Because I Love You Too Much To Let You Be Bored

I have another few posts in the works, but if you are pregnant with twins and stuck on bed rest, I couldn't leave you without some easily accessible and instantaneous reading material. And for those of you who aren't pregnant with twins and stuck on bed rest, I know the question at the fore front of your mind is how I'm surviving house arrest. Here is your answer in the form of multiple blog links. Go ahead, grab a cup of coffee (decaf, in my honour) and waste a few minutes reading with me.

First, because we all need a little awesomeness and creativity in our life, and because there is no such thing as too many dinosaurs, check this out: Dinovember!

Then, to hit on a few more serious notes, here is one of the best words of encouragement I've read in a while: "Everything isn’t a marker to make you feel behind or ahead; everything is a flame to make you see GOD is here," writes Ann Voskamp. And have I mentioned recently how much I love her? I just received her latest book in the mail, a collection of readings for Advent, and I hope I can update you on it towards the end of December, that is, if I survive the "advent" of the twins, haha. 

{Aside: I love being pregnant at Christmas. Seriously. I know I don't normally tell you things I love about my pregnancies, but there's just something about being pregnant at Christmas--even if I miss the entire Advent season because I'm on bed rest.}

While you're poking around on Ann Voskamp's blog, go read this challenge for Thanksgiving, because "What if gratitude always meant a question mark — asking how will you let your gratitude to Christ mark the world for Christ?"

And then, since we're prepping for the holiday season already, run by Jen Hatmaker's blog and join me in thinking about what we really want to be saying through our Christmas traditions. Special props to my oldest sister for sending me that way today: she knows how I enjoy a thought provoking read that still makes me laugh. This paragraph just had me howling:

When we saw the mountains of presents in front of our P.R.E.S.C.H.O.O.L.E.R.S. and watched them rip through boxes so fast, they had no idea what they even received, I caught Brandon's eye across the room and mouthed, "We were freaks!" Not to mention all this bounty was brought into a home burgeoning with loot already, so we had to get rid of a bunch of toys just to shoehorn in the new stuff. Kindly note that the recipients of all this commerce couldn't even wipe their own butts yet. 

Insane at best, sacrilegious at worst.

And then if you're wanting to explore some alternative giving options, bop on over to the Neverthirst website and check out what they're doing around the world. This is the company my not-so-big sister works for and you can read her personal (and absolutely insane) stories over on her blog, Dangdut. And really, this whole blog was just a giant lead up to tell you that she's coming to see me on Friday, and I am insanely excited about it (hence the italics and bolding), and I'm still mad at myself for forgetting to mention her in my last post, but at least it gave her plenty of fodder for snarky comments about her not-so-little sister.

Two more completely unrelated comments:

Aunt Beth is busy teaching my non-reading three year old how to do a word find and his gasp of excitement upon finding "yellow" helped me reconcile myself to the fact that when I asked him earlier if he would hate me if I did his word find, he actually said yes. I personally believe that telling a woman on bed rest that you won't share your word find puzzle is equivalent to stealing food from a pregnant woman. It should never be done if you value your life. Thankfully, I found a free word find app on my phone, and I may now survive until the babies arrive.

Today I realized that if I lived in the world of Harry Potter, my patronus would be a burping camel. I may never be the same again.

Anyway, happy reading and come back later for more self-mockery, some potentially deep thoughts, and new reading material (next time in book form).