Sometimes God Doesn't Give Us a Choice

I believe God gave all of us free will. He has laid out a perfect plan for us to lead a fulfilling bountiful life and we go along and choice by choice either steer towards that perfection or away from it.

I have been watching my diet since January. I make choices considering what I eat or don't multiple times a day. Yesterday I found myself at Safeway for a milk and banana run. Something (I can only describe it as supernatural) pulled me towards the freezer section. And there I saw it.

Ice Cream

Ben and Jerry's

Toffee

AND

Coffee

I have come to learn in my almost 31 years of life that sometime God doesn't offer a choice. Sometimes our hands are tied and we have to humbly submit to Him over the gift of frozen caffeine with buttery caramel crunchy candy.

Today again I heard the voice of God when I was reminded by Abby that Java Crew was giving away FREE coffee. And again I was given no choice but to load the twins into the car and have them miss their morning nap while I waited in line to receive my demanded blessing. It's hard being a servant.

Seriously my hands were tied. What would you have done? Ignored God? Followed the diet over our savior? Well, I am just not that kind of Christian.

Now just for fun, lets see what A Coffee Toffee ice cream and A Carmel Silk latte look like making out......

What a baby they would make.

Little Man

I know what your thinking, "Poor Becca is so busy with mothering those three young kids, and spending every free second packing and doesn't have time to blog."
Well, your partly right. I do my share of mothering but packing....not so much. We do have some things packed in boxes, neatly placed in the basement with their moving location written with a black Sharpie on the lid. But if I am being honest I am not on target for that stress free move that I have visualized in my head, (So much for "The Secret"). I tend to get overwhelmed easily and then retreat to my place on the couch with my lap top and read blogs and suck my thumb. It would be easy if I just threw all our junk in boxes and called it good but I really want to sort and purge and be mindful of what is useful and what is destined for the shelves of Good Will. So that takes time and quite and a clear head and lots and lots of coffee. Besides we've had some really sunny days lately that have given us glimpses of the promise of spring. So we've gotten the kids out to play and even took a trip to Silver Falls.

I have to take a pause from this post to tell you about a brief yet scary conversation I had with the gentleman walking behind me down the trail to the falls. I was pushing the twins in the stroller, (Really I DO NOT recommend this form of transportation down a steep, windy trail that can plummet to ones death.) when the man behind me starting asking me a brilliant line of questions that ultimately had me wondering if he had ever read a book in his life.
It went exactly like this-
Older Ignorant Man: Those twins you got up there?
Me: Yes
OIM: Were they born at the same time?
Me: Yes
OIM: I had twin sisters.
Me: That's nice. These are boy/girl twins.
OIM: Oh! That's weird. I've never heard of that happening before.
Me: (Silence)

I also took the twins in for their 18 month well baby check up. Here are the stats:
Jabe
Length: 31.5 inches
Weight: 20 lbs 5 oz

Phoebe:
Length: 33.25 inches
Weight: 23 lbs

Jabe is underweight according to the weight chart. The ironic part is that Jabe eats a lot! More than Phoebe. And a very balanced diet. So the doctor thinks that Jabe isn't digesting food properly. Jabe poops about four or five times daily. So Doc feels like the food is just going right though him and not absorbing all the calories and vitamins. He thinks that Jabes diet of whole wheat, verity of fruits, vegetables, meats are just too complex for him to digest. So he wants me to go to a very simple, easy diet of white rice, white bread, noodles, yogurt, cheese, whole milk, apples, bananas and other plain foods to help him to relearn how to digest. Then a weight check in three months. It's really hard for me to wrap my brain around this. I love that the twins eat anything and everything I give them. I have worked really hard to eliminate all white breads and processed food so to add some of that back is strange. I worry that I might get him addicted to carbs or that I might create issues have Jabe and Phoebe eat different meals. I still have lots of questions about it and need to email the nurse to get a little guidance. If I had to guess looking at the weight chart I would have to say Jabe is like -5%. He just fits into 18 months clothes and will be turning 20 months next week. So he's little but so darn cute!

Mawh!

Pop Quiz

I am bad at taking multiple choice tests. They make me really nervous. I have to read the question very carefully then read all the possible right answers a few times over before I feel like I kinda understand what they are looking for. Then one by one I try to eliminate the wrong answers. Problem is that I can make an excuse of how each choice could work given the right circumstances. Then I just get really upset that this test will only let me choose one answer when clearly all of them could be correct. This indecisiveness has gotten me into a lot of trouble and really, really poor (shockingly poor) SAT scores. In college, (Yes somehow they still let me in. On account of my charm and money,) I was told that when taking a multiple choice test that my first answer was most likely the right answer. Today sadly that was not the case.
Last night Matt came home from a poker party with a sack of quarters. He gave them to Tobin to fill is sadly underweight piggy bank. Matt also suggested that maybe he would like to consider taking a few quarters to give to the church the next morning. We reminded him about what offering means and how our church helps other families in need. In the morning during our typical rush to get out the door to church on time, Tobin remembers that he wants to bring an offering. He sticks his hand in the quarter bag and grabs and many quarters his four year old hand can muster. Something holds me back from speaking my first thought. I almost said, "Tobin you don't have to bring that many quarters. Just bring a few and you can spend the rest. This is your money to spend on whatever you want." WHAT!!!!!! I immediately scolded myself. Here my child was being selfless and demonstrating generosity and I was almost about to teach him to be stingy, to look out for number one.....And what could those extra quarters bought Tobin? Maybe he’d buy a new train to add to his already ridiculous collection. Or some candy or a few grab bags of crap at the dollar store. I was about to limit him so he could buy a new train. WHAT? Then I wondered how many times has my jaded adult ways stiffened his potential? How many times do I step in and tell him a better way to fold this or tell him to color in the lines? Today I am glad that I filtered my first thought and realized my first answer was the wrong answer. Today I was so happy that Tobin was the teacher and I was the student.

Stay tuned to my adventures in parenting. Besides the valuable lesson of being greedy, what will I teach my son next?
A. It's annoying for you to say, please and thank you every time.
B. We don't need to pray just because we can't find the missing gingerbread man from Candy Land.
C. You just peed so you don't really need to wash your hands this time.
D. You have to take two more bits of your french fries or no dessert.