my face when. . . we have a family conference

I am folding laundry in our bedroom (laundry is my nemesis) when I hear a weeping Eli climbing the stairs.

He has inherited my flair for the dramatic, my love of the English language, and his dad's intelligence which is a hysterically funny combination in a two year old.

"Mom,"  he wails, "the kids locked me in the house."  He is wearing his most insulted and injured expression, tears rolling one right after the other down his little face.

I find it hard to believe that the children locked him into the house, and tell him so. 

"No, Mom, they did, and they locked the front door and the back door and now they are out on the trampoline jumping!"  New, fresh round of bitter tears.

My blood pressure is elevated at this injustice and I leave the laundry for another moment day year and go downstairs to investigate. The front doors are bolted, latched and locked. Eli is telling the truth.  The little stinkers!

I call them inside and tell them they are in trouble. They are to march to the living room immediately for a family conference.

Jacob chooses the love seat, Cambria the couch, and Eli perches on the arm of the big chair, next to me, his ally. 

I begin:

Number one: I cannot even believe you would lock your little brother in the house.

blah blah blah ad infinitum, ad nauseum

Now would any of you like to add something?

Eli raises his hand.  "I have something to say.  Jacob, you locked me in the house." 

Jacob asks his forgiveness and I try not to smile. 

Cambria contributes:  "Well, Mom, I just want to say that we try to include Eli and he fusses so much that it's not fun.  So that's why we try to sneak outside when he's not looking."

Jacob:  "Mom, the last time we were on the trampoline with the neighbor kids, he begged to get up and I helped him and then he yelled at us the whole time and told us to get off."

[I googled my face when to see if there were any photos of expressions that did Eli's face justice. Found one that nailed it. Also, I have no clue who this dude is. ]

Eli's face when he knows JD and Cambria are telling on him

Eli raises his hand again.  And not even kidding, this is what he says:

"I have something to say.  Number three {theatrically holds up fingers}, Jacob is costing us a lot of money.  And he just costed us money.  And he keeps costing us money."

I want to die laughing but I'm the adult who just called this conference, so I have to finish it.  I pull my face together and ask Eli what he has to say about the screaming on the trampoline.

He hops down off of his perch next to me and says:

"I will show you how it is. Jacob, you jump with me.  I will be Cambria.  We are the big kids jumping." ///proceeds to jump up and down with an obliging Jacob on the hardwood floor///  Still jumping, he looks at Cambria.  "Now, Cambria, you be Eli David on the trampoline."

Cambria leaps off of the couch, between the boys, falls to the floor and begins (fake) wailing. 

Eli stops jumping, climbs back up next to me and looks at me. 

I look back at him. "Well, is that how it is?"

He nods.

"Eli, you need to quit screaming like that when the big kids let you jump on the trampoline."

He blinks dramatically, pointing to where the scene was just reenacted. "That was not me screaming, that was Cambria Faith."

Where do you even begin?

Yeah, I just parent for the comedy.

After working that issue out he trots off.

I ask if anyone else has any more concerns to bring to the family conference. Both kids join me on either arm of the big chair.

Cambria lowers her voice and shares that she feels Eli has been swearing a lot.  She believes he's learning it from Jacob.  I disagree and defend Jacob.  Jacob is about the most legalistic child to walk the earth; swearing just isn't his jam.  I ask what she means by swearing.

"Mo-oom.  Like Eli says poopoo and peepee.  All. the.time."

I point out that those words aren't swear words and maybe it's because he has the world's smallest bladder and goes to the bathroom about 427 times a day.

I kid you not, the words are not out of my mouth and we hear Eli swing the bathroom door open and the toilet in use. 

The family conference has pretty much lost all seriousness at this point, but I try to rein it in with a short comment about calling bodily functions and parts by their medical names and not cutesy made up ones that invite jokes, like winky and peepee.

Jacob throws out his hands, annoyed.  "Why do people even say that stuff?  It's so dumb."

Cambria's eyes twinkle:  "Like. . . the family jewels?!"  Jacob and I are shocked into utter silence and Cambria dissolves into giggles.

Then I start laughing and I can't stop.  The whole meeting is just a comedy of errors. I need to leave family conferences to Daniel and just get my normal show on the road before I lose complete control.

Late that night, tucking Cambria in, as usual, we discuss the best and worst parts of our day. 

"Mom," she whispers, "I know we were really in trouble, but the best part of my day was when we were all piled on the chair with you having a family conference."

Mine too.

i can't do it all

I have a housecleaner.

//gasp//

here i come with a bunch of excuses and explanations, groveling and apologizing----

NO.


Just this.


I can't do it all.

I came a bit late to this stunning realization last August.

We bought four houses in as many months last year, went to Africa, started planning another trip back there, taught a small group, ran a small business, participated in community, church, family and sports events and when it came time for school to start I just felt like I was going to drown.

I knew my husband was gone a lot; besides running a business he continues to work full time at MFD.  Out of curiosity one week I logged his hours gone: 116.  Really, this made me feel better, not worse.  I knew I was carrying a rather heavy load of bedtimes, training, teaching, mealtimes and practices alone, but doesn't everyone?  Why was it so hard on me?  Weekends are somewhat irrelevant since Daniel is usually on duty for either Saturday or Sunday (or both).  I don't get a break most nights when Daddy comes home.  We try to schedule one family day per week, but it doesn't always happen.

I felt like something was going to give and I really didn't want it to be a) my marriage b)our business c) my sanity.

I took a good hard look at what I loved doing, what I needed to be doing, and what mattered for eternity.   And then I started ruthlessly cutting out the rest.

Whenever you start taking things off of your plate in American society, your pride suffers horrendous blows and your very being starts quaking.  What if I'm not frenetically rushing??  What if I appear to have time to push my kid on the swing?  What if someone thinks I'm lazy?? What if I don't appear busy?  Our value as Americans is intrinsically wound up in what we produce and how full our schedule is; relationships, health, spiritual well-being and even sanity fall below the bar when it comes to how we prioritize our time.

So with my pride on the line I knew one of the things sinking me was quite simple:  housecleaning and laundry folding. 

But you're a stay at home mom! 

You are such a failure if you can't manage this!

How lazy!

You could be spending this money to feed starving children!

The accusations in my head were vicious (maybe because I'd mentally flung them at others before?) and I cringed; Daniel laughed and asked what I was waiting for. 

So I asked a teenage friend if she was interested in folding my laundry.  Why, of course! (What teen doesn't want some quick cash?) 

The first day she was at my house for barely two hours.  She folded and put away five loads of laundry, vacuumed the kids' rooms, scrubbed the dining room, kitchen and bathroom floors and washed the front glass door with windex.  I  couldn't even believe it; I kept pinching myself.  And that night when I was making supper at ten pm for my husband and the guys staying with us I didn't even feel guilty.  Instead I felt able to handle the weariness of an extra dinner, of cleaning up the kitchen and dining room late at night and I knew that only my foolish pride and independence would keep me from receiving this beautiful gift: one hour a week of help cleaning my house.

I can't do it all. 

I can't.

It feels good, freeing, now to admit this. 

I am pretty sure laundry is not eternal.  I do not want to give up snuggling my two year old or time with my husband in order to fold laundry.  I do not want to give up having friends over just to be or watching my kids' soccer games to scrub the floors. 

I have had to prioritize what is most important in my life right now and what I want to spend my precious hours on and as much as I love cleaning my house my way it's at the bottom of the totem pole of what's important. 

So I let it go.

Freedom comes in relinquishing my pride and giving God my time and energy;  His yoke is not a burden; His ways are not heavy and weary. 

 

 

Unless you believe the Gospel, everything you do will be driven by either pride or fear.

Tim Keller

 

The price of anything is the amount of life you exchange for it.

Thoreau

Tiger Woods & Duck Towels

"Mom, can I google something?"

I am in the bathroom with a towel swathed Eli, struggling to clip his tiny toenails while he's perched on the counter. 

Granted permission, Jacob proceeds to google: pictures of Tiger Woods' house.

Huh.

You just never know what your kid is going to be interested in next.

"Mom, look at this. . ." his voice is full of awe as he holds out the phone, scrolling through photo after photo of the golf idol's little massive mecca.  He finds an aerial image with explanations and arrows pointing to the indoor pool, putting green and massive excess of amenities. 

"Mommy, is this the ducky towel?" Eli asks, peering suspiciously at his white wrap.

"Yes," I say absently, thinking that Tiger Woods is not someone I want my son to view as successful.

We discuss golf and success and cheating and faithfulness and what's really important and I think that we connected some loose threads and then Eli's offended little voice interrupts:

"Mom this is NOT the ducky towel!  There are no ducks on this towel! You said it was the ducky towel but it isn't!"

Sorry, bud, not the ducky towel.

Behind me Jacob voice-googles: pictures of the INSIDE of Tiger Woods' house.

Maybe I didn't connect.

Maybe I didn't listen at the right time to duck towel question, maybe I over criticized the golf hero, maybe I undervalued what was really going on: a normal curiosity about public figures. 

It's a wild crazy world out there; a scary one to raise kids in, and I am stretched as  I try to meet the intellectual needs of my nine year old, the social needs of my seven year old and the 157 wide and varied needs of my two year old.

Tonight Daniel took us out for pizza and after finishing and driving away, Eli heaved a huge sigh:  "It was a busy day. . ."  You betcha son, glad you noticed.

I hate busyness for the sake of busyness; my cover photo on facebook is a quote to remind me: stop the glorification of busy. I try so hard to have time for people and carve out moments that really matter, but the truth is life is beyond crazy right now and I am struggling to wrap my fingers around the minutes. 

Deep inside there is this huge fear of missing the most important conversations with my kids or failing to connect with my husband.  I feel:

weary

 

spread thin

 

full

 

exhausted

 

spent

 

happy

 

bone-tired

 

 Almost every mom I know feels this way; relief at the end of each day tempered by the awareness that sweet sleep may be interrupted by

 

a) vomit

b) nightmare

c) need for a drink at 1 am

d) all of the above

 

But underneath the exhaustion I am so thrilled  to get to be the one to watch them grow and develop and become little people with thoughts and dreams and interests and personalities.  It is a privilege. . .

weary, yes, absolutely. 

 

More coffee please.

 

Also, advice on how to handle celebrity sports figures and their dichotomous lives.

when you do mother's day solo

My morning at church has ended my two month writing hiatus. 

Sunday mornings are always a mad rush: we give rides, answer texts, have 1000 last minute ends to tie up and are almost always late.  It's really a shame. 

I also go to church by myself a lot.  It's okay, it's normal, I'm used to it, but it's never super fun and I always feel on the edge of mental breakdown fielding all the comments of where my husband is or how tired I look or hearing by myself which child misbehaved.

So today as I pulled up to the church and saw three cars in the parking lot I wondered for a moment if I was truly losing my marbles.  Maybe today was Monday.  Maybe I was an hour behind?  I drove the long way around and into the parking lot.  Still only three cars in the main lot, though I spotted a few more up above in the overflow parking spaces. 

"I guess we're just really early,"  I said to Jacob.  It felt ominous.

"I think we should just go look at the ducks in the park for a little while," he suggested.

"I know, it's like it's weird to be early.  We just can't hit it at the right time.  It's either way too early or late for us."

We're just going to embrace this early thing, I think, and in we go.

First of all, Eli and I must stop at the ladies' restroom; this is his very first Sunday at church in bona fide underpants. I'm not used to shuffling both of us into a bathroom stall and I promptly catch and slam my finger in the latch. 

It throbs.

It's actually bleeding. 

So that's awesome.

But he goes potty so that's really awesome.

I drop him off at Sunday school with extra underpants and promises to check on him. 

In my own class I sit and wonder why the universe still feels off.  I'm forgetting something.

I open the bulletin and what I'm forgetting jumps out at me.

Today is THE LAST DAY to turn in your child's camp registration money

 

As an exercise in futility I fish through my purse looking for a wad of cash.  Or perhaps the checkbook.  Who am I kidding? I never have a checkbook with me.  Who even writes checks anymore? I just gave my last bit of change to Cambria and Eli for their offering, so it's not an exaggeration to say that I'm penniless.

 

I sigh inwardly, leaving my coffee and early-to-church aura and slowly retrace my steps, swimming upstream through all the people who get to church at the proper time, get in the van, and drive home to find a checkbook. 

 

On my way home I see MFD's engine and my engine driver husband which is a nice reminder that my husband isn't home sleeping or out golfing. I already know this but it is nice to be reminded visually.

 

I stand in the kitchen and catch my breath for a moment, notice my now-cold coffee sitting on the counter and I stop and drink it.  I need caffeine.  I need a lot of patience.

 

I drive back to church.  I'm late.  I have missed all the coffee chat and sharing time.  Everyone is praying and I wait outside the doors to enter.  The universe is feeling on now.

 

 

During the worship service, I once again have the nagging feeling that I'm missing something.

 

 

the promises to take Eli potty.

 

Oh YEAH.

 

 

This is becoming the most interrupted worship experience ever. 

 

We finish and try to leave and search high and low for Eli's missing shoe, do the potty thing again and finally arrive at the van.

 

 

The hatch is wide open.  

 

???

 

Why?  No one knows.  Apparently it's just been like that, sitting in the parking lot, with my back-up purse, gym bag and lawn chairs free for the taking.  Like, seriously? 

 

I think today was just not my day to shine. 

 

I don't know if it's ever my day to shine actually, but it really, really wasn't today.

 

I don't have a sweet spiritual wrap up to this: haven't had enough time to think of anything.

 

But to you, solo momma at church, at school, at the grocery store, at home, who doesn't feel like she's shining, Happy Mother's Day to YOU, cuz you're in the trenches and it's hard

 

and no one is rising up and calling you blessed

 

YET

 

But I'm saying HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY to you.

 

You don't look a bit tired, your absent hubby must be a rock star, your children are all angelic and you're doing a great job.

 

 

 

P.S.

 

The "moms with grown kids" from church treated the "moms with kids at home" to Moms' Night Out the other night.  Oh my goodness- go see it. 

 

 

Post by Moms' Night Out.

Postscript: {I'm saying postscript because saying PS sounds like peee S to me and I've seen enough pee this week}
Yesterday was the sweetest day of soccer games, family time, out to eat twice and doing yard work and porch swinging with my Daniel, who took the day off for me. So don't feel sorry for my solo mother's day or anything, I'm quite all right.  Back to potty training.

what they didn't say: on teaching at home

It'll be fun, they said.

You'll get to be with them all day long, they said.

Shape their little minds, they said.

It'll be so rewarding, they said.



I field so many questions from my friends about homeschooling, mostly because we married and had kids really young and I have about five more years of parenting under my proverbial belt than most of my peers. 

How does it work? (It works as hard as you work)

What do you use? (every brain cell I possess)

When should I start? (you started teaching your child the day you birthed him)

Do you distrust public education? (um, no, I envy that option many days and admire people who pour their lives out, underpaid and overworked)

It is a privilege to teach our children and we love this opportunity.  For our family, the rewards and benefits far outweigh  the work load, the burden, the difficulties.  But shame on me if I sugar coat the reality of hanging out the school shingle on the front door of your little house.

It's a good thing I counted the cost before I started because if I were counting on the glowing promises of what they said I would have quit teaching on Jacob's third day of kindergarten.

Homeschooling proponents raise visions of cozy library corners, energizing, engaging science experiments over the kitchen counter, throwing some laundry in while your kids do math tests (ah! multitasking at its finest!), the freedom to instill character and values.  They tout flexibility and movement and room to breathe and time for the individual attention so necessary for a child to achieve success. 

With reviews like that, who wouldn't be interested?

And people are interested.  Dissatisfied with a mass production approach to education, many are intrigued by the success and seeming ease of choosing a curriculum and following an educational path at home.  With Monday-Friday, 9-5 workforce demographics rapidly changing as employers grow more flexible and employees work unconventional hours (and from home), homeschooling can seem like an apple ripe for the picking.

Count the cost before you pick the apple. 

It's not a light decision to take your children's education into your trembling hands. 

Teach them character?  That's a nice idea:  the main teacher of that will be you.  With your life.  You just signed up to be the major influence on their value system.  How's your value system?

Are you grumpy?

They will be crabby.

Are you unmotivated?

They'll be lazy.

Do you dislike and avoid art?

They'll never know what it is to create beauty with their own hands.

Who you are will be mirrored in your students.

What you love is what you'll emphasize.

When you teach those little people, their eyes see who you are on Saturday and Sunday, too, and after 3 pm, and before you start teaching in the morning.  They see all of you. 

That kind of transparency can be good. It can be bad.  It can be ugly and beautiful all in the space of an hour. 


So here's a little list of what they don't say.

They don't say:

You'll wake up every morning with the burden of your children's education resting in your hands.

You'll have to spend as much time sorting out disputes and arguments and attitudes as you do teaching.

You'll find any shred of flexibility you had stretched far beyond what you thought your limits were.

You won't be able to finish a sentence because your toddler will have a catastrophe or your washing machine starts overflowing: though you're teaching, you aren't in school.

When you hang up your teaching hat, exhausted, your mom hat is right there waiting and sometimes you feel utterly spent and too tired to put it on.

They don't tell you:

You'll be teaching about respiration and lungs and airways and the diaphragm and then you'll be interrupted with a howl because the two year old pulled the unsuspecting six year old's hair.  You'll hypothetically discipline the two year old, who will then proceed to throw his crayola marker, bright pink inky side down, into the cream colored carpet.  Then you'll deal with that and turn back to the diaphragm. But by then you'll feel like your own airway might be blocked.

You have to be okay with your home littered with crayons, paper shreds, art supplies, pencils, piles of books, in a constant treadmill of shelving and unshelving your little ones' education. 

They don't tell you how inadequate you'll feel, how little actual support you'll get, how lonely you can be as a woman: it's sometimes difficult to explain why you're working a full time job that generates zero dollars.

They don't tell you about the sheer work volume, how self motivated you need to be: you are the boss of you.  You decide your hours, you're as free as a breeze with one massive caveat:  your children's educational success or failure is your employee evaluation and that's a stunning burden to carry.  No one tells you how heavy that burden is.

Why would they?

The truth, the agony, the loneliness, the monotony- why would anyone want to sign up for that? No one would.

And as with many choices in life, the rewards outweigh the pain.

So we choose to remember sweaty hands grasping first pencils and warm little bodies snuggled up against us on the couch, lisping first words and then sentences and then books, the math reward lunches, the lack of homework in the evenings since we've already accomplished it, the joy of watching the lightbulb moments of our own children, the stretching of our own minds as we teach theirs.

But if you're considering reaping the rewards, it's important to count the cost.

It is not easy.

It is 3% fun and 97% labor.

It is surely the hardest and most demanding task of my life.

I am absolutely giving it my all.

Wherever you are, be all there.

Jim Elliot

 

 

. . .and while He gives me breath, I will tell only the truth.

Job 27: 3-4

 

Jesus said,

No procrastination.

No backward looks.

You can't put God's kingdom off till tomorrow.

Seize the day.

Luke 9:62 The Message

if i were to title memoirs. . .

that title would change from day to day.


On Monday:

It's Okay For Mommy to go Potty By Herself: and other things I'm surprised to hear myself say aloud

On Tuesday:

Missing My Daughter's Piano Lessons (thoughts on inadequacy)

Today:

If You Don't Want Messes, Don't Have Children


And definitely don't try discipleship.


Did you know that trying to disciple someone into a mini-me is a really destructive idea?  I am learning this always the hard way with my children, with others.  I am flawed, I am frail; Christ is not.   It's people we're talking about, souls, and it's just not that clean and neat.  I want results, He wants surrender.  I want tidy, clean, neat.  He isn't afraid to break the clay and start over again.

Before and After.

Then and Now.

Mess to Success.

This is a fine and preferred approach when conquering inanimate objects:  The dishes, my fourteen hundred laundry piles, a disaster zone, a 30k income property.  It is about me and my work ethic, what I want in return for my time, return on investment and ultimately making my life easier.

Result oriented, pressure driven, watch me and copy me spiritual discipling breaks down when working with people in the real world. 

If we don't see quick results, then there's assumed failure, leading to blame: is it my failure or yours?

If we pressure behavior change without caring about motives, we will see a wide spectrum of response: people pleasing (which will last while you are visible to please or while your mentee wants to please you), frustration (because behavior modification never solved the root of any problem), or sheer refusal to cooperate. 

And copy and paste me discipleship is one of the most disillusioning styles because we all are human, prone to wander and quick to stumble; it's only a matter of time before a protege sees the flaws of an instructor.


When I'm reaching for the heart and not results, my questions and expectations change.

How can I serve you now? 

How can we equip you to use your gifts?

What are your gifts?

What is your fear right now?

What does God want you to do?

Yes, I have time for you. . .

What's keeping you from following now?

And don't follow me, don't copy me. Oh no,  me with the quick tongue and regretted words and passionate debater, me with the endless string of failures and frustrating inadequacies. 

Follow Him, perfect, wise, sacrificial example of perfect love, humble, servant, compassionate, healer, friend, justice personified.   It's hard to fail copying that stuff.


Thoughts I'm loving on discipleship and loving people:

"Keep your eyes on Jesus, Who both began and finished this race we're in.  Study how He did it.

Because He never lost sight of where He was headed. . ."

Hebrews 12:2 the Message

 

 

"It is a terrible thing to see and have no vision."

Helen Keller

 

[wildly paraphrasing Tim Keller from his message "A Tale of Two Cities"]

good art is creating a culture that encourages life

 

One of the stunning lessons of the Bible is God's free use of fragile human beings

to accomplish His purpose.

Brennan Manning, The Signature of Jesus

 

The church  must pursue reconciliation as well. . . .[but] we are not the reconciler; Jesus is.

Steve Corbett & Brian Fikkert, When Helping Hurts

 

"You can measure the character of a man by the size of the things that make him angry."

Dr. Lynn Anderson, They Smell Like Sheep

 

[on positive reinforcement]

Make it meaningful.

Be specific.

Make it timely: catch 'em in the act.

Keep it free of criticism.

Mark Murphy, Hundred Percenters

on savoring and sequins (in the bathroom)

What?

You too?

I'm not the only one who drives a letter to the post office so it can go out in today's mail so I can have ten minutes of peace?

[okay, peace is a nebulous concept, hard to put your arms around, but in my book, it's children restrained by the law of seatbelt usage and Matt Maher and Audrey Assad with Hayley on the background vocals belting out Lord, I Need You]

You don't?

So it's just me.  That's okay.

Savor the moments and slow down everyone says, you know, your mom, your grandma, Ann Voskamp's facebook posts, Jesus Calling (I read Jesus Calling and then I can't remember what I read five minutes later, but I'm pretty sure it was slow down and don't hurry).

I savor about one moment per week.

I showed Eli what sunshine patches on the floor were this week.  We sat on the floor in a huge square of sunlight and I made his little hand feel the temperature difference between the sun and the shadow.  It was very sweet to sit there and wiggle our toes together.  I should probably do it more often.

It should be more often.

Like wayyyy more often.

Instead I am annoyed by noise and irritated by the child reading the news over my shoulder while loudly crunching on a carrot stick and impatient with childish arguments.

Stop. Savor.  Yeah.  Sometimes.

I teach - it's a full-time job.  I get done teaching and all of the home stuff is waiting for me, patiently, it hasn't gone anywhere at all.  Some weeks teaching our children is glorious and heady and just such a privilege and other weeks you wonder if everyone is getting the short end of the stick.  We have a life outside all this and sometimes that life is super rewarding and other times it's just plain a ton of work.

I was driving home from AWANA tonight, stopping to check on a house issue that Daniel + tenant were working on, going home to dishes piled and laundry spread on the living room floor.  God. . . I just need a little bit of encouragement.  Please.  Just a little something pouring in.

I put Eli to bed and we read about the 9 little "bunkeys" that were Curious George's previous family- before the Man With The Yellow Hat- the things you learn.  I didn't even know. 

And then the kids were in our bedroom, breathless.  They had hot coffee and my Philip Yancey book that I am almost done with and book marks made from their looper loom. 

Mom, just stay here, please.  Ok? Don't come out.

I know it's  a shameless ploy to stay up a bit later but I'm too tired to care and oh coffee and Yancey sound too good to be true.

A little bit later they're back with careful notes and instructions: go to the pumkins.

I tiptoe down to the coffee table in the living room.  The laundry is gone (probably behind the couch, but who cares) and all the toys and library books are picked up.  The note next to the pumkins says: go to the appels and pumkins.

The dining room table is clean and dinner dishes left in the pre-church scramble are all cleared away.  The only thing on the table is my silver tiered cupcake platter filled with apples and mini pumpkins.  The note next to it reads: go to where your shoes are.

Oh my kitchen is so clean! The dishwasher is running and their faces are beaming.  The shoes are straightened and neat and my last instruction reads: go to the toilet

Um okay.

So my elaborate treasure hunt ends at the clean toilet, with a note on the lid declaring how much fun of a mom I am,  signed by "Jake" and "Cambria". . . . and the best part. . . . a whole scattering of sparkly sequins sprinkled around the toilet. . . for pizazz, I suppose, the hurrah of the treasure hunt.

I want to die laughing.  It's all so funny.  The toilet, the sequins, my request to God for encouragement, my children's happiness, that God answered with my kids. . .

My heart is warmed from the inside out and we sit at the dining room table and eat microwave s'mores and microwaved cookie dough-turned-cookies in the glow of our clean house and our pumkins and appels.

Thanks, God, for my sequined toilet surprise.  You're pretty creative. 

 Yeah, I'm savoring.

letting my 8 year old go. . . (for ten minutes)

He wants to buy worms, this little son of mine, and I don't have time.

I know, worms are a need, he's going fishing.  I calculate the bread in the oven still and Eli needing a bath and the distance out of my way to stop to buy worms and suddenly I have a great idea.

Three, no four, no five? blocks down the street, on our side, in the oddest place, is a little gas station that may or may not sell gas anymore, but they definitely sell bait. 

I think for a moment.  Jacob rides his bike all over the place, he's just never gone there.  I think about how easy it would be for him and me and know he's completely capable of buying a container of nightcrawlers on his own. 

I hatch out this little plan with him.  He is one hundred percent on board with running his own errand and with many assurances that he'll be fine, he trucks off on his own with my BlackBerry in his pocket. 

Call 911 if you need to! I trail after him and sound like a crazy person.  He is 8 going on 28 and savvy and smart and an all around great kid.  He will be just fine and I am turning into the clinging mother I vowed I wouldn't be.

My bread bakes and I kneel next to the tub, bathing Eli, strangely bereft of that constantly behind feeling that I carry. 

He's old enough and fine.

He's gonna be so proud paying for those worms and putting them in his HyVee sack.

I'm so scared he'll . . . like. . . veer out into the street in front of a car.

Truth, woman, tell yourself truth. 

#1 Jacob has never veered anywhere.  He was born on purpose.  He purposefully, dutifully, stubbornly marches through life according to plan.  He doesn't veer. 

#2 Refer to #1.

With the time I saved not stopping to pick up bait, I worried.

It is hard for me to imagine a more stressful state of being than raising babies and toddlers.  You pray for them to go to sleep, and in my case, pray for them to wake up too.  This leaves me in a strange tension of inadequacy and exhaustion. 

In my head, all of my mothering problems will go away once everyone is potty trained, sleeping through the night, not biting fellow tots, reading, mastering beginning addition and independently able to cater a snack to oneself. 

In another wiser corner of my head, I tell myself that this is an illusion, a mirage that only mothers of toddlers believe.

My friends with kids older than mine assure me that motherhood is still quite wearing even though they aren't buying Pampers anymore.

And now I'm experiencing it all on my very own.  I have coached this child on manners, his dad has drilled financial sense into him, we have quizzed and requizzed him on bike safety and let him out on his own numerous times. He even has a phone with him!  I have raised him to the point that he is totally capable of what he is doing and now I'm worrying and scared when I should be triumphant and happy.

Like I tell Deeann I'm gonna be at my kids high school graduations.  No sniffling here! I say bravely.  I am gonna be rejoicing and planning a vaca with my man!  Triumphant and happy, that's me.

Or not. 

What if?

Is he okay?

It's been all of five minutes.

Ok, that's it, I'm getting Eli out of the tub and driving down to see if he's okay. 

**noise in the driveway

"Mom, I'm back, it went fine, Mom, the worms are $3.20, but Mom I'm so embarrassed, I went all the way there and I forgot my wallet. I remembered everything else!  I have it now, I'll be right back."

Pause.

"There was one thing a little bad."

My heart stops.

"The guy in there was smokin', Mom, and it stinks, so bad."

Whew.

"I'll be right back!"

Be careful. . . . I trail off like the worrywart mom I never meant to be.



I savor these days with him, and love the conversations we can have now that he's a bit older; tonight he flopped across our bed and chatted endlessly about remote control cars and I know I glazed over but I love that he wants to tell me about it. 

I love the little man he's becoming and I ache for how much he has yet to learn and how hard life will be for him until he's willing to yield and be humble and teachable.  I am scared sometimes that we'll influence him in the wrong direction or that he'll see in us something that will scar him and wound him.

Cambria took down the letters to her name that hung above her bed leaving three: B R I .  She signs her letters Bree and calls me Mother just for something new.  Yesterday she was sporting a rubber band as an ankle bracelet.  She is always on a wild new tangent. (She is so my child.)  She does veer.  (She is not allowed to ride her bike down the street for bait.)  She may "do hair or work in a nursery" when she grows up and she changes her clothes about 52 times a day.  She can be insecure and too much of a people pleaser and a bit lazy.

You can't feed 'em a bottle and rock 'em to sleep.

It's much much more complicated.

I know, too, that I don't think these thoughts about Eli.  His needs are much simpler.  I just need a visceral strength and tons of coffee to deal with him. 

By the way, loved the study Harvard just conducted on coffee-drinking cutting suicide risk in half. Drink some coffee.  Life will look more beautiful.

But these other little growing up children of mine, beautiful and frustrating and moldable and independent-yet-needy -

I need grace and wisdom and I need to let go and rein in all at the same time. 

But when have I not needed grace and wisdom?


Always. 


And I cry out to God, for my marriage, for my children, for my family,

build something beautiful

don't leave until You do
(JJ Heller)

my real actual life

For a tiny breath this morning I felt like a normal adult.

Coffee + Brennan Manning + a house closing at our bank with Daniel before he went into MFD.

{makeup & skinny jeans & black top & cute scarf. . . you almost feel human.  People don't shout at you.  Life doesn't seem to be an emergency.  Well modulated voices.  Good morning. Just a moment. Would you like a pen to sign with?  No rush, we're just waiting on copies. }

After that meeting the real, actual part of my life commenced.  This pretending I can swim in the business world is really quite an illusion.  What I really do is stuff like this:

Eli throwing the jar holding the frog across the cement porch floor.  It breaks, oh yes, it breaks everywhere. Frog, shell shocked, realizes he's still alive, and finally free, hops off through the glass.

Cambria brings me Time magazine:  "Mom, wouldn't this be awesome?" I look down at Flo, the Progressive girl, surrounded by probably 389 white bunnies.  Yes.  Yes.  Just awesome. 

Jacob and I, desperate, dig his fave athletic shorts out of the laundry hamper.  He reasons: "You know, no one ever gets close to you and actually smells your shorts."  This reasoning is . . .flawed. . . but it will work today. 

JD and I work on painting and cleaning out a storage shed.  I forget that there are calendars up on the inside of the shed from the previous occupants. Fortunately the calendar subjects are (sort of) clothed, but he pops out of the shed, scandalized:  "Mom,  there are awful pictures in here!"  I remove them with him.  Well, here's the deal, it's not respectful to women to put up pictures like this.  Keepin' it simple. He thinks those women shouldn't be dressing like that.  True.  That too.  There are so many things wrong with this, I begin and he interrupts Yes, like girls don't even ride motorcycles! Seriously! Sure.  We'll stop there for now. 

I vacuum new carpet at our current rehab with Eli.  I turn my back to take a picture to email a prospective tenant and suddenly my day spins into a panic of how did you get that cleaner in your mouth?!!!  **gagging **coughing  ** spitting 

what if some awful chemical is eating away at his airway??  how did he even get this??

I definitely heart poison control.  I called Daniel, but it is a rule of thumb for firefighter wives everywhere that if you have a panicky question for your husband, he will definitely be tied up with some other panic. 

Anyway, Cheryl from Poison Control sounded just like a grandma and was just the perfect calm to my lil storm. 

forced bath time for Eli David

Daniel calls me back finally and I find that he was on a fire.  So yeah, definitely legitimate reason he couldn't answer my phone call. . . I process this through the lens of oh, yeah, I forgot I have him to worry about too!! Oh my. . . are YOU okay???

WORRY

I gotta kill it.

JD gets invited swimming with friends. I drop him off and chat a bit. I go home and discover my zipper was down. Yes. That's awesome too. 

Awesome like the way I was in the shower last night with Eli eating his supper on a paper plate next to the tub with all the doors locked and our small group meeting in twenty minutes in our living room.  I've got this.  WE CAN DO.  Except. . . I forgot. . . my sweet friends bringing food. . . early. . . bless their patient hearts.   

The two little kids and I finish vacuuming and painting and I get out the camera to dutifully finish my photo-emailing job.  Battery exhausted.  I scroll back with the bit of juice left.  Apparently while I was painting, Cambria was using the camera to video journal Eli's nap.  Well that explains a lot. 

YOU, my prospective tenant, are going to have to be happy with three pictures tonight because it is Friday and I am clocking out  and ordering pizza. 

Oh, weekend, I love you. . . .


and just for the fun of it I'm popping up some before and afters: 

before                                                                                             after

before                                                                                 after

How unfortunate that the real, acutal  part of life and motherhood doesn't show before and after results.  Sometimes only God sees the seeds we sow.  That's okay.  I love 'em anyway. 


Especially on Friday nights when they're all tucked in bed. 


Happy weekend to you!

sometimes i live for saturdays. . .

 

So the other day Pandora was playing Aerosmith's Don't Wanna Miss a Thing:

 

I could stay awake just to hear you breathing

Watch you smile when you are sleeping--

 

and

 

Don't wanna close my eyes

Don't wanna fall asleep

Cuz I miss you babe and I don't wanna miss a thing.

 

 

 

For real, someone needs to come up with a version of this song for couples who have been married for ten years, because while I definitely felt that way at one point in my life

 

like when I was twenty-one

 

I still don't wanna miss a thing

 

but I would really like to close my eyes. 

 

And I definitely don't stay awake just to hear him breathing. 

 

 

I made myself take the weekend off and just breathe.  

 

Pancakes and some menu planning and book reading 

 

Sent JD off on an afternoon fishing trip with his buddies

 

Ran errands with Daniel

 

Helped Cambria doll up for her daddy/daughter date night event

 

Oh. . . time. . . freeze. . .

She inherited my complete lack of organization skills and came up with two clip on earrings: one blue and one pink.  We got creative which is what organizationally challenged people have to do and colored the pink and blue stones GRAY with a magic marker.  Whew.  Disaster averted.

She was so excited to go off to her little date night.  Daniel signed up to bring potato salad {????} .  I never make potato salad, but apparently he likes it.  I didn't end up having any time so I invented a new recipe:  PotatoSaladAuDeliCounter. 

Does he look like mischief?  Oh yes, he does.

Off at Navy {SEAL- oh yeah, we're proud} boot camp, Daniel's brother Mark can receive mail now so Eli wrote him a letter today:

 Hi Uncle MArk!
I am writing this letter to you through my secretary while I take a nap. I have had a very busy week. I threw a library book in the trash, I got into markers, I escaped the house and went for a walk, I bought some swim diapers so I could go swimming. I also went to the zoo and saw some monkeys and rode on a little train. I threw my sippie cup in the koi pond and the orange fish sure liked that!
Also, while I was at the zoo, I emptied my mom's last water bottle into the pop vending machine when my mom wasn't looking. As you can see, some type of boot camp is in my very near future. I love you very much. eLi DaViD

After that busy week, Eli went to bed early tonight and Jacob and I called dispatch and let them know we were planning to have a little marshmallow roast.

We built a fantastical fire with about 5 matches (go, me) and then it started to rain. 

I told Jacob it didn't even matter so we put a little tent of plastic over our s'more ingredients and sat in our lawn chairs and enjoyed. 

Ahhhhhhh. 

Yes.  I do love Saturdays.

{I forgot about the terrible twos}

Eli is redefining everything I thought I knew about parenting.

I forgot about the terrible twos. 

Except he's only one.

Yesterday's text to my mom:  If his attitude were reflected in his appearance, he would be flying down the interstate on a Harley in leather with forty-five tattoos, ponytail and beard blowing in the wind singing bad to the bone. . .

but instead he's 2 feet tall, bald and cute. 

On the upside (you see if you think this is an upside), Daniel tried to encourage me that at least Eli wasn't swearing at me.

Obviously we're grasping at straws for upsides.

(And I'm pretty sure if he knew how to swear, he would be adding that to his shrieking tirades.)

Yesterday I was that mom in the grocery store.

I discipline.  I've read (and applied) Tedd Tripp and Ginger Plowman and Tim Kimmel;  I had millions of parenting strategies that I just couldn't wait to try when I was a teenager watching other parents' children.

But then your own moment of truth comes, pushing the big red racecar cart harrumph harrrumph bbubump bbump that your toddler wanted to drive

except that he doesn't want to drive anymore

so you're carrying him

and pushing the cart one-handed and going all the way back to the produce section to grab some forgotten cilantro

and his head is thrown back with a tornado siren wail

his little scalp is so red from crying that I notice little blond hairs that actually exist; hey- he doesn't swear (yet) and he has some hair!  (These are the only positive thoughts I can muster.)

and everyone in the store is looking at us.

You avoid eye contact except for the sympathetic mom types who had the good sense to come alone.

You race through the checkout.

He grips the paper plate package he's holding as if the clerk is trying to steal his birth certificate and she says oh, I can find the bar code while he holds it; I peel his fingers off and grimly tell her that I'm not catering to him and it's not ok for him to act like this while I hand her the paper plates to the soundtrack of renewed shrieks.

Just one kid today? she asks, because they all know me which is proving to be more of a curse than blessing today. Well, just one in the store. 

The other two are sitting in the van watching Alvin and the Chipmunks to avoid grocery shopping with Eli. 

I cannot wait for the day that I can sit in the van and send them in for the cilantro and I can watch Alvin.  Hopefully I will have enough brain cells left that I won't choose Alvin.


So I know what God's Word says and I have every intention of training up my child in the way he should go but God isn't kidding when He says foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child.

I don't think God elaborates on what to do at the exact moment you're pushing the red race car cart with one hand;  but here's what I'm clinging to as I teach my little son that obedience will bring him and everyone else happiness:

So do not throw away your confidence;  it will be richly rewarded. (Hebrews 10:35)

{Jesus said} You did not choose Me, but I chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit - fruit that will last. Then the Father will give you whatever you ask in My Name. (John 15:16)

Be patient, then. . . see how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuble crop and how patient he is for the autumn and spring rains.  You too, be patient and stand firm. (from James 5)



* I will write about Africa


* We are almost done with school


* If you see us in Fareway with the red cart and no screaming please understand the magnitude of this accomplishment.

when no one notices

This dish.

Beautiful china, tiny roses.  Wrapped in press n' seal, placed in our freezer with a meal, three years ago when the bottom dropped out of our world. 

I looked for a note, a marking, some clue to the whereabouts of the owner and the person who had taken time to prepare, braved the unknown to deliver their kindness. 

Nothing.

I asked around, kept my ears open, checked off all of the people I thought it might belong to, and after two years of no one claiming the dish, I started using it.

Every time I lay bread slices on it, muffins, strawberries, I think of the unnamed person who blessed us and never was thanked.

I think of the kindness that no one noticed, the offering that went to the seemingly ungrateful, the good deed that never got a thank you card.

I think of the frustration that I feel bubble when I offer good deeds to the thankless;  it's . . . well, thankless.

But a thankless task, an unnoticed offering, a kindness unrequited: it's a little hollow, maybe, but oh so important. Thankless does not equate unnecessary.



Today in the middle of teaching third grade and kindergarten and managing trying to love a toddler through a green playdoh snake mess,  I think: this job doesn't pay enough and I want the thank you, the pat on the back, the hey you did great today, the you matter and you're important. Never mind the sweet nothings, how about a paycheck to compensate the stress?  That could work too. 

I picked up my coffee mug to get some liquid encouragement and squinted down at 5 little green playdoh balls, floating in my Dunkin' Donuts blend.  Flavor of the day. I blink tears. 

No one notices. 

Or does someone notice?

Or does that even matter? 

why am I here?  why do I show the kindness?  what are my motives?


[so when you give to the needy, do not announce it with trumpets, as the hypocrites do in the synagogues and on the streets, to be honored by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full] Matthew 6:2

But. . . I like trumpets. . . maybe trumpets would help. . . maybe we need to queue up some Henry Purcell for the weekdays.

Actually I'm all about trumpets.  But if I'm living for the trumpets, Jesus points out so clearly, then I'm living for the trumpets.  And that's the reward.  To be honored by others?  That's why I'm loving my kids?  That's why I show kindness?

Well, that's humbling to throw out there.

[So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don’t give up, or quit.] Galations 6:9

Maybe the right time doesn't mean that Eli will thank me for reading I am a Bunny 42 times this week.

Maybe the right time . . . to be thanked. . . is not going to be here.

Am I okay with that?

Am I okay with pouring my life out and never being noticed, the thank you note left unwritten?

Yes, I am, right now, with my feet kicked on the coffee table, my children in bed, my own playlist through the speakers, but the rubber doesn't meet the road while I'm writing in my calm 10pm living room. 

The rubber meets the road when people put playdoh in my coffee and my kindergartener's eyes glaze over and she shrugs:

I dunno, 1 + 2?  Um. . . 56?

I have perspective when I can back away.

But when I'm in the thick of it, life closes in and I struggle and I just want a lil thank you note, y'know?

And I'm full circle, back to the dish in my cupboard, back to the feeling of being overwhelmed by a stranger's kindness, back to the carried part of my life where I didn't take a single step alone.

Back to the dish that didn't seem to matter. 

But it did matter.



To you, the unnoticed:

You matter.

Thank you.

Thank you for being kind, for being faithful, for caring, for doing good when no one notices, for loving without the fanfare.

Thank you for loving when those you love don't love you back.

Thank you for demonstrating faithfulness.



More thoughts on being overwhelmed:

A Life Plan When You're Overwhelmed: Sanity Manifesto

gosh is not a swear word: when truth is uncomfortable

Mom, did you hear [local radio station] isn't carrying Dave Ramsey's program anymore?

Yeah, I did.  Dad asked about it and I read the email reply; they said they received a lot of complaints about the program.  I don't know why, but they did.

*pause*

Well. . . I have a complaint about Dave. . . he uses God's name in vain a lot.

Um. . . he does?  (have never heard this phenomenon)  Can you tell me what he says?

Oh, yeah.  He says. . . G-E-E.  And G-O-S-H. spelling out the offending words

Well, saying gee and gosh - that's not swearing.  Or taking God's name in vain.  I guess we don't like you to say gee cuz it sounds like geez which can sound like Jesus and could get you in the habit of saying that. But gee and gosh aren't really swearing, they're just idle words.  Like, there's nothing wrong with gee all by itself.

Right, like A-B-C-D-E-F-G.

Well, sure.

Mostly Dave says it when somebody gets into debit really fast.

Yep, and that was all during breakfast. 

Isn't this the stuff of parenthood?  I know that too soon, he will tire of seeking my thoughts on every subject under the sun.  He will be happy to develop his own opinions independent of us and right now is a massive window of opportunity to shape his direction with truth.

I find it tempting to avoid truth when dialoguing with my kids;  at their ages, it seems simpler, easier, quicker to just dismiss undesirable behavior with blanket statements, like drinking is wrong or saying gosh is swearing. 

But that would be at least, misleading; at worst, dishonesty.

And children are so much smarter than we give them credit for.  It won't take them long to find holes in faulty logic, and the consequences for glibly mislabeling issues seem staggering. 

As a child of God, my final authority is continually the Word of God.  God speaks to every issue under the sun;  He has answers and He cares about my life, my little people, our home, our desire to raise our kids to honor Him.  Pointing my kids to Him is wiser than pointing them toward us and rules for well-behaved children.

I want a lot more out for my kids than good behavior.

In fact I am quite okay with struggling through bad behavior if we can get to the deeper needs of their hearts and raise kids who want to walk with God.  After all, He is the God of the man who falls seven times and picks himself back up. 

Daniel and I are fallible, broken, weak;  we will disappoint our children.

Friends we admire deeply are human, frail, not meant to be placed on pedestals for our kids to follow.

The church, children of a gracious Father, includes the honest, the hypocritical, the struggling and the strong; humans will disappoint, too, flawed by their very nature.

The only constant, the only unchanging that we can point our children to is God, accessible to us because of the Man, Christ Jesus.

Wading through the issues to find the truth is messy, uncomfortable, and it takes a long time. When the discussions are tangled I hope it's okay to say. . . I don't know, let's ask God to show us. 

I respect people who don't pretend to know all the whys and I hope my children will see through my weakness to the strength of a God Who cannot lie.

As a child, I thought smoking looked so cool, and it was the cool thing to do, with Marlboro Man on billboards and a beautiful blond Virginia Slims girl in every magazine.   I'm not going to lie, I pretended my little dum-dum sucker was a cigarette on more than one occasion.  Why?  Well, definitely not because my parents smoked, because they didn't.  It is impossible to totally shield a child from culture and the newest trends.  Children are intrinsic copy-cats; they need to be walked through these stages.  How wise my parents were to reason with us through these issues;  they didn't shrink from calling sin sin, but they didn't say it was sin if it wasn't.  Smoking isn't a sin, it just isn't wise.  It's poor for your health and destroys your lungs.  Amazingly, culture caught up with mom and dad, and interestingly, smoking is quite un-cool now. 

All that glitters is not gold, but it is foolish to deny the appearance of glitter. 

Denying the obvious

racing motorcycles on a two lane highway looks thrilling to a boy

the shortest shorts look prettier to a young girl craving approval and acceptance

school is grueling

work is boring sometimes

marriage is hard

Christians fail

bad things happen to good people

is setting my kids up to find that I lied.

I don't drink.  But I don't believe that the Bible forbids drinking and we don't teach our kids that.  They hear a pretty steady diet of the destructive consequences of alcohol from their paramedic dad and they know that God says not to be drunk.  Adding to the voice of biblical wisdom advising against drinking is the foolishness of being controlled by a substance that often causes harm to others. 

But saying drinking is unwise is a lot different than saying drinking is a sin. Adding to what God says might seem easy while my kids are 6 and 8 but it will quickly become alienating and harmful as they get older and find out what God really says.

I'd rather get to the root issues of wisdom, self control and not wasting one's life than camp on thou shalt not drink. 

Or thou shalt not say gosh.

Rather I want to point them to what God really says:

[Jesus said] you must give an account on judgment day for every idle word you speak. {Matthew 12:36}

People can tame all kinds of animals, birds, reptiles, and fish, but no one can tame the tongue. It is restless and evil, full of deadly poison. Sometimes it praises our Lord and Father, and sometimes it curses those who have been made in the image of God. And so blessing and cursing come pouring out of the same mouth. Surely, my brothers and sisters, this is not right! {James 3:7-10}

Let your speech always be with grace {Colossians 4:6}

And in contrast, the instructions He gives:  They are not just idle words for you—they are your life. {Deuteronomy 32:47}

march madness

In celebration of the beginning of  NCAA craziness, we made some caramel corn and painstakingly filled our brackets out,  with our decision-making relying heavily on people we liked in certain geographical areas.

[You know what they say, the sports nuts don't win these, the novices do.  Last year Cambria won our family bracket challenge.  I'm not sure what that says about us, but it is what it is.]

In the spirit of being random, we chose one game to watch, Mizzou & Colorado State, and it was a nailbiter since JD and I both had Missouri winning.  They lost. Oh well. 

Fun times with my boy. 

salt & pencil sharpeners

Just in case your day included passionate discussions of music The Ants Go Marching Two by Two
(do you think verse two is about tying the shoe?  do you think mom?  do you remember? are you sure?)

navigating disappointing cancellations
the catch 22 about playing in a MFD vs. Special Olympics game while on duty means that. . . you might not show up to the game  *super let-down oldest son*

schoolwork
no, Cambria, you may not use your cash register calculator to help you with subtraction

bible studies
three cheers for some sanity

lunch
and I fed them Cheetos on the side today.  Can you believe it? how the mighty fall

Sequence, States & Capitals x 2
(and I lost both times)

laundry that got folded, then flooded by a bathtub tidal wave
why, why do I fold laundry? tell me again

in case you cleaned your dining room floor once. . . then twice. . .

. . . in case you gave a toddler two baths today

. . .in case you successfully removed three screws and rescued a mangled orange crayon from the pencil sharpener

. . .in case you narrowly missed getting pencil sharpener grease on your new-to-you-jeans- from the Buckle via Goodwill

. . .in case while the pencil sharpener debacle unfolded, the salt shaker got emptied on the chair. (and floor)

. . . then take a breath and enjoy these two great reads.

I loved each one. 

In Defense of the iPhone Mom


Brave Moms Raise Brave Kids

#mondayquotes

I tiptoed into the library today while the kids were at choir and finished this beautiful little book. . .

It's not often that I borrow a book, read it, and then want to buy it and read it again in another month.  This is one of those. 

While finishing Anne Lindbergh's book today, I was struck once again with how applicable her words are to my own overwhelmed life. . .  I dug in my bag for a pen and the only paper I could find, an envelope, and scribbled.

Here's what stood out to me:

The interrelatedness of the world links us constantly with more people than our hearts can hold. . .
 

. . .My life cannot implement in action the demands of all the people to whom my heart responds.

. . .Because we cannot deal with the complexity of the present we often override it and live in a simplified dream of the future.  Because we cannot solve our own problems right here at home, we talk about problems out there in the world. . .
 

. . .Can one make the future a substitute for the present?  And what guarantee have we that the future will be any better if we neglect the present?  Can one solve world problems when one is unable to solve one's own?
 

. . .Have we been successful, working at the periphery of the circle and not at the center?

Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Gift from the Sea, page 116, 117

that moment when. . .

that moment when. . .

. . .you ask the homeschool mom next to you what she does. .

then autocorrect your sentence and offer-

but of course- you're a stay at home mom-

and then she smiles and says

no- I work full time as an ER nurse.  I just arrange my shifts so I can still homeschool.

Um. Yeah.  Okay.  You're my hero.

(She probably drinks three pots of coffee per day.)


. . .you hear your pastor's six year old son say to your daughter why do you keep trying to hold my hand, Cambria?  {sigh. parenting a girl is not going to get any easier.} #letsnotchasetheboys

. . .your son tells you he's been reading Focus on The Family's adult parenting magazine and he saw that often children get results if they ask for things three days away, rather than immediately, i. e.  "Mom, could we watch cartoons in three days?" {yes} vs."Mom, can we watch cartoons now?" {no} #thanksDr.Dobson.  NOT.

. . .you notice a suspicious lump in your daughter's jeans pocket and she proceeds to pull out some Kotex.  nooooooo. . . I don't want to talk about the birds and bees. . .

. . .you park in front of the house of someone you really look up to and your foot slips onto the gas pedal and there's a pedal to the metal acceleration sound and you actually wonder who is making that awful noise- and then you realize it's you.  In front of the house of the people you really look up to.

. . . you see those 52 Date Night Ideas and all your mind can do is calculate 52 x $30 to sitter = $1,560.00.  #hushedsilence.

. . .you take off your tennis shoes and blow all your breath out before you step on the scale.

. . .church gets cancelled due to weather and you shriek for joy and jump up and down even though you do love God and worship and fellowship.

. . .you look across your Chili's shrimp tacos and wonder what you ever did to deserve a friend like Deeann!

. . .your lil punkin starts to say "Mamma."

. . .your daughter asks mom, how old is a fifteen year old? Umm. . .

. . .you realize somehow your son has been avoiding and escaping showers. . . for a long. . . time. . . as in dayyyyys. . . #phew #showerschedule #Axe #lil'chat

. . .your five year old confides that she heard a bad word. . . hushes her voice. . . leans over to you. . . "s t u p i d."  #whew

. . .just a few moments over here at my house during the past few days.

Children's Museum {music room}

 

 



Infinity Scarf project with the yarn JD bought me for Christmas- it's almost done!  Just have to go to Wikipedia to figure out how to cast off. ;)



Eli popped his head into the picture- and yes, he has been a huge threat to the knitting project.  Even dropped the needles down the cold air return vent.

 



 

Our Bible Study is working through Jennie Allen's stuck.  This was a project at the end of a study of Romans 8-  contrasting selfish desires with desires filtered through the perspective of God's Word.

 

 

Happy Wednesday!