In Christ Alone

This song has been in my head for a while, and it's a good one to get stuck on, while I think of our friend Bill, and my Dad especially. It is not only beautiful, but full of good truth to dwell on. My strongest memory of it is when Keith and Kristyn Getty (composer/singer) performed it at our church a couple of years ago. When Kristyn sang this, I just couldn't help but cry. I dislike crying in church, but it was non-negotiable that morning. I have no idea what questionable Christian TV channel this clip comes from, and wish there wasn't a distracting little logo on the screen, but it was the truest semblance of what I remember. Have a listen!



In Christ alone my hope is found,
He is my light, my strength, my song;
this Cornerstone, this solid Ground,
firm through the fiercest drought and storm.
What heights of love, what depths of peace,
when fears are stilled, when strivings cease!
My Comforter, my All in All,
here in the love of Christ I stand.

In Christ alone! who took on flesh
Fulness of God in helpless babe!
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones he came to save:
Till on that cross as Jesus died,
The wrath of God was satisfied -
For every sin on Him was laid;
Here in the death of Christ I live.

There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain:
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave he rose again!
And as He stands in victory
Sin's curse has lost its grip on me,
For I am His and He is mine -
Bought with the precious blood of Christ.

No guilt in life, no fear in death,
This is the power of Christ in me;
From life's first cry to final breath.
Jesus commands my destiny.
No power of hell, no scheme of man,
Can ever pluck me from His hand;
Till He returns or calls me home,
Here in the power of Christ I'll stand.

Internet

I feel like a secret agent. It is pretty crazy how much info you can get easily and quickly via the internet. OK, not *that* much info really, but still surprising. I was trying to search for foreclosure listings in a town we're keeping our eye on. I found a website that listed an active bankruptcy, but only gave some little bits of info and you have to sign up/pay to get the full listing. I went to another website and sleuthed around and matched the data I had with the missing data to narrow down to about 8 possible addresses (20 mins). I went to a bankruptcy lookup site and narrowed to one address (5 minutes). I checked out the house visually from a bird's eye view and a street view, and looked at the neighbor's houses (10 minutes). I then reverse address looked up the names of who lives there (1 minute). I then called a free automated bankruptcy court phone number and got info on the case (3 minutes). Uh-oh. I just added up those estimates, and I've been sitting here longer than that :}

What did this get me? First of all, the house is separated from a six-lane highway by 1-2 acres of forest, no fences. Not so good for letting little boys explore. Also, from what I understand (which isn't much in these matters), the owners had a bankruptcy filing in 1996 that was resolved in 1997. I'm guessing the house shows up as 'active' bankruptcy status because there's a lien on it. I don't think that means it's even available at all (hence, why it doesn't show up on normal property searches...I was just trying to see if there are additional properties that don't show up on web listings). Furthermore, it stinks to pay a realtor thousands and thousands of dollars when they probably don't do this kind of work for you anyway, and you can basically access the same info they can. Finally, I just wasted a nice chunk of my Friday evening doing nothing profitable, which shows just how far I'll go to potentially get a bargain. But it was kind of fun.

Awww.

Bedtime tonight...should I share it? Almost something to keep just inside, but I want to remember...

[cuddling right before climbing into bed]
Me: Owen, I love you so much. Thanks for being such a big boy and for being such a great big brother. I'm proud of you. I will always love you! There's nothing that will ever make me stop loving you.
Owen: I love you too Mommy.
Me: You know, there is only One that loves you more than Daddy and I do.
Owen: Who?
Me: It's God. He loves you even more than we do, and we love you more than any person in the whole world does. God loves people the most!
Owen: No...I love you and Daddy the same as God does! I love you as much as much as God does.
Me: Oh, I don't think so! God loves us the most and he loves you the most. No one can love more than God does. He loves us perfectly. I love you so, so much, but sometimes I make mistakes. Have I ever made a mistake?
Owen: Oh yes.
Me: Yes, I make lots of mistakes every day, so even though I love you lots and lots I don't love you perfectly. But God never makes a mistake, and he loves you perfectly, just right.
Owen: I make mistakes too Mommy.
Me: Well I forgive you and God forgives you and I love you.
Owen: I forgive you too. I love you.
[major cuddles]

Tissue, please!

On the downhill...we hope!

For all of you wonderful sympathetic friends and family (sympathy is almost as good as healing!)...
...Asher was fully himself today. Still speckled, but the hives mostly looked like they were on the wane rather than new and angry like yesterday. Some of the hive patches from yesterday were so severe that he was bruised this morning! He was happy today, and that was a major relief because...

...Owen had a very rough day. He threw up a couple times (3rd day!) and just laid around and was irritable and moaning most of the day. Poor guy. He tolerated apple flavor pedialyte a lot better than grape; wish I'd tried that earlier! He wanted supper even though he didn't eat much once I got some bland choices in front of him...but the presence of appetite was marked improvement, so I hope he's on the downhill of this!

...Reuel is better already and my cold seems to be letting up surprisingly early.

Hallelujah! Just a couple weeks back I was kind of in a rut of disgruntlement about feeling like all I ever do is run a hamster wheel...clean, cook, bath, bed, laundry, and repeat. My attitude has been checked and I am now ready to return with gratefulness to the ordinary. Ordinary is quite spectacular, really! Trials are a gift, recognized only in hindsight :) And I do know this wasn't the biggest trial in the world. I'm a complainer :P

I just so happened to remember that I had a little Playmobil set stowed away from Christmas...when we discovered there were a few too many purchases for Owen and held it back for a rainy day. Yay! The kids had a blast with the tiny pieces of a workshop set, pretending with the tools, setting up the workbench, and it really turned Owen's attitude around for a little while. After I don't know how many solid days in the house now, a little something new was awesome.

Thanks for thinking of and praying for us!

Day 3

Please forgive the play-by-play description of our sick days. Just skip this if you're a reader, and tired of hearing the details! I think I like to look back at what we go through and remember the realities...that, and the saying about women using 30,000 words a day and men 20,000; men using theirs up at work, and women not getting to start on their quota until hubby walks in the door...true in our house!! So sometimes instead of calling a girlfriend I like to write :) Esp. since Reuel walked in sick tonight too :P All 4 down for the count, though I'm still waiting for the intestinal delights.

Well, if I thought the last 2 days were rough, I was a real wimp. Today was worse by far. Asher had his energy back like a switch had flipped. He is past the vomiting, just the diaper blowouts and the hives now. Oh, the hives. I am going to put a picture or two at the end of the post but they are pretty nasty...fair warning. I recalled the ped. today and he said stay the course w/ Benadryl (which seemed to do NADA!) and see if it's better in 48 hrs. Asher was ANGRY, irritable, and itchy. He seemed even more crazy agitated and mad after a Benadryl dose (as opposed to sleepy) but I was afraid not to give it to him. So...rough day. Owen was still vomiting today, and just wanted to snuggle and rest like Asher did the last 2 days. Thus, the problem. Asher learned in 2 days of coddling that he got picked up, cuddled and treated like the prince while he was suffering, and he was not about to let his throne go to Owen today. Combined with his general discomfort, the now-energetic and demanding toddler spent the day screaming, throwing things and trying to claw Owen's eyes out every time Owen tried to sit in my lap. Owen, now lethargic, was being so patient and just waiting for me to deal with the problem at hand, but doubled over and moaning most of the day. Yikes! Well, they're in bed now and we're all alive...as long as it doesn't hit me overnight I can probably make it another day. All the way through Friday would do me in. How do you get help though? You can't exactly ask someone to come over and expose themselves to the plague. Tonight Reuel is lethargic and in bed, and there are 5 mountains of laundry which must be done, or else burned as toxic waste. Is my character stronger yet? Does complaining disqualify me from the character-development? :)

OK, here's the ugly pictures. So I remember what little man went through, and maybe someone reading will find it useful to learn what a hive network looks like.

OK, I am in a hurry, so the photoshop censoring is a bit rough :)

In the oatmeal bath

Yikes!!

p.s.

Nearly forgot...when Asher perked up, we needed to get some soup, gatorade, and bread.  It was nice just to get out and drive.  The grocery store was next to the dollar store, so I let the kids pick out a $1 present for their sick day.  Owen just couldn't decide what he wanted...too many choices.  I asked him if he wanted one of quite a few cool 'guns' that shot foam disks, or darts, that sort of thing.  His response:  "No Mommy.  Those shooting toys are not really nice and kind, and I want to be kind to other people and not think about things that would hurt people."  Wow.  The stomach flu as morality teacher?  Can't help but give your boy a hug when he's that kind of sweet!  But where did he get the idea that guns could hurt people in the first place?  Male instinct?

Uncle!

Uncle!  I am crying it!  Last night as I woke up periodically feeling my throat start to get sore...then sorer and sorer...and my nasal passages swelling shut...I thought, "Oh boy, tomorrow's not going to be a whole lot of fun with a sick Asher and now a sick me."  But when I woke to Owen's peculiarly piercing screams (that boy knows how to express displeasure!!) and found him ralphing on the upstairs carpet, well, that's when the I knew it was going to be a character-building day.  Nothing like two GI-sick kids to keep you from focusing on your own discomforts!

What happens when tiny, immature brains are exposed to insanely large amounts of television programming?  I'll let you know when the results are in on my experiment.  Asher laid on me like a limp noodle all day, and Owen did alright until I let him drink 2 oz. at once, at which point it multiplied into way more than 2 oz. on the floor.  Well, whatever, we made it through the day.  Asher actually turned a corner at about 4pm, kept food and liquid down, and then at 5, he was the fussiest curmudgeon I'd ever met.  He was absolutely hateful and mean and I had no idea how to put him at ease.  I noticed his ears were bright red and he was really rubbing them so I made a late Dr.'s appt. (after having canceled one 2 hrs prior when he turned the corner) and by the time we got there...hives.  His chin and eyes were covered in little hives.  By the time we left the office...lips like Angelina Jolie's (literally, like 3 times the normal size), eyes almost swelled shut, itchy tongue, arms, legs, neck, everything.  He was MISERABLE and screamed the whole way home.  Dr. H thinks it's hives that can come along w/ a virus, often just a day or two before recovering from the virus.  Benadryl was the only recommendation, unless he starts having trouble breathing (praise the Lord, it hasn't gotten to that!).  I am just so grateful and feel very watched over that I happened to have him in to the Dr. for what I thought was ear infection (though that seemed very strange).  I think we would have been panicky about the hives at home, not having been through those before, or wouldn't have caught them since he would have been in bed for the night by the time they came on.  Yikes!

His little lips are still puffed, and he doesn't look like himself!  Prayers for him that it's passed by morning.  2 days of this is enough, thank you!