Mommy's got a baby in her tummy

I like to do big things.  I like to take little moments and make way too much about them.  It doesn’t always work out well for me or those around me.  After I mow the lawn I will comment about how nice our yard looks about 100 times that day.  It’s not because I’m trying to draw attention to my work or that I am looking for praise, I’m just really captivated by how nice the yard looks when it’s freshly mowed.  I do the same thing with food.  I will talk about “that one meal” way too much, even to the point that I am annoying myself with it.  But I can’t stop making big things out of small things.

Strike that.

I want to be a dad, husband, and friend who makes things a big deal.

So, when it came time for Mindy and I to announce to the kids that we were going to have a baby I knew that we had to do something fun.  We settled with having our friend take pictures of the moment when we told the kids so that we will be able to keep that moment alive forever in print.  I also thought it would be a really “big” and fun way to announce the pregnancy to our friends on Facebook.  We had pictures scheduled for a Friday and I made the sign and had it printed that morning.  It was almost an afterthought.  I’m really glad I did think of that.

Friday night came around and we headed out to the beach.  We got some individual pictures of the kids and then came the time for the big reveal.  Wow.  It was so much fun.  Honestly, the pictures turned out WAAAAAYYYY better than I could have imagined.  The kids were shocked!  They had absolutely no idea.  We were a little worried that they might be sad or disappointed.  (Just do the math kids!)  They didn’t think about number of bedrooms, the economy, daddy’s salary, our minivan, or the fact that we got rid of our crib already.  No, you just got to see it “sink in.”  It was amazing how well the pictures captured the idea sinking in to the kid’s brains.  And, it is amazing to have these pictures to be able to show this child.  To let this newest one know that we have loved you since the beginning!  There is one picture that is, probably, my favorite possession now.

I like to make things big.  So I decided to submit them to a couple of websites and then it started to take off in our little corner of the world.

I submitted these photos because I thought they were just beautiful and people needed to see them.  To see these kids completely shocked and overjoyed with news of a new baby was priceless.  To me it is an incredible picture of how beautifully God has made love, made the family, and made the human heart.  These pictures, to me, capture the glory of God in a way that I’ve never witnessed before.

I was not expecting some of what happened next.  People started to comment about the one black child in the family.  It was shocking because Silas has been apart of our family so long that it’s just a part of “us.”  I forgot that it’s a little different than some families.  (How can you forget that right?)  Some of the comments were just terrible.  They were terrible because they were “just jokes.”  If you have to defend yourself for “just making a joke” then you probably shouldn’t have made the joke.  It would be best to just ask for forgiveness and learn something.  Also, there aren’t “just jokes.”  Especially if you aren’t even a part of the circle of that group.  I was shocked, shamed, and embarrassed.

I instantly thought that I needed to contact these places and ask them to remove the photos because of the comments.  But, I couldn’t.  I knew that I couldn’t.  I knew that I couldn’t comment.  I knew that these pictures had to stay there.  I couldn’t ask them to take the pictures down because the pictures are much bigger than my feelings or my kid’s feelings.  These pictures show, in such an innocent and raw form, the overwhelming beauty of true love.  And the world needs to see true love.  

Like I’ve already said, sometimes I make big things out of small things.  I’m not going to quit doing that.  Like one great philosopher once said, “haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.”  I cannot let the actions, words, and keystrokes from some lost and hurting people shame me into living my life in a corner.  I will continue to overshare, be overjoyed, smile too much, laugh too much, and love those who don’t love me.

I will also continue to make big deals out of small things, because everything in life is a big deal.  Right now you are sitting on a sphere that is rotating and revolving around a gaseous ball of fire in a group of rocks and balls of gas that are rotating around other rocks and balls of gas.  Your body it taking in oxygen, involuntarily, and somehow supporting your life.  You are thinking.  As in your brain is actually forming thoughts that you are understanding.  These thoughts elicit actions from your body as well as emotions that can make you feel things.  How the crap is that not a big deal?  The sun “rose” this morning.  Can you believe that?  There is just enough oxygen, nitrogen, and other stuff in such an intricate balance to sustain your life.


All of life is a big deal.  Thank God.  And love, love is always a big deal.  Praise God.  I know that there is a lot in this world that is wrong.  But praise God for the work He has done and work He continues to do.  Thank you God for pure, innocent love.  Thank you for family.  Thank you for those wonderful souls who choose to forgive, to have patience, and love those who seem very unlovable.

You know what?  I want to get these picture on Good Morning America.  There I said it.








Priceless - Look at Will's face.







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