Happy Birthday, Owen!





Five years ago today I became a mommy. A whole new adventure as many of you can relate to.

Today we celebrated Owen turning 5 years old. He has waited SOOO long for this day. I think he has been talking about turning 5 for at least 6 months. We were so glad to have both sets of grandparents and my brother Sam be able to join us for supper and cake afterwards.

Altogether there were 16 of us around the dinner table.

I've been having this thought rolling around in my head lately about these teenagers that we serve here at Gateway. Sometimes I get stuck in the thought that this is my job and that my actual life occurs on the 9 days off I have each month. But I've been reconsidering what my life really consists of.

I believe that living at Gateway IS my life. Whew. I said it. That sounds kinda big.

But I believe that my family life currently consists of 3 toddlers and 5 teenagers and a wonderful husband. When I start looking at these kids as more than 'residents' something shifts inside me. I see them as part of my family and not some interruption in my life between my days off. My days on duty go a little more smoothly and my days off are more of a breather, because, you know, we all need those once in awhile.

I say all that to bring it back to Owen and his birthday. We celebrated Owen's birthday with our family, some of those who are related to us by blood, and some of those who are linked to us in other ways, but family nonetheless. Owen was thrilled that we were on duty for his birthday because he wanted the big kids to be there for it - which just made my heart smile.

Happy Birthday, my sweet, sensitive Owen. You are such a thoughtful young man who looks out for others, gets his heart hurt easily, and has a mechanical mind talent that is beyond me. We love you, Owen, and we pray each day that you grow to desire Jesus and your life may bring him glory.

Comments

  1. MouseymomOctober 12, 2011 at 11:06 PM

    neat realization, Nichole.

    I love your cake, wow, that was a lot of work, but it looks like it was appreciated!

    ReplyDelete
  2. RachelOctober 13, 2011 at 12:04 AM

    Nichole, it is so great that you are seeing this while you are still at GW! I have some regrets about working at GW and this is one of them. A lot of times I had the same thoughts that you talked about--GW was my job, and my real life was on our days off. GW is blessed to have you and Paul--you are doing a great job! Happy Birthday to Owen!

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Tell me how you live intentional. I'd love to know!

Popular posts from this blog

The jig is up

Image
OK, I've kept it a secret for 6 months, but now that it's over, I'm bragging on my man. : ) Since April, Paul has been training to run the Columbus Marathon. We were able to get a few days off of work, grandparents watched the kids, and on Saturday morning Paul and I headed down to Columbus. We headed downtown to pick up his race packet and then spent the rest of the day and night with Ben, Jaime, and Alayna . Dark and early (5 AM) Sunday morning we rolled out of bed, Paul got geared up, and we headed downtown again to find a decent parking spot. Thankfully we found a good place to park and had Paul to the starting area at 6:30 AM (an hour before start). Ben graciously came along so I didn't have to wander around Columbus on my own -thanks, Ben! It was mid-30's at the start with a slight breeze, but skies were clear and the sun came out once it rose. Ben and I saw Paul off at the start and then headed to the halfway point (got some coffee along the way) and
Read more

Madeline Nichole Suvar

Image
The newest addition to our family came into this world on February 1st. She weighed 6 lbs 3 oz and was 19 inches long. She surprised us all with having black hair - Owen and Hannah were born with next to nothing for hair and even then it was real light. She impressed the doctors at the hospital by gaining back her birth weight and passing it by an ounce (a rarity, I guess). Our first day at home (today) went well. She was awake for most of the morning and through lunch and then took a nap in the afternoon. She nurses well and doesn't get upset by all the noise Owen and Hannah make. Hannah loves to come over and pat her on the head and Owen will talk to her and hold her hand. I am working on wrapping my mind around the fact that I am a mother of 3 - it makes me feel old! :) I'm healing well from my C-Section, the hardest part is forcing myself to stay put and letting Paul do things for me. He's a great nurse, cook, father, husband.... : )
Read more

Of loss and hope

Image
Thank you to those who have reached out to me, prayed for me, since my post on Sunday. I am humbled yet again by the love of Christ, and His followers. I spoke of hope. And truly I am learning more about hope as life goes on.  I understand it more than I did 10 years ago. And even now, this week, I feel I am seeing new dimensions of it that I did not know existed. I am a realist. With a small dose of optimism.  And I think that it is that sprinkling of optimism that is keeping me from swinging way over to the pessimistic side of things. Because I truly want things to work out, HOPE that things will work out.  But I keep my hand on the shift knob, because I just may have to throw things into a lower gear because well, I'm just hoping for things to work out, but kinda doubt they will. I hope that made sense to someone.  You may need to go back and read it.  I'll wait. .......... I think I live most of my life, and approach most circumstances, like that.
Read more