You know when you just get settled into a groove, you see the light at the end of the tunnel called chaos, you start to relax and then life throws you are curve ball?
That was today...my father-in-law Eric lost his job of 17+ years at Microsoft. :(
I don't know what this will mean for Jeff & I (being that we rent their big house and they live across the driveway), but I know it will come in the form of change...again. If there was a theme for the last 12 months of my life it would hands down be "flexibility". Lord help me!
Thursday, July 17, 2014
Finding the Joy
I don't know what my expectations of being a Wife & Mom where as a little girl, but I don't think I anticipated how hard it would be. So hard. I was drinking my morning coffee this morning & I was talking to Jesus, trying to let go of the heavy burden that is motherhood & I heard Him ever so politely say to me, "Find the Joy, focus on the Joy". Where do I find joy in this 24/7 marathon called motherhood?
It is in these eyes...
It is in these eyes...
It is in this smile...
Joy is Auri asking me to stay and snuggle a little bit longer as I put her to bed. It is Luci giving a dozen voluntary hugs a day.
Today I choose to focus on the Joy!
Wednesday, July 16, 2014
Motherhood
Becoming a Mom for me has truly exposed me to the very core & left me undone.
I never thought I was a really selfish person.
I never thought I was an angry person.
Oh, but these little humans that I share a home with have been designed by God to push every button I have & know exactly the right combination in which to bring the worst out of me.
Sometimes I feel like they join forces. Auri starts off whining for a snack after barely touching the breakfast I made her, Luci is yelling because her demands can't be heard over Auri's whining. I have to, with my mind reading powers, figure out what kind of food Luci will eat today & then play the taste & see game. As soon as I sit down to eat & drink my lukewarm coffee they are done & ready to play. Our house is pretty chopped up in terms of rooms & because they are not quite at the age where they can play nice unsupervised for very long at all, I take my food on the go & rarely get to finish it.
Some Moms have girls who are so sweet & docile, content to sit & play with dolls for hours. Not mine! Both my girls are always on the move it seems. The messiest activities are the most attractive to them. They love variety & new experiences, which I blame 100% on my husband. Jeff is kind of the same way in an adult version. He expresses it in his desire for new & gourmet food most nights & rarely agrees to eat leftovers. The girls express it in looking for new activities every 20 minutes.
These days I feel like my whole day is spent on damage control. Toys, food, clothes & random crap is everywhere by dinner time & unless I want to spend my quiet evening time before bed cleaning I have to keep a lid on the mess somehow during the day. Some days I anticipate their next move & can keep the destruction at bay, other days it is a complete wasteland.
My complete inability to function in a messy house is my Mom's fault! Sorry Mom :) She is a clean freak & a control freak. She knows this. She did an excellent job teaching us kids how to keep a house clean & she had very high expectations. The downside is that with two very active girls a little piece of me has to die each day as I learn to live in chaos. This is hard for me. I get mean & nasty when I care more about the condition of my house than the condition of my girls. And the best part is my little 4 year old can spot it so fast, at least I know I am teaching her well on what a bad attitude looks like. She will often say, "Mommy, you're being nasty."
Whether it's Luci waking up too damn early in the morning, Auri finding a $10 tube of anti-fungal cream & rubbing it all over her body, Luci playing in the toilet water, Auri pooping in the front yard, wrestling Luci to just change her diaper or Auri dumping a pound of nails & screws on the shop floor; they are driving my ugliest attributes right out into the open air so I have to face them head on. It's a painful exorcism.
I'm not shocked to see my sin, just really sad & disgusted. I am extremely grateful for the blood of Jesus & His grace. I am learning more about Jesus, His love for me & His commitment to my salvation in this journey called Motherhood, then I ever did in any church service or program.
In the last year I have been stripped down to the most common denominator in so many areas of life that I am seeing it's all about Who loves me, who I love & how I love them.
The 2 words that cross my lips the most when talking to my girls every day are the two words I need the most in my own heart. Patience & Kindness. When I feel my head about to explode, profanity about to pour out my mouth, anger on my lips, if by the grace of God I catch myself all I can think of is: Love is Patient. Love is Kind. I know my girls will never be able to learn patience & kindness until they see it demonstrated in me first.
God help me be a patient & kind Mom.
I never thought I was a really selfish person.
I never thought I was an angry person.
Oh, but these little humans that I share a home with have been designed by God to push every button I have & know exactly the right combination in which to bring the worst out of me.
Sometimes I feel like they join forces. Auri starts off whining for a snack after barely touching the breakfast I made her, Luci is yelling because her demands can't be heard over Auri's whining. I have to, with my mind reading powers, figure out what kind of food Luci will eat today & then play the taste & see game. As soon as I sit down to eat & drink my lukewarm coffee they are done & ready to play. Our house is pretty chopped up in terms of rooms & because they are not quite at the age where they can play nice unsupervised for very long at all, I take my food on the go & rarely get to finish it.
Some Moms have girls who are so sweet & docile, content to sit & play with dolls for hours. Not mine! Both my girls are always on the move it seems. The messiest activities are the most attractive to them. They love variety & new experiences, which I blame 100% on my husband. Jeff is kind of the same way in an adult version. He expresses it in his desire for new & gourmet food most nights & rarely agrees to eat leftovers. The girls express it in looking for new activities every 20 minutes.
These days I feel like my whole day is spent on damage control. Toys, food, clothes & random crap is everywhere by dinner time & unless I want to spend my quiet evening time before bed cleaning I have to keep a lid on the mess somehow during the day. Some days I anticipate their next move & can keep the destruction at bay, other days it is a complete wasteland.
My complete inability to function in a messy house is my Mom's fault! Sorry Mom :) She is a clean freak & a control freak. She knows this. She did an excellent job teaching us kids how to keep a house clean & she had very high expectations. The downside is that with two very active girls a little piece of me has to die each day as I learn to live in chaos. This is hard for me. I get mean & nasty when I care more about the condition of my house than the condition of my girls. And the best part is my little 4 year old can spot it so fast, at least I know I am teaching her well on what a bad attitude looks like. She will often say, "Mommy, you're being nasty."
Whether it's Luci waking up too damn early in the morning, Auri finding a $10 tube of anti-fungal cream & rubbing it all over her body, Luci playing in the toilet water, Auri pooping in the front yard, wrestling Luci to just change her diaper or Auri dumping a pound of nails & screws on the shop floor; they are driving my ugliest attributes right out into the open air so I have to face them head on. It's a painful exorcism.
I'm not shocked to see my sin, just really sad & disgusted. I am extremely grateful for the blood of Jesus & His grace. I am learning more about Jesus, His love for me & His commitment to my salvation in this journey called Motherhood, then I ever did in any church service or program.
In the last year I have been stripped down to the most common denominator in so many areas of life that I am seeing it's all about Who loves me, who I love & how I love them.
The 2 words that cross my lips the most when talking to my girls every day are the two words I need the most in my own heart. Patience & Kindness. When I feel my head about to explode, profanity about to pour out my mouth, anger on my lips, if by the grace of God I catch myself all I can think of is: Love is Patient. Love is Kind. I know my girls will never be able to learn patience & kindness until they see it demonstrated in me first.
God help me be a patient & kind Mom.
Tuesday, July 15, 2014
Baby steps to Saturday, baby steps to Saturday...Jeff has been in DC since last Tuesday and I am losing my mind, no seriously can somebody help me find it. The natives have me surrounded and I hear them discussing whether to empty all the cupboards in the house or just burn it down entirely.
Come home Jeff!!!
Come home Jeff!!!
Monday, July 14, 2014
Thursday, July 10, 2014
Beginning...again!
I have been fighting with myself about blogging and really all social media for many years. To be honest I am a bit overwhelmed by it all, Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, Blogger and I can't name anymore because that is how behind I am. I guess it could be showing my age? Nope, a ton of my friends take to it like a bee in a clover field. I KNOW that Facebook and blogs have forever changed the fabric of our culture and I am curious what the outworking of it all will be. I wonder what it will mean for my kids. Will they know that you can't make "friends" by clicking a button and that just because you think something doesn't mean the World Wide Web needs to hear it? I worry about my own social skills which aren't amazing in the first place. I sometimes feel that part of my brain malfunctioning. The part that helps you engage in conversations and make new friends and grow old ones. I am afraid for how Facebook has changed the way we view relationship and what we define as "knowing" someone.
Anyways, I still have a lot of "issues" with social media that I am still working through. I would rather go out to coffee with you or have you over for dinner, but I understand that miles and busy schedules can keep us from sharing daily life together. So I'm thinking, if my friends & I can keep a little more relationship going in between the face-to-face meetings, then blogging is totally worth it! I suck at calling people on the phone and with two very loud girls in my house all the time the best time to talk is late at night, which makes for a convenient time to blog about the day...or sleep!
I won't blog to make money or build a following, I will blog in an attempt to keep my friendships growing. I will not stop getting together face-to-face, but the deeper I get into my growing family & business and all of your lives being full as well, the frequency of hangouts are less than what I would like. So I will read about your lives and hopefully you'll do the same, because I love you all and truly would spend so much more time with you if I could!
Here goes...
Anyways, I still have a lot of "issues" with social media that I am still working through. I would rather go out to coffee with you or have you over for dinner, but I understand that miles and busy schedules can keep us from sharing daily life together. So I'm thinking, if my friends & I can keep a little more relationship going in between the face-to-face meetings, then blogging is totally worth it! I suck at calling people on the phone and with two very loud girls in my house all the time the best time to talk is late at night, which makes for a convenient time to blog about the day...or sleep!
I won't blog to make money or build a following, I will blog in an attempt to keep my friendships growing. I will not stop getting together face-to-face, but the deeper I get into my growing family & business and all of your lives being full as well, the frequency of hangouts are less than what I would like. So I will read about your lives and hopefully you'll do the same, because I love you all and truly would spend so much more time with you if I could!
Here goes...
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