The Culpeppers Collected. . . : Count it all joy....James 1:2

First- I have to share a funny story...we have started putting Madden down promptly at 7:30 and Murphy goes at 8. This way he gets an extra 30 minutes of story time etc with daddy and also its kind of a big boy privilege. The other night after Madden was in her bed, Murphy grabbed her glow worm and took it over to the chair in the corner of the den (aka "Madden's chair", where she has to sit if we get to "3" for a few minutes to calm down and think about her offense- ha). The glow worm fell off the chair a couple of times but finally he had the poor doll folded just so -so that it would sit in the chair. He then looked sternly at the poor worm, shook his finger and head back and forth and said no, no, no, no, no, no (you get the idea) turned around and walked away from it. Do you think Madden's spent some time in her chair? Murphy apparently had gotten to "3" with poor Miss glow worm and that was that.

A week from tomorrow is Murphy's 3rd birthday-SIGH. I know I go on and on about them growing up so quickly but seriously did I not just get over the fact that he was turning 2?!?! We have been through a lot this year, starting school, tonsils, walking, more hospital...I could go on and on. We have also learned to "count it all joy." What a perfect way to think of Murphy-aka "heaven joy", or more recently "joy buckets". Through everything we do with him, we learn something or are reminded of the blessings in our life. A flash of his smile takes away just about any troubles, and to hear his giggles seriously makes me melt. To see my little fellow toddling towards me grinning ear to ear, makes me want to be a better person, a better mother, and gives me the strength to do things I never thought possible.

After our guy spent a week in the hospital, he stayed home for a week with me. So that was 2 solid weeks together. When I took him back to school the following week it was almost as hard as the first time I ever took him. I realized that Murphy does nothing but ADD to your day. He is laid back when I am stressed, he smiles when I am worried, he laughs at something when I am racing around trying to get things done...and then he makes you stop.
You just stop for a second and soak in his smile or give him pounds or hold him and when you do stop for a minute and think of everything God has provided and the son that he gave us... we are thankful...because for the past (almost) three years when I look back even at the difficult times-
we can do nothing but count it ALL JOY.