom.”

I love this picture of her.  This is when we told her we were expecting Tanner.  She was always so excited to hear the news of more grandbabies! :)

Evan has been in preschool for two weeks now and I am happy to report that he really likes it! He looks forward to his “school days” and I’m glad. Today, on our way home, he sang me the “bear song” that he learned. “Going on a bear hunt, going on a bear hunt (while patting his legs). A bridge! Can’t go around it, can’t go under it (hand over eyes as if looking), climb the tree (climbing motion.)” It was so cute hearing him sing the bear song. And he happyily exclaimed when we got in the car, “Mom, I had goldfish today for snack!” The simple pleasures of childhood. The bear song and goldfish. Life is good.

Our baby boy is almost 3 months old already! It’s simply amazing how quickly the days, weeks and months go with children. He’s such a happy little guy. He smiles every time I talk to him. And I mean the big, gummy smile that melts your heart. I can’t get enough of them. Yesterday, while we were “chatting” and playing he giggled for the first time. As a mom, that’s one of the absolute sweetest sounds! I can already tell that Tanner has a lovely personality and the months to come are going to be so great with him. To see him grow and flourish and slowly become who God has uniquely made him to be will be wonderful.

Tanner, my sweet, you are my lil’ love bug and you make me smile daily with your sweetness. I feel amazingly blessed to be your mommy! God has entrusted us with such a special gift when he gave us you! What a lucky lady I am. :)

Keep those smiles comin’!

I almost always check on Evan after I feed Tanner during those early morning feedings. Sometimes I don’t because I am in a sleepy stouper and I simplly can’t wait to crawl back into bed. But the other night something urged me to check on him even though I felt like I had sand in my eyes and my feet were made of lead and all I wanted to do was to feel my head hit my pillow. I followed my intuition and check on my sleeping angel. I’m so glad I did. As I tucked the covers up around him tightly something felt cold and wet. Great. His sippy cup of water had leaked. I’d better give it the sniff check just to be sure. That definitely does NOT smell like water! He had peed his bed.

Let me give you a bit of history here. Evan has been potty trained since he was 2 1/2 and night trained for about 4 months now. He never wets in his pants at night. He’ll wake us up to take him potty if he has to go in the night. We’re thrilled. Back to the story…

It wasn’t just a little pee. This kid had pee’d at least 5 gallons of liquid. It was bad. Evan was sleeping so soundly in his soggy bed but I had to wake him. So I got hubby up to help me with the task and we started changing Evan’s clothes and the bed. In going to the linen closet to get a sheet for his bed, I realized that all of our twin sheets for Evan’s bed were in the hamper. Side note: I have been doing laundry daily since we got back from vacation. I swear I’ve been given the “bottomless hamper” by some evil nighttime laundry gnome. Every morning there is more laundry to do! Anyway, so I pulled out the only sheet clean in the linen closet. It was a king sized sheet. Nice. I had to make this thing fit on a twin sized bed and fast. The little man was starting to get cranky as he wanted to go back to sleep. So I pulled it out of the closet and put it on his bed. I think we tucked it in for about 5 minutes as the thing was never ending! But we did it. Evan was dry (yet probably a bit smelly) and his bed was dry. That’s all that mattered at 3:00 a.m. The next morning he had to have a bath to get all the “pee funk” off of him. That’s just nasty.

Thinking the next morning of our little episode I remembered…Evan had about an 8 oz. cup of milk around 8:30 p.m. along with lots of water during the evening due to all of the heat and humidity. We had a church service and it was hotter than “you know what” in the place. The nursery was a sweat box and Evan was in there. So he was a bit thirsty after playing in there. Anyway, we went to eat after the service where Evan drank a lot. So…I can understand why he relieved himself in such a huge way during the night. His little bladder was bursting and he was too tired to wake up. Accidents happen. I’m so glad I heard my inner “mommy voice” that night and helped my boy out of his “water world.” There definitely is something to a mother’s intuition!

My new montra…”You are NOT Wonder Woman!” I seem to unknowlingly try to be this fictional character from time to time lately. Days where I think I can be mom, wife, friend, daughter, house cleaner, laundry washer, floor vacuumer, toiler scrubber, boo-boo fixer, milk maker, supper cooker, story reader, educator, child trainer, (you get it) and still maintain a stable frame of mind. I quickly come to a hault when I feel meltdown mode ensuing at a rapid rate. That happened just the other day. It wasn’t a pretty sight, folks. NOT PRETTY. You know, whailing, nashing of teeth, crocodile tears. Yeah, not good. I had officially ran myself ragged. I haven’t had too many of these “Mommy Meltdowns” since become a mother but I have had a few. Enough to know that I do not like this version of myself. It’s at those moments I feel like I have to be the only mother who has these crazy episodes. But then I read some of your blogs and hear some of your stories and I find a bit of comfort knowing all moms have those days sometimes. Whew! Daily I am convinced that mothers are some of the hardest working people on the planet! I would not want to be anything else right now at this time in my life. Hands down! I am also realizing that I think the good Lord gives us mom’s an extra measure of strength to do all of our daily tasks. But there’s a limit. That “tank” does run dry from time to time and it’s usually when mommy tries to accomplish too much in one day. Those “Mommy Meltdowns” are His way of saying, “Slow down, chick!!” So while I am still overly tired today and feeling pretty drained from house projects (cleaning out every closet in the house and purging!) and all of the other tasks that consume my day I am going to keep reminding myself that Wonder Woman is NOT a title I want to add to my already long list of names I call myself. That’s a high and mighty title I’d rather leave to the Marvel folks to deal with. :)

Last week we went on a 4 day vacation to Ogunquit, Maine. Wow, was it beautiful! We had never been to the coast and the Atlantic Ocean was breathtaking. We found a lovely place to stay called The Pink Blossoms Resorts. We highly recommend it! We got a great rate since we went during “off season.” It had a kitchenette, which is way cool with kids. We were able to eat “in” several times and save some money that way. And it was within walking distance to the ocean/beach.

The first night we checked in and ate sandwiches in our nice little kitchentte and then headed out in the evening to walk The Marginal Way. This is a paved pathway that follows the coast. The landscape was gorgeous and the houses along there were dream homes! We stopped a lot while walking so Evan could jump out of the buggy and explore. :)

Tuesday, we ate breakfast at a little place called The Egg & I. After that we headed to the York Zoo. It was larger than we expected and it held lots of neat animals that we didn’t get to see here at our local zoo. After a morning at the zoo, and with Evan’s prize in hand (a plastic sword of course), we headed off to an afternoon at the ocean. My sister-in-law let us borrow their sun tent for the kids and that was awesome. Tanner chilled in his bouncy seat in the shade while we played with Evan in the ocean. Evan found a really neat, blue seashell too. That ocean air will wear out even the most energetic of boys and for one hour our little man (including our littlest man) slept in our double stroller. It was great. Dan and I kept walking and got lots of exercise. We had sore feet to prove it! Evan woke up happy and rested and we decided to get cleaned up and head out for some grub. We ended up at The Lobster Pound. Yep, we had lobster! Dan actually had lobster tails and I nibbled on his. I got steak. YUM! After our busy day it was back to the inn for some rest. The boys fell asleep in a jiffy with all the activity of the day…

Wednesday, we ate breakfast “in” and had a leisurely morning before heading out to the Children’s Museum of Portland. This place was really great. Evan had a blast. There were so many interactive things for him to do! Once done there, we headed to the Portland Head Light, which is a spectacular light house. The view looked like something out of a movie. The waves were crashing against the rocks, the sky was blue and there were big fluffy clouds in the sky. Perfect! After exploring the grounds and taking tons of pictures we headed to Manniax Family Restaurant to eat. It was good! Then, it was time to swim! Evan was itching to check out the pool at our inn so that’s what we did. The air was cooler outside so the pool water felt like bath water. It was wonderful. Evan didn’t want to get out! But the thought of getting ice cream made him decide he was okay with the idea. :) So we headed out again with the boys in their stroller and got a sweet treat and coffee while walking the strip. It was nighttime and a lot of the businesses had white Christmas lights on the trees in front of their places. It was so pretty. This was our last night in Maine and we enjoyed a nice walk back to our inn.

Thursday morning, we had breakfast at The Hayloft before heading home! What a great time away. I’m so glad we went. It was sort of spur of the moment but, boy, did we need that time away. Evan had a great time. He’s at such a fun age! He enjoyed himself and so did we.

Here are some pictures of our time…