Count Our Days

Counting God's blessing in our daily lives

June 17, 2010
by Thuong
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Random Thoughts: Change in Marriage

There is a joke saying a woman marries a man thinking she will change him, but she can’t. A man marries a woman thinking she will not change, but she does.

My thought: It’s not really a joke; it’s the truth. We need to expect, acknowledge, and accept that there will be differences and changes in marriage. The sooner we recognize those changes and differences, the better marriage relationship we would have.

Actually, this is not so much a random thought. It was triggerd by Dr. Gary Chapman’s question of the day: “Looking back, what wasn’t discussed at pre-marital counseling that you wish you would have known before you got married?”

Dr. Gary Chapman is the author of the famous The 5 Love Languages book. I highly recommend this book, and sign up for his very insightful weekly newsletter. More information at The 5 Love Languages website

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June 5, 2010
by Thuong
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Road Trips

I just love road trips. There is just something fun about driving, discovering places, trying new foods, being outdoor, being spontaneous. For Thao, she just doesn’t like the part sitting in the car for too long. I don’t think the kids like sitting in one place either, not to mention the dreadful repetitive question: are we there yet?

With recent little short road trip to Denver with the kids, another issue arise: bathroom break. Benjamin was quite fussy and kept requesting bathroom break like every fifteen minutes. When he was younger, he just slept the entire trip in his car seat, which was a whole lot easier. He’s not wearing diaper anymore, but for little road trip like this, we put him in diaper just in case but he refuses to go in the diaper.

The we have the little guru in back seat giving us tip: “Mommy, usually he wet his pants when you don’t tell him. If you tell him pee in his diaper, he won’t. You should tell him: don’t pee in the diaper, then he will!” Then, she turns to her brother: “Don’t wet your diaper, ok?” I couldn’t help but laughing out loud during that little therapy session. She already uses reverse psychology at her age.

This gets me thinking of the huge “road trip” the Israel took from Egypt to Canaan, the promised land. Now, that is some road trip, 40 years long, crossing many desserts – not so much of a scenic drive. There was a shorter route but of course due to their constant complaining, God made them took the long route, wandering in the dessert.

Forty years, can you imagine that? There were lots of them, like sand on the seashore, like stars in the skies, with donkey, camel, pets, cattles, belongings, kids. That is one heck of a trip. I don’t know how Moses did it, leading millions of people, knowing when to start moving, when to stop, what to do for foods. Then, I got to curious how the bathroom breaks were handle. That trip was a miracle in itself.

Road Trip

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May 21, 2010
by Thuong
1 Comment

Different Problem Solving Skills

Lately, I notice how Grace and Benjamin play and interact, and their differences in solving problem just amaze me.

When we give Ben a toy still in its package, he immediately goes for the “main content”, yanking it off the box, then try to press on everything that might be a button, or flip it up side down to locate a switch. If nothing happens he gives it couple bangings against the floor. If still nothing, he concludes: “het pin roi!” (translation: it’s out of battery!) and will try to find a screw driver to open it up.

As for Grace, she goes for …the manual booklet first. Ha ha ha. She carefully pulls out the piece of paper from the box, spreads it across the table, and starts reading the instruction and follows the steps. When she got stuck, then she goes to daddy.

(On a side note, I’m so proud of her on the reading part. She’ll read just about anything she sets her eyes on, whether it’s her Bible, her books, Mommy’s book, back of a cereal box, or.. a toy’s manual booklet!)

The other day I bought them Happy Meals at McDonalds (bad parent, I know! Lol. This is not a frequent thing so it’s OK .. ha ha I hope), so they both got the toys that come with. Benjamin already gave me the Iron Man toy so I could turn it on for him while he’s eating the fries. I was driving away from the parking lot, finding the switch on the back of the toy and flipping it on, Grace shouted from the back seat: “No Daddy! That’s not correct. You have to pull the tape off on the chest first. That’s step one!” I looked in the mirror and saw Grace already had the instruction sat squarely on her legs with the toy already blinking light on her hand.

Isn’t that something?! We are blessed that God gave us 2 beautiful children with very unique in personalities and characteristics, which make our parenthood quite flavorful and completed.

May 8, 2010
by Thuong
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Today I learned: Benefit of Tetris

Today I learned:

Playing Tetris (remember that addictive blocks falling game that we used to still play all the time?) can really develop amazing skill in fitting many tupper ware containers into a lunch box.

Actually what I really learned is appreciation for what my wife prepares for me each day.

Lunch containers

Fitting these containers into lunch box requires skills

May 3, 2010
by Thuong
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Today I Learned: I Worship You Almighty God

Today I learned (actually last Friday, but didn’t got time to post until now):

There’s another part of the song “I Worship You Almighty God” (Sondra Corbett) and it’s beautiful.

I WORSHIP YOU ALMIGHTY GOD

I worship You
Almighty God
There is none like You
I worship You
O Prince of Peace
That is what I long to do
I give You praise
For You are my righteousness
I worship You
Almighty God
There is none like You
 
I come into
Your courts with praise
I bow before Your throne
Your presence here
Give me peace within
And joy I’ve never known
Lord I give to  You
My heart and soul
May it bring you pleasure Lord
There’s no higher call
Than to worship You
For You alone are God
 


YouTube - I Worship You Almighty God (Youtube)

April 30, 2010
by Thuong
1 Comment

Today I Learned: When Set Back Strikes

Today I learned:

Have Faith

Faith and Hope is when my boss brought his broken work laptop to the shop for repair and came back happy and said: “I knew something good will come from this set back!”  He explained that coincidentally, the repairman is someone he had came across and worked with in the past, and now this guy owns the computer repair shop. On one of the projects we work with, we were thinking it would be great if someone with good technical skill, not working full-time but be flexible to take care some of the tasks when needed. My boss thinks we found a pretty good candidate!  That is “something good” despite the broken laptop, don’t you think?

You know, we say things happen for a reason all the time, but many times we tend to focus on problems and issues rather seeing the big picturen or sit back and look at them with different perspective. God is great, I tell you. Nothing comes at us that He doesn’t know. Neither does He forget or ignore  when we are in need.

“All we know that in all things, God works for the good of those who love Him, who have been called according to His purpose.” (Romans 8:28)

Suddenly, I remember my bookmark (or of someone else, LOL): When life gets tough, toughen the faith!

By the way, this is a new category for my blog. Looking forward to post more under this category, I hope. We learn new things everyday, ain’t we?!  ;)