#mailthatmatters/purchase with purpose/Purpose Box

Mail that Matters

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 0 Comment

I have so many things I want to share about our trip–I’m sure you’ll be tired of hearing about it once I’m done recapping everything–but first I have to tell you how my heart is absolutely bursting with the Purpose Box launch this week.

Clicking the send button on the initial email for orders was a feeling like I’ve never known. From the day I dreamt this whole thing up on our way home from the beach to hitting that send button, I’ve prayed, wondered, and hoped about doing it. Would anyone order it? Would it just be people I knew? Was I the only one who thought this was worthwhile? Then it happened: an order. Another. They kept coming. People I knew. People I didn’t know. People all across the country were ordering. I sat in the recliner and bawled my eyes out.

Purpose Box Square

I’m not quite to my goal, but I’m completely blown away by the progress. I’m not making a profit; I’m not doing it for me. I’m doing it because I felt a stirring in my heart, a desire to make stories known and share purposes.

Not sure what Purpose Box is or what I’m talking about? Read here, here, and here. Want to order a box for yourself (or as a gift)? Click here and get yours now before they’re all gone! Already ordered yours? Share Purpose Box with a friend!

Thank you all for going on this journey with me! I can’t wait to see what God does through this!

Angelfire/New Mexico/skiing/Tuesday 10/Tuesday ten

Tuesday Ten: Ski Trip Edition

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 2 Comments

1. I’m in that stage of packing where you make a giant mess before you do anything that’s actually productive. As much as I love order and organization, I love this part of the packing process because it’s organized chaos. I’m all about a good oxymoron.

2. This will be the boy’s first plane ride. It has been incredible watching him process how he thinks it will all go down. He’s got a pretty good grasp of it all for the knowledge he’s working from. I still love those little kid processing skills so very much.

3. We have never flown with ski stuff. It’s all so bulky. Here’s hoping I can work my packing magic with a new challenge (and a lot fewer shoes).

A video posted by Mrs. Gray (@the_graymatters) on

4. This is our first real vacation with Baby Gray, and I am really excited. He is old enough to enjoy, remember, and provide input. It’s going to be fun. I’m glad the grandparents are going, too, so everyone can enjoy!

5. I have so much to do this week, it’s all crammed in as tight as my calendar can handle. The break will be quite nice.

6. One thing I do to make our return easier when we are gone is make sure the house is in order when we leave. Then there’s no catch-up going on when we get back; we do vacation laundry and call it good. I’m even having the house cleaner come while we’re gone this time. Everything will be fresh (I wash our sheets and towels just prior to leaving as well so we come home to our own bed and shower with fresh linens). Any travel tricks you use to make re-entry easier?

7. The boy is most worried about making sure his Ninjago mini-figs make it in his suitcase. It’s a good thing someone else oversees his packing, or he’d be awfully cold.

8. Expect Instagram and Facebook to be on overload while we’re on our trip. So many firsts to document! Follow along or hide me–whichever floats your boat!

9. I got a couple of never-before-seen surprise items for the plane rides and car trips as we travel. This is always my secret weapon, as the novelty keeps the boy occupied for extra time. What do you do while your kids travel?

10. I love the way Baby Gray is counting down the days until we leave–it makes it so much more exciting now that he is excited, too! Angelfire, here we come!


 

2015/baseball/t-ball

T-Ballin’

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 0 Comment

Yesterday, we signed Baby Gray up for t-ball. (Did you hear me? WE SIGNED BABY GRAY UP FOR T-BALL!) I cannot even begin to tell you folks how excited that makes me. I have–in all seriousness–looked forward to this day since we found out that our sweet baby would be a boy.

TBall Sign Up

Baseball was a huge part of our lives for quite some time, and I can’t wait to have a little baseball going on in this house again! Not to mention the fact that we have a lefty–that gives us even more to look forward to! AND, we were originally told he wouldn’t be old enough this year, so we got an extra surprise when we found out he could play beginning this season!

I am also looking forward to finding a way to create a balance as we progress so that we do not become baseball-heavy and have it take over our lives (I realize it sounds like I am getting ahead of myself, but if you don’t plan, you run much more of a risk of failing.)

Do your kids play sports? How does your family manage that?

camp house/transition

Home, Home on the Hill

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 0 Comment

We are having a great time in the little house on the hill, living our little country life. Before we moved in, I was dreading it. Now that we’re here, I’m almost (maybe, not quite) going to be sad to leave (pending the building of our home actually ever materializing). There are a few modern conveniences I am ready to have back, though.

Robin Williams

The things I miss the most:
+ closets. I prefer my clothes behind a door.
+ a dishwasher. Thank goodness we don’t have any dishes right now because it would really be Bad News Bears around here.  
+ insulation. I prefer my central heat in the house.
+ a bathtub. Oh, how I miss a bathtub.
+ three-pronged plugs. We have a few, but not nearly enough.

In all honesty, I love this little house. I’m excited for our new adventure, too, but I’m not feeling cramped and trapped like I thought I would before we actually got here.

chapstick/husband/lips/packaging

White Lips

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 0 Comment

As a regular thing, I use Burt’s Bees as my chapstick. It works. It burns when it needs to. I don’t get chapped lips. What a wonderful thing.

Also a regular thing, I buy other chapstick with cute packaging (see also: how I buy most things). My latest one was oblong instead of round. Oooooohhhh…. Aaaaaahhhhh… It’s truly the little things.

BUT.

Yes To

It turns my lips white. My husband may or may not have said, “No! Do not look at me!” when I put it on before bed last night. (I laugh every time I think about it.) (Went back to re-read and edit–laughing again. Aloud. At home with no one around.)

Seriously. It works. It works well. It’s great. If you want white lips. I don’t. So, I just wear it to bed. (Or to pose in front of our “winter lights” and take funny selfies. Don’t be jealous.)

faith/God/purchase with purpose/Purpose Box/songs/timing

Now, Never

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 1 Comment

Yesterday someone was asking me about Purpose Box, and as I spent time answering, some words came out of my mouth that surprised even me:

Timing

How many times have I needed to hear that? How many times has something just not been right at that moment? God knows the moments. He knows the inner desires of our hearts. He knows when the time is right–for anything and nothing.

So many times I have wanted something right now, when what God had for me was so much better. When will I learn to give it to Him and trust? When will I learn to let Him lead? Spirit lead me where my trust is without borders… 

“but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.” –Isaiah 40:31

books/movies/never/running/travel/WalMart

I Have Never…

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 3 Comments

… watched Downton Abbey (as a matter of fact, I actually thought it was Downtown Abbey for quite some time).

… run a full marathon. As I explained to Mr. Gray last night, if I ever did, it would be for the Mylar blanket. He told me to pay him $40 and he’d wrap me in a blanket after I ran around the block. (He also told me he thought they’d give me one if I happened to be in a fire.)  

… flown first class. But, hey, Southwest let’s you check bags fo’ free! That’s something, right? 

… seen Ferris Bueller’s Day Off. Maybe parts of it, maybe, but I really don’t recall. And I know people do the whole Bueller? Bueller? thing. I don’t have any clue what that means, though.

… stayed in a hotel alone. Is that a thing?

… eaten Nutella. However, my husband bought me one of those little to-go packages last night in the check out at WalMart (we spent $85 and bought FOUR things from the impulse-buy section at the register; that’s why we don’t shop together) last night when we went in needing nothing. 

Nutella

… read any of the Harry Potter series (or Twilight, for that matter). I don’t have any desire to. I’ve seen bits and pieces of the movies, and it’s just not my style.

… jumped off a rope swing. I’m always afraid I’ll get tangled in it and get hurt.

What’s something you’ve never done?

Adoption/faith/marriage/parenting/pregnancy/wait

I’m Already Ready Already

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 1 Comment

(Let’s just be clear here, you in this piece is me. Feel free to group yourself in if you’re so inclined.) 

Early marriage, before you’re ready to have kids, you “try not to” have kids. You go, enjoy, be married.

Jolie 147A

Then, when you might be ready for a child, you stop “trying not to” and see what happens. You claim you’ll wait patiently and that it will happen when it happens.

I know for me, when we got to the stop trying not to stage, it turned into the “are we pregnant yet?” stage. It’s like once you cross the line from not ready to maybe ready, you’re actually ready. You might stop short of charting cycles and taking temperatures, but you’re definitely on your game when it comes time to take a test and know when you could maaaaaaybbbeeee get that positive.

Maternity

I have found very quickly that I have a similar mentality while waiting to adopt. I went from not quite ready to mostly ready, but I somehow burned right through the mostly ready stage into the “why didn’t we get a call yesterday?” stage. OK, it’s not quite that bad, but it’s quickly jumped to the front of most of my thoughts and conversations. I went from completely content as a family of three, to knowing for sure that we were missing our fourth.

Because it is so different than carrying a biological child and feeling a tiny bit of physical control, it is interesting to talk and dream through it with Mr. Gray. We each have ideas of what it might look like–what adoption process, what age range, what time frame. Ultimately, though, we know He has the perfect child for us and that we were called to wait. He planted the seeds and asked us to wait, and that is what we will do. I will attempt to do it with as much grace and poise as possible, because there is always so much power in the wait. I don’t want to waste the wait at all. I want to use it to spend time as a family of three, to cherish the relationship Baby Gray and I have, to be on-the-go with him and being able to be a “yes” parent while he is still the only one. (I know not all of that will change when another child is part of our family, but I want to be intentional about it now.)

gray_family_2014-009

The waiting is the part I used to loathe; I didn’t want to wait, I wanted instant gratification. Now, though, I love knowing when we are in a waiting season so I can take advantage of what is while I wait on what is to come.  

“Wait for the LORD; be strong, and let your heart take courage; wait for the LORD!” –Psalm 27:14

Do you remember the commercial with the line “it’s already ready already” from the 1990s? I have always remembered the slogan, but I never knew what it was from. I looked it up in case any one (my husband) missed the reference in the title. Too bad it wasn’t for something better than frozen daiquiris. 

books/reading

Get Your Read On

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 3 Comments

Lots of folks are talking about books these days. Seems like everywhere I look there’s a book challenge, a friend looking for a recommendation, or a Facebook thread full of ideas.

This has lead to a few things happening around here:

1. I’m on Goodreads now. Let’s be friends.

2. I’m trying my hand at this 26 book challenge–that’s a lot higher than my usual annual number, but I think I can do it!

3. I’m recommending books:

Book Recommendations 2015

4. I’m asking for book recommendations. Leave ’em in the comments! 

2015/go/God/move/Revolution/settle/Sunday

Sunday

Posted on by Mrs Gray / 2 Comments

Sundays. 

First Sundays were hard because they were long, satan fought from the moment my feet hit the floor, I was on my feet more than any other day, and all the other things that came with being plugged into a church. It was exhausting, wonderful, and so worth it. It was time spent making an eternal difference. It was time spent on life change. 

gray_family_2014-009

Now Sundays are hard because we aren’t plugged in anywhere. It’s a longing to be somewhere we can’t–or somewhere that doesn’t exist. It’s spending the morning wondering what we’re missing because we don’t feel like we belong at any of the churches we have visited. Maybe that home feeling isn’t what we were called here to find. Maybe it’s a get-out-of-your-comfort-zone situation. Maybe it’s just time to rest. Maybe I’m not leaning in hard enough. Maybe I’m not seeing the obvious. Maybe Sundays are just hard.