Party in a Cup!

This pair made my morning!

Let's be honest. I may talk about coffee a lot, but I'm sort of just a party drinker. AKA, I prefer lattes and fancy mochas, but I rarely drink any at home. Although, that just might be changing. I absolutely LOVE the smell of coffee brewing and Matt has started a new routine this year where he brews his coffee at work instead of at home. It's sort of sad to not hear the coffee grinder every morning and wake up to the sweet aroma of a fresh pot (with the exception of Saturday and Sunday when he's home).

Well, when the holiday creamers hit the shelves, it's time for me to jump on the bandwagon. In fact, I was so excited that I paid full price for this creamer (and probably way too much for this whipped cream) at Safeway yesterday just so that I could have a delicious cup to wake up to this morning!

Honestly, I think the whipped cream was the perfect touch! I couldn't believe how delicious it was! If you happen to show up on my front door tomorrow morning, I'll make you some!

Aw!

It was delicious!

So I went ahead and cuddled up on our "Picasso" couch with pandora and drank two cups!

Here's my simple view, from my simple life.

I love watching the leaves slowly turn this time of year! This tree peeks over the top of our neighbor's house and is absolutely beautiful this time of year!

Unfortunately this picture doesn't do it justice!

I was even blessed to have a few minutes to myself this morning.

And although, I should exclaim that I spent a few minutes reading and praying alone, what I really did was pull out my phone to read this article... and this one. Honestly, I can't get this awful tragedy out of my head. I'm not sure why I feel it has hit so close to home. Maybe because this guy is technically from Stayton, maybe it's because Matt is friends with the poor victim, Cody Meyers, brother-in-law (they graduated from HS together), or maybe it's because it's just so awful... I'm not really sure, but it has totally freaked me out, to say the least.

I first saw that Cody was missing on FB on Sunday when quite a bit of friends kept posting a note about him going missing. Lots of people were re-posting it and it sounded pretty sad, but also hopeful that they might find him somewhere. After his car was spotted on Sunday driven by the suspected murderers, I sort of felt all hope was lost and couldn't imagine what the family was going through. Unfortunately, they found his body just a few days later, and the unimaginable was true. I'm sure you've all heard the story though, as it has been all over the news. And for some reason, I have had a new wave of fear come over me. Ridiculous, I know, but it's true. We had a Redbox movie to return the other night and I selfishly asked Matt to take it back after his 14 hour day because I was too afraid to get out of the car in the McDonald's parking lot at 9:30 at night. Yeah, I'm a baby.

I'm also driving up to my sister's place tomorrow night with the kids (Tacoma) and I have already informed Matt that I will not be stopping for anything. Emmitt may have to scream (hopefully it won't come to that) his head off and Madelyn will be wearing a pull up because this Mama is not stopping! They can thank me later for not being murdered at a young age cause you can guarantee we won't be pulling over until we see my sister's front door, which happens to be a completely gated condo...

We have some meth heads that live down the street and they've never really scared me before (despite their crazy yelling) just annoyed me, but now they freak me out. Stereotyping? Yes, but it's true. The lights go down around here and I get a little jumpier. Matt wouldn't let me read these articles last night because he knew I would dream of being attacked. And I would have. The night before I dreamt that our car was being stolen from the driveway. I'm pretty sure I shot the people, which Matt later informed me would have been illegal because you can only shoot someone if they are "threatening your threshold", or something like that... good thing it was just a dream!

More than anything, I can't seem to stop thinking about what would drive someone to take another person's life. Or better yet, why do we as a society in general tend to respect one another's lives, as in not kill one another? Is it really the fear of the law? I don't know and I suppose I never will relate to serial killers.

What I do know is that there are families out there grieving the loss of a loved one, reliving over and over what may have happened before their mother, father, son, or brother was tragically murdered, and I can't imagine that either. My heart goes out to them and I will continue to pray for healing in their lives.

My heart also goes out to the murderers' families. I read an article that said they attempted to interview Pedersen's mother and all she said was, "He's my son and I love him. I always will." I can relate to that. I can't imagine the pain of watching or knowing that your son has done something so horrible, but I can imagine that you would love them no.matter.what. What an awful pain for a mother.

And likewise, it made me think about God's unconditional love. It doesn't matter what we've done, he will always love us. His last words on the cross were, "Father forgive them for they know not what they've done." He loves these murderers and he always will. He loves me when I sin and he always will. How incredible is that?

Oh how we need His GRACE!

Eventually, I was greeted with this:

And she snuggled her baby, while I snuggled her.

And I couldn't help but think, thank you Lord for this sweet girl!