Picture Day: Part 1

I finally spent some time taking pictures of the girls.  I can't share SB's pics, c'est la vie - here are the other two girls.  I say Part 1 in the title because I really need to get more pictures of the girls for their age/milestones.

My husband bought me exactly what I wanted for Mother's Day/my birthday (they're only a couple weeks apart and I wanted a kind of big present).  I got a really nice new camera.  I'm happy with the quality, although I do wish it would take the pictures faster!  

I try to take pictures of the girls as much as I can and I've been meaning to take 2 month pics of SP for well, almost a month (shhh!)  I got them taken when she was about 2 1/2 months, so I think it still counts!

I also took a few sister pics....I'll have to revisit these on a day LB has off school, she wasn't thrilled with having a photo shoot after a full day of school :) (btw - school is going well.  LB enjoys it and my anxiety is manageable....I'd like her home still next year, but we're only on the third week, so we'll see).

I figured out my camera takes stills while you're shooting video...isn't she precious?!!!!

 I included quite a few of SP's shots because her facial expressions are hilarious :)

The first one....not so bad

And then someone sneezed...note the quality of the camera capturing the spit in flight

Back to a smile, but SP is shocked by what just happened

....and a little scared

Hope they gave you a smile/laugh.  Have a wonderful September.  I'm looking forward to getting some projects wrapped up at work, maybe starting a couple at home, finishing some more handmade gifts for friends (pics to follow after they've been given!), contemplating some minor kitchen reno and even a trip south to pack up my brother's family for the move back north close to us (YAY!).  September is going to be hopping!

Everyday Miracles

I think miracles happen more often than we realize.  I find that when I stop, take a breath and take a moment for those around me, I notice the miracles all around.

Last Sunday, LB, SP and I went on a daytrip to see my elderly Grandma in the nursing home.  She has dementia and has her good days and her bad days.  I am grateful for the fiesty grandma I remember.  Every now and then, I see a piece of the grandma from my childhood.

When we went on Sunday, I saw my grandma do something I have watched her do hundreds of times with my younger brother and sisters and the older great-grandchildren.  Sunday, I got to watch her make a little clicking noise to SP. It might not seem like much, but it took me straight to childhood and yet was a moment that went straight to my heart as a mother.  There is something about watching your parents or grandparents with your children that is miraculous in itself.  For just that moment, through the memory loss and deterioration of her body, I saw the soul still inside.  Sometimes our blessings come in rain drops, indeed.

L to R: LB, Great-Grandma, Godmother, SP, (one of my sisters hiding in the background) and my dad

Last Sunday, this is what a miracle looked like.

A New Chapter

Well, today was it....LB's first day of school.  She started 2nd grade after 3 years of homeschooling.  It's been a hard transition for me.  Honestly, it makes me feel really powerless that she's in school all day with other adults controlling when she's allowed to eat, use the bathroom, talk, have allergy medication, and all number of things.  In many ways, I feel like it's failing at homeschooling that she's in traditional school this year.  Having these feelings, I feel almost guilty when friends and fellow parishioners welcome us with smiles to the school year.  Everyone has been exceptionally welcoming and those that we know through church or other activities have celebrated the beginning of LB's school year....so why can't I?

LB asked me if I could hardly wait for school to start.  I told her, no, and asked why would she ask that?  She cited the line from a holiday song, "parents can hardly wait for school to start again".  I told her that I didn't feel that way; that I hoped she had a wonderful time at school, but that I would really miss not spending my days with her.  It got me thinking about our last few years of homeschooling and what I envision for our family in the future.  Truth is, LB going to school isn't the worst thing that could happen.  I think she'll gain some skills that are only gained from being in large groups of people.  She will learn that some people will not be nice and will try to take advantage of you.  She will learn that some people will go out of their way to be kind to a new friend.  Hopefully she will learn to tell the difference.  She will learn how to operate within structure.  She will learn how to play by the rules of a game she doesn't control.   

It's only been one 1/2 day, so I guess I'll have to reserve judgement.  I've told dh that I've paid tuition through November 15th....so we'll see :P  Mostly, I'm just trying not to cry that she's going to be gone everyday.  I'm wondering if other moms have felt this way when their kiddos went to school.  My biggest fear is really regretting some day that I didn't give her all of me when she was growing up.  For now, I'll put on a smile.....and share with everyone how very cute she looks in a uniform :)

Some pictures from our day and the last bit of summer:

A sister moment

No paparazzi!!!

Sweet snuggles

Gymnastics summer camp

New shoes for school!

"Mom, why did you wake me up?"

2nd grade!

"Stand nice for a picture for Grandma"

"Let's take one to send Daddy"

Lining up with friends

Continuing the day's signature move

Headed in for school

"Where did Sissy go?"

"Mom, it's too sunny to stand in front of the school!"

By the way, LB's verdict after a 1/2 day is that she likes regular school better than homeschool, so it really is just me!  We'll see how she feels after a few weeks :)

The Gratitude Experiment

It was harder than I thought to practice a month of gratitude.  I still find myself cranky or asking God for things I don't really need rather than being grateful for the things I have, but thinking about gratitude this month has really focused me on what I do have:

1.  A good husband
2.  Healthy children
3.  A home
4.  2 operational vehicles
5.  Lots of extra creature comforts
6.  Plenty to eat
7.  Friends to laugh (and cry) with
8.  Dreams for the future
9.  A great, flexible work-from-home job
10. Amazing parents, siblings and extended family

But as I've been thinking about focusing on gratitude rather than petitions, I've thought about how petitions are such a central part of leaning on God in hard times and good times.  It's not the petitions that have been my problem, it's the whining-please-make-everything-work-out-without-any-hiccups nature of my petitions. 

When my husband was laid off in 2011, a friend gave me a great verse:

Jeremiah 29:11-For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.

And what a beautiful future it is.  A new baby, a new job for my husband and enough love to go around.  Thank you God for Your plans.

Finding Gratitude

I've had quite a few reminders of just how blessed I am this week.  I have plenty of work from home to keep me profitable, but it doesn't feel so overwhelming that I can't get things like laundry done as well.  It's getting easier every day to take care of two babies, and my heart feels lighter when I contemplate my blessings.  It just so happens that a friend of mine emailed a link to a video on gratitude out to our listserv.  It's appropriately titled "Happiness Revealed". 

Hope you enjoy!

Please pray for a family in our community that suffered the loss of their child to a congenital illness this week.  I remember grace surrounding our family at the loss of our child in an ectopic pregnancy so much that it was nearly a physical presence.  May God bless them in much the same way during this difficult time.

Failure is always an option

One of the hosts from Mythbusters is known to say, "failure is always an option".  I'm not sure whether or not to agree with that, but I've been thinking about failure lately.

While homeschooling v traditional schooling is very much a calling and a personal family decision, sending LB to school after 3 years of homeschooling very much has feelings of failure attached to it.  Intellectually, I may agree with my husband that this is a good thing to try (we'll see how I feel after I haven't seen her all day for a week), but in my heart, there is that voice that says, "you could have done it better....then he wouldn't have decided to send her to school".  God knows that I have failings as a mother, it's a pretty human predicament.  And maybe I could have done a better job, but it's hard to tell because homeschooling doesn't look the same in every family. 

I was very laid back about schooling.  I bought the books and we worked on them.....but not every day, not every book consistently.  They were kind of the general guide of what things we should talk about and learn, not schedules that I felt we had to follow.  A lot of it, I made up as I went along.  And you know what, a kid who cried when we did reading lessons so much that I stopped doing them now loves to read.  She might prefer listening to a book on CD, but she actually told me about a week ago how much she enjoys reading.  "WHAT!?!", I thought, "is this my kid talking?"  How is it that the intuition to back off ended up with the reward of a child who loves to read?  I don't think it's anything that I can take credit for, the reading lessons stopped because I had a gut feeling that they needed to stop for a while.  I think maybe God lives in my gut as much as my heart....that He resides beyond even my consciousness where I get that "feeling" that doesn't always have a logical explanation.  I mean, to teach reading, one would think reading lessons necessary.  Turns out, they weren't for us with LB. 

I do recognize some gaps in her education, of course, like I never really got around to teaching her to tie shoes.  I MEANT to...I even got a special really big practice shoe/foam thing to do it.....but I still haven't.  I really do need to get that done before she starts school in a month.......

She also has a hard time telling time still.  If it's on the hour or half hour, she's pretty good, but I really should have worked more with the stuff in the middle.  She also doesn't write compositions yet.  I've had her write thank you notes as most of her writing practice so far.....but I think with just getting to love reading this Spring/Summer, writing will catch up pretty quickly as she moves through the progression of reading stories to writing stories.  The writing thing, I think I can semi-justify....but not the shoe-tying and clock-reading - those I really should have taken care of by now. 

Another thing I should have done better is networking with other families for social time.  I think this sole factor was the decision-maker for my husband on sending her to school.  He felt like she just wasn't getting enough social interaction.  I pray that the social interaction she has at school is positive.  I ran into a family with a little girl LB knows recently and LB was talking to her.  Every time LB suggested something they could do together, the little girl shot her down and LB just kept suggesting things, undeterred.  The girl was really not very nice about it.  She goes to traditional school and while I'm well aware that homeschooled kids can be twerps, it just added one more thing to my list of misgivings about the coming school year.

As I list the balance of my failures, it's only fair to think about the things that have gone well, like the reading.  I think also her character has been positively affected by homeschooling.  She is a genuinely sweet, kind child.  She is, of course, a child....prone to all the misbehaviors entailed therein, but to her core, she is kind.  My biggest fear is that school will rob her of her innocent disposition that we have managed to maintain thus far.  She has yet to be jaded by the bully, the popular crowd and the antics and politics of a school. 

When we were deciding to send LB to school, I deferred the decision to my husband (1) because he is the head of the household and responsible for such decisions and (2) because I was way too close to the situation to make the decision.  Sending LB to school feels like I am paying someone else to be fired from my job.  I couldn't have done that on my own.  So, as I weigh the successes against the failures of homeschooling, I think the balance may swing to success simply because I was willing to set aside pride and defer to my husband.  Because, really, homeschooling is a calling; it's all about doing what God wants you to do.  I pray that we are and remain where God wants us to be as a family......although I really hope that leads us back home soon.

Baptism and Birthday

The Sunday after we got back from our family reunion, we had the baptism for our newest addition.  So, on July 8th, as my dad the deacon would say, another one was claimed for Christ.

In fact, one of the sweetest moments was when she smiled when the words were spoken, "I claim you for Christ".....I immediately thought, "oh she's going to be a nun!!!!"  I'll try to squelch that over-exuberance and not pressure the poor baby :)

My brother was nice enough to take pictures during the baptism.  He was convinced that all the pictures would be terrible, but as you'll see, there were plenty of good ones :)

Before the baptism

Claiming her for Christ :)

The homily....she's listening intently

Around the baptismal font

Eating my finger to stop screaming :)

Blessing of the water

Baptism

Her cousin drying her off

Calm for now

Blessing her ears

All done :)

The other big event in the last couple weeks was SB's 1st birthday.  It was a sweet birthday.  We celebrated with my parents on Sunday with my sister-in-law who's birthday was a couple days before SB's.  My husband's new weekend is Sunday/Monday.  As luck would have it, Monday was SB's birthday.  She was having a visit with her birth family in the afternoon, so we went out to breakfast.  It was a great breakfast with all three of our babies.  I think the older gentlemen drinking their coffee might have thought we made the restaurant a little too lively, but the proprietors seemed to really enjoy us (they later came over and told us they had 5 children).

An individual birthday cake (she liked the frosting most!)

LB putting $ in the ceiling at the restaurant (it's a special thing at this place)

One bittersweet thing about SB's birthday was the thought that kept reoccurring that this may be her only birthday that we share with her.  It was a thought I had to push down because I felt it leading me down the crazy path of trying to make everything *just perfect*.  The reality is, it may be the only birthday we share with her....or it could be the only birthday we have to share her......we just don't know, and we won't know really for months.  She's been in our lives for a year and the resolution doesn't seem any closer, although, logically, the conclusion is a year closer than it was before, no matter how long it takes.  So, for now, I've got fond memories of her birthday and an ardent hope that there are many more with us.

In my last blog, I posted about my constant worrying/complaining/asking for something in prayer and my new focus for the month on prayers of gratitude.  It's not been a perfect last couple weeks in this endeavor, but even when I find myself longing for things I don't really need this minute or worrying about what the future holds in terms of providing for our children or even how many children we'll have, the reminder to stop asking and start thanking has really been an eye-opener for the attitudes I'm walking around with each day.  It's not been an immediate transformation, but I see a small shift in my internal thinking. 

Here's a story that kind of illustrates this internal shift:  My refrigerator died.  Six years old, compressor kaput.  Naturally, not a fun situation to need a new major appliance, especially one that we all generally rely on to be in constant working order.....my clothes don't spoil when my washer stops working (although washers in their death throes can do some pretty gnarly things to clothes!).  I noticed that my freezer wasn't staying as cold as usual.  I mentioned it to my neighbor, as she offered to let me store my freezer goods in her deep freeze while we figured out what was wrong.  I went home from visiting with her after this conversation and checked on my freezer....the ice cube tray was starting to melt, so I shuttled 5 full grocery bags of freezer goods to her deep freeze.  Then began a purge/cleaning of the fridge and moving everything into coolers (one of which was loaned by the same neighbor).  Well, over the course of trying repairs and ordering a new fridge, it was 5 days that we lived out of coolers without a fridge.  Throughout the entire hassle, I continually worked to shift my thoughts back towards the positive of the situation.  Multiple times, I would catch myself frustrated over the situation and I would repeat to myself, "thank you God for the means to take care of this problem".  I realize that a new fridge in the past might have been a painful expense for our family.  This was a noted expense, but not a painful expense.  There should be gratitude in recognizing that.

I also stopped to thank God for the generosity of my neighbor.  I am grateful that we only lost a few popsicles and a couple frozen pies.  We saved meat, veggies, and most importantly, breastmilk. 

I ended up purchasing a smaller fridge without as many fancy accessories like water dispensing, but also purchased a small chest freezer with the end result that we're able to store more food and have a little more space in the kitchen with the deep freeze located in the basement.  In time, this will help when we purchase a new kitchen table.  We have an eat-in kitchen and when our newest addition starts sitting with us, we'll be out of table space, so at some point, a new table is in our future. 

As I was driving and contemplating my new fridge/freezer situation, I thought about the positives of the whole deal.  I have a new fridge that is more appropriate to the size of our kitchen, I have a new freezer so I can store food appropriate to the size of our growing family, I have a generous neighbor who helped me save all the important things from my dying freezer......all in all, this was the best appliance breakdown possible.  But then I started wondering, was it really the "best catastrophe" or was I simply able to see the blessings in hassle because of my mindset?  I have a suspicion that God has similarly blessed many of my mishaps, but I've focused so much on the mishaps, I've missed the blessings.  So, I'll keep working on my negative/whining/poor attitude and I think the result will be seeing many more of the blessings with which I am constantly showered.