Christmas hint...

How cute is this COACH purse?

That's all.
P.S. It's about $800 so...
P.P.S. I'd actually rather have a year pass to Sea World!
P.P.P.S. Or a pink beach cruiser!

Do you have a daughter?

Do you have a daughter? Is she "boy crazy"? What is the deal? I don't remember being boy crazy as a little girl so I don't get it. My sons have had girls try to kiss them, tell them they're cute, ask to marry them and bring them gifts. In elementary school. Isn't this a little young! Yesterday my 1st grader came home with a princess picture a girl drew for him at home and brought to school and then told him she loved him. He's kind of a chick magnet and has had little girls asking to kiss him or marry him since pre-school. But it just seems weird to me! Is it all the princess movies that focus on love and romance? One teacher suggested it was due to Hanna Montana and all the teenager shows parents let preschool aged children watch since she didn't remember little girls acting like this 10 years ago. Do you talk about boys with your daughters? Is this supposed to be cute? Moms of daughters, help me understand!!

In the words of my son when he got the picture handed to him, "What the heck?"
(LOL. Yep, that's what he said to her!)

PLEASE PRAY

This is an excerpt from my friend Hope regarding her son Silas. They have been dealing with his health for months and he has been tested for so many things. There have been ups and downs and so much crazy uncertainty. But through it all she has put all of her hope and trust in God and is an amazing example to me!
Please pray for her son Silas. And be thankful for your own kids' health!!

            "Neuroblastoma is almost exclusively a childhood cancer. It is usually present at birth but not detected for several years until the tumor(s) grow significantly enough to exhibit symptoms. Wikipedia and http://www.nationwidechildrens.org/GD/Templates/Pages/Childrens/HemOnc/HemOncShortContent.aspx?page=2372 both have pretty good descriptions of the disease. There is still a lot we don't know and won't know until after the CT scan. I am expecting to find out tomorrow when the scan will be done, and after that we will have more information.
It is not likely, but we could go in for the scan and find nothing, or we could go in and find some pretty grimm news (and some in between). Either way, we know that God is GOOD. This is not happening outside of His hand. We are so thankful for a God who loves us, he knows what we're going through because He watched His own son suffer to the point of death for our good. He loves Silas more that we do (pretty unfathomable) and is faithfully comforting, loving, and teaching us through this incredibly hard time. My heart is breaking & and the same time trusting the only refuge I've ever found to be secure, is still faithful and good."

my weekend

Friday night:
Portraits at Sears for Lucas (2 year) and Ava (6 month). Best Sears experience ever. I'll go back.
Coffee Bean. Allison was working so she gave me my favorite drink for free-sugar free chai tea. Blended. It tastes like a pumpkin pie shake. I think I got 2 sips because my 3 sons stole it and never gave it back!
Dinner at Claim Jumper. Happy Hour. In the bar. All 6 of us. It was seriously fun. Great deals too! Martini for $6, Zuchini for $3!
Costco. Found the cutest coat for Ava.

Saturday:
All day soccer tournament. First game started at 8:30am. Caleb's team won 1 game. All season. Yep.
Lunch at the field. Carne asada tacos catered by a Mexican meat market. Fabulous.
Jesse was the coach and the team got him: a plaque w/ a team picture. $25 to Applebee's, $25 to Souplantation, $15 to Starbucks. Score.
Got Melissa's baby shower invitation in the mail. So excited for baby girl Grote!
Made dinner. I forgot what it was. Must not have been very good...
Left at 7:30pm for some time out alone.
Tutti Fruitt frozen yogurt. Tutti fruittt, pomegranate, birthday cake. Delicious!
Ross. Found a girl crying in the corner because she lost her mom. She looked about 6 but didn't know her mom's name. She was scared to go to the front so I started yelling "Kristi's mom! Kristi's mom!" No one came so I finally just went to the front and left her alone but thankfully she followed me a few seconds later. They called for "Kristi's mom" and she came to the front. It was a weird experience. I need to teach Lucas my name!
Met up with some girl friends for tea and talking.
Came home at 10pm and the UFC fight night was still going strong. Made some homemade chips for the crew and finally went to bed at 12:45am since Ava woke up and needed a bottle right when I was going to bed at midnight.

Sunday:
Church. Revelation. Pastor Tim is preaching hard! It's a blessing.
Chargers game. They won. Denver lost. That's a big deal and we'll be AFC champs for shizzle!
Watched Jesse and another neighbor dad and about 10 neighborhood kids play football. It was intense.
Wanted to go to MB to walk the boardwalk and watch sunset but the kids were having so much fun playing football so I just stayed and watched. Next week, hopefully!
Made dinner. Invited a neighbor kid over. She's a sweetie.
More football. Some Facebook/emails.
Cleaning my house. Excited for my cousins visit tomorrow. And parent-teacher conferences.
Amazing Race and red wine.
Nightie Night.

Oh, I forgot to say it was sunny and 70 degrees everyday. Because it always is.

Community

On Thursday nights I meet with my missional community. What is that? Simply put, it's a group of people from my church Kaleo that are covenanting to do life together and be the church in a tangible way while serving together in the community so that our unbelieving neighbors will see it and want Jesus too.
Awesome, right? It is. It's a blessing. I'm learning and growing in community. While it's easy to see how this is a fantastic thing, sometimes it's...hard. I'm prideful and selfish and that makes true community difficult. But I want to live my life with others who know me well. And care for me. And love me. And encourage me. And I want to do the same for those people. And together, I want to reach my neighborhood (all of San Diego, really!) for Jesus.
The New Testament speaks of the church as a family. Besides Jesus, nothing is as important to me as my precious husband and four precious kids but I hope that my life will become so intertwined with the fellow believers in my missional community that I consider them as precious to me as my own family.

John 13:35 "By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."

1 Thessalonians 5:11 "Therefore encourage one another and build each other up, just as in fact you are doing"

Hebrews 10:24-25 "And let us consider how we may spur one another on toward love and good deeds.Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more as you see the Day approaching."

1 John 1:7 "But if we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from all sin."

Are you living in community with believers?

I'm a soccer mom

This morning I was watching an re-run of The Practice. When it was on regularly it was my favorite show. It's about lawyers and ethics and morality and black and white and how they make shades of grey sometimes. I loved it. I wanted to be a lawyer for as long as I can remember-probably starting in kindergarten. I had a Great Lawyers of America coloring book (true story) and told everyone I was going to be a lawyer first, than a judge, then a Supreme Court Justice. Watching The Practice reinforced everything I was looking forward to: the courtroom drama, the thrill of victory, the agony of defeat, the intellectual debates, the power suits.

But, I'm not a lawyer. I'm a soccer mom. As I was watching The Practice this morning, I was feeding my 6-month old daughter and getting my toddler ready for my 6-year old son's all day soccer tournament and my husband is the coach of said team. I would be driving to this game with chairs, a cooler of drinks, diapers, sunscreen all loaded up in my Suburban with personalized plates (true story). Yep-I'm a soccer mom.

Have you ever thought something would be really great and then something even greater happens that you didn't expect? (It's like the time we went to see Matt Kearney open up for this band we'd never heard of called The Fray and they rocked the mic!)

Well, that's what happened to me. When I turned 19, God grabbed a hold of my heart and never let go. My desires changed and suddenly a couple years later I was married and a missionary in Slovakia and then a mom. It's been a crazy journey ever since. It's not always fun or exciting and I haven't been in a courtroom since but there are still intellectual debates and lots of drama! I'm a soccer mom so of course there is the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat (a little more agony this season though-keeping it real. Jesse kinda got stuck with some duds). No, my life is not what I ever expected it to be but better than I ever imagined.

Now, if only I could find a reason to wear some of those power suits...

blog etiquette from Jesse

Yesterday I wrote my 1st blog in my can-I-do-one-blog-a-day-for-a-year? set of blogs. It was a long one. As I was writing, Jesse asked me if I was writing a book or a blog. I laughed but he insisted it was too long. He pressed the issue and said, "If you're going to do it, do it right!" Me:"It's fine Jesse." Him:"Break it up into 2 or 3 blogs." Me:"Babe, I can't. I'm writing about my morning. Are you a blog expert?" I asked. "Ummm, yeah! Look it up! No more than 3 paragraphs, Angie!", He says and shuts the door. (He was saying this as he was leaving) Then he opened the door back up, stuck in his head and said, "Wait! Are you writing a blog to complain about your life?!?" By now, I was laughing so hard and finding this whole thing so ironic that told him I was putting this conversation in my blog, too. He didn't laugh so I start to sense that he was getting irritated with me and my blog now and then he just left. I didn't want to make my long blog longer so it had to be it's own post today.
Oh, and just to be clear, he was also totally supportive of me writing. In fact, he was so supportive he took Lucas with him-to the DMV!!! Honestly- I can't think of a worst place to take a 2 year old! But that's how amazing Jesse is. So here's day two on my one year journey. And it's short and sweet just like my hubby wanted because I love him!!