Know Your Enemy

Welcome to deep thoughts by RL! :) So we have a problem with our lawn. Let me start by saying that it has been HOT in Houston this summer and we haven't had much rain. Our subdivision was on water rationing for awhile plus we were on vacation for almost 2 weeks. Needless to say, our lawn suffered due to those conditions but then we started noticing that no matter how much we tried to water the grass it wasn't getting better. We decided to call TruGreen chemlawn and get a free estimate. Their diagnosis was that we have an insect called the chinchbug and it is killing our lawn. They declared our lawn an emergency situation - terrific news!(do you hear my sarcasm) So we decided to let TruGreen aerate the lawn and do 4 applications to get us back on track. In order to enhance the process, I decided to rake the dead grass and attempt to pull weeds that had begun to grow in the lawn.

I worked really hard about a week and a half ago raking and pulling weeds. I don't want the weeds to be taking the nutrients from the new grass that will hopefully grow. I talked to my mom, a garden expert with a beautiful lawn, and described my weed. I thought I was pulling up crabgrass. I got the majority of the weeds pulled and was quite proud of myself(pride comes before the fall). Today I look outside and noticed MORE WEEDS!! I wanted to get them pulled before the yard was mowed. At first I entertained the idea of just letting the mower cut the weeds down, but that would only make the lawn LOOK more pleasing not solve the problem. In that statement lies a wealth of spiritual applications that I thought I should share.

It would be so much easier to allow the mower to "eliminate" my problem, but in reality it would be doing nothing. You have to go straight to the root! Sometimes I know it is best to go to the root of the problem, but that takes time and can be painful and so I just "mow" over them. Of course we all know what happens the weeds just spring up again, because they weren't pulled. Sin is the same way. We can't just sweep it under the rug, we have to deal with it right then and go to the root of the problem. During my tedious weeding, I noticed that sometimes the weeds were growing in the good grass and I had to carefully spread apart the grass in order to get to the weed. Sin can be masked as many things and you have to make distinctions in order to get rid of the problem at hand - be a sin surgeon. In the midst of my yard working and spiritual lessons, I realized that I wasn't confident that I knew exactly what type of weed I was pulling. So I took pictures of the weed and emailed my mom. Come to find out I thought I was pulling crabgrass, when actually I was pulling nutsedge. Of course in doing my research, I found out that I also have crabgrass issues - lucky me (more sarcasm).

My final spiritual lesson for the day is to know your enemy. Dig deep and know what sin you are fighting and how you can overcome it. If you are a Believer, then you are victorious in Christ and He will help if you ask. Sin is a constant minute by minute battle just like keeping a yard. It takes hard work and sometimes you have to get your hands dirty, but it is worth it!

Mr. Creative :)

Hudson has been blessed with a WILD imagination!! He is always coming up with all kinds of ways to pretend and play. Yesterday he decided that he needed to make a river for his Indian and Cowboy figurines to cross. He, of coure, made that river by pouring water on the carpet. Creative but messy. :)

He loves to straddle the couch cushions and pretend that it is his horse. Many times he gets towels and puts them over the cushion to be his saddle. Today he decided to use my bra as a saddle and the straps would be his stirrups. Yes, I watched my 4 year old attempt to put his foot in the "stirrups" and climb onto his trusty steed. Of course, I quickly said, "Don't do that you'll break mommy's bra" to which he looked at me confused since he doesn't know the terminology for such contraptions. :) All of this occurred before 9:00am. Just a typical morning in the McLain household!!

When the kids are away, the Mommy will play!!

My little sister, Robyn, has the incredible opportunity to do her student teaching in the Dominican Republic. The school is called the Doulous Academy and it is run by 2 former Aggies who are Believers. It is a Christian school and Robyn was accepted into the International Student Teaching program with Texas A&M. She flew out from Houston two Saturdays ago. Check out her blog on my blogroll. :) Anyways, my mom came up with Robyn and they stayed at our house for a couple of days.

I had decided that I needed a break and my mom could tell so she said that she would take the boys home with her. Usually Hudson is super excited about going to BB's house, but not this time. I couldn't quite figure it out. He kept saying, "BB doesn't have a TV in her car and it is going to be a long time until we get to her house." The more I forced my way the bigger the battle got. I relinqueshed it all and my mom just said that she would come back from the airport and just stay a few days and help me out that way. Still I wanted the kids to leave, so I could have some quiet. She came back later that afternoon and mentioned that maybe she could take the boys at night and they might fall asleep in the car. I decided to have one more go at it. I took Hudson into his room and asked again why didnt' want to go and his story stayed the same. Then it dawned on me why. We had just come back from our road trip to Nebraska and he was thinking that he was going to have to be in the car all day long without any movies. :) Once I explained to him that going to Nebraska was A LOT LONGER than going to Tyler he immediately said, "I need to put some underwear in my suitcase so I can go." It is so funny how his mind works. So we packed the kids up, again, and they were on their way by 5:15pm that Saturday night.

Ben and I took full advantage of not having kids! Saturday night we went to dinner and a movie, Sunday morning we slept, ate out for breakfast and spent the whole day together. During the week, I was able to very productive. The first 2 days I spent searching for fabric for my bedroom curtains. I had already gathered swatches from different places a couple of months ago, but I wanted to make sure that I had found the right one. Of course, I go back to the fabric store and they are sold out and that pattern I wanted is now discontinued. So I had to go to plan B. I went to IKEA and found some panels for 1/3 of what it was going to cost me to make and I'm considering adding fringe to them to make them look more unique and custom. I'm still debating on whether or not I like them. Wednesday I spent cleaning and organizing and then got a mani/pedi which was wonderful!! Thursday I did more cleaning and got a haircut and then Ben took me to a terrific restaurant and spent most of the night talking. Friday I made my bathroom curtain and then Ben and I had an AWANA training meeting. After the meeting, we had one last hoorah and went out for pie and coffee. Saturday we met mom and brought the kids home.

Overall it was a terrific week!! I HIGHLY recommend sending your kids to the grandparents. It was nice to enjoy peace and quiet. I especially loved spending time with the Lord in the mornings and not being interrupted. :) I am so thankful that my mom was ready and willing to take both boys for a whole week. Y'all know my boys are active and very curious kids so she had her hands full, but she enjoyed it.

More Catching Up

One of these days I am going to get back on top of this blogging thing, but right now I have to do a lot of catching up. Enjoy reading all of the new posts!!

Family Vacation

We took a road trip to Kansas City and then on up to Omaha. Our journey began on July 9th when we picked Ben up from work and headed to Dallas. On the way there we stopped halfway at Bucees which is a HUGE gas station/country store. They are big in Texas. Ben took Hudson to the bathroon and while in there Hudson said, real loud, "Daddy, you love Bucees!" We continued on to Dallas and stayed with my grandmother. The next morning we headed to Kansas. Hudson would constantly ask, "are we almost there" and Ben would reply, "we are going to drive all day". Thankfully we have DVD players in the headrests and lots of toys/books. The kids did really well. When we got to Kansas City we met up with some church friends for dinner and then headed to the hotel. Ben's brother lives in Kansas City so we spent time with him. The next day we hung out with our close friends, the Wolf's and had a blast. Sunday we went to Jordan's (Uncle JoJo) church and then headed to Omaha. We stayed in Omaha until Thursday. Ben's sister, Meredith and daughter Bella flew in from California and his other sister, Beth, came in from Nashville. We had a great time hanging out as a family. On Thursday, we all packed back up and headed back to Kansas City. Beth had a wedding there and we all wanted to spend more time with Jordan. Saturday morning everyone had to head back to their own homes. It was great to see everyone, but now Ben and I need a vacation without kids!! :) To check out all of the pics from our trip go to http://picasaweb.google.com/brothermclain

McLain Family of Five :)

I am happy to announce that our clan of 4 will be turning into 5 the end of January!! I am 15 weeks along and doing well. The first several weeks I was extrememly tired and VERY hungry to the point of nausea. Things are better now and the boys like to touch my growing belly. Hudson asks a lot, "Mommy, is your baby doing okay today?" I'll keep you posted on any news.

We found a church!!!

When we moved to Houston, we wanted to take our time and find the right church. For a Christian, joining a church is like getting married. It is a very important step in a Believer's life and the Church should be an integral part of your life. It is no small decision and should not be taken lightly. All of that said, we looked for a church for a year and a half. We went to really big, big, medium and really small churches.

It is easy to assume that since this is Texas, it wouldn't be hard to find a church. For us, we weren't looking for anything average. Since both of us have grown up in the church, it was important to us to find a church that had lots of meat to it. We didn't want just great programs and activities, but a balance that consisted of in depth teaching, Believers that wanted to walk the walk along with solid, Biblically based programs. We found a church that has all that and more. Ironically, it is named Bethel which is the name of the church that I grew up in. We just joined and are so glad to officially be members somewhere.

Bethel is a great sized church of around 600-800 people. The pastor is terrific and the people are so real and personable. Everyone truly wants to know how you are doing in life. I attend a Mother's Bible Study on Tuesday mornings. The first 30 min or so consists of a panel of women, from all ages, that answers questions ranging from the Christian life, marriage to parenting. After that we have a lecture time, snacks and then small group. It ends at 11:30, but since the church is aware of the demands on mothers they extend the childcare until 12:30 so that we can grab lunch with friends or just run errands without kids pulling on us. Everything the church does seems to be well thought out and purposeful. We are also in a small group and Dinner for 8 group. Ben and I will be involved in AWANA's this September and we are really looking forward to that. We praise the Lord for directing us to this church and we look forward to what He has for us here. To check out the church's website go to www.bethelofhouston.com

A full week of fun!

Our journey first started with a road trip to Dallas with just the boys and I. We first headed to Grandmommy's unloaded and ate a great dinner. Then we were off to visit Grammie (Ben's 91 yr old grandmother) in her new place in Arlington. We had a great time with her and the boys loved giving her lots of hugs!

The next morning my mom came to pick up the boys and take them back to Tyler, while I went on Richardson for Girls Weekend 2009. There are 7 of us girls from college and we get together every summer for a time a catching up, laughing and eating!! I am so blessed to have such an incredible group of girls. We always pick up wherever we left off and we are there for each other no matter what. We lounge around, talk, drink coffee and eat all weekend - pure bliss. :)

Next I headed to Tyler to spend several days with my mom, sister, brother and sis in law. Ufortunately, while I was there my hubby took a bad fall. Ben was changing the air filters in the attic and fell down the ladder. When he got up and touched his head there was blood. He drove himself to the ER and he got 3 staples and a head scan that said he had a mild concussion. So now all the men in my life, except Landon, has had staples in their heads - my dad had about 30, Hudson had 1 and Ben had 3. When Ben called to tell me what had happened, Hudson's reply was "Daddy you can go get 2 suckers just like you got me to make you feel better." Wisdom from a 4 year old. :) Other than that, we had a great time in Tyler. To check out all of the pics go to http://picasaweb.google.com/brothermclain