Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket Photobucket
Photobucket PhotobucketPhotobucketPhotobucket Photobucket

Monday, August 31, 2009

Not Me Monday

Pin It


Well, I was working on a serious post, but it's not done, and I'm not entirely sure about whether it's post-worthy or not, so it'll have to wait a bit. I thought I'd share a few not me moments while we wait.

I have not had cake with every single meal since Friday. And, as I was ordering the cake, I did not waver between the 1/2 sheet cake and the 1/4 sheet cake and go with the 1/2 sheet because I was thinking of leftovers. Even if I had done this, it would be fine because I'm not diabetic or anything like that. And even if I were diabetic, I would not have NOT taken my medication because I can't find it. Nope, not me.

(for the record - the last remnants of the cake are being thrown away today, without me eating any. I'm also calling today for a refill of my medications. They were getting low anyway.)

I am not currently in mourning because I watched the last episode of Psych last night. Now I have to wait for Fridays for my Psych fix. I'm not crazy sad about that. I do have Season One of Monk sitting here waiting though. :D

I am not sitting here feeling all proud and smug because I got up and exercised this morning. I'm also not skimming over the fact that it was the world's easiest exercising, and really should barely even count as exercising. It was movement, so I'm counting it. I'm also not feeling quite pleased with myself because at least one of my children got to work on her schoolwork before 8:30 this morning. (We're jumping into our *full* schedule today, so I'm trying to figure out how to manage it. It's possible a second dvd player will be on my shopping list.)

Speaking of shopping lists, Brendan starts Mother's Day Out tomorrow. I am not more excited than he is about this! We haven't put off our supply shopping either, and will not be making a trip to Target this afternoon to buy stuff for him. Procrastinate much? Nope, not me!

In other bad parenting area, my daughter has not been asking me for a week now to sew an ear back onto one of her webkinz. I haven't been eyeing the ear and eyeing the stapler to see if I can make some magic happen. Nope, not me. I'd never take the lazy way out.

Oh, and we haven't eaten sandwiches every single day in the last week, just in case you were wondering.

And as I type this, Brendan is not pulling out all of the loud toys and annoying his sisters to death. HURRY UP MOTHER'S DAY OUT.

Thursday, August 27, 2009

Where did my baby go?

Pin It


I blinked.

And when I wake up tomorrow, he'll be four.

FOUR.

I remember like it was yesterday being pregnant with him, and being in labor with him. Having never experienced labor before, I had no idea. I remember calling the hospital and telling them that I still had almost two weeks before my c-section was scheduled and that I was having really weird pains. (The other two were scheduled c-sections as well, and they didn't surprise me by coming early.) I remember being home on that Sunday thinking that maybe I should pack my hospital bag, I remember calling my mom and telling her that I thought the September baby might turn out to be an August baby, and I remember calling Jim at church and saying "Um, I think we should go to the hospital." I remember dropping the girls off at Cyndee's and being unable to stop crying, which is kind of funny because I also remember being completely shocked when the nurse told me my doctor was coming in to do my c-section that night, that I was indeed in labor.

Brendan was born at 11:44 pm, and I had general anesthesia for his birth. I remember being so out of it when I saw him the first time, but I also remember thinking "well, that's different!" He was tiny compared to the girls (7 lb 6 oz, compared to Gabbi's 9 lb, and Madelyn's 9 lb 11 oz) and he didn't have tons of black hair like they did.

I remember watching the clock the next morning just waiting for it to be late enough that I could start calling people to tell them he was here. I remember how quickly Micah got there too. :) (Not an easy feat, considering that she was 9 mo pregnant herself!)

(Clearly, I could go on and on here ... I won't.)

To the sweet boy who can make me mad and then come up and hug me and ask if I'm happy now, and who insists that he's 2 and will tomorrow turn 4, and who has jumped off of every piece of furniture in my house, and who sings "You've Got a Friend in Me", and who wakes me up at dawn asking for chocolate milk every morning, and who has cute freckles and fair skin like his mama, and who has his daddy's eyes ...

I wish you happy birthday. I am so thankful for you, little one, and so thankful to God for giving me the blessing of you.

Some of my favorite pictures from the last four years:






Wednesday, August 26, 2009

Wordless Wednesday

Pin It Back to school pics. Brendan's will come next Tuesday.


Tuesday, August 25, 2009

An Actually Fabulous Day

Pin It And no sarcasm there!

LIGHT YEARS different from yesterday. WOOT~!!

We changed our schedule up, which helped. Gabbi started with math and Madelyn started with reading. Oh, and if you're interested, Brendan started with jumping off the furniture.

Then Madelyn moved to the kitchen to do her math and Gabbi moved to the family room for reading. Then switch again for Madelyn to do her English and Gabbi to do spelling. Finish up with Gabbi doing English. (We're still easing in - no science/history/handwriting yet.) We were all done by noon.

And get this: GOAL MET. NOBODY CRIED!!

The schedule is going to take a little tweaking when we add in the other classes, but we'll worry about that next week.

Oh ... and last night? I should set up a poll to let people guess what time he finally fell asleep. 11:45. Yikes.

Even worse? We're playing that game again tonight. Nap from 5-7 tonight. And I TRIED to wake him up. Tried HARD. Stuck pins in him and everything. Okay, not really, but we did turn lights on, talk to him, jostle him around a fair amount. Nothing. Oh well. He clearly needed a nap.

Monday, August 24, 2009

Our Oh So Fabulous Day

Pin It Homeschool, day 1. Otherwise known as the day everything went wrong.

Everybody is excited about the first day of school, right? Well, I guess that's everybody except the people that live in my house!

The plan consists of getting the girls out of bed at 8:00. This will eventually become 7:30, but we're planning to ease into it. (You'll notice I didn't mention waking the boy. He wakes at dawn, remember?)

So this morning, I got up with a panic and realized that I had promised some work done that I hadn't even begun yet. It seemed obvious that getting their schoolwork started while trying to get my work done was a bad idea. So, wrinkle #1, I let the girls sleep while I finished my work. They didn't get up until after 9:00. Not a horrible thing in the grand scheme of things, but it did kind of start us off on the wrong foot.

By the time they were fully awake and fed, it was about 9:30. Woohoo, only a little later than planned, so we're still good.

Enter wrinkle #2. We can't find Madelyn's math book. Gabbi gets going on her math and I'm tearing up the house trying to find Mad's book. Finally found it and realized that she was ready for a new math lesson. No problem, I know where her DVD is. I pull it out with that feeling ... you know the feeling ... the "this DVD case feels a little lighter than it should" feeling. Yep, no DVD.

You may have noticed that I can be just a leeeetle high strung, so I'm starting to get stressed by this point.

I looked at the lesson and figured we could wing it pretty well and decided that rather than searching for something else, we'd just run with it. She knows how to do it all, so it's no problem to skip the teaching for this lesson. So she gets to work.

You can read below about all of the interruptions there. Finally she brings it to me and I realize she has done every single problem wrong. She knows very well how to do this, she was just so distracted!

I was really starting to LOSE IT by this point. We just stopped with that page and went to the next one. Everyone is trying to breathe in, breathe out, calm down. I sat with her and she did her work without any problem at all.

Wrinkle #3 - now Brendan is absolutely climbing the walls. He'd already been outside, played with trains, played with play doh, jumped on all of the furniture, played with stickers ... he's pulling out the loudest, most obnoxious toys and is making everyone insane.

Now it's lunch time, and thankfully everyone was happy with our lunch choice - chicken parmesan sandwiches.

Time to go to the next classes. Wrinkle #4 - we realized that putting Gabbi on the DVD player in my computer and Madelyn on the DVD player in the family room wasn't working so well. We need to come up with a solution other than using my laptop as a dvd player, as these dvds and my computer aren't exactly in love with each other. So now, I'm trying to figure out how to shuffle the kids around so that each gets a dvd player without anyone getting a ton of free time because nobody wants school going on all day long.

I finally gave in and put Brendan in my room with Noggin. Hey, it's like preschool on TV, right? Wrinkle #5 - I hear him making a weird coughing sound that I have heard exactly one other time in my life - when he swallowed a whole peppermint and was trying to throw it back up. BRENDAN, WHAT DID YOU SWALLOW??? He swallowed a penny, or some coin; they're all pennies to him. He was trying his best to get it to come back up and I called the doctor's office. They said it will either come back up or I get to do some poop gazing. Lovely. Thankfully, Brendan came in a few minutes later and said it didn't hurt anymore, so I guess it made its way out of the esophagus.

Really, by this time, my nerves were just shot. Three of the four of us had cried during the day (oh - one of my goals with our schooling is for nobody to cry. Great to completely obliterate that goal on DAY 1!)

Thankfully, also by this time, the girls were finishing up their schoolwork.

But wait ... there's more.

We decided that we deserved Sonic Happy Hour. On the way the two little ones were fighting and hitting each other, so they did not get to participate in Happy Hour. Here we go with tears again. So Gabbi and I get our drinks and Brendan fell asleep. No problem, the car seat sends out magic sleep vibes all the time. It usually ends when we get into the driveway.

Not today. He slept as we walked in. He slept in the chair. He slept on the couch. We finally woke him up and he walked to my bed and went back to sleep. He slept until 7:00.

Good news and bad news about that.

The girls and I got to talk about our school day - what I expected from them, what they needed from me, some forgiveness was sought from a mommy who lost her temper. We had a nice time and we're all okay with continuing our homeschooling. I have a better idea as to what our schedule needs to look like, and I believe we're going to make some changes with Madelyn's math that will benefit all of us. That's the good news.

The bad news? It's 10:30 and Brendan is WIDE AWAKE. I think I may need to put him in my bed to see if I can get him to sleep.

More good news though -- we have a plan for tomorrow. We are all thankful that His mercies are new every morning, and He is faithful to us. Today is done and over, and everyone is happy about that. There is no need to dwell on the failures of today. I realized I could plead to be released from homeschooling, or I could accept that I'm not released from that at this time, and be content with what I have. I'm choosing to be content.

Not Me Monday

Pin It


It is not my children who decided to get into a fight over who would get to select a movie to watch one day last week. It was not these same children whose fight took place right at the dvd player, and they did not, in the midst of this fight RIP THE DOOR off of the entertainment center. They did not break the door by SPLINTERING THE WOOD so that it cannot possibly be repaired. I did not immediately unplug the TV and consider committing unspeakable horrors upon it. My children would never fight over such petty things, and I would never be angry enough to consider ripping the TV out of the wall the same way they ripped the doors off of the entertainment center ... or didn't ... as the case may be.

As I type this (Sunday night), my two girls are not in their room yelling at each other. I have not been completely OCD about the house lately, and noticed that their room was a little messy today. I did not look at it and estimate that it would take all of ten minutes for them to clean it. Ten minutes. That's it. They've not been in there for thirty minutes and have not done even half of it because they've been so busy yelling at each other.

Oh -- and the funny part? After yelling at each other and taking an hour to clean what should have taken ten minutes to clean, it was not my two girls that I found cuddled up together sleeping. LOL

As I type this (Monday morning), we are now getting ready for our homeschool to begin. After lots and lots of false starts, today is the day.

That said ... it has not taken my easily distractable child two hours now to do her math. And she's not finished. It's not too difficult for her, really it's not. She has not stopped 83 times to go try to pull her tooth, and 44 times to get a drink, and 27 times to go to the bathroom. I did not just have to threaten her ... on the very first day of school ... with disciplinary action for each problem that is not done by the time the timer beeps.

I have also not been sitting here seriously considering public school. I have not been praying for the Lord to remind me of why I'm doing this in the first place, because for the life of me, I cannot remember at this moment. Sad that it's the very first day and that's where my mind is.

And one more ... it is not my sweet son who is insisting on playing with every loud toy in the house while his sisters are trying to work. He really is being sweet and playing nicely ... just with everything L O U D. Nope, not my child.

Friday, August 21, 2009

Everybody needs an Aunt Nancy

Pin It The year was 1987.

I was very young and very clueless.

I was headed off to college away from home.

At the time I thought I was ready for this. Looking back? Maybe I was not quite so much ready. Intellectually? Sure. Emotionally? A little less sure.

Nevertheless, off to Baylor I went.

I didn't really know my Aunt Nancy, Uncle Albert, and cousins Amanda and Clay all that well at the time, but they lived about twenty minutes from my dorm. The next closest relative was my grandmother, at about an hour and a half to two hours away.

I don't think I had been away from home even to go to camp at this point in my life, and although I had spent a ton of time at my bff's house, she also lived in the same town as my parents, so it was safe to say I had really no experience being away from home.

Oh - and I also had a car with some issues. Or maybe it was the driver who had some issues. It looked cool (it was a Mustang) but it seemed like every week there was something else that needed to be done with this car! I should probably mention that I just barely knew how to put gas in the thing, much less how to check anything on it or how to do anything with it.

So here I am dropped off at my dorm, so not ready for this, even though I thought I was. I was completely clueless, still kind of learning to drive, and had a car that was a little less than reliable. Plus absolutely no sense of direction. (Still plagued with that particular problem.)

Enter Nancy and Albert.

They have no idea what an enormous blessing they were to me. Albert spent a ton of time under the hood of that car. (and giggle ... I remember him asking once when the last time I checked the oil was. I'm sure I gave him some blank look. Oil? Is that something I'm supposed to check??) I don't think I could count the number of meals I ate at their house. Their house was a refuge to me because it was far enough away that I could completely escape from college life. Aunt Nancy took me shopping and got me familiar with Waco. They all just really helped to make it feel like a home to me. And yet, not once did they ever make me feel less than the independent person I thought I was. (Which was a total illusion - I was the least independent "away at college" person ever, but that's another story.)

So today, my nephew is moving not far from me to start college. I'm the only relative within a short driving distance. I really hope to be his Aunt Nancy.

(Can we just take a moment and all be thankful that he doesn't have a car? Because I distinctly remember my aunt pushing my car out herself after I got stuck. I love my nephew, but I'm not sure I love him quite that much.)

You know, I can't remember Nancy and Albert ever once asking me to babysit. I've ... um ... already asked my nephew to babysit. Maybe I need to take some *selfless* lessons from Nancy. (Even though, let me reiterate -- if he gets a car and gets it stuck, he's on his own.)

Anyway ... I haven't seen Nancy a ton since my Baylor days. They moved far far away, and then I got married and moved away before they moved back. Uncle Albert has since gone on to be with the Lord. I really am so thankful for that time in my life with them, though. They made a difficult (for me) situation so much easier to deal with.

I really hope I can be John's Aunt Nancy. To notice needs and just fill them. No big fanfare or anything, just seeing something that needs to be done and doing it.

And in case I never said it at the time, thank you Nancy. You have no idea the difference you and Albert and the girls made in my life.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

I am just so tired!

Pin It I said in my last post that I was feeling unmotivated. I think it's because I am just. so. tired.

I mentioned to someone on the phone today that I was asleep early last night. Early meaning I was asleep by 11:30. And this is early?? Before Jim left I was asleep between 10 and 10:30. That works best for me. Here's the deal though -- I have a night owl. If I get her to bed too early, I get all kinds of whining. If I get her in bed by about 9:30, she'll be asleep by 10 or 10:30 on a good day; closer to 11 or 11:30 on a bad day. I really don't like being asleep when there are children awake, which means I don't even think about going to bed before about 10:30. I really crave some quiet time every day though, which means after she is finally asleep, I stay up for a while just enjoying the quiet in the house and relaxing, or straightening things up around the house or whatever. By now it's close to midnight. Then there are some other issues -- getting up one more time to make sure the doors are locked, just checking on things, etc. So then I finally get to sleep.

Next problem. I am the world's lightest sleeper. The dog rolls over in her cage and it wakes me up. The cat chews her food and it wakes me up. The birds eat the dog's food and it wakes me up. The a/c turns on, the a/c turns off, a car goes by, ice falls from the ice maker, a lizard burps ... you get the point. (Except the lizard thing. That was an exaggeration. I don't think I have ever really been awakened by a burping lizard.) Part of this is due to the before mentioned anxiety issues and part of it is due to just my nature.

And then there's yet another problem. The boy wakes up at dawn. He comes in and jubilantly announces that the sun is up and nicely requests his chocolate milk. I respond with a joyful "mmpf" and pray that he will just crawl in bed with me and go back to sleep. One morning in twenty this works. The second time he requests his chocolate milk, it's not as nice. The third time he pulls out that boy voice.

So how do I fix this? I'm really looking for suggestions here. I can't change her clock or his clock, and I can't change the fact that I need at least a short while every day where someone isn't making demands on me. I could try to take a little less quiet time and get to bed a little earlier, but I don't think thirty minutes is really going to help all that much. I'm sure I could look into some sleep aids to help with the light sleeping, but I'm really scared to do that.

So ... do any of you have suggestions? My children will thank you for any help you might be able to give me. Have I mentioned how grumpy I get when I'm tired?

Monday, August 17, 2009

I'll Take "Struggles" for $1000, Alex.

Pin It Answer: Motivation, Motivation, Motivation.

oh oh oh~!! I know!!

What is Melanie's biggest struggle right now?

ding ding ding

It's like an enormous problem. I mentioned earlier that I had postponed the start of school, yet again. Want to know why? I have ALL of our stuff sitting here. I have my planner sitting here. EVERYTHING is sitting here. It's all kind of lurking and leering at me. I can't seem to find the motivation to just do it and actually get started. We did get some stuff done today because both girls can just jump in and go with their math. So that's something, but I still need to figure out where to start Madelyn in spelling and get the DVDs ready, and get some lesson plans done. This is really not a huge deal - our curriculum is DVD driven. Lesson plans consist of "on THIS day, do THIS lesson and THIS page in your book." Not rocket science or even anything that is going to take too long to do. I JUST NEED TO DO IT.

Exercise. I tend to do really well in short spurts. Then something happens - someone gets sick or we go out of town or something, and the motivation wanes, TO NEVER RETURN AGAIN.

I really am not happy with this part of me. I do want to seek contentment, however, I still have to do the things I need to do, and I don't see slothfulness being on the list of things I need to do, anywhere. I certainly don't want to be content in sin and laziness.

I'm hoping that by posting this, I'll either gain some motivation, or at least let y'all know how to pray for me.

Not Me Monday

Pin It


Good morning friends!

I did not wake up with some kind of tummy issue going on today. Because of this, I'm not seriously considering delaying the start of school ... again. And for the record, this is not the 47th delay. Actually I was thinking of starting off slowly anyway, so a day of math and spelling might be just the ticket.

I did not get a little over-zealous in the filling of the freezer for convenient meals while hubby is away. Nope, not me. I did not stuff the freezer so full that I have no idea what's even in there, and I have not found that it's too much trouble to dig through it. I am not looking at the stuffed freezer with a fair amount of nerves considering that it's hurricane season. It really is not me who has had to clean out a disgusting fridge/freezer after power losses the past few years. It really is not me who has no one else to pass this yucky task off on this year, should it happen again. For that reason, we're eating from the freezer this week. Sliced ham and fajita veggies ... it's what's for lunch. Yum. (As a side note, I'm REALLY wishing I had labeled food a little better. Gives a whole new meaning to mystery meat!)

I do not, again, have a mountain of laundry to deal with today. :-/ With that said, I need to close this post and get going on it. SIGH.

What have you not done today?

Friday, August 14, 2009

Why the change?

Pin It Was "Pressing Forward", now "Seeking Contentment". I think this is where I am in life right now. Seeking contentment with my life situation, seeking contentment with myself personally, seeking contentment in my motherhood abilities, seeking contentment with my family. It may be a surprise to some of you, but I definitely have some high maintenance in me. Okay, maybe a LOT of high maintenance, and I know to at least a few of you, that is NO surprise! I'm spoiled and have found that being spoiled works pretty well for me. I like things the way I like them and don't like change so much.

The Lord has been working on me for a while in the area of contentment. Just to be thankful for what I have and not continually strive for more. This has been since long before Jim left, or was even planning to leave. The girls both had the same verse to memorize in AWANAS last year: Be content with what you have because the Lord has said "never will I leave you or forsake you." So we can say with confidence the Lord is my helper. (Hebrews 13:5) Let me just say -- if I'm going to be content and not continually strive for more more more, I definitely need the Lord to be my helper.

And it's not just material things. Maybe that's part of it, but not even the bulk of it. It's just a struggle with discontentment, and I'm not entirely sure I can even put it into words. I've tried to explain it but then what I write either sounds stupid or doesn't make sense. I've given up trying to explain it.

Here's a "for instance": I'm sitting here planning our homeschool year right now. This is a big struggle for me. I want to do it all. I want to have children who sit at their desks and look at me and say "Mother, darling, what shall we learn today?" And then they do their work without arguing or complaining. I want to direct them without having to make *that* face. I want to be content with me as a teacher and with them as students. This is kind of in opposition with my desire to push them further and further along. To let go of some of my ideals and yet to do the best job I can by them, and to not expect them to be superchildren but to still challenge them. It's a fine line and a big struggle for me. We have everything laid out and just need the plans made. I'm trying to do that now and well ... I want to be content with who I am and who they are, and trust that the Lord who called me to this task is sufficient to equip me for it. Be content, He is my helper.

Anyway ... there's more, but I think this is enough of a post for now. :)

So ... what do you think?

Pin It Like it? I do!

An explanation post is coming up soon. I know I say that a lot. This one is actually written already, but I'm having a hard time saying one thing without sounding stupid. LOL

Thursday, August 13, 2009

Wonderful Wordless Wednesday

Pin It Except that:
a) it's ... um ... no longer Wednesday. I was too tired and too sunburned to upload these last night.

and

b) it's virtually impossible for me to REALLY have a wordless post. Especially now, as I'm the only adult in the house. I have way too many words that aren't getting used up.

We went to the SPAR park in Sulfur, LA yesterday and had a fabulous time! I love that park. It's big enough that the older kids have a good time, and yet small enough that the mama doesn't have an anxiety attack trying to keep track of all the little ones. Oh, and the shallow area is perfect for three year olds!!

(One question though ... we jumped into the pool and the friendly lifeguard told me Brendan's arm floaties were not allowed. WHY?? He didn't really need them in the shallow part, but it would have been kind of nice to turn him loose in the deeper part too.)

Oh yeah, the wordless part.

Evidently Madelyn was pretending to be a fish on a hook or something:


Meet my niece, Kelli. There HAS to be some hair product that would make her hair look JUST LIKE THAT when it's dry.


He jumped in approximately seven billion times. He hollered out "CANNONBALL!!" every single time.


He loved the slide, as did Madelyn. Check out her action. The little camera did pretty well! (um, yeah, no way is the big camera coming near randomly splashing water!)


Brendan was delighted with these jets that he could stand on and make stop.


I just missed him laying down right next to her. Now that would have been a cute pic!


Gabbi did not want her picture taken so I had to sneak one in. She's so sweet to her brother!

Sunday, August 9, 2009

Weddings and Going Home

Pin It We had a fabulous weekend. The kids and I loaded up to go to Trinity yesterday. I wanted to attend the wedding of a friend and visit with family and just relax a bit.

Note to everyone: relaxing and having a three year old do not mix. Just so we're straight on that. Relaxing means putting the three year old in someone else's care.

The bride was a girl I used to babysit. Unbelievable that she's old enough to be getting married. I still see her in my mind as a ten year old. Funny that I HAVE a ten year old.

I remember so well Christie and her sister Cindy as little girls. I loved these girls! I taught both of them in Sunday school for years and just got to be a part of a lot of their growing up. It's amazing to reconcile the young girls they were when I left for college with the young ladies they are now.

(btw ... Christie, I know you're on your honeymoon right now and won't be reading this, but you are directly responsible for my fine french braiding skills. I remember like it was yesterday being at GA camp and you wanted your hair french braided. I remember thinking that I really wanted to have a little girl someday with hair just like yours. I got my wish. :) And she has greatly benefited from my fine french braiding skills. Sorry that you had to be the guinea pig though! I remember distinctly being a SLOW LEARNER on hair matters!)

The wedding was beautiful, and I thoroughly enjoyed the company I had. Gabbi and Kelli (my niece) went with me. Weddings are always fun, but attending a wedding in the company of an almost 11 year old and an almost 10 year old was extra special. They were delighted with every aspect of it. I was actually fearful for the taller people in front of us because during the beginning of the wedding, the girls could not see the bride. Thankfully they could at the middle and end, otherwise I'm afraid there might have been an attack.

I have to say it's a little odd attending the church I grew up in after many years. Lots of the same people were there and it was very nice to visit with them. It's just funny because on one hand I felt like a young girl again, and on the other hand, I turned 40 this week. And then the kids that I knew way back when are all grown now. Just an odd feeling.

For the longest time I just wanted to go back THERE. I loved that church, I loved the people in it. I had a hard time when I got married because I married, quit my job, and moved all at the same time. Quite an adjustment, and for the longest time, I just wanted to go HOME, home being back there. Other than hurrications and weekends here and there, I haven't been back a whole lot. Even with that, Trinity has always felt like HOME. It was an interesting moment today when we drove back to our house and realized that here is now home. The church I attend is my home church, after I thought my church in Trinity would always feel like my home church and everything else would be just marking time until I could get back there.

(Interesting that it's at this moment in my life that it feels that way too, but I'll save those thoughts for another day.)

Don't get me wrong - I love Trinity, love my family, love my former church family to pieces. I am so thankful for the impact they made on my life. It just kind of surprised me today to drive *home* and look forward to coming to *my* church and actually feel like I was at home, where I was supposed to be.

Just thoughts rolling around in my mind as I drove home today.

Christie, I wish you all of the happiness in the world in your marriage! It was a beautiful wedding and I'm so glad I was able to be there. Cindy, I was delighted to catch up with you, and I can still hear your song in my head!

Wednesday, August 5, 2009

Forty

Pin It


Suddenly forty doesn't seem quite so old.

I had a fabulous birthday filled with some of my very favorite things and people. Micah kidnapped me for the day, Rhonda kept the kids. They had a great time, I had a great time, life is good.

But FORTY?? Okay, I can be in denial and all, but yeah it still does seem pretty old.

The good things --

my hair is not gray (unless I stretch the color for too long)
I'm not wrinkled (one of the benefits of having some fluffiness) ;)
I have as much energy as I did twenty years ago (I was lazy then too)

hm ... okay, this list is starting to be a little depressing.

And I DO NOT want to go there.

So ... I had an absolutely fabulous birthday, and life is good!

Monday, August 3, 2009

Not Me Monday

Pin It


It is not me who is looking at August on the calendar and wondering where our summer went. It's not me who intended to get a history class done, a math class finished, a couple of book studies done, and some serious homeschool organization done. It is also not me who didn't do a bit of it all summer long. It is also not me who is disgusted with herself for not doing any of these things! In the interest of full disclosure, it's also not me who has set a start date for school several times and pushed it back for one excuse or another several times. Stuff like stubbing my toe hasn't been one of the excuses either! ;)

I am not, tonight, spending my first night EVER all alone in my house. All three kids will be at a friend's house for the night. I'm not sitting here climbing the walls in advance, wondering what I'm going to do with myself. I might just take a bath ... and SHAVE!! (because I haven't been realllllly lax on the shaving lately or anything like that ...)

And one more ... I am most certainly NOT going to be 40 this week. NO WAY. I'm still young, and 40 is ... not young ... so I can't possibly be going to be 40. Unfortunately my hair and body all think they belong to a 40 year old, so I should close this post right now and go do some ... um ... maintenance. ;)

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Weeks Seven and Eight

Pin It Well, I was doing really well keeping up with this until the last couple of weeks. Other than a Pampered Chef party and my sweet friends coming over last night, I got nothing. No idea what we've done the past two weeks. We've been less busy, I can say that. It's been kind of nice!

Oh - we've had a couple of milestones, and one is sharable.

Brendan had his first sleepover with a friend! Evidently he had a great time ... not quite sure how I feel about not being missed! LOL He has slept over at Rhonda's house before, but this was his first time to do a real friend sleepover.

Maybe I'll do a better job of keeping track of our activities this next week.

(as an aside ... a big change is coming soon ... and I'm excited!) :D