Family Ties

Serious post ahead. I'll be back to my light and fluffy, sunshine and rainbows tomorrow.

I got a call last week that my grandfather (my dad's dad) had been taken the emergency room after exhibiting some strange behavior. An MRI showed a mass in his brain and further x-rays of his lungs showed a mass there too. I went home for a super quick visit on Saturday afternoon to hug his neck (and my dad's.) He still knew who I was, which was a great relief.

The next few months are going to be difficult for my family. How do you go on with life as usual while also traversing this road? I really would be so honored if you would pray for us through this season, as the family navigates my grandfather's and grandmother's care.

Everyone experiences a situation like this at some point in time. That is a sad reality of life here on earth, you know? It should make us long for the day when there is death, pain, and tears are gone forever (Revelation 21:4.) For the Follower of Christ, this is the reality, that our Savior has conquered these things. I am clinging to this promise today.

{If you read the above and have no clue what I'm talking about, please contact me because I would love to tell you all about it. Triple exclamation points. (!!!)}

While we were there Saturday, we went out for supper with my parents. There is a little boy at my house who can cheer the frown off of anyone's face, especially his Granddaddy's. He is just good medicine. And because my mom couldn't let us leave without a pic for her Facebook, here we are in front of the local Mexican food restaurant in town.

The sound you hear is me lacing up my running shoes to run this baby weight off of my face. Yikes.

My Royal Souvenir: A Review of the Modalu Bristol/Pippa handbag

Back in mid-May, I saw this picture of Pippa Middleton and knew that I must have that understated grey handbag. It is by an English company called Modalu, which I had heard nothing about. Of course everyone else in the world wanted Pippa's bag too, which actually resulted in Modalu renaming the bag from "Bristol" to "Pippa." And ultimately, they've produced it in other colors as well, and sent a bunch of them to Pippa. That lucky duck. Not only is she Prince William's sis-in-law, she gets free handbags.

{Sigh.}

As I mentioned, everyone and their mom ordered the "Pippa" so the wait time became long. Like several months long. I ordered this bag in the color shark in Medium Grab size back on the 19th of May, I believe.

It came in the week of my birthday.

{August 23rd, feel free to take a moment to mark your calendar.}

I thought I would do a review as I had difficulty finding any about the quality of the bag online.

And hey! You might be wondering the same thing.

My bag came wrapped and stuffed with paper. In addition to the outer paper wrap, it also had a plastic bag around it. It looked to be well protected as it made its journey across the pond.

All of the metal details on the bag, like the label shown here,
and the zipper pulls were either plastic covered or paper wrapped.

You can see the cute shell detail on the zipper pulls.
They are a good, hefty weight, in my opinion.

Pippa (the bag) has 3 compartments.
I fit my very large paper planner in the middle one,
and my working mom survival kit in the top one where you see an
internal zipper pocket. There is also a cell phone pocket and
one other easy access pocket up in there.

The bottom compartment (as shown in this pic) is just a plain zippered section. In my bag, there are usually baby accoutrements, like diapers and wipes.

Front shot of the bag, and the accompanying leather strap,
which so far I have not used.
It really is a beautiful bag. The leather is "like butter" as one of my friends described it the other day. Just really, really beautiful. I might compare this to a classic Coach bag, perhaps? You can't tell from my pics, but unlike Pippa's (first photo), mine has metal feet on the bottom, which I think is a really nice detail on a handbag.

As far as a mom bag goes, I have to say that this one works great from 9-to-5 for me. I think most mothers will agree that a shoulder bag works best with wee ones, which this is not that, and I'm not terribly fond of it with the strap added. So I'm loving carrying it to work each day and swapping it out for the weekend when I am out and about with my little.

I took a bit of a risk for myself (I research a handbag relentlessly before I make a purchase) and bought this one. I love it! It is likely to be in style for years to come as long as the leather wears well, and I take care of it. I would buy another one.

Well done, Modalu!

Weekending in September

Ladies' Luncheon centerpiece

Baby in a bowling alley

The Man playing whirlyball*

Baby sleeping during whirlyball

Church cookbook sales
There are 1000 recipes in this book!
We spent the weekend with church activities, from the Saturday morning Ladies' Lunch, to Sunday afternoon cookbook sales after church. Sandwiched between those rather grown-up ladylike events was a retreat with our high school seniors. The youngster was up rather late Saturday night but was still his smiling self the entire time. I can't even say that about myself half the time. He has just a wonderful disposition, and I am so thankful! We stayed at a nearby hotel for the retreat, and he had no problem adjusting to another bed, being fed sitting on a sidewalk while waiting for our tables to be ready, etc. He had fun playing with the girls and came home just talking up a storm about them.

{At least, that's what I think he was talking about.}

So this has me thinking, this parenting on the go thing. What is the weirdest place you've ever had to feed your kid?

*Whirlyball is a combination of lacrosse, bumpercars, and basketball, kinda. We do it as a teambuilder at work on occasion. It completely levels the playing field between those with athletic ability and those without. I will let you guess which of those categories I fall into.

A Kickoff I Will Not Soon Forget

Jack watching his first Aggie football game
As most everyone in the great state of Texas knows, we have been in an incredible drought this summer, the heat index notwithstanding. I gave up watering my flowers at least a month ago, and we're barely keeping the yard alive at this point.

I've mentioned this before, but my parents and grandparents live out in the country on the farm my grandfather grew up on. If you've read any Little House on the Prairie books, you know that there are many dangers of living in the country: pestilence, distance from help, and of course, prairie fire.

My mom called me around 5 PM to say that a wild fire was burning out of control heading towards their place. While we were talking, my dad beeped in to tell her to start gathering things up in the house to evacuate. That is the most stricken I've ever heard my mom, when she called me back to ask if there was anything in the house I wanted to hang on to. Providentially, my brother had gone home last minute for the weekend, so they had an extra set of hands and wheels to load up the more irreplaceable things in the house. They grabbed all photos off of the walls, portable family heirlooms, and then took the time to photograph everything they would leave behind. She told me that as she closed the door on the the bare-walled house, she prayed that God would send a miracle.

Then she got on the phone and called me to pray before heading over to my grandparents' to help them pack up and photograph too.

I tweeted and texted asking anyone who could, would pray for my family. Brad and I got on our knees in the living room, and in tears, I begged God to deliver the farm, no, to deliver TEXAS from becoming a scorched earth. I prayed for protection for my family, protection for the fire responders, and ultimately, that an end to the fire would come, in such a manner that anyone who witnessed it could only say that the Lord had intervened and saved. Specifically, we prayed that no matter what, God would be glorified in the situation, whether in prevention or recovery.

About 20 minutes after we got up from our living room floor, my mom called to report (quite fanatically) that IT WAS RAINING. Downpouring!

We spent the rest of the afternoon monitoring the situation. By late evening, the rain had slowed the fire such, that the fire department had it contained. Yesterday, my hometown newspaper reported that the rainstorm directly followed the path of the fire until it was controlled.

In short, it was a miracle.

Only God could have intervened. The fire had consumed more than 1500 acres and was quickly burning through more directly on its way to my parents' place. Glory to God alone for His protection and His mercy.

I will never get over it.

If you would be so kind, please continue to pray for my hometown. While I am praising God for delivering my family from the devastation, many were not spared. Whether they are replacing homes, livestock, or other buildings which are used for their livelihoods, much is left to be done to recover, outside of the emotional trauma itself. Please pray for comfort, for peace, for recovery efforts, and of course...more rain!

Birthdays are my favorite {especially my own.}

So I think I documented here last year that I am no longer in my 20s. Actually, now that I think of it, I never blogged about my 30th birthday party. It was at Joe T's and my wonderful husband along with my wonderful college roommate organized it. We officially announced to many of our friends that we were expecting a sweet, little baby. And I took an awesome trip to NYC with the ladies in my family to celebrate.

I was fairly convinced that this b-day would be a little bit of a letdown because I'm working (a lot) and of course it was thirty-one.

C'est la vie, and all that, you know?

But I also did not take into account this little boy.
He is the biggest blessing to come out of year the thirtieth.
And his daddy brought him over to take me to lunch.
How sweet is he?

{Referring to his daddy, in this case.}

And while I worked the rest of the day, they went shopping (for golf stuff, don't get too excited)
and then hung around to meet me for supper. We went to The Porch, which
was completely Jackers friendly.

And then we had this.

{Gooey Butter Cake, homemade vanilla bean}

I think I posted on FB that this was my favorite birthday.

And you know what?

It was.

Some Random Thoughts for Today

Have you heard of goodreads? I'm guessing yes. If you are a goodreads member, what are the ways you've used it? Does it keep you accountable to give a book report? I'm just curious if I need to join one more social media-type site.

Do tell.

And also, I must own to you that my royal wedding souvenir shipped out two days ago from across the pond. I am like a little girl {or, ahem, early thirty-year-old girl} the night before Santa comes.

Thank you, that is all.

Jack's 5 Month Update

This boy continues to steal our hearts. He is just too much! This month, he expanded his eating of solids. From fruits to veggies, to mac and cheese and chicken noodle, so far I've not put anything in front of him that he hasn't eaten all of. One of my friends was keeping the baby room in the nursery and commented on how solid he was. And he is definitely that--a solid little kid. I love it! He's outgrown his little bibs, so we've moved on to the bigger ones. He rolled over a couple of times from back to front, and then got mad that he was on his belly. (He's figured that one out in month 6th, for sure.)

Below is a video of suppertime. When I introduce a new food I will say, "MMMMM, yummy!" You'll notice he's picked up on that. A little.

I'm so blessed to be Jack's mama!