Its 3am & Its Raining

It is 3am & I am W I D E awake. I had the alarm set for 3:30. Why you may ask? No, its not Black Friday shopping .... although, I won't be getting much sleep then either. My little Logan has to be at Brenner's at 6am. WOW! I'm sorry, that's really early for me to be up, dressed, & presentable. At least with Black Friday shopping, I can roll out of bed & put on a hat.

Yes, 6am, which means I have to leave my house around 4:45 .... "just in case". So, I took my shower before I went to bed, but I had to allow extra time to pump his milk. You see, lack of sleep is not even the bad part. I'm used to that. I have to keep my baby from eating when he wakes up. Ug  - really? That kid still wakes up every 2 hours to nurse! And all I can give him after midnight is clear liquids. Yea, so far he's not real sure what he thinks of Pedialyte, but he knows its not momma!

So anyway ... back to why......



I sure hope I see that smile today!



When Logan was born, we had to put off his circumcision because he also has a condition called chordee (caution-link has "adult" material) that needed to be corrected. His was very minor & should be easy to correct but he needed to be 5-6 months old.

Apparently this is a very common problem, but if its not corrected he can have lots of issues later in life. We all know that men don't need anything else to complain about in that area.

Oh, this is NOT going to be a fun day! So say a little prayer for us today! Pray for the Dr's steady hand, for my peace, & for Logan's comfort!

Naturally, as I started typing, I couldn't get this song out of my head.

Who's Your Favorite?

As parents, we try to treat our children equally right? We try to spend equal amounts of time, money, & even discipline. Sometimes that gets a little hard & one child will start to complain that they feel left out or that you love the other one more & that child is your favorite. No matter how much you tell them its not true, the only way for them to really believe you is through your actions.

What about kids? Do they have favorites? Of course they love their parents the same, but from time to time, one of them is the favorite.

I've been on a "oh woe is me" kick lately. I really don't think Austin & Makenzie like me as much as they like their daddy. Makes sense. I am with them ALL day long. I do most of the fussing, correcting, punishing, etc. I teach & reteach lesson after lesson. I have to tell them "Be patient, I'm helping ____". I remind them to clean up their messes. I ask them to help in the house. Then daddy comes home...... YEAH! Its play time. He gets to watch T.V. with them while I grade papers & clean up school. He wrestles with them while I feed Logan. He pushes them on the swing while I cook supper. He reads them a book while I put Logan to bed.

Yes, I can understand why he is their favorite right now, but it still hurts. Oh, I know they love me, but it doesn't change how I feel.

Then God said "HELLO, sound familiar..." Huh, what do you mean Lord?

How many other things do I put before God? How many times have I chosen something else instead of what He wanted me to do? How often does He feel unloved by me? Oh, I SAY that I love Him, but does that help after I have hurt His feelings?

Thank you Lord, yet again, for using my kids to teach me!

Hey There Snow White....Today I am.....Sleepy

You know that fairy tale with all those short guys in it.....No, not the Chipmunks.....No, not the Smurfs either. I'm talking about those dwarfs. We all know them but can you name them?

Hmmmm..... Sleepy, Sneezy, Bashful, Doc, Grumpy, Happy, & Droopy. Oh wait, that's not right. Droopy was a dog, right? Dopey, yeah, that's it.

Did you know that these legendary men are not fictional? Me neither, I thought they just lived in the forest with Snow White. Apparently they are alive & kicking.....& our churches are full of them.

That's right, we had a guest preacher this morning preach on the dwarfs in the church.

• Sleepy - this one is easy. How many times do we look around the church & see heads bobbling uncontrollably? Yep, I'm guilty too. Don't laugh, I bet you are too. But Sleepy Dwarf not only sleeps during church, he also sleeps on God. He can't stay awake or focused long enough to do God's will.
• Bashful - Why can we hoop & hollar (yes I am from Wilkes County Thank You Very Much!) at a ball game or out with friends, but we clam up in church. Now I don't mean we should sit around & talk all the time, but when the Spirit moves you, DO something about it! Raise your hands, sing a song, say Amen, shed some tears - whatever you feel lead to do. Quit pretending to be so shy.
• Doc - oh, that's the preacher right? Well possibly. Today preacher's feel the need for titles & initials after their names. What good are titles if you don't let God lead you. Oh & have you ever been told something based on "a professional opinion"? YEAH - well, in my opinion, there are TOO many opinions in this world. And it seems that they are all professionals.
• Grumpy - um, enough said.
• Happy - isn't it great to be happy in the Lord?! Well, not everyone is happy for the right reason. Some people aren't happy, unless someone else is miserable. "Why are they singing again?" "He's the preacher's favorite." "Why does the choir sing so many songs?"
• Dopey - we are all pretty guilty of getting stupid in the world.

Hey wait - I forgot one. Sneezy - well...........other than that person having allergy issues, I can't think of anything.

So today, I would have to admit that I am Sleepy. Yes, I am physically sleepy, but I have laid down on God. Its time to wake up.

Which dwarf are you?

I am a C

We sing a song at church with the kids

I am a C

I am a C H

I am a C H R I S T I A N

And I have C H R I S T in my H E A R T and I will L I V E  E T E R N A L L Y

Its a simple song & the kids like it, but if you take a few minutes to think about it. I mean REALLY think about it. It pretty much says it all.

We had Austin's football awards program tonight. The guys love getting together for food & lots of goofing around. I enjoy seeing them just getting to be kids. The boys always get so excited about their trophies & secretly, I get excited too. Not because of the reward, but because the coach always tells what stands out to him about the kids. I enjoy hearing about inside stories & personality quirks that sometimes only come out on the football field. Its a good time to recognize how special each boy is. Sometimes, its easy to pick out who is being described.....

When Coach Brian started talking about Austin, he did acknowledge his football skills. But more importantly, he told how proud he was that Austin would lead the team in prayer, how Austin was never afraid to let everyone know he was a christian. Those few words made my heart sing. I couldn't have been prouder if he had said that Austin was the best player he had ever seen.

Even though, Austin doesn't always make the wisest decisions, Christ still shows through in his life. Can people say the same thing about me?

All in all, God blessed me with a pretty awesome kid!

Betty Homemaker - I am not!

I have made several references here lately to "Super Mom". We all know how incredibly crazy my life has been. Thankfully, it slows down somewhat during this time of year. Good thing too, or I might miss the Holidays. Anywho.....

I have some sort of deep seeded desire (as backward & unpopular as it might be) to be "the ideal (not perfect - well not completely anyway) wife, mother, & all around woman". I want to have a nice tidy house that always smells fresh. I want to have hot meals on the table at their respectable time. I want to have obedient children. I want to have an abundance of time left for just whatever. Do you see the pattern here? I want, I want, I want. Has our crazy world built up an attainable dream with outrageous demands? Or have we, as women, placed that much pressure on ourselves?

Whatever the answer is, I have come to the terms (at least for the time being) that somehow I cannot be everything every day. Some days, I get my house cleaned & supper fixed but I have neglected quality time with the kids. Some days, we have an awesome day with school, but the house is a wreck. Some days, I get lost making hairbows & have completely forgotten to fix supper. Some days, more often than not, I push the laundry off of my bed & choose to go to sleep.

Yesterday really opened my eyes........ As I was going through a cabinet to make room for baby food - yes Logan is already big enough to be eating baby food! Where has the time gone? - I started checking some jars of pickles that I had canned a few years back. I had to dump out a few about a month ago because they had unsealed {On that note....Have you ever checked a lid & had you finger go THROUGH it? - Yep, I did}. So I'm checking them just to make sure. Lo & behold there's a seal that has unpopped, and another, and another. UGH! I through out about 5 or 6 jars of canned goods.

In my defense, these were some of the first things I canned, so I was still learning.

Then, I go out to the building for a box & think to check the freezer. I had sent the kids out the night before to put a few groceries in there & wanted to make sure the food actually made it to the freezer & the lid was shut, etc. I open the lid & hear "drip drip drip". What is that? Why isn't there any ice around the top? Why does it not feel super cold? Ah yes, I know, because I UNPLUGGED it!

Why would I do something so stupid? Well, it seems that the other day I vaguely remember removing the battery charger from my car (lovely children left the doors open all afternoon while we carved pumpkins), unplugging it, & placing it in the building. What didn't dawn on me was the fact that the battery charger was plugged into an extension cord along with the freezer. UGH!

So we emptied the freezer & had to throw out several things & ALL of the milk that I had pumped for Logan! UGH! UGH! UGH! Do you know how much time & energy that was?

But.....I had a clean kitchen, finished hairbow orders, had supper ready on time, & made it to church. The laundry will eventually get folded.

Tales of a Homeschool Nothing ~ Acceptance, Admittance, & Adjustments

I have been struggling so much this school year. I have no problem admitting that. I feel like I am still in - what I call - "survival mode". Most days, I am doing just enough to get by & its starting to catch up with me. Even though Logan has gotten on a decent routine, I am still getting up with him 2-4 times a night. That can really wreck havoc on what little bit of common sense & judgement that I may have previously claimed to have had.

Don't get me wrong - I'm NOT complaining, I'm just stating the facts.

I've felt that "something" wasn't quite right, but I just couldn't put my finger on it to begin with. After some deep thought - ok, maybe not so deep, but lots of thinking & searching - I realized that my heart just wasn't into part of our curriculum. I couldn't make our unit studies work. I'm not sure if it was me or if it just didn't fit us, but  e v e r y s i n g l e d a y  was a struggle to get through it. I kept thinking that I would get the hang of it, I kept wanting to make it through Christmas, but deep down, I knew we needed to change.

Sooooo ...... I bit the bullet & returned to the history curriculum we used last year. Tapestry of Grace is a 4 year rotation & we started out with year 2 because I was part of a co-op & that's what they used. We enjoyed it last year, but I guess I needed to venture out & see what else there was.

Unfortunately, I can't afford to buy Apologia for science right at this moment, so I am having to make due. Hopefully by Christmas, we will be able to swing it.

Sunday morning, I spent my extra hour laying in the bed thinking........... I knew when we set out on this homeschool adventure that I really didn't want to teach high school. Unless God completely changed my mind, we would send the kids back to public school when they got older. BUT, Sunday morning, I could NOT get middle school out of my head. This scares me to death! This only gives me another year and a half with Austin at home! Have I made any difference in this short amount of time? Will he have trusted God enough to stand up for his beliefs? Has he really learned ANYTHING?

I just want to follow God's lead for our family! Please pray for us!

Tales of a Homeschool Nothing ~ Week 10 ~ Trust, Daniel, Elijah, Bernoulli, & sick days

Yet again, I didn't accomplish nearly as much as I had hoped for in structured learning. Sickness has dominated my house all week long - snotty noses, sore throats, barking coughs, yuck, yuck, yuck.

TRUST - having blind faith in something or someone

We are still studying trust so we have talked a lot about Daniel, Elijah, Noah, David, & Jesus this week. Its amazing how much my kids already knew about these men.

We have also finished up our study on airplanes, the Wright Brothers, & Bernoulli. I really wanted to take a field trip to an airport, but unfortunately, that didn't happen. Maybe some other time. But we did manage to conduct several cool experiments about air.

I helped Makenzie make a cherry pie for Keepers & Justin took the boys on a nature walk looking for animal signs in Contenders.

All in all, it was a pretty uneventful week.

PINK is NOT my favorite color!

I really didn't like pink until a few years ago. I guess it was too much effort from my mom to turn me into a real live baby doll or some other deep seeded insanity like that. So after lots of therapy (BWAHAHAHA), I have come to terms with my distrust of pink. Afterall, its a nice enough color & it hasn't ever meant me any real harm ..... or has it? **ba ba bum**

So after all these years & my final acceptance of it, how does it repay me ..... it sits on my fridge taunting me ..... ok, not me exactly. Afterall Justin is the one with the lead foot, but it is still taunting my bank account!

Convo went a little like this - *Caution, this is a reenactment, any resemblance to real life persons or events is completely INTENTIONAL*

me: How was your class tonight?

Justin: It was fine until I was coming through Roaring River.

me: thinking *OH NO, NOT AGAIN* What happened?

Justin: Well, I bout hit several deer & then got pulled over.

me: Um, ok, HOW many times have I tried to warn you about your speeding?

Justin: Don't fuss at me. You don't exactly drive the speed limit. I just got caught.

me: Yep, you got caught alright! & How many tickets have you had?

Justin: Just 4.

etc etc etc etc

You get the picture.

YEAH! There was an expense I REALLY wasn't expecting. **SIGH**

Tales of a Homeschool Nothing ~ Revival & Mufaro's Daughters

We took our school pictures at Smoot Park. It was a beautiful day for it!

Well, it wasn't my original plan, but ... we took last week off from school. We had revival & I mean we had REVIVAL! It has been a L O N G  T I M E  since I have felt God's presence like I did last week. I have heard other people talk about that Holy Ghost fog. Last week, I SAW it! It was the most amazing thing I have ever experienced! There wasn't a lot I could do other than raise my hands towards Heaven & cry! PRAISE GOD!!!

The only other thing "school" related that we did involved a John A Walker Center play. Mufaro's Daughters was about an African man with 2 beautiful daughters. Both of them possessed physical beauty, but only one was beautiful inside as well. They were both invited to meet the king in the hopes of becoming his wife. One used dishonesty & cruelty to try to get ahead. The other used kindness & humbleness & won the king's love.

I loved this play! The plot was wonderful, the actors were energetic & the music was enchanting. It is classified as an African Cinderella story, but what stuck out to me was the kindness shown to the king.....

Have you ever heard the story John 3:16? This is what came to my mind! Maybe, it was the state of renewed faith that I had been experiencing this week, maybe not. But I REALLY liked this play!

JOHN 3:16

I don't understand it, but In the city of Chicago, one cold, dark night, a blizzard was setting in. A little boy was selling newspapers on the corner; the people were in and out of the cold.

The little boy was so cold that he wasn't trying to sell many papers. He walked up to a policeman and said, "Mister, you wouldn't happen to know where a poor boy could find a warm place to sleep tonight would you? You see, I sleep in a box up around the corner there and down the alley and it's awful cold in there, of a night. Sure would be nice to have a warm place to stay."

The policeman looked down at the little boy and said, "You go down the street to that big white house and you knock on the door. When they come out the door you just say John 3:16 and they will let you in."

Then he did; he walked up the steps to the door, and knocked on the door and a lady answered. He looked up and said, "John 3:16." The lady said "Come on in, Son." She took him in and she sat him down in a split bottom rocker in front of a great big old fireplace and she went off.

He sat there for awhile, and thought to himself "John 3:16. I don't understand it, but it sure makes a cold boy warm." Later she came back and asked him "Are you hungry?" He said, "Well, just a little. I haven't eaten in a couple of days and I guess I could stand a little bit of food." The lady took him in the kitchen and sat him down to a table full of wonderful food. He ate and ate until he couldn't eat anymore. Then he thought to himself "John 3:16 ... Boy, I sure don't understand it, but it sure makes a hungry boy full."

She took him upstairs to a bathroom to a huge bathtub filled with warm water and he sat there and soaked for awhile. As he soaked, he thought to himself, "John 3:16 ... I sure don't understand it, but it sure makes a dirty boy clean. You know, I've not had a bath, a real bath, in my whole life. The only bath I ever had was when I stood in front of that big old fire hydrant as they flushed it out."

The lady came in and got him, and took him to a room and tucked him into a big old feather bed and pulled the covers up around his neck and kissed him goodnight and turned out the lights. As he laid in the darkness and looked out the window at the snow coming down on that cold night he thought to himself, "John 3:16 ... I don't understand it, but it sure makes a tired boy rested."

The next morning she came back up and took him down again to that same big table full of food. After he ate she took him back to that same big old split bottom rocker in front of the fire place. She took a big old Bible and sat down in front of him and she looked up at and she asked, "Do you understand John 3:16?" He said, "No, Ma'am, I don't. The first time I ever heard it was last night when the policeman told me to use it." She opened the Bible to John 3:16, and she began to explain to him about Jesus. Right there in front of that big old fireplace he gave his heart and life to Jesus.

He sat there and thought, "John 3:16. I don't understand it, but it sure makes a lost boy feel safe."

You know, I have to confess I don't understand it either, how God would be willing to send His Son to die for me, and how Jesus would agree to do such a thing. I don't understand it either, but it sure does make life worth living.