the final weeks.

I honestly have to say I can hardly believe I am writing this, still pregnant, at 34 weeks...or 8 1/2 months... it feels so surreal. like... totally surreal.

All my heart keeps whispering throughout my last weeks & months over and over is 'God is so good'... and there is this soft refrain that keeps singing 'victory', and a beautiful knowing that the enemy is defeated by the power of our mighty God. The enemy was always defeated, even before this victory of a little girl growing healthy in my tum... but to see the outworking of such a victory...it brings that glorious defeat to the forefront of my mind constantly. It is a constant reminder that all those things I know are so wonderfully true are playing out in a story of life right in front of my eyes.

It has certainly been an adventure, a ride of wild curves and swerves as we've made our way through the last months. I spent about a week in hospital at 29 weeks after our little maizey made an attempt at escaping a little early... and all was well after some precautions were taken... and again God was faithful and Maizey was healthy and happy with a bit of encouagement to stay put. Then, this past Sunday, we gathered together as a church family to record the 2011 Hillsong Live Album marking another year since losing our Max and marking a huge miracle victory as I had the privilage of standing and singing while carrying our healthy baby girl in my womb.

It seems as I type all of this, that I'm again overwhelmed by the simple fact that the story is just that... its the facts belonging to such a greater picture. Important? Absolutely! Our stories are so vitally important... but as I think about the story that is our (matty and my) lives together, I see so clearly that they only frame the substance which really matters and is true no matter what the up or down of the story is at the moment. The truth and the substance that is the constant, that makes up the fabric of who we are in every season is Jesus... the JOY of that washes me over. He will never change... No matter what comes in life... He will always be the center of our lives... and as the story frames the substance of us... we always live with the same truth and hope.

Maybe its just my pregnant brain as I type this all out, but I feel like there's a revelation in my heart today. I'm so beyond thankful for this beautiful baby that will be in my arms soon. Lord knows, she's been prayed for and so long awaited... but i'm also very aware that there are so many of you that are still in the waiting season... waiting for your promise... waiting for the answer you've been crying out for... and I feel like God's saying so clearly to let Him be your substance and to let him frame your life with a story that will glorify the substance that makes you up. He will never stop being faithful and true... and in the waiting He will be glorified as the constant in your heart and life.

i'll leave you with a little photo of late. the 34 week equator shot ... its getting harder and harder to take these simply out of vanity! ha!



As well a little update on Haylee (if you don't recall, she was our foster daughter for a little over a year)... she's doing great! She is about to be fully restored to her dad, so we are praying for him every day, believing he is going to be the very best dad she could have ever had... believing for his absolutely success in life and the next few years learning how to parent a toddler. We saw Haylee for what will most likely be the last time a couple weeks ago and she was BEAUTIFUL of course, walking and chatting and being the absolute treasure she always is...




xxxx

OH MY!

well... i'm still growing! yay! and at our scan of 25 wks last week so was our little one.
she does cheekily keep trying to make early appearances... i'm hoping that she's getting her wild side out of the way while she is 'womb-bound' ... then the perfect little angel that i know she is can be forever present from when shes born... over ambitious??? ha!

here's a blurry one.
and a bit of chubby cheeks on that face of hers...



i'm in love.

................................

in other news...

After a few weeks of no computer internet access *just phone* ...
we are back online.
moved in to our new place thanks to our amazing friends.
& SOOOOOO happy here.

i can't wait to sit and write again... for now though.. a sunday afternoon sleep is in order...

*snoooorr*

xx

and so we propose a toast.

{sfgirlbybay}

The best thing about yesterday was sitting on a park bench in bondi beach and 12:05 pm... my best friend Karalee by my side... with sparkling parkers organic juices... toasting. We toasted max kingston and how precious his life was when it entered the world at that point in my pregnancy last time... and in effect toasted the little victories that God has given to get me and matty to this point... and we toasted our little girl.. still in my tummy... still growing... and staying put.

I realised again, that sometimes in life its the little victories in the every day that make the big ones seem so much closer.

Oh victory, in Jesus
My Saviour
Forever
He sought me
& bought me
With His redeeming blood
He loved me 'ere
I knew Him
And all my love
Is due Him
He plunged me
To victory
Beneath the cleansing flood.
{words and music E.M. Bartlett}

alarm clock.

It would seem my body already has some sort of internal alarm set to prepare me for this baby. 4:45am and i was WIDE awake... i tossed and turned for a while... tried to think about nothing... thought about everything... even tried a trick a friend taught me ages ago, where you picture a roll of toilet paper right up close to your nose, and watch it roll around over and over.... (this of course must be a white roll.. no fancy decorative rolls... its totally the new counting sheep?? Ha!)... however, this didn't bring the sleep I was so desperately after. After a good hour of fighting my 'awakeness'... I got up... fumbled around for my contacts... put on the kettle... and now I'm sitting computer side with my cup of 'sydney breakfast' tea from T2 (FAVORITE-thx mia fieldes) and rambling off my early Sunday thoughts to you. I feel like I should apologize now... or maybe just hold down the delete button and start again????

We are moving in exactly a week.
I say we, but I actually won't be participating aside from maybe directing a little. When we worked out that this would be the time we needed to move, part of me thought... umm... perfect... this is gonna be an easy one for me... considering I'm not allowed to actually move anything! That is totally selfish... I know... but I try to be a teller of truths. Considering we only moved into our current place about 4 months ago, another move is daunting.... not only for us... but probably more so for our amazing and generous friends who always come show up with willing hands to speed up the process. or just make it possible!

Turns out tho, I'm WAY more of a control freak than I previously thought.

Surely, we all battle the 'control everything' side of our human nature.... or maybe some the opposite 'couldn't care less side'... but being high risk pregnant, with a side of surgery, and moving on the week which coincidentally was the week we lost our little max on (we are 23 wks yesterday and max came at 23wks and 5 days)... means that I won't be doing much of anything. I'm going crazy. I think my mind runs at a bazillion miles per hour with what we need to pack, how we need to pack it, how we can make moving the least complicated for the actual move and when it comes to unpacking, what and when we should move which items... am I sounding crazy to you??? Even as I write it, I shudder to think what my husband must think of this crazy woman he married! ha! I mean, seriously friends, I have plans to draw a diagram of the house to place on each box and mark where in what rooms the boxes go... and even contemplated colour coordinating boxes to items which I can't pack on my own. ?!

Its not that there's anything wrong with any of these things... being organized is great... its a good quality... but what I'm finding God is teaching me ... is to LET GO. These are NOT the things that need to be keeping me up, mind racing. I have decided that I'm going to consciously choose and let God make this side of my personality work as my greatest asset and not a hindrance. If I am going to be kept awake by something, the absolute truest reality, is that I would hope that it would WAY more often being children without mothers, women in captivity, people oppressed and needing hope... not how many boxes still need my new home diagram on them. The stark contrast of putting those things even side by side in the same sentence only reiterates my point to myself. PERSPECTIVE MCCLOGHRY. perspective.

seriously. perspective...it changes everything.

Its is so much easier to focus controlling the things that are small and in our grasp(obviously!)...its easier to think on those things...to let them quietly become the things that consume us... maybe its easier because we can see the problem and the solution all at once. I suppose the challenge we face is understanding and knowing (not just in our heads but really knowing in our hearts) that even the biggest problems on the earth can contain both the problem and solution in the same view... and His name is Jesus. It is much harder to face the mountains, stand in faith, believing for the impossible and trusting in the unseen... speaking things are not yet as though they were and actually and truly resting in the confidence that He is the answer and He will come thru... and with the biggest things we see or know are happening, that though the solution might not right now be in our head, in our heart or in our hands... each step with the Saviour of the world... each obedience... each small or large practical God placed step... puts us hand in hand with THE SOLUTION... as we walk out the steps to heavens answer...

I'm not sure how discernible this post is going to be when my brain is actually functioning with all cylinders firing (wait...not sure that happens ever? haha)... but hoping something good and life giving comes your way from it... xxx jilly

home is where.

{5Gardenias}

Home is where the heart is.

short and sweet... but as a girl thousands of miles from my family... i just was loving that thought today.

xx

oh and you seriously leave the most wonderful ...lovely... encouraging comments. some at the most appropriate of times. pretty amazing. so thanks!!