A Theological Question

It is almost midnight and I can't seem to keep my mind quiet. There are a lot of things my mind wants to think about, with the Holidays coming up and everything. Also I have a baby that always decides to move when I'm trying to sleep. Most of the time I don't get exasperated though, it gives me a wonderful opportunity to thank God for how healthy my baby seems to be and think about wonderful baby things.

Anyway, as I lay there with my mind going this way and that, and my belly going this way and that I got to thinking about an article I read recently. I get emails about my pregnancy; telling me about the growth of the baby and various topics that might be relevant. The topic I am referring to is about drinking alcohol while being pregnant. They, of course, recommend that you steer clear of it entirely; farther down in the article it says that even a woman who only has one drink a week is more likely to have a child that shows aggressive and delinquent behavior later in life. It said that drinking alcohol can cause low birth weight and/or learning disabilities.

Now as I hope most of you know, I am not an alcohol drinker; however since I've been pregnant I've had an ongoing internal problem that I have drank wine for. As I'm sure all who will read this know, but for any who may not, the Bible says to "Drink a little wine for your stomach's sake, and your oft infirmities." I think I quoted that correctly. (I'm too lazy to go look it up right now though, sorry) Anyway, from time to time since I've been pregnant Matt and/or I have blessed a drink of wine that I have consumed in hopes that God would have mercy and relieve my problem.

As I was laying there in bed feeling my baby move inside me I was thinking about how I wouldn't want to hurt my baby in any way. I was thinking about that article and hoping that the drinks of wine I have taken haven't affected my baby in a bad way.

Here was my question for myself. Is it a lack of faith to worry about the wine I have taken for a spiritual reason? Wouldn't God allow that it wouldn't have an ill affect on my baby since I wasn't taking it to enjoy the alcohol, but because I was trying to do all I could do to have faith in God to take care of my problem? On the other hand, is it selfish of me to take wine for my problem if there's a possibility that it could harm my baby? Now when I was taking the wine it didn't even dawn on me that it was alcohol and I was pregnant. I don't even think of it hardly as an alcoholic beverage, but something we only use when we are sick. Now that the topic has been brought to my attention I'm really questioning what to do. Would it be lack of faith to not take the wine when I feel the need, or would it be selfish to continue to take it?

I have anointed myself, and of course prayed a lot about this problem; so there are other ways to seek God's mercy. I took the wine because I was doing everything I could think of to seek deliverance from this problem. Would it be bad to stop doing this one thing for the sake of my baby, would it reflect a lack of faith on my part that God wouldn't take care of my baby when I take the wine? Or would it be better to just hold off on the wine for now because of the possibility that it might have a bad effect on my baby?

I know this is kind of a deep subject; maybe even a little controversial (I hope not too much though), but I really would like some opinions on the matter; because I really want to do the right thing.

Thanks

Sigh*** I decided I better look that verse up; so here it is:

"Drink no longer water, but use a little wine for thy stomach's sake and thine often infirmities."

I Timothy 5:23

A Little Fender Bender

A couple of weeks ago Matt got into a little fender bender on his way to work. It was rainy and wet. Traffic stopped all of a sudden and he didn't stop in enough time and hit the guy in front of him. Luckily neither one of them were hurt. There cars were smashed up, but they were able to get out of the way of traffic and settle the matter peacefully. Matt said the guy he hit was very nice about it.

Matt called me about 6 o'clock in the morning to let me know what happened. He had planned to just continue onto work, but when he tried to drive away he found out that the steering wouldn't work. He called the insurance people and they called a tow truck. I had to take my Aunt Nadine to the airport that morning, so I just told Matt I would leave home a little earlier than I had planned and pick him up and take him to work. The airport is not that far from where he works; so it wouldn't be that far out of the way for me.

I figured the tow truck would beat me to him, but when I got there it still hadn't arrived. Matt had to be there when the car got picked up; so I waited with him for a little while. After awhile when the tow truck still hadn't arrived I had to leave for the airport anyway so my Aunt wouldn't miss her flight. By this time Matt's accident had happened over 2 hours ago.

I had planned to wait until her flight left to leave the airport, but I just ended up getting all her business taken care of and leaving her there so I could go pick up Matt.

I guess not long after I left the tow truck came, but the guy really took his time loading the car up. They had a hard time figuring out where to take the car. The towing guy wanted to park it at his lot; the insurance people wouldn't give him a suggestion as to where to take it. Finally Matt decided to take it to a dealership he knew about. When they got there they found out that the dealership didn't have a body shop. They were told about a different place they could take it to. I guess after driving back and forth for awhile they never could find the place they were told about, but eventually in all there turning around they ended up in the parking lot of a different body shop. At this point Matt was getting pretty frustrated. I guess the tow truck drivers' driving skills were pretty scary. The insurance people said Matt could take the car anywhere he wanted so he decided to just stay where they were instead of trying to find the other place.

Anyway, by the time I got to where he was it was almost lunch time and he had given up on the idea of going to work that day. When we got home he made calls and took care of all the kinks with the insurance company. They weren't going to get him a rental car that same day, but he talked them into arranging one for him that evening so he would have a vehicle to drive to work the next day. He has been really enjoying driving the Pontiac G6 that he get to drive around until his car is fixed!

That first morning was pretty chaotic and frustrating, but things haven't been too bad since then. It was so nice that Kara has been staying with us; so I didn't have to drag all the kids around with me that morning. It seems like the repairs are coming along on the car. I'm not sure when it will be ready. We're not worried about the time limit of it all as long as it gets done. Like I said Matt is really enjoying his brand new car for awhile! We do have to come up with the deductible, but we are very thankful that Matt wasn't hurt and that he didn't hurt anybody else.

I took a few pictures of the car. As you can see the damage was pretty minimal. We are very thankful that God was watching out for him, and that there weren't more people involved.

As I look at these pictures again I'm amazed that he couldn't drive the car to work that morning. Its kind of weird that the steering wouldn't work. He said the air bags didn't even deploy; so the impact couldn't have been too hard. If the air bags would've deployed it may have totalled the car and we don't have gap insurance; so I'm thankful for that too.

The "Twin Cousins'" 2nd Birthday

As some of you know, my sister-in-law Kim and I had our last babies only 17 hours apart. Her's was born on the 28th of October and Garrison was born on the 29th. We had their first Birthday party together and I thought it would be neat to have their Birthday's together again. When they get older they might not like doing this, but I think it's kind of neat to celebrate together when their this young. Anyway, since their Birthday's were in the middle of the week, Matt and I went down the following weekend and we had a little party for them after church on Sunday.

I really enjoyed the party. I, of course, took pictures. I think it will be neat to look back on them in years to come and see them sharing their special days together. Here are some of the pictures I took:

Here are the Birthday kids with their cakes. I had a REALLY hard time finding a Blues Clues cake, by the way. Garrison really likes Blues Clues, but you can't hardly find it in the stores anymore. So if anyone finds some nice Blues Clues items, let me know and I might see if I can get them for him for Christmas.
Here's Kylee blowing out her candles.

Garrison actually blew his out in one blow! I was surprised, of course Kylee had just shown him how it was done...

Kylee opening her presents with her big sister Shay.

Daddy's helping Garrison open his presents. Whatever this one was, he was excited about it!

He got $2 in one of his cards. We still need to take him to the store and let him spend them...

He really liked his presents, but it was nap time too; so he looks pretty tired, poor little guy!

You can't really see, but Kylee LOVED the hangers that came with these cute clothes. We were all laughing about that!

I did manage to find a few small Blues Clues things, but not much.

Here's the Birthday boy hamming it up while he makes a mess with his Birthday cake.

This is just a really cute picture of the 2 of them at Gramma's house later on. What cuties! Garrison is wearing his new shirt and vest from Uncle Mark and Aunt Kim.

Well, I thought I would post these pictures before Garrison's Birthday was too far gone! I just today put the pictures onto the computer. I have some other pictures I want to put on a post too, but that will have to wait until another day. It also dawned on me that I should take some pictures of my pregnant self so you all can see how fat and sassy I'm getting. Who knows when that will happen though. I have approximately 2 months left. Time is flying by. I really need to get busy making sure I have everything ready for this precious little bundle...

Spending Time With Dad

I'm sorry everyone that it has taken me so long to make a new post. Life has been busy, but I still think I could have taken the time to post. After I get this posted I will try to take time to slowly catch up on everyone else's blog.

In my last post I had mentioned that I was going to go spend a few days in B-ville. He was actually doing a lot better than he had been, but he was still so weak and so much frailer looking than when I had last saw him. I left on a Tuesday and had planned to come back on Saturday morning. Matt had to work; so I left him behind at home by himself. Dad had a lot of visiting family while I was there, so he was in pretty good spirits. I spent a lot of time at Dad and Mom's house through the week, and I was doing pretty good dealing with Dad's illness, I thought. On Friday my pregnancy emotions got the better of me, and I had a pretty weepy day. Early that morning I was laying in bed feeling my baby move all over the place and I got to thinking about how I always like to have Dad there when I have my babies (not in the room, but in the house). It occurred to me that if he didn't get better that he may not be there this time. Anyway, throughout the day thoughts like that would creep up on me and I felt very emotional. I was trying to decide whether to come home Friday or wait until Saturday morning. After the day I had I really felt like I needed my husband; so I went home on Friday evening.

We spent this past weekend in B-ville too. It seems like Dad has stayed pretty much the same, except that maybe he's lost even more weight. It seems like they've been able to keep his bowels moving pretty regular. He's still really weak, but he's able to walk by himself (but not very far at a time) and get up and down by himself for the most part. What we're worried about now is that his stomach is so sensitive and he really can't eat very solid foods or he throws it up, or it really causes him a lot of pain and makes him get worse for awhile. He just hasn't been able to consume all the calories he needs. Matt and I found him a liquid diet that was 350 calories per 8 oz can, but the first time he drank some of it (about half a can) he threw quite a bit of it back up. He thought maybe it was a little too rich for him. Anyway, Mom has been trying to think of things that will be easy on his stomach and have lots of calories. I think they will try mixing the liquid diet with other things, or only give him a couple drinks at a time. Anyway, him and those that help him need prayers that they will know what to do for him. If anyone has any suggestions as to what to feed him I would love to hear it and will pass it on to my Mom.

I actually stayed up with Dad Saturday night. Matt slept in the spare room so I could get him if I needed his muscles. I didn't get much sleep until after 6 when I traded places with Matt so I could get some sleep, but I enjoyed the opportunity to help my Dad somehow. Sometimes when someone is sick like that you really don't know how to help them. Matt actually didn't wake me up until after church was over; so I missed church, but I'm glad I got to stay up with Dad.

You might pray for my Dad's spirit. It's so hard to keep a good attitude when your sick for so long. Just pray that he will have the grace to endure whatever God wants him too.

Thanks again for all your prayers.

Pumpkin Patch

After the days of being apart while I was visiting my Dad, Matt and I decided to do something fun as a family on Saturday. Around here there are quite a few farms that are open to the public this time of year. We went to one last year that we really enjoyed; so we decided to take the kids to a farm again.



At first it seemed like the day might not not turn out that well. The first farm we went to was not as interesting for the kids as we had hoped; so they were kind of grumpy and irritable. We finally left and decided to go to the same farm as we had went to last year since we knew we enjoyed it last year (and it happened to be close to where we were already)



This farm was much more fun. There was a neat gift shop that Matt and I enjoyed browsing through. We bought some fresh apples and squash and a few other little items. There was a huge blown up apple bouncy toy that the kids enjoyed jumping in. They also had face painting and a hayride. We all rode the hayride together and really enjoyed it. They also had a pumpkin patch that the kids enjoyed climbing around in. They had hay bale mazes too, but for some reason our kids didn't go in them. I guess they were too busy with the other things. We took pictures of course! I decided to post last years pictures from the pumpkin patch to compare how the kids have grown in the past year.



All in all we had a pretty good day. It was nice to enjoy a fun day as a family!





Here we are on the hayride (I'm taking the picture) What an adorable family I have!

Here are all the kids in the pumpkin patch.

Here are Ruby and Garrison last year. Notice Ruby's faithful elephant? I still feel sad when I see pictures of him. I wish we hadn't lost him...

Here is Christian and Anthony last year.

Here are all the kids together last year.

This is Ruby posing in the pumpkins this year.

Here she is with elephant last year.

Garrison this year.

Garrison last year.

Christian this year.

You can't see him real well, but this is Christian last year.

Anthony this year. The sun is in his eyes, but it's still a cute picture!

Anthony last year.