richly and truly blessed...

when i came home from a doctor's appointment today, i was surprised to see a trash bag on my front porch...
...but as quickly as surprise changed to curiosity, i parked the van and ran to the front door to read the note...
and it said:wow!!! me/us...WE have a secret santa!!!!! somebody loves us!!!! somebody wants to love on us!!!! somebody spent a lot of time to make sure that WE felt special this holiday season!!!

i wanna know who it is...i'm DYING to know who it is...but, wait...that's the secret part of secret santa, right?....i just soooooo bad want to thank whoever for what he/she/they did for us!!!! wooooowwwww...i really can't describe for you how special i feel and we haven't even opened the bag to see what's in it!!! the kiddos weren't home when i found the bag, but there was no way i was checking this out all by myself---come on 240pm~!!!

so here are the kiddos with the bag--they were very pumped to see what was in it--and being the good mother that i am (ha ha), i wouldn't let them tear into the bag until i got a picture of them with it...
getting started opening the presents...

wiffle balls and a bat!!!! (this was b's favorite!!!--we went outside and made homeruns as soon as we finished opening all the presents--awesome!)
TWO lightning mcqueen cars!!!!!!!! holy cow! it's only corbin's favorite thing in the whole world right now...especially the matchbox size ones!!!! he was so excited when he opened them up that he would help with the other packages, but really only cared about lightening mcqueen...

racecars and monster trucks...always a winner in a house of boys!

snowman stickers!!!! yahoo!!!!! we just LOVE "rosy" the snowman (no, that wasn't a typo---it's really what corbin calls frosty...

even more stickers!!! (batman, spiderman, planes, military vehicles, trucks, underwater animals, and more!!!)

back to the wiffle balls (like i said, it was little b's favorite thing!)

and the cars never left corbin's sight (they're in bed with him as i type this)

two cool sticker books...a galaxy/space one and a tool one...we've already colored and stickered a bunch tonight!

wow!! coloring books galore!!! and lots and lots of markers (can't have too many of those with 2 destructive boys!!) and washable paint (they love that stuff!)

this one is one of my favorites...i'm very much a personalized ornament person...we got 4 ornaments each with our name on them...a penguin for me, a reindeer for brendan, a bear in a stocking for corbin, and a santa on a reindeer for kelly...

it's hard to tell what this is, but it's chocolate santas (big hit!)

these two pics are of everything laid out (minus a couple things)...i'm telling you what, we got S-P-O-I-L-E-D!!
this last picture is one of my favorites...it's a pic i took of the list of the things that were given to us...please notice that i didn't mention the pedicure gift certificate (ooh lah lah!!!...might have to save that for before kelly comes home!), the beauty supplies (i love burts bees!!), and the sonic bucks--and you know i love food!!!
i really have no clue who did this...and it really doesn't matter if i ever find out...i just wish i could let the person(s) who did this know how much i appreciate it...how much you blessed our christmas...how special we feel to be thought of...and how wonderful it is to be loved on...

i would love to share with you why this show of love means so much to me, but to do that, i need to recap a little bit...please hang in with me...you'll be blessed by the way our Lord has blessed my family...

here goes...
you know, 2007 has been an incredibly rough and challenging year for both our immediate family and for our extended family...

• i was barely out of rivercrest hospital when we found out that kelly was going to be deployed...if you don't know what i'm talking about or have forgotten, i was admitted into rivercrest psychiatric hospital october 2006 b/c of very severe depression which had led me to become suicidal...
  

• then my sweet little sister confessed to the rest of the family that she'd been living in a physically and emotionally abusive marriage--that her husband had recently tried to strangle her--and that she was no longer going to take it anymore (praise god!!!)...so she and her 2 year old daughter moved out and have spent 2007 being everything to eachother (which is comforting and exhausting)...almost a year later and the divorce is still not final...

• my mother's health has steadily declined...i tell you what...that woman is a fighter! the type of muscular dystrophy that she has would've put most in a wheelchair years ago, but mom is both hard-headed and strong-willed and she is fighting a fight that i admire--but the battle breaks my heart...and i know she must be exhausted...

• my dad had to have his heart literally stopped and restarted--a procedure that they didn't think would work, but b/c our precious lord & savior is gracious, it not only stopped his heart from racing, but has kept it in rhythm...(hallelujah!)

• my memaw (my mom's mother) is aging swiftly--we believe that she is plum wore out and ready to be with her lord--when her husband passed away in 1981, she was left as the primary caregiver to a physically and mentally handicap child (sandy)...sandy is now in her 40's and has way outlived anything the doctors ever imagined (i think they told her she wouldn't live past her teens?)...anywho, sandy's getting older, memaw's getting older and not able to fully care for sandy, memaw's not ready to put sandy in a nursing home--the bottom line is that this in turn puts a lot of pressure on memaw's kids (my mom, her brother & sister)...

• for some reason, (can you say "satan"?), i couldn't get my meds to work and so i spent the months prior to kelly's deployment in a panic--anxiety flooded over and attacked my body...so by the time he did leave, i was almost at the point of being hospitalized again...the first few months i spent in bed mostly--having to rely on others to help me with the kiddos--it was a painful time and a scary time, but we got through it...
  

• kelly finally left for qatar in july...it was bittersweet at least for me...i was tired of all things that i felt needed to be done before he left and although i didn't want my best friend, my lover, the father of my children to be gone, i was at the point of let's just do it and get it over with...i spent the 1st few months in misery--i was honestly very angry--not at him, but just angry that i was having to do it all myself--i guess i was feeling sorry for myself--but i felt like i was both physically and emotionally dying and it didn't matter b/c i was the only parent the kiddos had--which was another problem...brendan HAS NOT handled daddy being gone with any grace---bless his little heart, he took it very personal from the moment kelly told us goodbye...he still asks (5 months later) on a daily basis "mommy, can daddy come home today for just five minutes?"...he cries at the smallest thing...he yells and gets frustrated over the silliest things--you can tell that he just doesn't know what to do with himself and i can honestly say that this has been the most horrible part of kelly's deployment...you see, i can handle and rationalize and reason with myself...i understand time and days and months--but how do you explain that to a four year old who feels like he did something wrong to make daddy leave? my heart just aches for him...
• and now, right before christmas, my older sister and her husband have split up
  

me and my precious boys have done whatever it takes to get through this tough time...but to go into that would start to show you the ways god has blessed us...so here we go....

• right before kelly deployed we knew that we were going to have to put both the kiddos in school/childcare full time (as i wouldn't be able to care for them both)...which could potentially mean a lot of money...but god opened two huge doors for us: one, brendan got into the pre-k program at woodson and two, corbin got a huge scholarship at rainbow bible school!!!! this lifted a huge burden both financially off our shoulders but also emotionally--i knew that though brendan would do ok if he stayed at rbs, he really needed the speech therapy that the public schools provide--and as it turns out, they have also provided him with play counseling (HUGE blessing) to help him work through some of the anger that he has about daddy being gone...and also teaches him how to be nice to his friends (his behavior has been a pretty sore spot for us)...he got put with just the perfect teachers--they are sooooo kind and patient with him and no matter how bad of a day he has, they always start fresh the new day...they are christian women who love the lord and who also very obviously love their job and the children they teach (which includes brendan!)...corbin is with a group of kiddos who really are like family--they love and hug and push and fight like any group of siblings would--but they really care for each other and stick up for each other...being in teacher joy's class has really helped corbin develop and i'm so thrilled with all the things that he's learning and the ways he's growing.
  
• god has always provided us each and every month enough money for me to travel down to my parents house to get a break from the every day life and to recoup on some much needed rest and sleep
• i have been involved in bsf and have gotten involved with a wonderful group of ladies who have helped me to grow and mature spiritually
• i have been visiting churches but have spent most sundays at pioneer drive baptist church...the people there have been really wonderful to me...they have welcomed me with open arms and anxiously look forward to kelly's return
• i have learned to slow down and to say no--something that's hard for me to do...i try to lay down 1-2 hours every day so that i can be rested enough when the kiddos come home...it gives me a little more energy to focus on what's important: loving on those boys!!
• i have learned to ask for help--something i don't like doing, but am getting better
• i have found a passion for taking pictures--i see so much beauty in all the things that god has created...he is so amazing!
• i have learned to be more patient and loving with my kiddos (some of this comes from learning how to give myself "time outs"...)
• my relationship with my mother in law has grown tremendously and for that i am sooooooooo thankful....she is a wonderful woman who i love greatly
• i have done more studying of the bible and talking to god than i probably have my whole life (very sad, huh)...but very exciting!!!....i am learning to listen to all the ways he speaks to me and am also developing "my faith" (verses the the faith of my parents, grandparents, etc)....
• and i think that this may be the most wonderful and important blessing that i've received in 2007...i have fallen in love with my husband all over again...i know that may sound odd to some people and to others they will totally understand...but you see, it's not just 2007 that has been challenging for kelly and i--pretty much ever since we got married september 15, 2001, life has been fluctuated from ok to yucky to please, lord, get me through this, to even for me, unbearable...don't get me wrong, we've had some good times thrown in there...but it's often so hard to remember those things as the bad times seem to blanket over the good...but in these months that kelly has been gone, god has been softening my heart and opening my eyes...he has allowed me to see kelly in a totally different light...he has reminded me of all the reasons why i first fell in love with kelly six years ago, why i married this handsome man who gave me two absolutely perfect little boys...god has shown me how incredibly lucky and blessed i am that kelly chose me to be his wife--his soulmate--the person that he will spend the rest of his life with--for better or for worse--for richer or for poorer--til death do us part....

b/c you see, life is just that...it's life...it's mostly hard, but occasionally easy...and it's the blessings that get us through from day to day, hour to hour, minute to minute...and god has so richly and truly blessed me with so many things that i often take for granted...

so right now i want to say thank you for whoever it is that decided to be our secret santa--b/c although the gifts are thoughtful and appreciated, the true blessing for me is being reminded of how richly and truly blessed i am...
candace, brendan & corbin