Quick Winter Slideshow

Quick Winter Slideshow a video by gharper356 on Flickr.

Morning Time...

Jackman and me big chair 3, a photo by gharper356 on Flickr.

Most every morning while the boys are asleep, and sometimes before Lisa wakes up, I get up and go downstairs to the living room. I go down there to sit in the big chair and read my Bible and pray. When I’m done, I wait.

I know Jackman will be coming soon. Sometimes he even comes before I can get finished. 

He’s over three years old now, and he’s been in his own little bed for a while. At first when he woke up, he liked to lie around in the bed like a teenager. I would have to go and drag him out. Now he’s got something that he seems to like better than that, which makes me happy. He likes to get up early and come sit with me.

He’s usually awake by around 6:00, sometimes earlier. As soon as he gets up, I hear him jump out of bed. The house is still dark then, and I can hear him walking slowly and carefully down the stairs. Then he peeks around the corner to see if I’m in the big chair. When he sees me, I just motion for him to come on and sit down. He hurries on down the last few stairs – always with Stitch and his Toy Story blanket in-hand. Then he crawls up beside me and under my left arm, and we just sit there together looking into the dark. Sometimes we sit there without making a sound for nearly and hour. It’s one of my favorite times of the day.

I wish I were like him. It occurred to me that I should be exactly like him, be as punctual, as enthusiastic, as eager to wake up every morning and go sit with my Heavenly Father downstairs in the big chair. I must admit that at times I do it out of habit or obligation. But for Jackman it never is – he just wants to come sit with me. I want to be like that so badly. We should all want that. 

Jesus said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” I think I’ve found my role model.

Ten New Year's Eves Together...

The younger us, over ten years ago... but the happier us just keeps getting happier.

A decade is a period of ten years. As of today – New Year’s Eve, 2012 – that’s how long Lisa and I have been married. Happy anniversary, Lisa!

Ten years is a long time in marriage years, especially the way society has become so comfortable with the idea of divorce. As of about 6:15 P.M., Lisa and I will officially hit that ten year mark. That’s 120 months, or a little more than 521 weeks, or 87,672 hours, or 5,260,320 minutes, or if we could pinpoint it, 315,619,200 seconds. It’s a milestone to say the least.

I’ll never forget, before we got married, our pastor Daryle Nichols said to me in our one marriage counseling session: “Greg, do you realize that God is going to hold you responsible for…” I forget exactly what he said after that, but those were the most important words I’ve ever heard in my life. He meant that the vows I was going to make weren’t a joke – God was going to hold me to them. And God fully expected me to keep them all. Marriage and family became serious business that night, and although I don’t remember much else about that session, it was a life-changer.

Brother Daryle married us in the old sanctuary on a Tuesday night – New Year’s Eve, 2002, at 6:00 P.M. To our surprise, it was standing room only. We had a simple wedding; my brother was Best Man, and Lisa’s brother was the other Best Man (or Maid of Honor as we like to kid him). We wanted a simple wedding that kind of reflected who we both were, but we did splurge on our wedding rings. That was important to us.

We had a verse engraved inside each of our rings. Lisa’s just has “Matthew 19:6” because hers is so small, but mine reads, “Therefore what God has joined together, let not man separate. Matthew 19:6.”

Now, that may sound kind of un-romantic or anti-divorce, but you would be missing the point. From the very beginning, we recognized that our marriage was something God had orchestrated. He had brought us together as one flesh. Back then, we just knew that divorce was off the table, but as we grew spiritually, it became more about depending on God to preserve our marriage, through the good and the bad.

Lisa and I have faced some very rough… some awful times. But the worst times we’ve faced have all ended up being the best years of our marriage. How can that be? How can I honestly say that times when I have seen my wife in pain, times when I have seen her suffer, times when I have seen her heartbroken as we left our son in the hospital were the best years of our marriage? Because from Day 1, ten years ago, God has had our marriage in His hands, protecting us, lifting us up, and making sure we knew it was Him doing it all.

We are not special, and are not particularly strong… but God is. Today isn’t a celebration of us. It’s a celebration of Him. He took two polar opposites and made them inseparable. He has brought us through the impossible… repeatedly! We are just plain, messed up folks like everyone else, but we have entrusted our marriage and family to God instead of ourselves. Who better to preserve us that the One who joined us together?

Thank you Lord.

“Who am I, Sovereign Lord, and what is my family, that you have brought me this far?”

2 Samuel 7:18

Picture Update on the Boys...

Here's a little picture update. The boys are doing well, as you can see. Jackman is eating more, and we've cut back on his tube feeds just a little to make room for some hunger per his nutritionist's instructions. Now he wants to eat. He's not eating anything solid yet, but he's eating some, nonetheless. He's also making leaps and bounds in his speech. Speech is tied very closely with the mechanics used when eating, so he has been behind other kids his age. But his speech therapist says he is a few years ahead of others in the sounds he says, and his counting, etc. It's just the pronunciation that he has to work on. He hasn't been refluxing (or throwing up) at all. He's about 50th percentile in weight and height - awesome for a tube-fed kid. He doing great right now. Brolin is doing really well. Talking up a storm, eating everything except strawberries. He's in the 75th-100 percentile in height, and 50th in weight, and still growing like a weed. He likes reading books, then tearing then to shreds. The boys are great together. Check out the pics. Hope you like them.

Jackman is kind of a depressed kid. Sometimes he can barely get out of bed and go to work. All he does is complain and whine about the economy... No wait... he's pretty much like this all the time.

Lately, because of this towel that that was given to Jackman by a good friend of ours, Brolin pretends to be a dog all the time. And Jackman loves it, because he has a pet. It's kind of like a two-for-one deal, so if you have a second kid, forget the pet, just get yourself a dog towel.

Rare photo opp indeed! This was taken without the use of duct tape or Benadryl. I merely hypnotized them with a new cartoon, and jammed them into the chair with the footstool. 

Okay Einstein, I need my specs back... Jackman was taking my goggles for a test drive. Lisa liked this one so much, it earned a spot on the lock screen of her phone.

Maybe Brolin will be an archaeologist. That sure sounds more promising than being a dumpster-diver. This is one of his favorite pastimes.
Step 1: Climb in the toy box.
Step 2: Dig the to the bottom of the box.
Step 3: Beg for help out of the box.

Grandma Brenda had a good idea - Jackman's first Happy Meal. He may not have swallowed much of it, but he sure enough chewed it up, and drank a lot of that shake. He's come a long way since we brought him home.

A Walmart diaper just can't contain all that manliness. Well, if he doesn't become an archaeologist, maybe he can fix your sink! Brolin exudes potential from every direction.

Priceless! Taken on the road at Lisa's grandmother's house, in South Alabama. Long day of traveling, playing, rambling, and finally, crashing. 

Guess which one Daddy dressed? Both of them! Jackman specifically asked for the dinosaur pants, and he's been working hard on his speech, so he got what he asked for. Now, dressing Brolin before bedtime is like trying to skin a cat. You want to make sure that you have on long sleeves and eye protection before you start that battle.

It is amazing how fast those little plastic things can get coming down that driveway. It's a good thing we have a chain link fence to catch'em before they launch off into the woods. Jackman is pretty daring on his little red car at three years old, but Brolin (one year old) gives me multiple heart attacks trying to keep up with his big brother. There's nothing he won't try five times.

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Public Servant's Announcement

'Bout Time...

Thank the Lord, we finally got to get Lisa and Jackman together.

It's strange really. Jackman has only been here for just over 2 days. The thing is, he has spent almost all of those two days in NICU, with no contact at all with his mama. That has been so tough for Lisa. I really can't imagine what it would feel like, and I was halfway going through it myself. For two days, I spent the day with Jackman in NICU, and the night with Lisa in "our" room. But up until today, the only time Lisa spent with Jackman was immediately after he was born, and a couple of minutes looking at him through the plexiglass transport before he was flown over to Children's.

Normally I would say something like "I don't know how she held up so well", but if you read my last post, you already know that I do know how she held up.

Well, at long last, Lisa got to be reunited with Jackman, even if it was only for a couple of hours. You can look at the picture and judge for yourself wether or not God has granted her peace with all that's going on. This picture is photographic PROOF of what God is capable of doing.

It turned out to be just like I told Lisa it would be. As tired and worn out as she is, and emotionally drained as she is, that couple of hours with him tonight made all the other disappear. I really enjoyed watching them together. We didn't even get to pick him up and hold him, but it didn't matter. It was just a pleasant, peaceful, happy time...for all of us.

We can't wait to go back tomorrow!