The First of Many

Friday night was the first baseball practice of the 2009 Season for Babione6. Bobo had a short practice and got to meet the coaches and players. However, all of Saturday's practices were cancelled due to rain. And while Friday was technically the First of Many practices and games for this season, tonight was also a First of Many.

But first, I had to show you the boys' shoes. Three different sizes of the same shoe. You can insert different colored tabs into the side of the shoe to make the swoosh any color you want. It is probable that the colors will change once we know our team colors, but for now Bobo is red, Bear is blue, and Popeye is green.

Tonight was Popeye's first t-ball practice ever. The First of Many. He loves playing baseball. (He's the one in the green shorts, center of pic)

My Dad once told my littlest sister that she should be the best at everything out of the three of us girls because she has had the chance to watch two older sisters and learn from them. Well, Popeye has definitely paid attention to his brothers. He isn't very strong or fast yet, but he has much more understanding about the game of baseball than either of his brothers did at 5. And he is so stinkin' cute out there!

Listening to Coach at the end of practice. Popeye practiced outfield today and was the first to take batting practice. I'm expecting lots of improvement by the end of the year.

On a side note: Mom, Dad, Bobo, Bear, and Princess all played catch while Popeye practiced with his team and Bear missed the ball and got nailed in the forehead right above his left eye. He's fine and as of 9:10 tonight didn't have much of a bruise. We'll see how he looks in the morning. If it's anything good I'll take a pic.

Love,

Bridget

Times Are a Changin'

The Babione6 blog is now private. But you know that, don't you?

We have our first baseball practice tonight and two more tomorrow.

Look for pics and an update after.

Love,
Bridget

P.S. I've missed you all.

Indefinitely

Hello.

Sorry for my absence.

I will now be taking a break from this blog indefinitely.

Our life is very normal and nothing is causing me to make this decision other than the fact that I want to focus on other things right now. Not that I gave the blog alot of my focus but taking a break from it allows me one less thing hanging over my head to keep up with.

I guess you could say that I'm simplifying.

Even more.

And I'm happy about it.

Love,
Bridget

I will leave this blog up, though, so feel free to read past posts.

Two Things

Numero Uno

Before writing my last post I should have discussed my struggles last week with my husband, but I did not. RC - I am very sorry. Everyone else - Practice more patience than I did before sharing personal struggles on very public spaces.

Lesson learned.

Numero Dos

I'm impressing you with my Spanish, aren't I? Let me impress you some more: I can actually recite the Pledge of Allegiance in Spanish as well. Learned how in 3rd grade and have never forgotten. Doesn't really come in handy seeing as how it is the AMERICAN Pledge of Allegiance in SPANISH, though, next time you see me ask me to recite it for you and I totally will. And, no, this wasn't number two.

Numero Dos (for real this time)

I wasn't 100% clear in my last post, and, after having it brought to my attention, I feel I need to be. The truth is that God has called us to leave, what we call for sake of conversational clarity, the 'institutional church', not Altus Christian Fellowship. After several years of seeking God in this, we are finally walking the path of no administration, salaries, top-down hierachies, clergy/laity, and buisiness-like churches.

We love all of God's people no matter how they feel about these things. God has just released us from having to love Him within them. And it is amazingly freeing.

Bridget

*I just spell checked and numero kept being highlighted so I googled it and found out that without a little ' above the u it is actually Italian. So I can speak Spanish AND Italian!

This post might get long. Or it might not. Who knows? We'll see.

Last week was spring break and last weekend was Hub's and my 11th anniversary.

The kids and I spent the first part of spring break in Chicken Town with Nana. Nice change of scenery. Then we doled the kids out to the grandparents and Hubs and I spent the weekend at Quartz Mountain Resort. It was beautiful and relaxing and we enjoyed every minute of it.

And I came home planning on posting the beautiful pictures we took on top of Twin Peaks.

Obviously, that hasn't happened.

Partly due to pms and partly due to finally hitting the wall that I was running toward.

The first part of '09 has brought major change to our family. RC started working part time at the radio station. God has opened the door for another part time job for RC that he is really enjoying, we got our tax return, and we have family that continues to selflessly help us. But this extended season of financial hardship has been trying. When RC took the job at the radio station we thought '09 would bring a very different type of change financially. Our level of trusting God concerning our finances is deepening, though it's not a pleasant process. And our mindset materially is also changing. We can honestly say, "Thank You, God, for these changes in us."

The other major change concerns our involvement in Altus Christian Fellowship. God has called us to follow Him apart from ACF. What makes this change so hard is that some friends don't understand and there are some friends that we only saw at ACF. The relationships that are severing are painful, and the relationships that are being lost are sad.

Our decision to disconnect from ACF is based solely on what we believe God is telling us to do and what we believe Scripture says about being the Church. It has nothing to do with people or a person or any 'incident'. We still love all our Brothers and Sisters in Christ at ACF. And we still believe that God is doing great things there.

However, making the extra effort to connect with our friends from ACF is hard right now because we aren't yet sure how those relationships are going to go. If we will still be received or if we won't. It is very stressful. And the unfortunate part is that most of it is a battle in our minds. It is hard not to determine beforehand how we think people are going to respond. It is also hard to open ourselves up to the possibility of being misunderstood, disagreed with, or even rejected.

The one thing I kept hearing in my spirit when we finally received the confirming word that it was time to go in a different direction was "Are you going to please God or man?" Right now pleasing God is costing us, but in the long run pleasing man would cost us so much more.

So, about that wall.

Since the beginning of '09 I have gained 6 lbs. Unfortunately, that's how I tend to handle stress. And while we were in our routine it was easy to ignore. But the welcomed changes of stepping out of our routine that came with spring break ended up bringing me unknowingly close to my wall. And this week I crashed into it.

It was no doubt made more obvious by the fact that I was also dealing with pms, but I believe that to be completely God's plan. Had I not crashed this hard I would have continued to just manage. And that is not God's best for us. Stress is inevitable. Change is too. And following God successfully through it doesn't mean that we are completely unfazed by it and go along all nonchalant and happy. Jesus sweat blood before He went to the cross. Following God successfully means we have a deep knowing in our spirits that we will be victorious despite our present circumstances because Jesus has already won the battle.

And we don't have to fall back into old and destructive habits because we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Romans 8:37-38)

So, instead of going to food for comfort or release during this season of stress, I will once again start going to Jesus. And one of the best ways to focus on Jesus is to plaster our minds with Scripture, so during the month of April the kids and I will be memorizing Psalm 112. It is 10 verses long. Verse 7 says: They do not fear bad news; they confidently trust the Lord to care for them. Another translation says: they do not fear bad news for it is settled in their minds that Jehovah will take care of them.

Things are hard right now but through these trials it is becoming more and more settled in my mind that Jehovah will take care of us. And that confidence is priceless because OUR GOD IS ALWAYS FAITHFUL!

Bridget

Let's Continue to Grow

I caught an episode of 18 Kids and Counting yesterday and something stuck out to me that I've been thinking about today. Here's what I got:

Mr. and Mrs. Dugger (dad and mom to 18 biological kids) were traveling from their home in Arkansas to New York City to appear on The View. They took two older daughters and the new baby with them while the rest of the crew stayed home with Grandma. The at home crew got to get the t.v.s out of the closet and set them up with the rabbit ears to watch mom and dad on The View. (Honestly, I become more attached to the idea of life without t.v. everyday. It's just so hard to say goodbye)

As the kids are gathered around the t.v. a commercial comes on that has women dressed immodestly. One of the sisters (around 10 yrs old) immediately raises her hand to the t.v. and covers the screen. When asked why she did this, she says she does it because it is wrong to dress like that and to help her brothers not look. You can tell that all she understands is that it is not good for her brothers to look at girls dressed like that or for girls to dress like that. Right now, she obeys without complete understanding.

I'm so very glad she does. But some day, hopefully, she will fully understand why it is important to dress modestly and to help her brothers (biologically and in Christ) not be tempted to lust or dishonor one of God's creatures. If she never grows into that fuller understanding she will miss out on knowing God more.

But there are also times when we do things because it is what we were taught and we never move into that place of greater understanding, and in that we end up doing things unnecessary or incorrect. I'm thinking of the story of the new bride cooking her first roast. As she cuts off the ends of the roast before putting it in the pan her husband asks her why she does that. She replies, "Because that's how my mother does it."

Curious, now as to why her mother does it, she calls mom and asks. Mom's reply is, "Because that's how my mother did it."

Now, they are both curious so they call Grandma and ask her. Grandma responds, "Because my pan was never big enough for the whole roast."

Mom and daughter had continued cutting the ends of the roast off and missing out on perfectly good meat simply because they did it the way it had been done before them without ever moving into that fuller understanding of why it was done that way.

This was me for many years when it came to my relationship with Christ. I did what I was told to do in some cases and what it appeared most everyone was doing in others. But I can gladly say that I'm trying to continue growing into the fuller understanding God desires for us. He doesn't want us to drink milk our whole lives. He wants us to feast on His meat too.

Some of the things I was taught or copied are good things that I'm understanding more and more. And some of the things are unnecessary and need to be released. I'm letting go.

Let's continue to grow.
Bridget

You have been Christians a long time now, and you ought to be teaching others. Instead, you need someone to teach you again the basic things a beginner must learn about the Scriptures. You are like babies who drink only milk and cannot eat solid food. And a person who is living on milk isn't very far along in the Christian life and doesn't know much about doing what is right. Solid food is for those who are mature, and who have trained themselves to recognize the difference between right and wrong and then do what is right. So let us stop going over the basics of Christianity again and again. Let us go on instead and become mature in our understanding. Hebrews 5:12 - 6:1

Hi!

The kids and I are in Chicken Town till Thursday. Just wanted to say "Hi".

"Hi!"

Bridget