“Love Is Not A Fight”

I recently got my hands on a lot of great music, and have been listening to it and reflecting quite a bit lately.  I thought it would be fun to post some of the more exceptional lyrics every once in a while. 

This song literally stopped me in my tracks.  If it would have been around when I was getting married, I would have had it sung at my wedding!!!  The lyrics are so poignant. 

My brother Brock and his fiance Renee are getting married a week from today.  My prayer for them is that this is what love would be to them…

 

Love Is Not A Fight  by Warren Barfield

Love is not a place
To come and go as we please
It’s a house we enter in
And then commit to never leave

Lock the door behind you
Throw away the key
We’ll work it out together
Let it bring us to our knees

Love is a shelter in the raging storm
Love is peace in the middle of a war
If we try to leave, may God send His angels to guard the door
No, love is not a fight but it’s something worth fighting for

To some, love is a word
That they can fall into
But when they’re falling out
Keeping that word is hard to do

Love will come to save us
If we’ll only call
He will ask nothing of us
But demand we give our all 

Love is a shelter in the raging storm
Love is peace in the middle of a war
If we try to leave, may God send His angels to guard the door
No, love is not a fight but it’s something worth fighting for

I will fight for you
Would you fight for me?
It’s worth fighting for
 

 Here is a link to an article that Warren wrote about his inspiration for the song.  Here is a link for the video too. 

Meet my new accomplice!

I have been posting very sparsely lately because my late laptop succumbed to a slow death.  Because of that, I had been confined to posting from our older model (dinosaur) desktop.  I didn’t realize how much more efficient I was with a laptop, until it was gone.  I could get work done in the backyard watching Jackson or in the living room when he wanted me there with him. The best, was being able to multi-task by doing travel work/posting to the blog/keeping in touch with friends while watching a movie at night (especially if it was a movie chosen by one of the male members of my household). 

Anyway, I would like to introduce you to my new accomplice, the Fujitsu Lifebook S6510.  It was ordered on Mother’s Day and finally arrived yesterday.   When shopping for a laptop, the things that were most important to me were size (I liked the smaller, lightweight versions) and ruggedness/durability since I often travel with my laptop and tend to be pretty rough on it.   This was the only model I found that was both thin and lightweight, but also rugged (complete with shock-mounted hard drive and spill-resistant keyboard).

I’m hoping this is the start of a great (and long) relationship!

Monkey Class

Today was Jackson’s end-of-the-year preschool performance.  This was his first year of preschool and fittingly enough, he was in “The Monkey Class”.  During the ceremony each class got to get up and do a short performance.  Jackson’s class started by singing “Jesus Loves The Little Children” (complete with hand-motions), and ended by dancing & singing to “Hey, Hey We’re The Monkeys”.  Below is a video I took with my camera (forgive the horrible videography as I am still getting used to taking videos with my camera).  Jackson is the one on the far right end in the orange monkey hat (you already know that is his favorite color if you have read previous posts).  Notice- my son is the only one who doesn’t stay in his own personal space.  Oh, my darling little monkey…  what am I going to do with you?

Our visit to “The Captain”

Over the weekend we went camping at El Capitan campground near Santa Barbara.  We took some great friends with us and enjoyed the company, the weather and the beauty of God’s amazing creation. 

 

As soon as we arrived, Jim set up a 1 man tent (the smallest I have ever seen) so that the kids could have a tent to play in.

 

Jackson, Riley and Emily “lunching” at the campsite

 

Glo-sticks- a big hit with the kids!

 

The campground had a beautiful nature trail.  Here are some pictures from the nature trail:

 

The campground also had a great beach:

 

Some animal encounters:

 

Nearing sunset at the beach…

 

…these are a few of my favorite things!

This Mothers Day was for sure the best so far!  (Hey, I know there has only been three of them, but still…)

It started with the boys making me breakfast in bed.  I have no picture of that part of the day because 1) (yes, you guessed it) my mind doesn’t even think of things like that until AFTER I have had my coffee, and 2) it would have been too scary a sight (even with the cute boy, the adoring husband and the nice breakfast).

Then my husband had some fun presents for me.  A beautiful orchid…

And a cookbook that has been on my wish-list:  “Hungry Girl: Recipes and Survival Strategies for Guilt-Free Living in the Real World” by Lisa Lillien.  (I highly recommend it!)

 

Then it was Jackson’s turn.  I thought it was so cool that this year Jim decided that he would take Jackson shopping and let Jackson choose a Mothers Day present for me all by himself.  (A little background info:  Jackson has been very into “favorite colors” lately.  He loves telling everybody that his favorite color is Orange, Daddy’s favorite color is blue, Mommy’s favorite color is green, Grammie’s favorite color is red… etc.)  Jackson was so excited to give me his present this morning, and it was looking fancy -all wrapped up in a SpongeBob Squarepants giftbag.  (What’s funny is that Jackson doesn’t even like SpongeBob Squarepants, but I guess he figured that I might…)  I opened the bag to find this:

 

I was speechless!  (Wouldn’t you be?)  I mean, how do you even describe it?  Later, I tried to describe it to my mom over the phone, and the best I could do was: “A headless-green-pepper-with-arms cookie jar and spoon rest.”  Anyway, Jackson was so excited to see me open it and he kept saying “Momma, it’s your favorite color!  It’s green mama, your favorite color!”  I told him how much I loved it and that we would have to find a special place in the laundry room (a.k.a. garage) to display it.  The proud and satisfied look on his face was priceless.

Funny how the heart of the giver can transform one of the ugliest things you have ever seen into the most beautiful…

 

Later on… me and ”my baby” at Mothers Day dinner -a perfect ending to a fabulous day!

National Train Day 2008

On Saturday, we were invited by some friends to go attend “National Train Day”.  Before this weekend, I didn’t even know it existed.  But it was sure good fun!  Jackson enjoyed meeting two of his best buddies- James and Edward, at the Fullerton train station, and riding it all the way to the downtown Los Angeles station.  Once there we got off and explored a little, then back on the train for the ride back to Fullerton and lunch at the railroad cafe.  The three boys even got stickers that said “I got my choo-choo on!”

Waiting for the train

On the train with my buddy

Are we there yet?

In the station… we arrived!

Hoola hoops in the station!

The beautiful station windows

Touring the “parlour car”

Shall we do this again next year?

Cancun In Pictures

Our trip to Cancun was just what the doctor ordered!  We returned rested, relaxed and sunburned; ready to take on life.  Thanks again to Grammie & Papa for watching Mr. Jackson while we were away!   Luckily we didn’t catch any bugs while we were there.  (Except the travel bug!!!)

Here are some snapshots of our vacation:

View from our room

Sushi on the beach at our hotel. 

(Bad picture, I know.  But at least you get the idea.)

 

B-day dinner at one of the hotel restaurants

 Our hotel at night

Our hotel pool at night

Visiting the Mayan ruins at Tulum

In the ruins

The beautiful beach right behind the ruins

Together at Tulum

The steps down to the beach in Tulum

More of the beach in Tulum

….

There were iguanas everywhere!  This was one of our favorites.

After Tulum, we went to Xel-Ha (an ecological park) to relax and snorkel for the rest of the day.

Snorkeling at Xel-Ha

An restaurant with an awesome view and neat thatched roof at Xel-Ha

Jackson loved the souvenir that we brought him: a hand carved wooden alligator!

Hola from Cancun!

Hi all,

I have been absent from blogging the last few days because my hubby and I have been able to relax and enjoy ourselves in beautiful Cancun.  A big shout-out and thank you to my parents who are taking wonderful care of Jackson while we are gone.

But alas, our adventure ends tomorrow.  See you all soon.  I will post more pictures when I return, but for now here is the view from our room.

Jenn