My daughter has been really getting into dolls lately with some of her friends. Most of it has been doll house dolls of the smaller type. So my daughter gets this gift card to Walmart and I suggest to her to buy a Barbie or some Barbie clothes. I didn't see any other doll stuff that looked 'better' or 'worse' than Barbies (okay actually I do think there are dolls that are worse than Barbie). But in that moment, I remembered comments from people being very against Barbie and I second guessed myself. It's not that I'm trying to please other people, but I have had a few of those parent moments where you think something isn't going to be a big deal for your kid and then you look back and think "wow, how did I get here". I don't want to have to take the Barbie's away in the future because they are causing issues. So do you think Barbie's can really cause image issues in girls? Do they as a whole portray a lifestyle that I would not want my daughter to emulate? I really don't know on this one, so thoughts??
The summer has started out as a busy one for us. We seem to have these months throughout the year where things ending and new things beginning overlap and its just pure craziness! We are finishing up baseball season in the next couple weeks and starting other summer activities. All four boys are playing baseball this year. Luckily, because of the way their ages fell, we only have to deal with 2 different teams. I also signed my three littles up for a theater class. The class runs for 2 1/2 hours on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays. My oldest is joining the swim team and is considering joining 4-H for rabbits. Yes, this means lots of driving around for me. I really don't mind though and it's been kind of fun so far. Ask me again at the end of June!
Our bunnies have finally reached 8 weeks old. We ended up losing one a few weeks ago. It was the one that my oldest wanted to keep, so he took it really hard. Hopefully we'll be able to get rid of the others easily on craigslist. I'm hoping to not have 5 rabbits in a few weeks!! We did find out that we have 2 females and 1 male. The male has already been separated from mama! We don't need this whole fiasco happening again!!
Tons of other things are swirling around my head to write about, but I think I'll just stop at that for tonight.
Hope you all have a blessed week!!
Tuesday, June 11, 2013
Tuesday, May 14, 2013
Five months of happenings
Wow, it has been WAAYYYY to long since I've been on here. I actually think about posting stuff often and back in February, I actually had a list going of things I wanted to share, but I've found it hard to get the time to sit and post. Well I will try and cover some of the things I've thought about over the past 4 months. Readers beware... it's a long one
A while back we bought a couch off of craigslist. It was already old and worn, but with our family of boys, it was perfect. Just after a year of having it, one of the recliners permanently broke and was stuck open. Additionally the fabric was wearing immensely and it just started looking bad. I was sick of this old beat up couch in my living room so I decided to get rid of it. There was just this one thing.... I had no replacement. I felt like the kids had been mistreating the furniture, so we decided to move on and went couch-less for a few months. At first, it was cool. The living room was wide open and the kids enjoyed having tons of space. After a while though, it got annoying. My husband and I were sitting in office chairs to watch movies, and that just got old. My parents had been storing two couches in their garage and offered them to us. One is an all white Victorian style couch and the other was a recliner couch that the back had broken on one of the recliners. Since all white did not seem like a good fit for our family and the recliner was broken, we declined their offer. That is, until this whole situation really got annoying. So we decided to move up the couches. That same week, a woman from our church heard we were couch-less and offered us an old leather bonded couch that the bonding was coming off. The couch had a lot of life left in it, but didn't "look pretty" anymore. With the way my boys are with couches, I figured, hey worse case it would last us a few months. We took that couch too and threw a blanket over it to hide the peeling. So we went from no couches to three in the matter of a few days.
Crazy thing was that same week someone offered us 4 bar stools for our kitchen counter. I have been looking for years... yes literally years, for 4 matching bar stools. Who knew bar stools were so expensive?? even used!! I had bought 2 stools from a co-worker about 2 years ago and after bringing them home realized only the kids could sit in them because they were too high. So imagine my excitement when we are offered 4 matching (beautiful, I may add) bar stools for free!! I felt so amazingly blessed that week! I felt like, okay God, I see that you know even the things I "want" and will freely pour out your blessings!!
We have celebrated 5 birthdays since I last wrote. Yes our family birthdays are heavy on the first half of the year. My husband celebrated his birthday fairly uneventfully in February. Two of my children celebrate March birthdays. We started a cake decorating tradition a few years back and much to my sweat and tears we've tried to continue it. My son didn't have a specific request this year, but asked to be surprised. So we made him a drum birthday cake. Funny thing was I put an 8 on the cake (after this picture obviously). Then I'm laying in bed and suddenly realized he was actually 9!!! I had to run out in the middle of the night to change the 8 to a 9 so he wouldn't see the mistake in the morning. It's truly amazing how time flies!!
The cool thing about this cake too was that it was checkered on the inside. My son had given me this kit to make checkered cakes for my birthday or Christmas, so this was the perfect opportunity to use it.
My daughter dances ballet and we were going to make her a ballet cake and at the last minute she decided she wanted a road with a car on it. My daughter is a girly girl!! We were like "what???!!!! a road???" I think this was all triggered by the stop sign candle she found in the drawer with the other candles. So we obliged her request. My husband did a fantastic job in making a S7 cake since her name starts with 'S' and she turned 7. Who knew?? I think we'll look back on this one and laugh some day.
The other two birthdays were celebrated just last week. My babies are 5!! I am officially the mother of school aged children. We spent the week in the Outerbanks of North Carolina. The boys got to spend their birthday at the beach.
Since cake decorating is a crazy undertaking ( and messy too)... we fore go the cake decorating while on vacation for them and just do cupcakes. I think the trade-off is fair. I'll talk about vacation a little more later....
Another exciting thing that took place was that one of my twins auditioned for a movie. I saw an ad for blond haired, blue eyed boys ages 5 - 7 on a local news website. I thought what the heck, let's try it. At first I assumed they were filming the movie in Cleveland and looking for a local boy to fill the main role. Then I found out the filming was in Canada and they had already done some auditions in other cities. I figured we'd still go for it. So one Sunday in April we headed out to Olmstead Falls to audition. He had to learn some lines, which he did quite easily and the first verse to Amazing Grace. The song was the hard part. Try teaching a four, almost five year old, words like 'wretch'. We played the song over and over and over for 5 days straight. Everyone in the family was singing Amazing Grace quite regularly. One comical thing came one day when I asked my son to sing it for me (hoping he finally had the words down). He sang:
"Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a witch like me". Of course I started chuckling, when up pipes his twin brother in the back seat... "it's not witch, it's wench" Oh man, did I lose it. Too funny!!!
So we went for the audition, figuring there was a one in a million shot at getting it anyway, but what an experience. Afterwards, I found out it was a nationwide search for the next "kid star". Ha!! Yeah, no way we're going to get that!!!!! But like I said, it was an experience!
Here he is right after his audition.
Back to the birthdays for just a moment. My oldest son had been asking for a while for a rabbit. We really didn't want anymore pets (we already had 2 dogs, a hamster, and a bird), so we kept pushing him off without really putting down a firm 'no'. When we got to my daughters birthday, she also had been asking for a pet - none of the ones we have "belong" to her. My oldest son has been extremely responsible (of which I am super proud) for his bird and has regularly paid for its food, cage stuff, etc out of his own money. For whatever reason I gave in to letting him have a rabbit since I figured he would take equally good care of it. We decided to get him one (he was actually due a partial birthday gift from his birthday) and his sister one for her birthday. We got 2 female rabbits and one cage with all the accessories. Shortly after getting them, my daughters rabbit, Snowflake, started getting very aggressive. At first she was aggressive with the kids and after a few days she was aggressive with the other female rabbit. When she started biting Twitch, the other rabbit, I thought that was strange and wondered out loud if she was pregnant. My husband thought I was crazy. One week, on a Thursday, Snowflake bit Twitch enough that it actually injured her. We decided to get another cage. We looked on craigslist and one had been posted THAT morning. We called and picked it up that afternoon. Talk about another blessing from God!
A rabbits gestation period is 30-31 days, so when we hit four weeks (28 days), I thought my worries were unfounded. This is the Sunday after buying the new cage. Then it happened. My son came into my room early on April 15 and said "Snowflake is acting really weird. She's pulling out her fur and it's in her mouth." It sounded to me like she was nesting, so I quickly grabbed a cardboard box and went to put it in her cage. Sure enough, she was acting VERY weird. She was running all over the cage in a frantic way and pulling out her fur. By 12:30 that afternoon she had given birth to 4 baby bunnies. Wow did we get a little more than we bargained for!!!! the babies are now 4 weeks old and SO DARN CUTE!!!! Of course the kids want to keep some of the babies... yeah, we'll see how that goes.
Here they are at 2 weeks old
Okay, lastly, vacation. Last year, we took a trip to the Outerbanks, NC and had such a good time that we decided to do it again this year. My parents treat us by renting the house big enough for multiple families. This year my sister, her family, my family and my parents went. We go early in May since it is off season and much cheaper. The weather can be a little iffy since it's still spring time. We were supposed to have rain for three of the days, however, God blessed us again. The "big storm" ended up splitting around us, so we only had an occasional sprinkle here or there. We did get just enough rain one day to have a beautiful full double rainbow.
We were snapping away with pictures when I grabbed my niece and said lets drive down to the ocean to get a picture with the water. The double part of it was gone by then, but we did get this great shot.
We had a great time relaxing at the house, frolicking on the ocean and cruising the beaches looking for wild horses. We rented a jeep the one day to go off road on the beach.
My husband drove all 15 of us in shifts down the beach to look for horses and enjoy the unpaved part of the Outerbanks. Unfortunately, my shift (the first one) was the only one to not see any horses. I have seen them before and didn't think the twins would remember too much anyways, so we just left it like that. He did get some pretty pictures of them on the beach however.
Here's my sister and I
So hopefully I've caught you up on our first half of 2013. I hope all is well with your families and I look forward to seeing or hearing from you soon!
Peace out!
Oats
The Sofa
A while back we bought a couch off of craigslist. It was already old and worn, but with our family of boys, it was perfect. Just after a year of having it, one of the recliners permanently broke and was stuck open. Additionally the fabric was wearing immensely and it just started looking bad. I was sick of this old beat up couch in my living room so I decided to get rid of it. There was just this one thing.... I had no replacement. I felt like the kids had been mistreating the furniture, so we decided to move on and went couch-less for a few months. At first, it was cool. The living room was wide open and the kids enjoyed having tons of space. After a while though, it got annoying. My husband and I were sitting in office chairs to watch movies, and that just got old. My parents had been storing two couches in their garage and offered them to us. One is an all white Victorian style couch and the other was a recliner couch that the back had broken on one of the recliners. Since all white did not seem like a good fit for our family and the recliner was broken, we declined their offer. That is, until this whole situation really got annoying. So we decided to move up the couches. That same week, a woman from our church heard we were couch-less and offered us an old leather bonded couch that the bonding was coming off. The couch had a lot of life left in it, but didn't "look pretty" anymore. With the way my boys are with couches, I figured, hey worse case it would last us a few months. We took that couch too and threw a blanket over it to hide the peeling. So we went from no couches to three in the matter of a few days.
Crazy thing was that same week someone offered us 4 bar stools for our kitchen counter. I have been looking for years... yes literally years, for 4 matching bar stools. Who knew bar stools were so expensive?? even used!! I had bought 2 stools from a co-worker about 2 years ago and after bringing them home realized only the kids could sit in them because they were too high. So imagine my excitement when we are offered 4 matching (beautiful, I may add) bar stools for free!! I felt so amazingly blessed that week! I felt like, okay God, I see that you know even the things I "want" and will freely pour out your blessings!!
Birthdays
We have celebrated 5 birthdays since I last wrote. Yes our family birthdays are heavy on the first half of the year. My husband celebrated his birthday fairly uneventfully in February. Two of my children celebrate March birthdays. We started a cake decorating tradition a few years back and much to my sweat and tears we've tried to continue it. My son didn't have a specific request this year, but asked to be surprised. So we made him a drum birthday cake. Funny thing was I put an 8 on the cake (after this picture obviously). Then I'm laying in bed and suddenly realized he was actually 9!!! I had to run out in the middle of the night to change the 8 to a 9 so he wouldn't see the mistake in the morning. It's truly amazing how time flies!!
My daughter dances ballet and we were going to make her a ballet cake and at the last minute she decided she wanted a road with a car on it. My daughter is a girly girl!! We were like "what???!!!! a road???" I think this was all triggered by the stop sign candle she found in the drawer with the other candles. So we obliged her request. My husband did a fantastic job in making a S7 cake since her name starts with 'S' and she turned 7. Who knew?? I think we'll look back on this one and laugh some day.
The other two birthdays were celebrated just last week. My babies are 5!! I am officially the mother of school aged children. We spent the week in the Outerbanks of North Carolina. The boys got to spend their birthday at the beach.
Movie Audition
Another exciting thing that took place was that one of my twins auditioned for a movie. I saw an ad for blond haired, blue eyed boys ages 5 - 7 on a local news website. I thought what the heck, let's try it. At first I assumed they were filming the movie in Cleveland and looking for a local boy to fill the main role. Then I found out the filming was in Canada and they had already done some auditions in other cities. I figured we'd still go for it. So one Sunday in April we headed out to Olmstead Falls to audition. He had to learn some lines, which he did quite easily and the first verse to Amazing Grace. The song was the hard part. Try teaching a four, almost five year old, words like 'wretch'. We played the song over and over and over for 5 days straight. Everyone in the family was singing Amazing Grace quite regularly. One comical thing came one day when I asked my son to sing it for me (hoping he finally had the words down). He sang:
"Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, that saved a witch like me". Of course I started chuckling, when up pipes his twin brother in the back seat... "it's not witch, it's wench" Oh man, did I lose it. Too funny!!!
So we went for the audition, figuring there was a one in a million shot at getting it anyway, but what an experience. Afterwards, I found out it was a nationwide search for the next "kid star". Ha!! Yeah, no way we're going to get that!!!!! But like I said, it was an experience!
Here he is right after his audition.
Rabbits
Back to the birthdays for just a moment. My oldest son had been asking for a while for a rabbit. We really didn't want anymore pets (we already had 2 dogs, a hamster, and a bird), so we kept pushing him off without really putting down a firm 'no'. When we got to my daughters birthday, she also had been asking for a pet - none of the ones we have "belong" to her. My oldest son has been extremely responsible (of which I am super proud) for his bird and has regularly paid for its food, cage stuff, etc out of his own money. For whatever reason I gave in to letting him have a rabbit since I figured he would take equally good care of it. We decided to get him one (he was actually due a partial birthday gift from his birthday) and his sister one for her birthday. We got 2 female rabbits and one cage with all the accessories. Shortly after getting them, my daughters rabbit, Snowflake, started getting very aggressive. At first she was aggressive with the kids and after a few days she was aggressive with the other female rabbit. When she started biting Twitch, the other rabbit, I thought that was strange and wondered out loud if she was pregnant. My husband thought I was crazy. One week, on a Thursday, Snowflake bit Twitch enough that it actually injured her. We decided to get another cage. We looked on craigslist and one had been posted THAT morning. We called and picked it up that afternoon. Talk about another blessing from God!
A rabbits gestation period is 30-31 days, so when we hit four weeks (28 days), I thought my worries were unfounded. This is the Sunday after buying the new cage. Then it happened. My son came into my room early on April 15 and said "Snowflake is acting really weird. She's pulling out her fur and it's in her mouth." It sounded to me like she was nesting, so I quickly grabbed a cardboard box and went to put it in her cage. Sure enough, she was acting VERY weird. She was running all over the cage in a frantic way and pulling out her fur. By 12:30 that afternoon she had given birth to 4 baby bunnies. Wow did we get a little more than we bargained for!!!! the babies are now 4 weeks old and SO DARN CUTE!!!! Of course the kids want to keep some of the babies... yeah, we'll see how that goes.
Here they are at 2 weeks old
Vacation
Okay, lastly, vacation. Last year, we took a trip to the Outerbanks, NC and had such a good time that we decided to do it again this year. My parents treat us by renting the house big enough for multiple families. This year my sister, her family, my family and my parents went. We go early in May since it is off season and much cheaper. The weather can be a little iffy since it's still spring time. We were supposed to have rain for three of the days, however, God blessed us again. The "big storm" ended up splitting around us, so we only had an occasional sprinkle here or there. We did get just enough rain one day to have a beautiful full double rainbow.
Here's my sister and I
So hopefully I've caught you up on our first half of 2013. I hope all is well with your families and I look forward to seeing or hearing from you soon!
Peace out!
Oats
Friday, January 25, 2013
Love the Little Things
Well it's the middle of winter and winter has definitely hit. It has been snowing all week and we have quite a bit of snow on the ground. I'm starting to get a little cabin fever and have been feeling melancholy today being all couped up. I'm ready for some change. My husband says only good change of course. Every once in a while I get restless. Especially when life settles into some kind of routine. It almost feels monotonous to me. Don't get me wrong, we've been quite busy. But it's the same kind of busyness we've had for a while now.
January has brought a boat load of new activities. We started basketball with the two older boys, gymnastics with my daughter and younger two, sign language classes for the 3 oldest and swimming lessons for all. On top of speech appointments and story hour, we're running almost every day of the week. I enjoy the running... for the most part. It's an opportunity to get out of the house and DO something.
I don't really have any big events to "look forward to" these days. No vacations approaching, no big parties, nothing of too much interest lies ahead. The biggest thing I look forward to on a daily basis is being able to snuggle up in my room after the kids have gone to bed and watch old episodes of Alias on Netflix. I never watched the series when it was on television, but it has been so captivating! It's awesome too because I don't have to wait a week to watch the next episode. I'm also totally caught up in the Downton Abbey rave... but alas, I have to wait a week (sometimes 2) to see what happens next.
So other things I've been keeping busy with. We made another wood hanging. It was for a friend of ours wedding. The power had gone out the week of their wedding and we weren't able to finish their gift. Then with the wedding being past, it had fallen down on our priority list. We finished it a few weeks ago and we were really happy with it. I have a feeling we are a little partial being that it was our creation... but so it is. Actually, I had originally envisioned it with little chain links between the pieces. However, when my husband added the hooks, they were so large, the links made the pieces too far apart. Next time I think I'll use smaller hooks and put the actual chain in between. Here's a pic:
My other new found fad is Tiny Tower on my husbands iPod. My sister introduced me to this simple, but addictive game. I've commandeered my husband's iPod for the time being so I can play it even when he's not here.
When these snow storms were hitting, the wind was blowing pretty fiercely over the roof of the house. The wind caused these huge drifts to be hanging from our back windows. When I started to try and clear them away through the windows, I realized, not only were they about 18" - 2 ft hanging down, they were about 18" wide as well!! It was a pretty cool sight.
I suppose it's the small insignificant things in life that are supposed to bring joy to our day. So I hope that I can learn to treasure the little things and find contentment in all situations.
I guess that's all for now. I hope the winter blues aren't hitting you all too hard. If you're looking to hang out, you know where to find me :) Until I see you all... be blessed!!
January has brought a boat load of new activities. We started basketball with the two older boys, gymnastics with my daughter and younger two, sign language classes for the 3 oldest and swimming lessons for all. On top of speech appointments and story hour, we're running almost every day of the week. I enjoy the running... for the most part. It's an opportunity to get out of the house and DO something.
I don't really have any big events to "look forward to" these days. No vacations approaching, no big parties, nothing of too much interest lies ahead. The biggest thing I look forward to on a daily basis is being able to snuggle up in my room after the kids have gone to bed and watch old episodes of Alias on Netflix. I never watched the series when it was on television, but it has been so captivating! It's awesome too because I don't have to wait a week to watch the next episode. I'm also totally caught up in the Downton Abbey rave... but alas, I have to wait a week (sometimes 2) to see what happens next.
So other things I've been keeping busy with. We made another wood hanging. It was for a friend of ours wedding. The power had gone out the week of their wedding and we weren't able to finish their gift. Then with the wedding being past, it had fallen down on our priority list. We finished it a few weeks ago and we were really happy with it. I have a feeling we are a little partial being that it was our creation... but so it is. Actually, I had originally envisioned it with little chain links between the pieces. However, when my husband added the hooks, they were so large, the links made the pieces too far apart. Next time I think I'll use smaller hooks and put the actual chain in between. Here's a pic:
My other new found fad is Tiny Tower on my husbands iPod. My sister introduced me to this simple, but addictive game. I've commandeered my husband's iPod for the time being so I can play it even when he's not here.
When these snow storms were hitting, the wind was blowing pretty fiercely over the roof of the house. The wind caused these huge drifts to be hanging from our back windows. When I started to try and clear them away through the windows, I realized, not only were they about 18" - 2 ft hanging down, they were about 18" wide as well!! It was a pretty cool sight.
I suppose it's the small insignificant things in life that are supposed to bring joy to our day. So I hope that I can learn to treasure the little things and find contentment in all situations.
I guess that's all for now. I hope the winter blues aren't hitting you all too hard. If you're looking to hang out, you know where to find me :) Until I see you all... be blessed!!
Thursday, January 17, 2013
A hospital for sinners
I read this quote on Facebook today.
"Church is not a museum for saints, it is a hospital for sinners."
At first glance, I thought this was a cool quote and then went on my way. Funny thing is I've been thinking on it ever since. I don't think the church as a whole treats our buildings, ministry, vision like we are treating sick people. I feel like, at least in my own eyes, that we try to keep things clean and orderly, similar to a brand new hospital opening up. But guess what when the sick people come, things get messy, it may even get chaotic at times until the patient is stable and on the path to healing. Sometimes we shelter ourselves, our kids, everything from "the world". I liken that to a nurse who is afraid to go to work for fear that she will get sick. Sometimes you just gotta do what the job calls for. We took on this job when we became Christians. Jesus gave us the great commission. Yes, we will stumble and make mistakes. We may even fall flat on our faces, but that is what God gave us grace for. If we want this hospital to be successful we need to call in the sick from every corner and be willing to get messy! I have been struck with renewed passion to find the sick.
"The harvest is many, but the workers are few" Matthew 9:37
"Church is not a museum for saints, it is a hospital for sinners."
At first glance, I thought this was a cool quote and then went on my way. Funny thing is I've been thinking on it ever since. I don't think the church as a whole treats our buildings, ministry, vision like we are treating sick people. I feel like, at least in my own eyes, that we try to keep things clean and orderly, similar to a brand new hospital opening up. But guess what when the sick people come, things get messy, it may even get chaotic at times until the patient is stable and on the path to healing. Sometimes we shelter ourselves, our kids, everything from "the world". I liken that to a nurse who is afraid to go to work for fear that she will get sick. Sometimes you just gotta do what the job calls for. We took on this job when we became Christians. Jesus gave us the great commission. Yes, we will stumble and make mistakes. We may even fall flat on our faces, but that is what God gave us grace for. If we want this hospital to be successful we need to call in the sick from every corner and be willing to get messy! I have been struck with renewed passion to find the sick.
"The harvest is many, but the workers are few" Matthew 9:37
Tuesday, December 18, 2012
Why I Am This Way...
Had a doctors appointment this morning for a routine physical. My husband's work has this rewards program for having healthy levels of blood pressure, cholesterol, weight, etc. The main thing my doctor was concerned about was my weight. No surprise there. He said I need to work a little harder to get my BMI into at least a healthy range. Ok... so the rest of my day went like this...
I had to fast for my doctors appt for 12 hours which meant no eating after 8 PM last night. I have a bad habit of eating late. I only ate a salad for dinner. So after my appointment I was very hungry AND I had no kids with me, which happens... like... NEVER! So I decided to run through the McD's drive through and get a breakfast sandwich and coffee. While waiting at the "2nd pickup window"... apparently a new thing at the Chesterland McDs for those who have to wait, I saw a Grand Opening sign that showed they were having a promotion for the month of Dec. Today's special was $1.99 happy meals. My kids hardly ever get happy meals because they are so darn expensive. So with this being affordable, I thought it would be a special treat for today. I took the kids there for lunch and had a McDouble meal.
THEN... I had no idea what to make for dinner tonight. When my husband woke up, I asked him, "if I could make anything for dinner, what would you want?" I really had no taste for anything specific (probably because I had already eaten my days worth of calories from breakfast and lunch)... after much discussion... he decided he wanted chinese. Even though it was totally a bad idea... I couldn't sit here and watch him eat chinese (the kids got pizza)...so I ordered a meal too.
Yep, that explains a lot doesn't it. Granted not every day is like this!! We've actually been trying to eat much, much better!! I just thought it totally ironic considering my doctors advice this morning.
I had to fast for my doctors appt for 12 hours which meant no eating after 8 PM last night. I have a bad habit of eating late. I only ate a salad for dinner. So after my appointment I was very hungry AND I had no kids with me, which happens... like... NEVER! So I decided to run through the McD's drive through and get a breakfast sandwich and coffee. While waiting at the "2nd pickup window"... apparently a new thing at the Chesterland McDs for those who have to wait, I saw a Grand Opening sign that showed they were having a promotion for the month of Dec. Today's special was $1.99 happy meals. My kids hardly ever get happy meals because they are so darn expensive. So with this being affordable, I thought it would be a special treat for today. I took the kids there for lunch and had a McDouble meal.
THEN... I had no idea what to make for dinner tonight. When my husband woke up, I asked him, "if I could make anything for dinner, what would you want?" I really had no taste for anything specific (probably because I had already eaten my days worth of calories from breakfast and lunch)... after much discussion... he decided he wanted chinese. Even though it was totally a bad idea... I couldn't sit here and watch him eat chinese (the kids got pizza)...so I ordered a meal too.
Yep, that explains a lot doesn't it. Granted not every day is like this!! We've actually been trying to eat much, much better!! I just thought it totally ironic considering my doctors advice this morning.
Saturday, December 8, 2012
Cleaning Tricks
Today we asked our children to clean their rooms. One of my children happened to clean their room in record time. Too fast, actually. Being the smart mom that I am, I walked over to the closet and voila! I found all the "stuff" that was previously on the floor. My husband and I chuckled to each other. Don't they realize that we were children once too! We know all the tricks :)
I read once a quote that "Cleaning is just moving things to less conspicuous places". There's some truth in that and it made me laugh. The closet, however, isn't less conspicuous enough!
Have a blessed weekend!
I read once a quote that "Cleaning is just moving things to less conspicuous places". There's some truth in that and it made me laugh. The closet, however, isn't less conspicuous enough!
Have a blessed weekend!
Monday, December 3, 2012
Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde
Do you ever feel like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde? Meaning your personality quickly switches from one place to another? For me, it does sometimes. And there's nothing more sure to make my personality switch than a trip to the grocery store toting five children along with me through the aisles. Such an occurrence happened last week. Within a matter of 15 minutes, I went from being completely "normal" to an impatient yelling mess. I don't know what happens or why on some days it seems that I can "handle" the minor inconveniences of children, but there are those times where it just sends me into overload.
Have you ever taken those personality tests? I guess I'm specifically referring to the Myers Briggs test -- the one that determines if you are an extrovert or an introvert? When they state extrovert or introvert, they're not relating to whether or not you like to hang out with people, but where you gather your strength... by being with other people or in solitude. Years ago, pre-children, I tested as an extrovert. I loved being around people and would jump at the chance to get together with friends because that's where I would find my energy and strength to recharge. About 2 years ago, I took the test again at work and it determined that everything was the same except for this one area. I tested as an introvert. I found it interesting because I think, now that I am constantly surrounded by people, albeit miniature ones, I prize and treasure my time alone.
I think that's the only way I can explain why I all of sudden get frustrated with the little things. Usually my best resolve is to just spend some time alone! I'm sharing this because I hope in some way you can relate -- specifically that I'm not the only crazy one out here :) I guess I found that my other resolve is, no matter how short I think the trip in the store will be, I need to use the in-store child care!!!
Funny note about this though.... I couldn't remember whether Dr. Jekyll was the nice guy or Mr. Hyde. So I searched for it on the web prior to writing this post. When I read this explanation I actually rethought my use of this analogy: "The novella's impact is such that it has become a part of the language, with the very phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" coming to mean a person who is vastly different in moral character from one situation to the next." (Wikipedia) Made me laugh... surely I'm not referring to being "vastly different in moral character". Well at least not in the way they refer... I guess I hope you know what I mean.
So onto other things.... the past week or two has been a difficult one. Our family has never quite been in such financial straits that it really takes some adjusting to. I have been all over the map in this one in terms of where I believe God has placed us and what His plan is for us. I'm pretty sure I've sinned more than a few times too in not trusting God and questioning His character or at least how He's not living up to my expectations of Him. But it's amazing how God is SO faithful through it all. Our pastor spoke a message on Sunday that related EXACTLY to that point. I have had expectations and a hope that God would be a certain way when we were in need and provide for us how I wanted Him to. I've been sorely disappointed that God has not done it my way. He really spoke to me through that message and used my husband later that day to speak words of wisdom to me as well. I had a moment of surrender since then. Then God showed today that He will take care of us, once again, in our current situation. God has provided many hours of extra work over the next 4 weeks. Words cannot express my thankfulness and relief.
Sometimes I can be so short sighted. I get so wrapped up in the momentary situation that I lose my focus on Him as my source. I tend to doubt Him and get angry. And yet... still... He is there.
I'm starting to realize what Paul was feeling after being a Christian for many years. You'd think after being a Christian for so long you would "be better" or "be further along"... but all I realize is what a wretched man I am (Rom 7:24).
I write this post humbly today. I hope that in my weakness, you will find encouragement as we all seek to find strength in Jesus, our true hope. And as we try to be more and more like Him, we will continue to fall short. But I find hope and cheer in this... He disciplines those He loves (Pro 3:12).
Love you all... hope you are having a fantastic week!
Have you ever taken those personality tests? I guess I'm specifically referring to the Myers Briggs test -- the one that determines if you are an extrovert or an introvert? When they state extrovert or introvert, they're not relating to whether or not you like to hang out with people, but where you gather your strength... by being with other people or in solitude. Years ago, pre-children, I tested as an extrovert. I loved being around people and would jump at the chance to get together with friends because that's where I would find my energy and strength to recharge. About 2 years ago, I took the test again at work and it determined that everything was the same except for this one area. I tested as an introvert. I found it interesting because I think, now that I am constantly surrounded by people, albeit miniature ones, I prize and treasure my time alone.
I think that's the only way I can explain why I all of sudden get frustrated with the little things. Usually my best resolve is to just spend some time alone! I'm sharing this because I hope in some way you can relate -- specifically that I'm not the only crazy one out here :) I guess I found that my other resolve is, no matter how short I think the trip in the store will be, I need to use the in-store child care!!!
Funny note about this though.... I couldn't remember whether Dr. Jekyll was the nice guy or Mr. Hyde. So I searched for it on the web prior to writing this post. When I read this explanation I actually rethought my use of this analogy: "The novella's impact is such that it has become a part of the language, with the very phrase "Jekyll and Hyde" coming to mean a person who is vastly different in moral character from one situation to the next." (Wikipedia) Made me laugh... surely I'm not referring to being "vastly different in moral character". Well at least not in the way they refer... I guess I hope you know what I mean.
So onto other things.... the past week or two has been a difficult one. Our family has never quite been in such financial straits that it really takes some adjusting to. I have been all over the map in this one in terms of where I believe God has placed us and what His plan is for us. I'm pretty sure I've sinned more than a few times too in not trusting God and questioning His character or at least how He's not living up to my expectations of Him. But it's amazing how God is SO faithful through it all. Our pastor spoke a message on Sunday that related EXACTLY to that point. I have had expectations and a hope that God would be a certain way when we were in need and provide for us how I wanted Him to. I've been sorely disappointed that God has not done it my way. He really spoke to me through that message and used my husband later that day to speak words of wisdom to me as well. I had a moment of surrender since then. Then God showed today that He will take care of us, once again, in our current situation. God has provided many hours of extra work over the next 4 weeks. Words cannot express my thankfulness and relief.
Sometimes I can be so short sighted. I get so wrapped up in the momentary situation that I lose my focus on Him as my source. I tend to doubt Him and get angry. And yet... still... He is there.
I'm starting to realize what Paul was feeling after being a Christian for many years. You'd think after being a Christian for so long you would "be better" or "be further along"... but all I realize is what a wretched man I am (Rom 7:24).
I write this post humbly today. I hope that in my weakness, you will find encouragement as we all seek to find strength in Jesus, our true hope. And as we try to be more and more like Him, we will continue to fall short. But I find hope and cheer in this... He disciplines those He loves (Pro 3:12).
Love you all... hope you are having a fantastic week!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)