Discourse on Pets

O.K..... for most of you who know me, this will probably not come as a surprise.... I am not an animal lover. I'm sure that puts questions in some of your minds about my character, or ability to love.
I did, at one point, love animals... like my first dog, Gypsie. I also remember when I was little, we lived in Idaho and had some rabbits. I would dress one up like a baby, or put it under my shirt and pretend I was pregnant.
The memories all go down hill from there. The next dog I loved, Tuffy, took on a wild animal more tough than he was. We found him dead on the porch one Sunday morning. Then there was, Muffins, our cat. Something happened to her, she got sick, and we watched her die for a week. Another cat, "Joe-Nathan short for Jonathan," as my sister had named him, climbed up an electrical post (one of those about 50 feet in the air), and we watched as he electrocuted himself, fell with back arched, and let out a horrible death meow. The sudden impact of hitting the ground started his heart back up again, and he jumped up and ran away for a few days. When he returned, he was never the same.... brain was fried. There's also our dog, Tiffany, a white, long haired Llasa Apso. She had big eyes that bulged... and one of her eyeballs popped out one day. Mom and Dad took her to the vet to have the socket closed up. She was then our one eyed dog, until the unfortunate incident that rendered her blind. Not sure exactly how it happened, just noticed her running after us with a dangling eyeball. Here's the worst of the memories... we had an Airedale dog, I don't even remember his name as I have probably psychologically blacked it out of my consciousness. Anyway, he got hit by a car and injured his back leg. Within a few days, he was acting really strange, so my mom was going to take him to the vet. We found him in my room, of all places, hunkered down in the corner. When my brother when to pick him up, an abscess the size of a grapefruit popped, spraying puss all over my stuff. Picture a zit the size of your head exploding in your room. Even years later I would pull a book off my shelf and have to separate the pages because of the incident.
Russ, has had his own painful encounters. His first dog, "Pinto Bean" ran away one day. It was devastating for him. Imagine the horror to find out years later that Pinto hadn't run away, but had actually been given away by his parents.
So maybe by now, you are understanding why I stopped having affections for animals. I'm not sure if I could get attached to one. I mean, sure, some of them are cute, but they all poop, and vomit and that just makes me sick... especially if it's in the house.
I will tell you, though who I am a lover of... orphans and the fatherless!!! You might be offended that it seems like I have put them in the same category as pets. That couldn't be further from the truth!! They are of so much more worth than that, but unfortunately, most American pets are cared for and loved on more than the orphans of the world. I keep seeing this commercial by Pedigree dog food. There's mournful music playing and this sad dog looking at you from behind his cage in the pound. The narrator says, "For every dog adopted, there is one who isn't.... that's why when you buy Pedigree, you are helping to... blah blah blah..."
Well, for all the lonely, longing children who will get adopted this year, there are 142.99 million who won't!

Our First Pets

Here's Han's fish "Princess Bubbles." Don't tell her "she's" a he!

Here's Hud's fish "Sir Knight."

I was thinking it was finally time to let the kids have a pet. At this point in our life, I thought a fish would the best option as they don't take too much training or effort. I mentioned it to Russ and he said, "Can we get a low maintenance fish?" As opposed to what?.... One that has to be let outside every three hours to poop in the yard?

Anyway, since we're not going for a filtered aquarium, the boy at the pet shop said that a Beta would be best. Betas however, don't like roommates unless it's one of the opposite sex, and we're not ready for those kind of questions around here... we already have enough hard ones to answer. So, in order for the kids to each have their own fish, we had to create two bowls (I just used some vases I already had). The kids spent their own money to buy a toy for their fish.

If you notice the kids are wearing their Bel Aire Rec Center Soccer shirts. We left straight from their soccer game to get the fish. Earlier that morning, Han had quite a cough and I mentioned that she might not be able to play in her game. Hud immediately said, "Don't worry about it Han, I'll get your snacks for you!!!" That's really what it's all about at this age... SNACKS!!! Oh, and for Han, it's a great place to meet people. She made a new friend on the other team during the game. She was just following her around on the court visiting with this little girl, both oblivious to the ball rolling past them.

Happy Easter! He is Risen!

We've had a great Easter Sunday! After going to church, we joined some good friends at their house for lunch. They are the new parents of an 8-year-old foster son. Hud and Han think he's pretty great, and we agree!

Here's Hud in his Easter duds. Notice the shot gun.... which actually might have come in handy during church if the police hadn't shown up in time to escort out a man dressed in fluorescent orange coveralls and sitting front and center. There's more to the story, but that's enough for now.

Han's on the loose for some Easter goodies! She insisted on putting her dress back on for the hunt, but decided on more comfortable shoes.

Easter egg hunting is serious business!

Orphans

Did you know that every 18 seconds a child becomes an orphan?

Sometime during your Bible study, look up all the times "fatherless" and "orphan" is mentioned.

When you begin to see how important the orphan is to God, you can't help but ask yourself what He wants you to do for them... maybe give, maybe adopt, maybe visit... something!!!

I recently read a statistic that if 7% of all Christians in the world would adopt one child, there would be no more orphans (143 million estimated).

This video is of orphans in Etiopia, the least of the least of these.

This is our religion... to look after orphans.

God's the best parent coach!!

For the past two weeks Russ and I have been baffled by something Hud has been doing. Last week he incessantly told Han that she was his best friend. He would say it at least 50-100 times (maybe more) a day, to the point of frustrating her. He would keep repeating it until she said, "thanks," or "You're my best friend, too."
We were relieved when that only lasted a few days. But, THEN he started saying, "I love you, Mom" constantly. I know, it's really cute, but he would say it over and over, maybe 5 or 6 times in a row, and at least 100 times or more a day. I would affirm my love for him every time. If I would instruct him or get on to him, his first thing to say was, "Do you still love me, Mom?" Then I would go into the speech about how I will always love him, and that he could never do anything that would make me stop loving him.
Yesterday, he got to spend the day playing with one of his favorite friends. Apparently he drove this little guy nuts, too. He said, "I love you," so many times that Jack didn't want to play with him.
This has been hard for Russ and I to figure out. I mean, we are continually affirming our kids, and telling them we love them. I was feeling like something was wrong, wondering if Hud was having some huge insecurities about our love for him. Last night as I was going to bed, I said to Rusty, "It feels weird that I am praying that Hud would stop telling me he loved me so much." I mean of all the trials parents go through...
But today...... God gave me insight!!! I found him in a hiding spot with his blankie sucking his fingers. About 3 weeks ago, we bought baseball batting gloves (Russ' genius idea) for the kids to wear during their naps and bedtime to help them stop sucking their fingers. The first couple of times they were really sad, but we cuddled them longer, and after a few days they didn't seem to mind the gloves. They've even both earned new movies for finishing the chart we made. Hud and Han have both done well, and I really haven't even seen them sucking their fingers during other times.
When I found him sucking his fingers, he acted guilty (poor guy). I snuggled him, and then the light bulb went on.... he's lost a huge means of comfort and security by not sucking his fingers... that's why he's driving us nuts with the "I love you's." Before now, if he needed comfort or security he'd just find his blankie and suck on his fingers for awhile.
So, that's where I'm at now. So grateful for the insight from the Lord, and praying that he'll soon find other ways to feel secure. Please pray that for him too!!

I'm Officially a Soccer Mom!!

Here they are right before their first game!

Can you tell whose out to win and whose out to have fun?

A little half-time water break and pep talk.
Good game!!!

It's quite entertaining to see 4 & 5 year olds play! It was actually a lot more organized than we anticipated. Hud, when he knows what he's supposed to do, really gets after it. He almost scored a goal for the opponents. Han, is all heart and aims to please! If her coach repositioned her during the game, you could count on her to stay put in her spot for a good several minutes until the coach told her to go after the ball rolling right past her!

Go Comets!!