When I was too young to be asking, I asked my mom the standard "where do babies come from?" Being the Godly and taken-by-surprise woman she was at the time, she answered something like "God decides when to make you pregnant, when He wants to" - I'm sure the discussion was longer than that, but that was the impression that I left with. Her general "you" was, in my head, turned into a specific "you, Mallory!"
For weeks afterwards, before falling asleep, I would pray for God to please not make me pregnant until I was grown-up and married. Please, please, please.
Ha and Aw.
I didn't come to God with any understanding. I came with Him as a child, letting Him know exactly what I wanted and asking with the knowledge that He was listening and cared.
When do you get infiltrated by our culture and begin to think that God doesn't care about every tiny aspect of our lives? This is what our Bible study lesson was on today. We are going through "The Praying Life" where the author discusses the mysterious, improvable, and commanded act of coming to our Heavenly Father "without ceasing."
We learned today "The Lord (the infinite, Holy, beyond) is my shepherd (tends, leads, grooms the wool of even me)."
When we let go of control and learn how lowly and out of control we are, we can only cry out to God. He is all we have, and He is all.
We, just like any child, have a limited knowledge of the world. We have a tiny miniscule vision of life. We have a limited impression of what God's goodness and true love and wisdom is. And yet, as Jesus did, we are supposed to tell Him "I don't like this and I don't want to do this!" And THEN He, in His grace, makes our hearts more like His.
Faith Like a Child- Jars of Clay, Live
Thursday, October 13, 2011
Sunday, October 9, 2011
rain expected tomorrow afternoon, too.
Here in Florida (I don't know if it's all over the state, or just in the two cities where we have lived) there is a nice little rainfall once a day during the summer and some of the fall. It's nice- it kind of cuts the heat when it's summer. And, who am I kidding, in the "fall" too.
So we've been getting into the time where we have several days straight of just sunshine. No clouds, not even some drizzle. And the wind has picked up a little, too, so it's been cooler AND sunnier. What niceness, no?
Then! DUM DUM DUMMMM
Friday morning, it was raining when we woke up, and rained off and on all day. And then Satuday hit. We woke up to some wind. I took Bear out for his morning walk and fed him, letting Tommy enjoy a day of sleeping in. The sky went from cloudy to dark very quickly, wind picking up and rain starting and whatnot. Tommy had an appointment for a haircut at 12:30, and Ever After came on at 12, so we were both happy. Halfway through the movie, Bear and I were realizing that the rain was coming down way too... hard? Fast? A lot? Tommy showed up, hair a little shorter, saying that he was almost blown off the road from the crazy wind and rain.
It rained as much as it rained in "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" from 1977, which is an excellent movie.
So "the rain rain rain came down down down" and we tried to sneak Bear out to potty as often as we could. Long day of nothing but rain.
Tommy went to go get Five Guys as a special dinner treat, and I took a shower (yeah.... I put off bathing as long as possible... I'm a pretty gross person). During my shower, the power went out. We lit a bunch of candles, and had a nice dinner, and brought out Phase Ten. After a while, we noticed all those candles keeping us well lit were also putting off a lot of heat. We started blowing out candles and tried to keep only the essentials. Tommy decided to open the garage door manually, keep it propped open with a large box, and the open the house door to the garage to let some air in. It helped a little. We then decided to practice some songs to distract us from the warmth and the loud storm. Then Tommy decided he was just too uncomfortable- we were going for a drive in the car and were going to blast the AC, dang it! (we're delicate... Bear, too.)
Riding around, we discovered that a very small area was without power, only a few streets north of us and maybe one street south. But, that meant that they could fix ours quickly, right?
After a little while, the rain became just too dangerous to drive in, so we turned back. Tommy lifted the garage door with his he-man strength so we could get the car in and wouldn't have to worry about it losing a window, etc.
Finally, hours later, the power came back on with a -SURGE- and went right back off. And we smelled something burning. A couple of moments later, the power came on to stay, but not in the living room, and not in our bathroom. Random, right? We're still waiting to find out what was fried.
I went to the bedroom to put some things in my bedside table since I could see in there again, and when I stepped beside it, my foot sunk into water. YUP.
Momentary Catch-You-Up: when we first visited the house, there was some damage on the carpet in the bedroom. it was coming away from the wall and was lose and stained. they told us a sprinkler head had broken, and had pumped water into the house. but, not to worry, that sprinkler was fixed. so we positioned our furniture over the worst parts of the carpet, by the window.
SO guess where the water had seeped into the house?? Right under the furniture.
Over the next hour or so, we soaked up water with beach towels, pulled back the carpet, got out our only tiny fan, and moved furniture. We made the twin beds in the guest room into a king-sized bed (like we did for the Turners when they came to stay!) and hunkered down for the night.
Today is Sunday. We went to church (which was wonderful- encouraged us WHILE it spurred us on towards holiness), and between that and lunch, we dropped by the house to let Bear out for a moment. I opened the door to our room, and got hit by a wall of STINK. All I could think of was all the little smelly particles soaking into our comforter, our clothes, our furniture, our mattress.... Yuck.
On the way home from lunch, our realtor called, saying the home owners were sending an electric guy and carpet guys to the house tomorrow. When we got home, we took apart our bed and put the pieces into our front room (it has a desk and books, so we sometimes called it 'the office' when we're feeling fancy). We pulled the carpet further back, found more puddles of water, and closed off the room.
So, we will see what the guys say tomorrow!
It's been kind of like a weird adventure. Things are much more fun when you're with the love of your life. We decided this is the first time we are glad we don't own this house.
So we've been getting into the time where we have several days straight of just sunshine. No clouds, not even some drizzle. And the wind has picked up a little, too, so it's been cooler AND sunnier. What niceness, no?
Then! DUM DUM DUMMMM
Friday morning, it was raining when we woke up, and rained off and on all day. And then Satuday hit. We woke up to some wind. I took Bear out for his morning walk and fed him, letting Tommy enjoy a day of sleeping in. The sky went from cloudy to dark very quickly, wind picking up and rain starting and whatnot. Tommy had an appointment for a haircut at 12:30, and Ever After came on at 12, so we were both happy. Halfway through the movie, Bear and I were realizing that the rain was coming down way too... hard? Fast? A lot? Tommy showed up, hair a little shorter, saying that he was almost blown off the road from the crazy wind and rain.
It rained as much as it rained in "The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh" from 1977, which is an excellent movie.
So "the rain rain rain came down down down" and we tried to sneak Bear out to potty as often as we could. Long day of nothing but rain.
Tommy went to go get Five Guys as a special dinner treat, and I took a shower (yeah.... I put off bathing as long as possible... I'm a pretty gross person). During my shower, the power went out. We lit a bunch of candles, and had a nice dinner, and brought out Phase Ten. After a while, we noticed all those candles keeping us well lit were also putting off a lot of heat. We started blowing out candles and tried to keep only the essentials. Tommy decided to open the garage door manually, keep it propped open with a large box, and the open the house door to the garage to let some air in. It helped a little. We then decided to practice some songs to distract us from the warmth and the loud storm. Then Tommy decided he was just too uncomfortable- we were going for a drive in the car and were going to blast the AC, dang it! (we're delicate... Bear, too.)
Riding around, we discovered that a very small area was without power, only a few streets north of us and maybe one street south. But, that meant that they could fix ours quickly, right?
After a little while, the rain became just too dangerous to drive in, so we turned back. Tommy lifted the garage door with his he-man strength so we could get the car in and wouldn't have to worry about it losing a window, etc.
Finally, hours later, the power came back on with a -SURGE- and went right back off. And we smelled something burning. A couple of moments later, the power came on to stay, but not in the living room, and not in our bathroom. Random, right? We're still waiting to find out what was fried.
I went to the bedroom to put some things in my bedside table since I could see in there again, and when I stepped beside it, my foot sunk into water. YUP.
Momentary Catch-You-Up: when we first visited the house, there was some damage on the carpet in the bedroom. it was coming away from the wall and was lose and stained. they told us a sprinkler head had broken, and had pumped water into the house. but, not to worry, that sprinkler was fixed. so we positioned our furniture over the worst parts of the carpet, by the window.
SO guess where the water had seeped into the house?? Right under the furniture.
Over the next hour or so, we soaked up water with beach towels, pulled back the carpet, got out our only tiny fan, and moved furniture. We made the twin beds in the guest room into a king-sized bed (like we did for the Turners when they came to stay!) and hunkered down for the night.
Today is Sunday. We went to church (which was wonderful- encouraged us WHILE it spurred us on towards holiness), and between that and lunch, we dropped by the house to let Bear out for a moment. I opened the door to our room, and got hit by a wall of STINK. All I could think of was all the little smelly particles soaking into our comforter, our clothes, our furniture, our mattress.... Yuck.
On the way home from lunch, our realtor called, saying the home owners were sending an electric guy and carpet guys to the house tomorrow. When we got home, we took apart our bed and put the pieces into our front room (it has a desk and books, so we sometimes called it 'the office' when we're feeling fancy). We pulled the carpet further back, found more puddles of water, and closed off the room.
So, we will see what the guys say tomorrow!
It's been kind of like a weird adventure. Things are much more fun when you're with the love of your life. We decided this is the first time we are glad we don't own this house.
Wednesday, October 5, 2011
gator bait, pt. 2
By 7:30, we were all exhausted. Bear began laying down and only wagging his tail when people would pet him. We had been out there for 6 and a half hours!
But guess what. We found out that Jon had found 2 free tickets to get into the game! So, Kim and I graciously and sacrificially (sarcasm) gave up the seat to hang out together while the boys went to see the dumb football. One of our good friends brought Tommy a student ID so he could get in with Jon to their student tickets' area (Jon already had a UF ID because he works for the university). Tommy was READY.
Side note: Everyone I know (ok, not literally.) uses student ID's that aren't theirs to get into SEC games. Tommy and I ourselves used two complete strangers' to go to the Auburn/Bama game with his brother. We sat in the student section at Auburn covered in Alabama garb. The ticket takers never look at the pictures on the ID's, because they aren't losing money either way. So all of this was also true for UF.
Jon and Tommy headed towards the stadium, and Kim and I began to walk ALLLLLL the way back to the car, got hollered at and heckled (at?), and finally were on our way out. We were looking forward to curling up in cozy clothes and chatting and maybe watching a girly flick (if you say "flick" that makes it extra girly).
I got a phone call before we were even off campus. It was Tommy, "They wouldn't let me in." We turned around, picked up the guys, and got the full story. Apparently, this game was the moment UF decided to check everyone's ID's. The lady checking Tommy's took the ID, held it up next to his face, and even asked what his middle initial was. She took his ticket and gave it and the ID to her supervisor behind her, and didn't say anything more to Tommy. How embarrassing!
So we spent the rest of the night with the game on- Kim and I watched some of it, and talked for most of it. How encouraging it is to just talk about Godly things with a sister in Christ! And Tommy got his birthday wish: Alabama won. Yay! I just wish they had won a little earlier than a quarter to midnight.
The next morning, we got to return to our old church and had a wonderful time worshiping with people we love. We then got to eat with many of our friends at another one of our favorite restaurants- Chipotle! After visiting a little longer with friends at Jon and Kim's, we had to pack up to leave.
We now miss our peoples in Gainesville more than ever!
I guess I should change the title of these to something like ... "the tide rolled." or "we got no sleep."
But guess what. We found out that Jon had found 2 free tickets to get into the game! So, Kim and I graciously and sacrificially (sarcasm) gave up the seat to hang out together while the boys went to see the dumb football. One of our good friends brought Tommy a student ID so he could get in with Jon to their student tickets' area (Jon already had a UF ID because he works for the university). Tommy was READY.
Side note: Everyone I know (ok, not literally.) uses student ID's that aren't theirs to get into SEC games. Tommy and I ourselves used two complete strangers' to go to the Auburn/Bama game with his brother. We sat in the student section at Auburn covered in Alabama garb. The ticket takers never look at the pictures on the ID's, because they aren't losing money either way. So all of this was also true for UF.
Jon and Tommy headed towards the stadium, and Kim and I began to walk ALLLLLL the way back to the car, got hollered at and heckled (at?), and finally were on our way out. We were looking forward to curling up in cozy clothes and chatting and maybe watching a girly flick (if you say "flick" that makes it extra girly).
I got a phone call before we were even off campus. It was Tommy, "They wouldn't let me in." We turned around, picked up the guys, and got the full story. Apparently, this game was the moment UF decided to check everyone's ID's. The lady checking Tommy's took the ID, held it up next to his face, and even asked what his middle initial was. She took his ticket and gave it and the ID to her supervisor behind her, and didn't say anything more to Tommy. How embarrassing!
So we spent the rest of the night with the game on- Kim and I watched some of it, and talked for most of it. How encouraging it is to just talk about Godly things with a sister in Christ! And Tommy got his birthday wish: Alabama won. Yay! I just wish they had won a little earlier than a quarter to midnight.
We now miss our peoples in Gainesville more than ever!
I guess I should change the title of these to something like ... "the tide rolled." or "we got no sleep."
Tuesday, October 4, 2011
gator bait, pt. 1
It is Tuesday, and we "Florida Middletons" are still recovering from the weekend.
Two things:
1) I do not like being "The Florida Middletons" - although I know it is nice on the entire Middleton side of our family. But Florida just doesn't sound like us, even after a year and a half.
2) If you didn't know us, "recovering from the weekend" would probably sound like we "partied" or drank a lot. Nope.
So this weekend was the much-anticipated Bama vs Florida football game. Have I mentioned I don't like football? I feel like there's an old post on here somewhere venting that several times... But! This game was being held (held? played? located? what's a football-y thing to say??) in Gainesville. Well, fortunately for us, we know many people in Gainesville who desperately want to see us. ALSO it happened to be the weekend before Tommy's birthday.
Doesn't take a creative mind to figure out what Tommy wanted to do for his birthday!
The plan was to spend the weekend seeing our Gainesville friends and rooting (rooting?? why is that a word.) for the Crimson Tide. I checked with Jon and Kim, asking if we could crash at their place. We also went out on a limb and asked if we could bring Bear along. This would be our first trip with him, and we were all curious to see how he would handle the 3.5 hour drive, being in a new house, and meeting lots of new people.
Of course, I needed to plan a little somethin' somethin' for Tommy's birthday. I messaged several of our friends and asked them to surprise him at one of our favorite restaurants. I asked that they try and bring a balloon or two and that we would let them know when were close to getting into town.
Tommy was preparing in his own way. He ordered a jersey for Bear, complete with his name and the number 13, for 13 national championships. We let the dog practice wearing it a few times, and were also mentally preparing for the comments UF fans would be throwing our way...
...yes, the plan was to walk around campus during tailgating, sporting our own Alabama colors and with a dog who may or may not enjoy getting hollered at. We're so brave.
So Friday, we packed up the car with everything Bear owns, and a few things of our own, and started our trip. We stopped twice, but both times were for us, so we don't know how long Bear can go without a break. We arrived in Gainesville right around 5, just in time to meet Kim coming home from work and Jon coming home from working out. Jon took a shower, we moved in and let Bear get a good look at the place and his new friends. We sat and chatted for a little bit while Kim secretly let everyone know we were going to be at the restaurant soon.
We walked in, and in front of a full place, our good friends led everyone in a round of "Happy Birthday" and made Tommy feel completely loved and slightly embarrassed. We stayed at Rolls & Bowls (I would highly suggest you try this place if you're ever in the G'ville) for a little too long chatting with everyone, and then went back to the Moller's. We played a great type of name game, and finished up with a couple rounds of "mafia". We stayed up too late and laughed too much.
The next morning, the guys went golfing, and to make it to their 7:00 t-time (it may be "tee" time but, whatevs) Tommy had to wake up at 5:45. By 7 Kim was also out the door to run, and I was unfortunately wide awake, even though I had planned to enjoy sleep instead of being like the crazy people I was living with. I ended up watching a re-run of Boy Meets World and walking Bear around their neighborhood.
By 10:00, Kim and I were back out the door to SHOP! We rarely get to just buy things for fun, but since the boys were playing with some money, we got to use the same amount to have a little of our own kind of fun!
By 1:00, we had all eaten lunch and were donning our separate team colors. Bear looked manly in his jersey, and I got to wear an awesome felt-flower clip (shout out Bella Designs!) of grey and ruby red. We were ready to face the madness.
We thought that the dog would get too excited. That he would jump on people and be trying to run after cool looking strangers and not listen to us. He could've even snapped at people if he got annoyed. Or he could've been scared of the thousands of fans pouring into the campus.
But let me just brag, he was amazing. At first he did want to pull to people, then he realized there were way too many people to try and see all of them. People would walk up to him and hug and pet him. They would shyly stick out their palms. They would wait to see if we would allow them to come close. Some would kiss him on the head. I let kids give him treats and talked to random adults about their own dogs. We told people about the Humane Society.
Uf fans would shout "nice dog! ugly jersey!" and "animal abuse!" But some even wanted pictures with him.
One college kid did the gator chop AT Bear, hollering "gator bait! gator bait!" Bear started walking up to him, and the guy slightly froze. Then Bear gently licked his hand twice and walked away. Of course, every Gator fan there "AWW"-ed. I hope the guy was humbled a little bit.
And we walked miles, and miles, and miles.
Two things:
1) I do not like being "The Florida Middletons" - although I know it is nice on the entire Middleton side of our family. But Florida just doesn't sound like us, even after a year and a half.
2) If you didn't know us, "recovering from the weekend" would probably sound like we "partied" or drank a lot. Nope.
So this weekend was the much-anticipated Bama vs Florida football game. Have I mentioned I don't like football? I feel like there's an old post on here somewhere venting that several times... But! This game was being held (held? played? located? what's a football-y thing to say??) in Gainesville. Well, fortunately for us, we know many people in Gainesville who desperately want to see us. ALSO it happened to be the weekend before Tommy's birthday.
Doesn't take a creative mind to figure out what Tommy wanted to do for his birthday!
The plan was to spend the weekend seeing our Gainesville friends and rooting (rooting?? why is that a word.) for the Crimson Tide. I checked with Jon and Kim, asking if we could crash at their place. We also went out on a limb and asked if we could bring Bear along. This would be our first trip with him, and we were all curious to see how he would handle the 3.5 hour drive, being in a new house, and meeting lots of new people.
Of course, I needed to plan a little somethin' somethin' for Tommy's birthday. I messaged several of our friends and asked them to surprise him at one of our favorite restaurants. I asked that they try and bring a balloon or two and that we would let them know when were close to getting into town.
Tommy was preparing in his own way. He ordered a jersey for Bear, complete with his name and the number 13, for 13 national championships. We let the dog practice wearing it a few times, and were also mentally preparing for the comments UF fans would be throwing our way......yes, the plan was to walk around campus during tailgating, sporting our own Alabama colors and with a dog who may or may not enjoy getting hollered at. We're so brave.
So Friday, we packed up the car with everything Bear owns, and a few things of our own, and started our trip. We stopped twice, but both times were for us, so we don't know how long Bear can go without a break. We arrived in Gainesville right around 5, just in time to meet Kim coming home from work and Jon coming home from working out. Jon took a shower, we moved in and let Bear get a good look at the place and his new friends. We sat and chatted for a little bit while Kim secretly let everyone know we were going to be at the restaurant soon.
We walked in, and in front of a full place, our good friends led everyone in a round of "Happy Birthday" and made Tommy feel completely loved and slightly embarrassed. We stayed at Rolls & Bowls (I would highly suggest you try this place if you're ever in the G'ville) for a little too long chatting with everyone, and then went back to the Moller's. We played a great type of name game, and finished up with a couple rounds of "mafia". We stayed up too late and laughed too much.
The next morning, the guys went golfing, and to make it to their 7:00 t-time (it may be "tee" time but, whatevs) Tommy had to wake up at 5:45. By 7 Kim was also out the door to run, and I was unfortunately wide awake, even though I had planned to enjoy sleep instead of being like the crazy people I was living with. I ended up watching a re-run of Boy Meets World and walking Bear around their neighborhood.
By 10:00, Kim and I were back out the door to SHOP! We rarely get to just buy things for fun, but since the boys were playing with some money, we got to use the same amount to have a little of our own kind of fun!
By 1:00, we had all eaten lunch and were donning our separate team colors. Bear looked manly in his jersey, and I got to wear an awesome felt-flower clip (shout out Bella Designs!) of grey and ruby red. We were ready to face the madness.
We thought that the dog would get too excited. That he would jump on people and be trying to run after cool looking strangers and not listen to us. He could've even snapped at people if he got annoyed. Or he could've been scared of the thousands of fans pouring into the campus.
But let me just brag, he was amazing. At first he did want to pull to people, then he realized there were way too many people to try and see all of them. People would walk up to him and hug and pet him. They would shyly stick out their palms. They would wait to see if we would allow them to come close. Some would kiss him on the head. I let kids give him treats and talked to random adults about their own dogs. We told people about the Humane Society.
Uf fans would shout "nice dog! ugly jersey!" and "animal abuse!" But some even wanted pictures with him.
One college kid did the gator chop AT Bear, hollering "gator bait! gator bait!" Bear started walking up to him, and the guy slightly froze. Then Bear gently licked his hand twice and walked away. Of course, every Gator fan there "AWW"-ed. I hope the guy was humbled a little bit.
And we walked miles, and miles, and miles.
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