Please Pray For This Family

This morning a set of twins at our school who we know (they are in 2nd grade, boy and girl) lost their mommy. She had some health problems but it was still very sudden that she passed away. It was this morning right before school. They are not believers that we know of. Please pray for the dad and these precious children who are grieving, and for us to have opportunities to love them and make sure to take those opportunities. Thank you.

Praise and Prayer

I'm still on a blog fast to pray for Haiti. I just came by to praise the Lord for an answer and ask for prayer.
May of last year I had a PAT episode that was scary. Never experienced anything like it before. Nov 2nd I had it again and it was worse. This time I had nausea. It always came with my cycle. I was again told every test was normal, I was healthy and fine. You can imagine my frustration because I knew I did not feel fine, but the symptoms would wear off (the first time they were just that one day and the next day I was at my grandpa's memorial service feeling fine) and I went on hoping it just would not happen again. I was told to watch caffeine near my cycle time too.
Well, last Thursday I was out on a date with my husband and we had just got our food when it happened again. I had to go out to the car and lay down. This time the heart racing with the PAT did not hit me as hard as the faintness and nausea. I went home and the nausea made me puke. The weakness, faintness and nausea lasted a few hours and then I felt better. I was kinda proud I'd made it through without going to the ER and thought that since it was over it would be a while till anything happened again.
Friday my husband had to call in to work. I woke up and nearly passed out, got nauseous and vomited again. I was in tears by this time with frustration. The debilitation of my life was nearly more than I could bear. A mom has to be able to stand up and get her family taken care of and I was so upset that there were no answers. Rick took me to the Med Stop in town when my nausea would not go away. Again, all tests came back good. I had a healthy heart three times over, a healthy blood sugar every time, and my blood work was always beautiful. It was not that I wanted to be sick, but I was beginning to hope something would come back wrong so we would know. They sent me home. Saturday my cycle started so once again I knew there was a connection. I felt okay except for some nausea and a major aversion to food. Sunday, I did not feel like eating much but felt okay.
Monday morning it started up again around 10 am. I was supposed to run to the grocery store and the nausea was so bad again, I knew I was going no where. I decided to call the OB on call since it was a holiday. Thankfully, and Lord willing, it was my OB Dr. who I've had personally for 12 years and who was with me through all three pregnancies and two births. She wanted me to go down to the ER to have an ultrasound done.
We went down after getting our kids situated with friends. I felt so bad dragging Rick around for this and I was really thinking a lot about what love really is when you get to the "in sickness and in health" parts of your life it hits you. This man would do anything for me and he loves me so much. I was so thankful to have him with me.
They were looking for fibroid problems. They found none. After all that the ER doctor said I needed to follow up with my OB the next day but that he could see no reason for my symptoms. He said there was a "little" (those were his words) cyst on one of my ovaries but that would not be causing all this.
I cried some more on the way home.
I was so frustrated.
Rick went on to a dinner BBQ we had planned with our dear friends who had our children and I went home to rest. I fought awful nausea and had three spurts of the PAT while resting. I turned everything off and got out my bible hoping to be comforted in the Word. I could not look down to read without getting nauseated. So, I closed my eyes and leaned my head back and prayed, crying out to God with all my heart. I was shown many things in this time that were pertinent to my life. It was a prayerful pruning session with the Lord and I'm so thankful for it.
This morning my doctor finally got hold of me and had me come in. I had nausea and faintness again in the AM and was so thankful I had not tried to drive myself down. Rick took another emergency day and Superkid had a bad cough and was with us.
Long story short, the ER doctor did not even mention the cyst to my doctor on the phone and it is not a "little" cyst. It is 5cm (2.5 inches) in diameter and the cause of all my nausea and problems. It's throwing my hormones off so much as to cause the episodes of PAT as well. She has scheduled surgery for tomorrow. I appreciate your prayers. I'm a little nervous but willing to go through anything not to have all this anymore. Once it's taken out, I'll have to do some treatments to get my hormones back on track again.
Lessons learned?
God is always in tune and working.
Hormones are so important to overall health and sanity!
Don't believe everything the ER doctor says and get more advice!

I'm thanking God for answering our prayer as to what was wrong.
I tell this story too in case anyone has such strange things happen and everyone tells them they are fine.

I'm Blog Fasting -See You In Two Weeks

I'm taking two weeks to use the time I would blog to pray for Haiti. I'll return Feb. 24th.

Inspiring Follow Up Video's Regarding Part 4a

Hopefully these will hit you like they have me, and help clarify some things in the previous post Part 4a.






Can Armenian believers be Christian Hedonist?
(thought I did not discuss this, I wanted to share it for some I know who have been pondering it)


...also..
I need feedback as to whether this is helpful to anyone. I am debating whether to hit all these segments or to send you where you can find this information for yourselves. I will be happy to continue if it is meaning anything to anyone. Thank you for the feedback.

Christian Hedonism Part 4a: The Problem

Please read Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3 to know what is going on here.
I came back to the "table" of my thinking to finish this off with joy, frustration, and a great sense of being overwhelmed. There is no way to do Part 4 in one sitting. There is just too much for me to write and too much for you to read and I worry if I put it all out at once you will get exhausted of the reading. So, I'm breaking it down into what I believe will be 5 sub parts, both for my benefit in organizing the thoughts and your benefit in receiving them. They will be:
The Problem
The Power
The Praise
The Prayer and..
The Practical
I'm not trying to be all spiritual with the P's, it's just the best way I could come up with organizing the thoughts in my mind. I don't know how long it will take me to get to them either so I will be taking the week off blog themes till I get through them. They were just too important not to miss though.

The Problem:
I said when I ended Part 2 that the problem I felt in myself and other believers in Christ is that we don't enjoy God. That was bleak to me.
Now don't misunderstand, this is not something I'm just coming up with. In fact, what you read here to day will be more from others than from me. It is something the Lord has been trying to show me and I've been amazed at the congruency of his direction on this topic as many different things in my life that "coincidentally" come my way are right along the lines of this topic.
You may not understand what I mean when I say "we don't enjoy God" and you may disagree with me. If we are not enjoying God as believers, then what the heck are we doing? Well, see if any of this sounds familiar to you:
"....once we've been saved, once we've understood and accepted the message of the gospel, the person and work of the Redeemer becomes secondary to what we're focused on- living the Christian life. ....our attention is primarily focused on our performance, on our spiritual growth. We know that the incarnation and resurrection are important truths to our initial salvation, but that's pretty much where their impact ends. "
"We haven't felt his absence because we're so preoccupied with living life for him."
"I believe that most Christians think fondly of Jesus, are sincerely grateful for salvation, and remember his name as a tagline when they pray, but they don't see his work and life as something to contemplate every moment of every day. I have to admit that until fairly recently I, too, pursued godliness without much thought of him."
"In your pursuit of godliness, have you left Jesus behind?"
(from Because He Loves Me by Elyse M. Fitzpatrick)

Here I was studying Piper and then opened the book I was rather begrudged-ly beginning for our ladies discipleship group when I came across this in the introduction! Do you ever feel God is pretty much taking something and hitting you over the head with it!? I felt Elyse stated the problem a little more clearly than some of the more challenging poetic type language of Piper (that I do love, but it can tie your brain in knots within 30 seconds sometimes). Her focus in her book is really on Christ, so it may seem unrelated to what we talked about in Parts 1,2 and 3 but it's not. Why? Because of what is at the right hand of God Almighty, pleasures forevermore....Jesus Christ. They are all connected and therefore her points are completely valid to this discussion.
Now that we've done some stretching with Elyse and started to feel our mental muscles warming up, let's visit the "Jillian Michaels" of Christian thought exercises- Mr. John Piper:
"For many, Christianity has become the grinding out of general doctrinal laws from collections of biblical facts. But childlike wonder and awe have died. The scenery and poetry and music of the majesty of God have dried up like a forgotten peach at the back of the refrigerator.
And the irony is that we have aided and abetted the desiccation by telling people they ought not seek their own pleasure, especially in worship. We have implied in a thousand ways that the virtue of an act diminishes to the degree you enjoy doing it and that doing something because it yields happiness is bad. The notion hangs like a gas in the Christian atmosphere."
The trap for the believer is working out our righteousness rather than enjoying God. We so often put the cart before the horse. We do our duty and hope to find our delight when we need to delight and find that our heart response to God when we do, is nothing we would dare call "duty" at all. Working out our righteousness actually distracts us from Christ and it causes us to focus instead on our measure and the measure of others. We still are not focused on God.
This is a serious thing because it is falling into deceptions of the enemy. Let me try to explain how.
If God's main goal for us is to be happy in Him, what then would the enemy's main target be? Well, it seems that he would be working that we would attempt to fill that with anything BUT God. For the unbeliever that would be through false "happiness" and pleasure seeking of the world. But what would it be for the believer? What would it look like? How would he take our eyes off Christ and have us once again drinking from an empty well? By the very deception that we don't need to enjoy God, but we need to be a better Christian. God calls out to us trying to give us the joy and happiness of Himself, the goal He has had since the dawn of our existence and we sit there with our hands over our ears and our mouths gabbing "la,la,la,la,la!" at the top of our lungs. The only difference is that the unbeliever does not want to hear God say there is more than the happiness of the world, and the believer does not want to hear that there is more than the striving and striving to be holy!
"We assent to these precious truths of Scripture, but we frequently find ourselves living life like practical atheists- not much different from our unbelieving neighbors down the street- except that our garages are empty on Sunday morning. We forget who he is, what he has done; we don't know why it really matters. Because of this, we fail to remember who we are and how he has called us to live."
(Elyse)
This is the saddest of the sad! I believe it's the passion in God's heart when he says to the church of Ephesus that they have forgotten their first LOVE! What were they doing then? Well, the passage says they were doing really good at working on being Christians! Sobering don't you think?

"I know your deeds and your toil and perseverance, and that you cannot tolerate evil men, and you put to the test those who call themselves apostles, and they are not, and you found them to be false;
and you have perseverance and have endured for My name's sake, and have not grown weary.
But I have this against you, that you have left your first love.
Therefore remember from where you have fallen, and repent and do the deeds you did at first; or else I am coming to you and will remove your lampstand out of its place--unless you repent."

(Revelation 2:2-5)

The strong admonishement is just as heavy as those given to the believers behaving as the ungodly! Yet, we seem to not realize the severity of these words.

The problem with the unsaved is their love affair with themselves. Are we falling in love with Jesus just to abandon enjoying Him (and thereby enjoying God himself) only to fall back in the pit of a love affair with ourselves?
I present to you that this is why God called me OUT of homeschooling. NO, I do not mean that all should be called out. Yet, I had fallen guilty of the above, my friends. I had barely a thought of enjoying God and my savior, I was too busy working harder at the Christian life. I was looking for my fulfillment and my happiness in one person's work, mine. You may not struggle with that if you homeschool, but I did and I THANK GOD EVERY DAY THAT HE PULLED THAT IDOL FROM MY LIFE, AND I HOPE HE KEEPS PULLING THEM! (This does not mean it is an idol or form of idolotry for all or any for that matter, for them I cannot speak nor do I dare to presume, but it had become that for me. It did not start that way, but it became that) He may even call me back at some point but I know now that it would never be to me what it was then. When I stopped homeschooling I had to take a huge leap of faith into the very hand of God. I began to acknowledge how powerful and huge he was and how I needed him. I began to be more and more focused on Him every day. He used that to grow my faith. I still struggle with this battle of self-righteousness. I use to want to be godly to keep up with the godly, now my heart has changed to want to be godly because I want to be like Him. "..our desires will be transformed when our eyes are fixed on his godliness." (Elyse) How often I still struggle with that godliness meter I parade around with me. I've been praying lately that God work in me now not to let the enemy have a foothold in my heart toward my brothers and sisters through that stupid meter either as I interact with them in any way. God has no use for such measurements and they dishonor him entirely. They only serve to do one thing and that is puff up my pride. I don't have to worry about others when my focus is on Christ. But, I digress and see the dust of a rabbit trail starting! LOL!
"Instead of humbly receiving the gracious love of our Father and depending daily on him, we want to believe that we really can improve ourselves. God's love is wonderful at first blush, but because it's not based on anything we've done, it humbles us to the dust." (Elyse)
Does it not pain you as it does me that we are just as bad as the world then in not enjoying God!? This is what I mean when I say I put the cart before the horse. I focus on me! I pray for help for me! I ask that I would do better! OH, heavens! I have forgotten my first love, which is NOT me! My LOVE is CHRIST! All that he has done, all that he will do, all whom he is, all he forgave of me, all he will work in me, all he does in the church around me, the world around me, his wisdom, his might, his promises, his peace above understanding. Do you know that if we pondered more the great things to enjoy about God, we would have so little time to fret about our performance. Our performance is pathetic, and it will always be pathetic. So what is the glory in our life? Whatever God does in us and through us, but that which he can only do if we let him and stop trying to grab the wheel of our deceptive strive for holiness!
I have to bring this back around at some point.....
I think that what we mean when we say that God's goal for us is our complete happiness, that this is what we mean, our enjoyment of Him. We enjoy Him by so many means I'll get to later. It's a constant hunger and pursuit, a passion, a delight and a constant need that God fills. Our joy stays with us through it all, but we also pursue our happiness through pursuing enjoyment of God in many ways. If we don't focus on Christ, we do just as the unbelieving and focus on our flesh. Even if the way we do that is by focusing on our Christian performance, that is still us, and it's still the flesh and it's satisfaction is deceptive.

"Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? (Galatians 3:2-3)

"Religious 'flesh' always wants to work for God (rather than humbling itself to realize God must work for it in free grace). But 'if you live according to the flesh you will die' (Romans 8:13). That is why our very lives hang on not working for God.

You may also be discouraged repetitively, depressed again and again, and insecure. Though these are a struggle for us all, the more we understand this view of God not needing our service to Him, the more freed from these we become.

"God is not looking for people to work for Him, so much as He is looking for people who will let Him work for them. The gospel is not a help-wanted ad."

"From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him." (Isaiah 64:4)

"Most of us think serving God is a totally positive thing; we have not considered that serving God may be an insult to Him. But meditation on the meaning of prayer demands this consideration.

Acts 17:24-25

'The God who made the world and everything in it, being Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in temples made by man, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mankind life and breath and everything.'

'The Son of Man came not to be served (Mark 10:45). He aims to be the servant. He aims to get the glory as Giver.

This is true, not just in the days of His earthly humiliation, but even in His glory at the close of the age.

'Truly, I say to you, he will dress himself for service and have them recline at table, and he will come and serve them.' (Luke 12:37)

To be sure, we are called servants- and that no doubt means we are to do exactly as we are told. But the wonder of this picture is that the 'master' insists on 'serving' even in the age to come when He appears in all His glory 'with his mighty angels in flaming fire' (2 Thess 1:7-8). Why? Because the very heart of His glory is the fullness of grace that overflows in kindness to needy people. Therefore, He aims 'in the coming ages to show the immeasurable riches of his grace in kindness toward us in Christ Jesus' (Eph 2:7)

What is the greatness of our God? What is His uniqueness in the world?

Isaiah answers:

'From of old no one has heard or perceived by the ear, no eye has seen a God besides thee, who works for those who wait for him. (Isaiah 64:4)

All other so-called gods try to exalt themselves by making man work for them. In doing so, they only show their weakness. Isaiah derides the gods who need the service of their people"

(All taken from John Piper's Chapter entitled "Prayer" from Desiring God.... I went from thought to thought that struck me. I really do it injustice to say that is all however as reading on your own you will find much more in between)

The obvious question would therefore be what about all the scripture that tells us to serve God? How do we serve Him. Well, first I have to recommend reading this yourself because I'm not getting it all as I just stated in the parenthesis. But here is a morsel:

"The way to serve God so that He gets the glory is to look to Him for mercy. Prayer prevents service from being an expression of pride." Piper

Ah, and there in lies the rub as they say! Pride is self, self is flesh, flesh is me. I'm back to square one where I'm not enjoying God I've started to enjoy me and my fine tuning Christian ways.

I hope you start to see therefore, how this all comes together. It's a lot I know, and there is more important stuff surrounding it.

Next post I'd like to hit the really joyful aspect of the power behind this happiness. Where does it come from? What makes it such a strong desire in us, this pining for happiness?

Please, please, and I say again, please ask any questions and make any statements of thought. I welcome them all.

Menu Monday: You Share

I'm not quite on a roll yet with which cookbook to work through. My kids are off today and I won't be doing my normal SAHM thang today making menu's and cleaning the kitchen out so....I'm crying out to YOU! Yes you, the reader.

Got a favorite receipe you are going to try this week?

Leave a link to your blog in the comments or the receipe itself.

Also, Don't forget to check out Erin's Epicurean Travels for some ethic ideas.

Amy at Not My Words gave a go at the famous Beef Bourgauignon from the fab movie "Julie & Julia". She talks about her mouth watering adventure here.

Lastly, I just started following a blog from the ladies at my bible reading blog who is from Down Under and has a recipe blog. You can check her out too if you mind is on food today. Her blog is That Smells Yum (cute title). I thought it was neat that clicking over to their she was talking about the harvest from her garden about a month ago. It's funny to remember that they are ending their summer over there!

Enjoy...and share, share, share!

btw: don't you want one of those posters in YOUR kitchen, ha, I do!

Side Step Sunday: Exodus 20-22:15

Today my devotional is on Exodus 20-22:15. You can read it here at The Bible In A Year And Beyond site I participate in.
*feel free to comment here or there if you'd like to! It's a friendly crowd over there too:)

Saturday Scraps: 100's Day and Basketball Girl

• Isn't he cute? Yes, he is. He was so excited for a week to work on his 100's day project (celebrating the 100th day of school the kids make a project of their choice using 100 things). He made three different scenes and all of them were great. This was his choice to enter. Sadly, it was judged by junior high kids who had no idea what the early years of Mario looked like. He only played the retro games before we got the Wii. With it's block art it was perfect for lego's. He made a scene where Mario is running through a graveyard to save the princess in the castle at the end. I think these older kids just saw lego's, but we were very proud of him. It was all his idea and his work. I took him for an ice cream sandwich myself (the winners won a coupon for one at lunchtime) to celebrate.



(She is #2)




• Princess had two games this week. My camera stinks in the gym. The girls played their hearts out and even though they lost 15 to 19 they fought hard for it. There are only about 7 of them and the other school was huge (you can see the blue uniforms lined up on the bench) and there were lots of them, all big girls. Rick really loves going to the games. He is such a good daddy, he works hard and fast to be there in time and cheers them on so well. I have to encourage him not to try to coach them from the bleachers but....:) He really should coach but he cannot get off in time for all the practices.



• Lost started....and I'm still confused. Still a fan! However, they better throw this fan some scraps soon or I'm going to howl.

• I have another new blog to recommend. Mary and I grew up in the same homeschool circles. She is an avid reader and loves to chat about what she reads. I like that she has a refreshing layed back outlook and isn't afraid to say what she really likes and doesn't like. Lookout, she is also an Edward fan! Yes, there is a whole new world of Twilight kindreds. *sigh* Her blog is called "A Girl And Her Books" She seems to read from classic to contemporary that I'm not even aware of yet. Check it out! She also will go on my bloglist.

(just a sidenote funny: i was out with a friend this week and the this song came on and we both just stopped talking instantly.....and paused. if you know, you know why *wink* which really, the soundtrack on Twilight was better than the movie itself, but still....*sigh*)

• Scripture concept I've been pondering: "I will make with them an everlasting covenant, that I will not turn away from doing good to the....I will rejoice in doing them good...with all my heart and all my soul. " Jer 32:40-41

Besides that my week has been focused on really working that SAHM gameplan and disciplining myself to persevere in all my domestic areas. It has made for a very nice week.

I'm A Fan Friday

I'm actually excited about this blog theme. I'm worried you'll learn too much about me but I'm excited to share whatever I loved in my life in the week.

1. I'm a fan of Saturday Night Live: The Best of Dana Carvey. At least part one. We have not watched part two yet. I'm even more a fan of watching my husband laugh till he's crying when he watches it. It's on Netflix Watch Now. (Thanks Trish!:)





2. I'm a fan of John Piper's sermon on Exodus about God hardening Pharaoh's heart. I learned a lot about election and predestination and Piper once again made it clear to understand. Well, at least he clearly pointed to the mystery of it...LOL! Not at all a waste of time to listen.





3. I'm a fan of the song "Telephone" by Lady Gaga and Beyonce'. No, I'm not a fan of Gaga herself, she is a little strange (though some of her songs are okay, many are raunchy). I love this song because sometimes a woman just wants to do that....leave it all and get on a dance floor. I don't do clubs but if they were just a bunch of girls needing a night out from home, I'd be there. I don't wanna think anymore...I left my head and heart on the dance floor. I promise, someday I'm shutting all my blinds and playing that to kick it in my living room!





4. I'm a fan of the book we are reading in my ladies discipleship group "Because He Loves Me" by Elyse M. Fitzpatrick. I'll be using some of her thoughts when I finally get to Part 4 of Christian Hedonism. It's really just reiterating so many things I've been pondering.





5. I'm such a fan of sushi. Rick and I both are. He got a Dummy book on Sushi but he says he can hardly read it because he starts salivating. So funny. I want a "got sushi" shirt. There has to be one. The problem is that it's hard to get it for a good deal. I want to learn to make California rolls at least at home so we can have it more. Princess and Superkid got to try some (yes, with the slab of raw salmon on it) a few weeks ago when we brought them home a taste and they LOVED it.




6. I'm a fan of people who think....who contribute, participate, converse, and greet the world with open arms. To those who can do it with grace and truth as Christ was said to do in the scriptures. I'm a fan of them, I like to be around them, and they encourage me to live my own life fully. I'm not a fan of the silent stuffies of the world, nor the obnoxious shouters, but I am a fan of those who have something to say on just about anything in the most friendly of ways.

What are you a fan of this week?

Thankful Thursday

I did not get to the Wed. post that was supposed to be Part 4 of my rant on Christian Hedonism. I've been a little discouraged as to whether it's been helpful or understandable here but I also just have a lot of thoughts to pull together and that takes time and effort I've not had today. Rick was off and honestly, after he took the kids to school we crawled back into bed and watched LOST on hulu.com (....what did you THINK I was going to say?:) Then we had some things we needed to get done. It was a productive day and I sat in the winter sunshine of my living room listening to NPR and sewing patches on Superkid's jeans. Lovely.

I'm doing this post tonight and scheduling it to post tomorrow because I know I have full day. I did not have to work today so I'm doing three hours at the day care tomorrow.

I AM THANKFUL!

• I'm so thankful Superkid rode w/o training wheels for the first time today! He has been ready for a long time but his chain was broke and Rick had not got to it. He took to it like water. No problems. He then came in when daddy had to run an errand though and he came through the kitchen telling me that he wanted to wait till daddy and his sisters got home because he was not sure if his breaks would break or not. I tried to reassure him that they were fine but I did not push it.


• I'm thankful my children make me laugh. Today Superkid said "Is it okay if I pay you to clean my room?" (to me) I laughed and said "No!". He laughed too. Later at dinner he though he knew what was for dessert, said what it was and then said "I've spilled the beans". We all laughed because it was a new phrase for him and then it got even funnier when he added "what does that mean?". "Oh, you don't know? You used it properly" I said. He said Mrs.B uses it in and he thought it was funny but was not sure what it meant.


• I'm thankful the new house cleaning routine is REALLY helping me. I don't stress about getting to everything and then end up getting to nothing. Last night I was going to clean my room while Rick took the crew to Awana but I just was dying for a quiet bubble bath without interruption. I remembered that today was my day to do that and I did get it done today! I don't even have to worry if I get everything done in that room because I can hit it again when that day comes back around. It helps me stay focused on one spot and then the spots add up. *Sigh* it's a beautiful thing.


• I'm thankful that my parenting convicts me. Lately the two on my mind have been how I tell the kids they can't play on the computer until their jobs are done and how they can't eat anything at bedtime when they decide they are hungry at the last minute. I should be just as disciplined on myself.


• I'm thankful LOST started again...but that's so not spiritual.:)


• I'm thankful I can trust God when he gives and when he says "no". I'm thankful I'm not anxious either way. At least not right now:)

NOTE: I have added a new feature to the posts. Blogger now allows you to have an opinion on each one. I LOVE comments, in fact they spur me on to keep this up, so if you have one (really, no matter what little tid-bit it is..it makes my day) please leave it. However, if you just have an opinion on the post click one of the options before you leave if you'd like! Thanks.

Tackle It Tuesday: SAHM Gameplan

My first post for Tackle it Tuesday is just getting my week on a game plan. One of the biggest challenges of a SAHM (which right now I am not a 100% candidate for that but I only work an hour and a half a day at a daycare) is to not let your time go down the toilet. When no one is watching and no boss is checking on you, it can be so easy to procrastinate over and over. Well, at least I do. Maybe you are more of a superwoman than me.

So, I tried this out last year and it worked when I kept it. Don't be discouraged (I tell myself) when life messes it up, just get back on track. Usually I'll get it going and it will be time for a big holiday, or kids get sick, or the car breaks down and something in this is really thrown off. The important thing is doing the next thing and not giving up.

Sometimes housekeeping is simply doing the next thing. Eventually you will get a lot done. Rarely do you get it ALL done and if you think you have, don't hold your breath.

The plan is to have a ball park idea for each day of the week. Somethings however have to be done every day. I know some mom's do laundry all on one day but I cannot because the stacks that have to be put away are just to overwhelming for me. So, I do a load a day if I can.

Here is my game plan:

Daily: One load of laundry

Keep the heart of the home healthy (see below)

Monday: Kitchen/Laundry room -

(I work an extra two hours on Monday morning before starting this so Monday is a big day I have to stay on task)

Weekly-clean counters, wipe down appliances, mop, clean out bad food in the fridge, wipe the fridge inside, update food inventory, make menus, bake goods for the week.

Monthly- Wipe down counters, vacuum cobwebs, wipe high decor items, pick up counter items and clean under, clean counter items, clean inside of stove, dishwasher, and gunk in washing machine.

Tuesday: Living Room/Dining Room

For me these are one big connected area so I lump them together.

Weekly-dust, vacuum, put away items in an organized way, tidy paperwork at the desk, vacuum, clean glass surfaces.

Monthly-oil wood surfaces, clean out old paperwork at desk, clean out window tracks, clean windows and dust blinds, vacuum cob webs.

Wednesday- Master Bedroom and Bathroom

Weekly- Tidy, dust and vacuum. Wash bedding. Clean shower, tub, sinks, etc, and mop floor.

Monthly- Oil furniture, dust blinds, clean windows, organize closet, vacuum cob webs, dust light fixtures, wash curtains.

Thursday-Paperwork Day

This is the day to do any paperwork I need to do but also look for shopping deals, coupons, and organize my list for needs and groceries. This takes more time than you might think to do well. I might look ahead to the next week for menu ideas and see what I need to pick up for them.

Friday- School Aid/Errands

I am up at the school in Superkid's class ever Friday morning. Then it's a good day to do errands. I have not been on this schedule for a few months because we didn't have a car but now I'm excited to do this. It's my day to be in town after staying on task all week. I get what we need and like to stop at a thrift store for fun while I'm out.

Saturday- Morning off/ Family Chores

We take it very slow Saturday morning. After a week of school schedule the kids really love to have a break and so do I.

Weekly- In the afternoon though they have to clean their bedrooms, and now I'm having them start to share the load of their own bathroom. We have many pick up times during the week though so that this task is not long and drawn out. The also vacuum and dust their rooms and wash their bedding.

Monthly-I try to clean their windows and vacuum cob webs. Sometimes some re-organizing of items is needed too.

We are also going to have them vacuum and wash one vehicle every other weekend together. This is a new development and we'll see how it goes.

I'm hoping to start some gardening chores on Saturday afternoons when they are out playing as the weather gets better.

Sunday- Church/Family Outings/Community Group

Sunday is are only real day as a family as Rick works most Saturday's. The important thing about the above routine is that by the time we get to Sunday, we can enjoy each other and just relax.

This is easy to put into a chart and print from a simple computer program. Once it's set up, it can go in your notebook for running the house. I'm hoping to complete mine soon and share about it.

Within all this is of course a keep up plan. The kids unload the dishes and put them away every morning, they pick up their stuff and dirty clothes etc. Otherwise, you don't have time to get through the daily tasks.

When I refer to keep the heart of the home healthy I mean keeping the kitchen tidy. I have found that if the kitchen does not get done first and kept running well, we spend more money on easy dinners and lunches. I also will get discouraged and not want to get up to hit my day if the kitchen is a mess. Every meal, a little work has to be done.