Grateful

Little t getting ready for some outside time...man I love those eyes...

Little t and his truck...I am not sure what he enjoyed more - pushing the truck or falling down and getting dirty...

What is that verse??? “God’s grace is sufficient for you, His power is made perfect in weakness?” Yeah, that one.  Yesterday was a testement of that for me in big ways. 

A and I had stayed up waaay too late the night before watching something on the Discovery Channel We now have cable t.v. people. (it costs us a whole 3 dollars a months…and  will blog more about it soon)The first time either of us has ever had it in our house in our entire lives…and we are kinda giddy about it. We started out watching commercials (which are at times more entertaining than the shows themselves here) and then something on the Discovery Channel and then part of a movie.  Needless to say it was late when we made it to bed and after waking up to change a diaper and nurse a baby, I was not ready to get out of bed in the morning.  I finally rolled out after A had told me to 10 times and little t had crawled right over my face 13 times. I decided I was grumpy and I didn’t want to go to our service that morning (Friday is our Sabbath here)…which was wonderful seeing as I was in charge of speaking and leading that morning.  I didn’t feel prepared, or excited about going and definitely not about sharing.  I was moaning to myself about not having a break from the little guy and snapped at him and chewed him out as he tried to escaped while I attempted to change his (very poopy) diaper. 

And then I sat there, wondering what in the world I was doing. An hour before I was supposed to share what the Father was doing in my life and I am chewing out my one year told, muttering to myself about how pointless it was for me to share when I didn’t want to be there and couldn’t control my temper.  A intervened and I was able to jump in the shower 3 minutes before the service was supposed to begin.  It was one of those humbling desperation moments where I knew I didn’t have it in me to speak or lead or even show up at that service. The Father quietly urged me to let the words He had laid on my heart speak to me as I shared them and it was good…a humbling, but uplifting time.

After the service and lunch and putting little t down for his nap, A and I were hanging out when we received a text from one of our teammates.  She said that she would be happy to watch little t for a little bit that afternoon if we wanted to get out for a walk.  A and I had talked earlier in the week about the possibility of asking someone to watch little t while we went on a motorcycle ride on Friday afternoon, but we hadn’t followed through with it.  There are only three other people (besides us) here right now and we didn’t want to stress someone out on their day off.  But here someone was asking us…how wonderful! 

We jumped at the chance and were out the door soon after little t woke up. We dropped him off at R’s house and set off on the motorcycle.  He didn’t even realize we had left as he was having way too much fun watching R’s cat play in the grass as he was in the swing.

As soon as we got on that bike, all of the stress of the day was gone.  That may sound weird to some of you, but it is true!  Motorcycles have always been A and I’s thing.  They have always been A’s thing…from the time he was a little boy. And now they have rubbed off on me! I mean, let’s be honest, one of the reasons we waited so long to have kids was because we loved that so much. I know that this may sound shallow, but in some ways it is true. We have put a lot of miles on bikes exploring a lot of different countries and for a long time we weren’t ready to give that up. Okay, okay, it wasn’t the only reason we waited, maybe not even a main reason, but we definitely were sad when we took our last big trip in Thailand (I was 6 months pregnant at the time). 

Anyway, we had a great time on the bike. We just rode down the river on the outskirts of town, enjoying the beautiful weather (50 degrees and sunny) the scenery, the chance to be together and talk doing one of our absolute favorite things.  We stopped at a shop to get a few groceries on our way back and then made our way home.  By the time we returned we had been gone an hour, though it felt like it had been a day.  We both felt refreshed and A commented on  how nice it was to have little breaks like that before we were desperate for them.  And it was true.  I realized that given the stress of the morning and my terrible attitude, the break was just what I had needed.  We walked in to find a very happy and chatty little t. He was grinning from ear to ear and told us all about his time.  R said they had played outside for 45 minutes and said that she honestly didn’t think little t realized we were gone.  So, it was a great time. 

Upon return to our yard, the guard was there to meet us.  He loves loves loves little t and smiled big when he saw him.  He took him from me and they walked to our house together. kAkA (pronounced Cocoa…the word for uncle here and what we call the guard) smiled the whole time and talked to little t. Little t talked right back. kAkA told me again about how he had been best friends with the little British girl who had lived here before us and to little t he said, “now you will be my little friend right? Anytime you want to, you just come hang out with me.” He also mentioned that if little t wasn’t sleeping at night and just crying, I could take him out to hang out with kAkA in his room and he would take care of him. I am pretty sure this was his subtle way of telling me that he hears little t crying at night sometimes and doesn’t think it is okay…

Anyway, they played outside for about another hour, little t walking around with kAkA, picking up sticks and rocks, pushing his truck.  kAkA was showing him birds in the trees and showing him a big plane flying over.  I hung out for part of the time and then Andy kept an eye on them while he worked outside and I worked on supper.  When it started to get dark, little t finally came inside for the night, smiling from ear to ear and full of stories. 

The day that had started out so stinky in my books ended on such a positive note.  As I put little t down for bed, I found myself so humbled and thanking the Father for His goodness that day and His provision of exactly what I needed; lessons learned, a little bit of a break and the reminder of friends and people here who love us and are willing to help make life good here.  It just made me be very grateful for the Father’s goodness in these small, yet monumental ways.