Past and Present

I cannot believe it has been more than 7 months since I blogged personally. This is my intimate blog, the one where I can say whatever it is I want to without the concern that the wrong person is going to read and be offended.

I sit here on the couch with only a few minutes before I have to return to work looking at a facebook page of a friend from many years ago. It takes me back to the days of college and what life was like then. Sweet memories.

And then, I am brought back to the present, with a big little bundle laying on my chest as I type, amazed that Scotty and I had a little boy 7 months ago today and also at where God has brought us and is moving us now.

It's been a hard day for me. I know what I want and the doors that God has opened, but the process to get through the door is overwhelming! I know that I cannot take many more steps, and I so desperately need Yahweh to make my feet like hinds feet so I can reach the high places.

Wait on the Lord, wait patiently for Him. He gives strength to the weary. He causes me to run and not be faint. For the Lord my God is with me wherever I go. I will claim truth over and over and over. May today be lived to the fullest!

Here goes everything...

One Week Before Due Date

Well, I have to say, I have been shown a whole lot of grace (undeserved favor and kindness) during this pregnancy, because it has been so very smooth! I am very grateful because there are so many women (you my friends) who have had and continue to have it rough and you are all troopers!

Even with the ease of my pregnancy, it has still been hard on my body. I have really started to feel it in the last few days. I'd have to say over the last three weeks, I have felt great besides an ear infection. But this weekend, has turned the tide and my cold is getting the best of me. I just can't shake it. So, a trip to my midwife today confirmed that I do not have an infection so we are just actively shaking this cold with over the counter medicine and sleep and phytonutrients! Please pray that I feel better quickly because this baby is coming shortly (shortly being relative to any hour to a couple weeks). I really do not want to feel blah during labor and delivery; it's going to be hard enough as it is! With the hopes of getting better, we have decided that this Friday will be my last day of work. I had planned on going until delivery, but my body needs some rest so I am going to take it!

Now, for those of you who care, my cervix is dilated to 2 cm and is 60% effaced. The baby's head is also very low. For those of you who have no idea or don't care, it doesn't really mean anything except things are beginning to move around and get ready for the baby to come. Again, it could be any minute or it could be two weeks. Alice, my midwife, said, "We're just waiting on the consistent contractions because everything else is ready." Good to know. I've been having practice contractions for weeks now, but they are getting stronger and encompassing a larger area. Still though, they are not regular at all. We shall continue to wait patiently. I do feel though that the time is drawing nigh (whatever time span that means).

My due date is next Monday, March 30th. If I haven't gone by then, they will schedule an ultrasound just to make sure everything is good with the baby. Then as of now, they will allow me to go until April 13th naturally. After that, the attending physician decides what happens.

Scotty is pretty much ready. Still not happy about the pain that I will have to endure, but ready for the little one to show herself. That's what he thinks--it's a girl. I, on the other hand, haven't the foggiest idea if we have a son or a daughter in my womb. The excitement is building! We can't wait to share the news that our child is here. This really is so much fun!

Baby Blogspot

I just created a new blogspot http://scottyandshellie-lilp.blogspot.com for everyone to keep track of the baby and our progress.  It's not going to be quite as initimate as this one, but I am going to try to duplicate the posts on this one if I can figure that out!  Check in on that one regularly to follow when we go into labor and delivery and the weeks afterwards.  This is going to be so much fun!

Life

New life is all around!  BJ and Aubin's little girl entered this world in a pool of water on March 5th.  David and Kelli's boy, Reid, has a planned appearance this Friday, the 13th, at Winnie Palmer.  Dustin and T.J.'s girl is scheduled to be here on Monday the 15th.  My new little nephew, Jett (Austin and Britney's boy) is due to come sometime in the next two weeks (around the 24th). As an aside on Jett, he is breech so we are praying for a flip soon!   Not to mention the 5-10 babies due at the YMCA over the next four weeks.  And then our little surprise is going to be here before we know it!  Life.

And yet, with life comes death.  It is reality.  With all of this new life around, where is the death?  I heard a great quote on death the other day.  "It's just stepping out of the costume I've been wearing into who I really am going to be for forever."  Death is like taking off your clothes after a really long hard day and climbing into the arms of the Greatest One ever (after you've bathed, of course)!  

The beginning of life is stepping into that costume.  These little ones are not who they will ultimately be.  I just pray right now, with tears filling my eyes, that each one of these babies listed will truly know God and through these March/April babies of 2009, millions of people will know God because of their lives here.  I pray that the day they step out of this costume, they will jump into the arms of their Abba!  Oh, how I long for a godly generation of people to scream out His name and make a difference in this crazy and uncertain world!  God have Your way!  You are trustworthy!

My first steps to coming closer

'"Come close to Me and listen to this: since the beginning I have not spoken in secret, since the time things began to be, I have been there; and now Adonai Elohim [the Lord God] has sent Me and His Spirit."  Thus says Adonai, your Redeemer, the Holy One of Isra'el: "I am Adonai, your God, who teaches you for your own good, who guides you on the path that you should take.'"

Yesha'Yahu [Isaiah] 48:16,17

So this life's journey truly began for me, some 19 years ago listening to some kind of music at some venue where the One Adonai Elohim showed me Himself and His Spirit and has since followed through as my Redeemer and Guide.  The redemption and guidance are continual and this blog is just evidence of that.  And whatever path that follows, I will rest assured that every previous step was necessary and that every next step will be critical in leading me straight to my own good--my Abba [my God, my Daddy]!  

May the words that follow reflect real life and not idealism, truth and not deception, openness and not secrets, sinfulness as well as holiness, hard times as well as the good.  And in the end, may I "heed Adonai's mitzvot [command, general principle for living] then my peace will flow on like a river, and my righteousness like the waves of the sea.  My descendents will be numerous as the sand, my offspring countless as its grains.  That their name would never be cut off or destroyed from Adonai's presence." Isaiah 48:18,19

I invite you into my life to come close to me and hopefully closer to Someone else!