unexpected events...

this week has caused me to be VERY thankful that it's the weekend.
We're all very tired and drained around this house.
We have a very very sick little girl with the nastiest cough she's had yet.
I've had some major unexpected complications from my endometriosis causing me to miss a day and a half of work.
Doctor visits for Jewel's and me.
My poor hubby is so tired from pulling his weight plus mine this week.
Bless my Mom, Dad and Hubby for all their sweet caring this week.


My heart is aching for all the pain in the world around me and especially those that have cancer that are in the community and our church. Observing other's struggles have helped put my week in a different perspective. I may have had some physical health struggles this week, but I am not faced with the challenge of fighting for my life like so many others are.


Through all this choas this week and feeling like every thing is so uncertain, I feel a peace and like we're relying completely and totally on God for healing (for Julia and me) and to meet our needs and that we're (I'm) not trying to "fix" everything on our (my) own. I DO NOT rely on God the way I need to. The way He wants me to. I usually try to over analyze EVERYTHING (just ask my husband!) and try too hard to problem solve and calculate every little thing without factorying God into it.


I don't have a lot of witty or deep things to say tonight.
I'm tired.
I am just so thankful for how incredibly blessed my family and I are...and that God has made that so evident to me this week.

Blessings to you!
Nighty night!

welcome to miami

As most of you know I went to Miami about two weeks ago. It was a beautiful 60-73 degrees there! The scene flying in was gorgeous and the answer to Jeremy's first question when I got back was yes, did it look like it does on CSI Miami. We landed, found a taxi and we were off! Now I've never ridden in a taxi before but they truly do drive like they do in the movies...like a bat out of hades! Some of you know that I get car sick easily and I was SOOO thankful to be out of that car (and that I had taken some Dramamine!)

Here's the room I stayed in. I felt like a giddy little kid being able to jump from bed to bed and not get caught doing it! haha

The view was nothing to write home about. It over looked another roof which was kind of sad and not what I was expecting.


After putting down my bags I found this:

I honestly don't know what it is about my fascination with over priced bottled water. I guess I just think it's ridiculous. They charge $6.50 for their water unlike Atlanta who only charges $4.95. I yet again stuck with tap water. I got their early afternoon and since we didn't have time to stop and get anything to eat from the airport to the hotel I got to order room service. They had VERY good food there. Everything was done to perfection.
This is the back of the hotel where there is a river canal running through it. BEAUTIFUL!


We had our dinner reception on this patio on the canal the night before. love love loved all the palm trees!


The second night we were there we took a tram to bayside and walked to pier 5 for supper. Down there the have an outside shopping mall and restaurants on the ocean. We ate outside at the Hard Rock Cafe. I was awestruck by the handiwork of God on such a beautiful night and the massive waves of the ocean. I could sit and watch that for hours. so peaceful.

See the pineapple in the picture below?! It's a building called Club Cabana. It was a pretty cool looking building.

I was SOOOO glad to get home even though my flight in Chicago was delayed by 50 minutes and I got off the plane to a blizzardy snow storm in a jacket and summer shoes (i.e. no socks).

Going back to when we took the tram through downtown Miami to get to bayside it reminded me of a missions trip that YAC took to St. Louis when I was in high school. There were homeless people sleeping in the tunnels and under the stairs and escalators that took you down to ground level from the tram. Women were walking around by themselves in the midst of men yelling inappropriate and derogatory words as we walked past them. I didn't even feel safe walking in a group of three and wonder if some of those women made it safely to their destination.