my heart.

Sometimes I don't do a good job of being grateful on a moment to moment basis. Overall I am grateful for what I have in my life- but on days when babies are sick, toddler hasn't napped, I am short on sleep, and then Jon comes in the house an hour late, I forget how thankful I really am. In fact I probably sound extremely selfish. And I struggle to remain calm and in control. Perfection hasn't been my strong suit. But I am a work in progress. I could elaborate on this further, but I'll get to my point.

This Christmas I wasn't feeling particularly needy for anything. I don't know if it's because I feel such satisfaction over my family right now- or because my birthday was just a month ago, or I was so happy with what I was giving this year, but I couldn't think of anything that I really would want. I LOVED what we gave Caed, and I was so happy I was getting to see my mom, grandmother, aunt, and sister and her hubby. I also loved that I gave Jon his first tickets to an NFL game. I arranged with his brother and he flew in to go with him!

Jon was planning something for me. I didn't know what it could be because I didn't know of anything I wanted! I was thinking if I had mentioned anything and I really couldn't think of anything. I mean, maybe some kitchen something here or there, or some new clothes- but it was obvious that he wasn't planning on getting me a crock pot or a new pair of jeans. The gifts were arriving by mail, and he had to go out and go to physical stores too. What could this be? I had happened upon a new CD that he got me, when he left it on top of the stereo. (it's up high and I typically don't look up there, but I had misplaced the checkbook and was searching everywhere!) So I only knew I was getting the new Switchfoot CD.

Christmas Eve he wrapped my gifts while i was putting the kids to bed. I came downstairs and there was a stack of 5 small-ish gifts. Tied together.

Christmas morning I was overjoyed to be with the family! The babies slept in, so we really got to watch Caed open his gifts. For those that are curious, we give each kid 3 gifts. Representing the three gifts the wise men brought to Jesus. Caed knows this. He gets three gifts- and all from mom and dad. Since he's been exposed to Santa, he thinks, and we direct his thinking, that Santa only fills our stockings. So if I have something outside the three gifts I want to give him and it's small, I'll stick it in the stocking- but I find it really helps me be intentional about the gifts we buy him- and we don't go overboard since we keep to the three gifts. I got this idea from another former roommate of mine, shauna. I don't know if she still does it- but that's where I got the idea for the three gifts. We bought Caed a small Wall-E figure, a Mack truck from the movie Cars, and a Woodland House Playmobil set (with a thousand small, cool pieces).

Jon then had me open my gifts- in order they were stacked. Gift 1- an Ipod nano. we had talked about me getting one before, but we always say it doesn't make sense right now with small children. I am not typically putting headphones in my ears at any point in the day. I need to hear them. But I LOVED the gift! Gift 2- TWO cd's! The switchfoot album I came across, and a Live Toby Mac album. Both are christian artists. LOVE it. Gift 3- a clothes box (yes!) a pair of workout pants and an arm band for the nano. How sweet. He wants to help me get back to running! Gift 4- another clothes box! Yes! Some more workout clothes and what is my METS key chain doing in there...with three cards attached to it....? A gym membership for me, with the kids enrolled in the childcare there!!! HOLY COW!! WOW. I was speechless. See- a gym membership with childcare is one of the only ways I could see me being able to get back into shape. I recently asked a friend if I could run with her, but she runs marathons...I am not in the shape to start back up with running with her. I need some warm up runs. And I don't think that I can leave early enough in the morning before the babies wake up. I just need some extra time with childcare. Gift 5- a beautiful book of historic Paris maps. Inside Jon wrote "Lauren, Thought you could use these to study up on the Paris Marathon course. Love you, Jonathan"

Grateful. I get tears in my eyes even as I write it again.

the gifts were more then the money spent on them. It was such a demonstration of Jon supporting a dream of mine. He cares for me, and the desires of my heart. Even when I show some ugly behavior and I am not the best person I should be- he still shows me how much he just knows my heart.

I want to run the Paris Marathon in 2011. That means I have to know by about Oct. 2010 if I can commit to it. That means I need to start working on it. Jon is supportive. It means a big trip but he wants me to follow through on it. I am so filled with gratitude to have him as my husband that for this week, and hopefully at least the next couple of weeks I can work on remembering this. No, really- to have this tangible thoughtfulness will be a reminder on those evenings I want to be short on patience and frustrated with him arriving home at the kids' bedtimes instead of at dinnertime. And hopefully getting some workouts will help alleviate some stress and tension too. :)

Again- I am so thankful. Thankful that when I was a junior in high school and still had my braces on (a total of 7 years, thank you!) and dyed my hair "red" (read: orange) he still decided to like me. That even though 5 years later he thought I might be a good girlfriend and I did not,he still pursued me. And when we dated those 5 years later while I was still in college, I finally knew we would get married. And even though we had COMPLETELY different upbringings, we had our faith as our common ground and it's kept us together and in love from then on. Thank you sweetheart! I am so thankful for you and how well you know me and what's on my heart!!

I just wanted to Blog this so that I share the good that happens when I maybe let the bad leak out too.