Joyful in Hope

          So, It has been a long time since I have posted and it has been gnawing on me for awhile!!! I let life get me so busy and then the end of the day finds me before I know it! Evelyn is a year now! Already almost 13 months! She has been walking for the past month and half and it has made life quite interesting!! She is a busy girl! She is also very observant and at times it freaks me out how much she is soaking up! She will see something on TV that looks like a sign she knows and she will start signing what she thinks they are signing. She does not forget things! She knows where the dog food is located and currently she knows which ornaments on our tree will make noise when mommy is not looking! She is little copy cat too! You laugh, she laughs... you dance, she dances... you growl, she growls. She loves to just study people and figure out how, why, and what they can do! I am seeing more and more that the Lord has blessed her with a teachable spirit and I, as her mother, am starting to feel guilty that I am not nurturing that as much as I can! Her favorite activity right now is reading!! We are reading the same books over... and over... and over again! She also loves climbing stairs over... and over... and over again. 

          Evelyn is definitely keeping me busy... And things are only going to get busier in the Hentges's household because we are expecting Baby Hentges #2 in Mid-June 2013! And what a ride it has been already!! This pregnancy has been a whole lot tougher on me than my pregnancy with Evelyn. There are so many similarities but they just all seem to be heightened!! The nausea from 6 weeks to 10 weeks was pretty difficult! I did not have that so much with Evelyn, just at night, this was ALL DAY! The fatigue has definitely been affecting me more, but I am sure that is because I do not get to sleep like I did with Evelyn! I have also been getting heartburn daily for the past month or so and I do not remember getting that until much later with Evelyn. I am also starting to show a whole lot quicker too, which I know is to be expected! So I have been hanging in there for past couple months! Waiting for the relief to hit and the energy to return and the joy to fill my heart over the anticipation of baby #2.

         I will just be honest with you, I have been struggling with much guilt the last couple months. Guilt as a mom who can't give her daughter the attention and engagement she once could. Guilt as a wife as my drive to cook, clean, laundry, or even be intimate with my husband has been extremely difficult! Guilt over the thoughts and the feelings I have been wrestling with. Those being, whether pregnancy is worth it... all the sick feelings worth it... How could I feel that way over such an amazing, beautiful blessing. How could I even ask myself such a thing!? But I have... often... I have struggled to feel that I am failing my family and my walk with the Lord! If you have been following me for a while you may recall a post I wrote when pregnant with Evelyn how pregnancy is a gift of grace. Well, I am learning a whole new aspect of grace in pregnancy. The first time around it was just about God giving me a gift that I truly did not deserve, a baby, and how it is only by grace that the baby sustains and grows. This time, it is totally about God's grace on me and my inability to do it all! That even when I am struck with complete laziness or just my struggle to be a good wife and mom is completely covered by God's grace.

 2 Corinthians 12:9 

     But he said to me, “My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.” Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ’s power may rest on me.    

       How wonderful, how beautiful is the grace of God! Not that I can use that as an excuse but God does not reward me or take things from me just solely based on what I do. He is not Santa Clause... He is a sovereign God who loves his children and knows his purpose for them and their life! So it is just very interesting to me what the Lord is teaching me this time around! It is not working through the worry of the little baby growing inside me, but this time it is working through the struggle to sustain and serve my family! 

     This past week our pastor was preaching from John 14:1-3. He was spurring us on to Heaven and our anticipation of it! He stressed the fact that Heaven is not just some altered state of mind or involves us hanging out on the clouds but it is a place! It is our HOME! It will be a new heaven and earth! It is not about mansions and it is definitely not an apartment but it is a place of NO VACANCY! We do not have to worry about one day getting there and not being able enter because there is no room... we will only not enter when we are not reconciled with God. Anyways, how this connected with me was just how often I struggle to anticipate and take hope in the fact that I have a HOME in Heaven with my Savior! How the worries of the world and the darkness around me so often discourage me and where I am at. You get through an election like we just had and it can be hard to keep our head up. I found myself relating that with this current pregnancy. I have struggled to see the bigger picture, that it will be worth it! That the Lord has a plan in this!! I so often forget about the glory of Heaven and it being full of joy and splendor  I must be forgetting the little piece of heaven a newborn brings. Don't get me wrong I am excited to be able to welcome a new little one into this world! I know the Lord has a great plan in store for our family and for this little one's life! I do not wish I could change a thing!! Other than my lack-of-better-terms, poor attitude :-) The Lord has been so GOOD to Andy & I and we are truly, TRULY blessed! 

Please pray for me, that this pregnancy would be used for the glory of God! That I would take joy in all that he is doing around me and inside of me! That I would be able to serve my family as God so desire and that I will take time to glean in the LORD first and foremost!! Especially to praise and glean in the Lord with my little girl!! That her heart would too take joy in the Lord! Thank you all and it is good to be back with you all!