It's a beautiful life!: All you need is love

Romans 5:8 "But God commendeth his love toward us, in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us."

Valentine's day is big deal to our family. I have always tried to make it a little extra special for the boys. I try to make an effort to do a couple of Valentine themed crafts, decorate the dining room, and make a cake. This year, we also gave them some Squinkies as a little "I love you" present. To whoever came up with the concept for these tiny creatures I have one question, why? Apparently, somebody thought it would be funny to make a toy that would take little boys five seconds to lose and mommies five hours to find! At least they were happy for the five seconds they had them.

Anyway, things have been busy around here as usual. I actually got a chance to take Cody with me to school the other day. He fit right in with all the other students like he had been going there all year. The next day, some of the children asked me where he was and if he was coming back. :) I realized a couple of things watching him in a classroom setting. One, he has incredible focus and follows direction very well. This was, quite a shock to me. At home, he kind of just does his own thing and never seems like he can stay put for more than five minutes. Second, while I have been teaching other kids to color, cut and glue, I have not devoted nearly enough time working with Cody on these skills. He was slightly behind the others in this area. However, like I said, he was very focused which put him way ahead of most of the children in this area. As a teacher, I know that skills and concepts are easily taught, teaching someone how to focus is alot more difficult. However,his biggest skill continues to be melting people with his smile and charm (when he feels like it). :)

Jack is as inquisitive as ever, asking the why and how behind everything. The other day, he asked Jay how the hot wheels cars stayed on the track while they were going through the loop. He wanted to know why gravity didn't pull them down. Jay proceeded to give the exact explanation, big words and all. The crazy thing is he actually got the general idea of what Jay was explaining. After a few moments he said "Oh, that's why the cars don't go very well on the carpet, there is too much friction. On hard floors there is not as much friction so they go faster". That's his daddy coming out in him.

In honor of Valentine's day, I put Romans 5:8 at the beginning of my post. Lately, we have been trying to teach the boys that it is not enough to just "do the right thing". We want them to learn to be motivated by love to do these things. It was Christ's love for us that motivated him to sacrifice himself for our sins. We are praying they learn that the power of Christ's love can overflow from their hearts into acts of service for others. What a humbling lesson this has been for us as we try to demonstrate this to them in our own lives.

Here is a peek into our Valentine's week!