New Year Dreams

It's a rainy day and I just can't help but look inward and think. I've been thinking a lot about my dreams. Some are attainable and some are not. Some are what my life would look like if it was perfect and some are what it would look like if I just got my act together.

Running...

I dream of being able to run. I've never been able to run long nor have I ever enjoyed it. BL has inspired me so much and my dream is to be able to run a marathon. Next year I dream of building up to that. Right now I dream of the shoes I need to start.

A chicken coop....

Silly, I know but I've always wanted to have chickens. Our friends in WA, the Cowan's built one this year that made me drool. It was SO cute! Good job guys, now come build me one!:) I don't know if we are allowed to even have them but I'm going to find out. I don't know how to take care of them either so this could be a big dream down the road.

To garden...

I have NO green thumb at all. The only instruction I got in gardening was to pull the weeds and remove the rocks. I have everything to learn and frankly don't know where to start. I dream of a garden this year though and a shelf for seedling pots outside that the kids can start things in from seeds even that we get from our own pumpkins or squash or whatever.

To dance...

I really want to take a dance class with my husband someday. I dream of dancing with him.

To sew....

I dream of being able to make things. I come up with lots of ideas but don't know what I'm doing. I plan to get my machine out permanently this year and get my supplies organized. I dream of learning what the heck I'm doing and how to thread my machine. Yes, I'm that bad. I have to read the instructions every time I need to use it. I want to MEMORIZE how to thread it!:)

To learn new recipes...

I dream of working my way through some cookbooks. I dream of compiling what works in a notebook to keep for now and posterity. That will weed out a lot of unnecessary collecting. There are a few vintage ones I'll hopefully never have to part with.

To read the bible chronologically...

Something I've always wanted to do.

Organization dreams...

I am so close to having a place for everything. I really hope this year to finish that off this year and since I hope to stay put for a while, it will be nice to enjoy it for a good long while.

To be out of debt...

We have been working so hard on this and are making progress. My new little job will help us more in the new year Lord willing, and I think this will be a good year if we stay focused.

To loose weight...

I have 20 lbs to go people! I'm so close and yet so far away! The last ones are the hardest and that is why I know I will have to sweat everyone of them off.

To be an active family....

We have a great desire to hike, bike and generally GET OUT more with the kids this next year. We plan to have one to two Sundays a month where we spend the day doing exercises activities. This may be a seaside hike, or it may be going up to the school with our skates or basketball.

Of family evenings together...

My dream is to have a hand project (crochet, hand sewing..etc) to work on for the evenings when Rick wants to sit and read to us all. I dream of getting the girls started on some of their own. Caedmon is quite the artist and loves drawing during this time but I'd love to learn some needle work with the girls.

To remember birthdays and do something about it....

One thing I've been frustrated with my life since becoming a wife and mom is that I cannot seem to remember birthdays of those I care about. I really don't know why but it probably has something to do with my brain forgetting dates all the time. I want to find a birthday calendar and keep a bunch of things I can just give or make for those I care about for their birthdays.

Reading C.S. Lewis...

Rick and I started a C.S. Lewis book club near the end of this year. I would like to continue that all year and read more and more from this man. If I could manage to throw some Jonathan Edwards in there too, I'd be elated.

Writing my book...

I was inspired months ago with a fiction story finally and have not been able to work on it. I really like the story as it's still in my head and I long and dream for time to write. This one may not be very tangible.

Fixing the deck...

I dream of repairing and painting and ....oh, please...putting a roof on my deck outside. Another not very tangible as my husband is very smart but not a fix it guy. I dream of it looking inviting and so much better than the shabby white trash look it has right now. I dream of potted plants around and on it and steps that don't wobble when I walk on them. Ah..alas.

Letting go...

of a lot of things and holding even tighter to others.

Well, I think that is about it. Any dreams for the new year you have?

That's all I can think of right now.

Sugar and Silly String

I told the girls we could not do parties this year. I'm usually the big birthday bash mama because we did not do birthdays when I was growing up so I have this imbalanced set of emotions that I have to make up for lost time (same with Christmas..but I've mellowed on that craziness due to lessons learned!:).

The girls wanted to do a small sleepover party each and I was fine with that as long as it was SMALL. Emma has been excited for months about this event of hers and the countdown has been a constant dinner table update.

Her birthday is Monday, the 14th, but her party was last night. She invited four girls and two were able to come. Only one was planning to sleepover.

They had pizza and soda, played with silly string and then made sugar cookies (well, mommy made the cookies while they played because they were so distracted). Emma does not like cake at all so she requested doing sugar cookies months ago. I tried to get some sprinkles that were more birthday colors to have a oasis event outside of the Christmas around us everywhere.

I tried to capture a picture between the giggles. Aren't they cute!?Using an unbelievable amount of sprinkles!Little brother was happy to benefit from the goodie creations. You can really see his lost top front tooth here too.

Sadly, Emma had a rough time later when her little friend decided she wanted to go home to sleep. She had told Emma she might not make it because she did not sleep over much. They are still so very young, and Emma is more adventuresome that kids her age so it's hard for her to understand not wanting to stay. She had a good set of tears and it didn't help that Victoria had gone to a friends for the night so she was alone in the room even more than normal. It was a sad way to end her fun day but life is that way sometimes. We told her she can do a sleepover soon but you know how it is, at the time it does not console much. It doesn't help either when it's 10pm and you are melting down from fatigue and sugar as well. We felt very bad for her. Ironically, Victoria called at 11pm and wanted to come home from her sleepover a few houses down. Whew, what a night.

I have some fun little plans for her actual birthday though so the party session is not over quite yet!

Life In Five Minutes

Anyone with a blogging hobby knows you start to hear your life in blogs. You are doing something, feel a deep revelation about something, hear a funny, whatever...and you think about blogging it. Or.....am I the only crazy person who hears my life in my head this way? Oh, no.

Anyway...

Lately I just have not had the time for some of the blogging I've wanted to do. So, I'm going to give the the drive thru version , okay?!



Yearly Tradition

Rick and I have a tradition of a treasure hunting day each year before Christmas. We spend the day hopping thrift stores together looking for a steal that the kids or someone we know would love. Sometimes we do amazingly well, and sometimes it's just okay. This year we went on his day off Monday while the kids were in school. We found a few very fun things: some Christian hip music for the girls (and mommy usually likes most of it too:), some books and movies cheap, and a great deal on new (well, new to them) coats for the girls. This was actually my favorite find since Goodwill had a B1G1 free deal going on. I got two great winter coats that were actually quite fashionable for just 7 bucks!



Victoria's Basketball

I was so tickled for my little growing girl. She got in the van after practice the other night and exclaimed "Mommy! I don't huff and puff anymore!". Darlin', I know what you mean and I know how great a feeling that is! I was so happy for her. The gal who was teasing her found out that basketball was a little tough for her too and has backed off making fun of others. She is enjoying it and growing stronger. I'm excited to see her making the goal of her dream. Rick and I really look forward to going to some games in January! She will be decked out in a yellow and green uniform too! It will be a blast to cheer her on. I can't wait.



Caedmon's Tooth

Last night we were watching the season finale of The Biggest Looser (way to go Danny! you da man!) and we were cheering for the gal who won the 100,000 prize when Caedmon exclaims "My tooth just fell on the floor!". So, we transition from clapping and cheering for the contestant to clapping and cheering for him! It took FOREVER! He would hardly wiggle that thing at all. The other other top tooth is pretty loose too and we told him he may get to be two front teeth toothless for Christmas but he does not want to wiggle it. So, we'll see!



Emma's A Business Woman...I'm tellin' Ya!

Emma is a shrewd business woman. She takes her money, buys this big smelly rainbow rope eraser at the school book fair and comes home to cut it into sections. She then sells those sections to her classmates for a profit. She tried to sell her brother some of her stuff this morning to weasel him out of his new $3 from loosing his tooth! I told him not to let her do that. She is very shrewd though, you have to watch out!



Rick Wore Pants!

Yes, this is big Ozfam news. Rick wore his mailman pants the past two days. That means...yes, ladies and gentlemen, he is finally cold. I told him he looks way hot in them (cause he does) and should wear them more. He probably does this 3-5 days a year and that's it. Sigh.



Mommy's Magazine of the Mind Issues

I was going to do a whole blog on this but it won't happen. I looked at a trendy magazine recently and realized it had been years since I had opened one. All the perfect outfits, cosmetics, everything reminded me of how much pressure young women are in to conform. It actually felt like an assault to my senses. It caused me to reflect on how when I was a young mom I really looked to other women who I wanted to pattern myself after. I had to go on a real journey to realize that God had his own nitch for me and I needed to stop striving to attain what I saw as mommy superhero status as I had defined it. The past few years I've been doing the same thing, only with families. It's one thing to look up to people, but it's another to try to look LIKE other people. There are many great aspects of other families that I would love to reflect both in personality, status and accomplishment but the Lord has been showing me that this can be like a magazine in my mind that I let breed discontentment in my situation or restlessness in what He has called ME to. It's funny to me to think that when I was a teen, there was a Christian t-shirt that my parents got me which read: "Be yourself! It's better than a copy!" We really push that when we want teens to not conform to worldliness or patterns of behavior of their peers. Yet, I fight the urge to do the same thing now! It may be within the Christian circles with whom I mingle, but it's still not healthy at all. I've realized that I don't have some of the same resources personality wise and tangible wise, to what some great families do but that does not mean God cannot do great things through who WE are as a family. That is my hearts desire and to be thankful for the resources he HAS given us. My husband is not everyone else's husband, my children are not so and so's children, they are my gifts from God unique to the sphere of this home and upbringing. I want to stop flipping through the magazine I create in my mind.

Emma's Birthday!
Tonight (I started this blog two days ago and am just now finishing it on the 11th! So much for "five minutes!" ha!) Emma is having three friends over for a birthday sleepover. They are going to have pizza, and make sugar cookies to decorate. The sprinkles are NOT Christmas! We have to try so hard to keep the girls birthdays a little oasis from Christmas. She is very excited. I'm bracing myself for being very tired. Somehow I threw my neck out four days ago and it has not been the same since. I'm on tylenol constantly right now. So, hopefully the girls rest well. We just found out only one is actually staying the night so it should not be too bad.

The Lion The Witch and The Wardrobe!
We took Victoria for an early birthday present to see this live at the PCPA theaterfest! It was her first live experience. This story is a challenge to put on live and for what they had to accomplish I felt they did pretty well. Of course, it was my dream to go into live theater both in acting and directing, so I had a few pointers for them that they never heard, but my husband did. :) Still, it was such a fun afternoon with our growing girl! One thing that struck me like it never had in the story was that the Professor says to Susan and Peter the fact that either their sister was insane, a liar, or was telling the truth. Now, who reading here knows why that is significant? Comment. ;)

The New Year!
For the fist time EVER in my life I am SO excited about the new year to come! Why should I not be?! My position in Christ is secure! Heaven awaits, death holds no fear, everything good comes from his hand! Trials will come and he will strengthen! I will fail, and he will use it! I will grow and He will use it! I have all the riches I need in Christ! I REALLY FELT the verse in Proverbs 31 about laughing at the days to come. That is really how I feel right now! I may not look all so spiritual, I may struggle, and I may not look like a gentle and quiet spirit if you know me, but the truth of that statement is something deeper than the surface. I am still and quiet in Him and I delight at anything to come! I'm not sure I could say that years ago. Even this year I had been so enveloped with fears as to how some things will turn out, what was around the corner. My dad's death did not scare me, but it did teach me that YOU NEVER KNOW what lies ahead. That produced a type of somber spirit in me. Now I feel the joy of the morning, the dawning of the day approaching and I know that nothing can snuff that out in my life because the hope, the dawn, the joy are not my circumstances, but my Savior!

Letting My Butterfly Struggle

I've definitely felt the parenting change my life has taken since Victoria went into 6th grade. Remember that book (horrible book BTW) "Nothings Fair In 5th Grade"? Well, I feel it should be 6th instead. This has been a tough tough year for her socially. Having come to the public school just a year and a half ago, at times like this I am so tempted to take her out and shield her from this part of growing up. Homeschooling again tempts me in these moments. Every time God convicts me to hold on, work through it, and let Him do what He needs to in her little life. It is so hard sometimes though!
Victoria is only the second child in her class with straight A's. She performs very well scholastically as she always has. She is self motivated and tells me she has to bring her grade up when she gets B+ on her homework. LOL! This gives me a chuckle as I was not an academic kid and would have been so happy with a B+. I love her spirit of focus and desire when it comes to her grades. She wants to be a Veterinarian and Rick and I are running with that goal as it will help her focus through the tough years ahead. Even if she changes her mind later, she will have the knowledge under her belt and her freedom in direction will be wonderfully open to her. If she does no further schooling and God gives her a husband and family, it still will only help her. Having the goal helps navigate the social roller coasters as well through the Jr. High and High School years to come.
Victoria has been debating for months as to whether she wanted to do basketball this year. She is not very athletic but she just loves basketball. She loved when they played out at recess or PE. She got teased however because she has always been uncoordinated. She never crawled as a baby and her coordination has shown it ever since. Her run is a little funny and her ability to run and bounce the ball is very challenging. But, she loves it. Because of the teasing she was so uncertain as to whether she would try out or not. I was encouraging her because she really needs the exercise at this time in her life. I also encouraged her to do what she loved no matter what people said or teased her about.
This one gal in the class in particular is very hard on Victoria. She teases her for being smart, and for anything else she can come up with. She has always been obviously jealous of Victoria and singles her out for criticism because of it. She recently got in trouble for not keeping her own grades up so Victoria's focus in school work is always a topic of reticule from this girl. As a "leader of the pack" of sorts, some of the girls will be nice to Victoria but mean to her when this girl is in the mix. I encouraged her to make all new friends with girls who were nice to her no matter what, nice to others all together, and focused in their school goals. She has done that but this little circle still comes around now and then and this gal always has something waiting for Victoria to tear her down.
She decided at the last minute to go for the basketball. I was excited for her. For two days the practice was challenging but fun for her. Then, a bunch of new girls decided to join and guess who was in the mix. Yep. Victoria has hard time being able to make the basket from the throw line as well and the coach has them keep shooting till them make it. Right now, she has to move up closer to get her shot. She has very little upper body strength. That's what you get when you are a gal who loves to read (and this is why we were excited for her doing this). The days before this had been tough but not discouraging. Now, this gal started laughing at her from back in the line. The distraction of that made it harder and harder to make the shot. She came home without wanting to do practice yesterday because of this and soreness in her feet. She didn't have great shoes either.
As she told me about this it was just so hard for me! Last week she had a tough week because a friend who was boy was all of a sudden being very mean to her, telling her to "shut up!" and teasing her for "sucking at basket ball". She and this boy had been friends and she had a crush on him for a while so this just crushed her. I wanted to go beat him up myself or at least demand what his problem was. That is how I felt yesterday as well. How dare this gal haggle my child over and over! I was upset and Victoria thought I was mad at her but I tried to explain that I was not but was dealing with frustration over this girl. I tried to encourage her not to let these awful kids dictate what she can and can not do. We also went shopping last night for better athletic type shoes so her feet would have more support.
In the mean time I just battle wanting to rescue her. Then I remember something my dad taught me. He use to tell me the story of the butterfly:

A man found a cocoon of a butterfly.
One day a small opening appeared.
He sat and watched the butterfly for several hours
as it struggled to squeeze its body through the tiny hole.
Then it stopped, as if it couldn't’t go further.
So the man decided to help the butterfly.
He took a pair of scissors and
snipped off the remaining bits of cocoon.
The butterfly emerged easily but
it had a swollen body and shriveled wings.
The man continued to watch it,
expecting that any minute the wings would enlarge
and expand enough to support the body,
Neither happened!
In fact the butterfly spent the rest of its life
crawling around.
It was never able to fly.
What the man in his kindness
and haste did not understand:
The restricting cocoon and the struggle
required by the butterfly to get through the opening
was a way of forcing the fluid from the body
into the wings so that it would be ready
for flight once that was achieved.
Sometimes struggles are exactly
what we need in our lives.
Going through life with no obstacles would cripple us.
We will not be as strong as we could have been
and we would never fly.
So have a nice day and struggle a little and teach well.

That feeling of desperately wanting to help that butterfly and hating that she has to struggle, be knocked about and all of this, is one of the hardest things I've ever had to feel. God keeps tugging on me though saying "nope, nope...don't try to fix this! Encourage her, inspire her, remind her of the treasure she is to me, but DON'T RESCUE HER!" My pain now and her struggle her and now, are determining her strength for her whole future. If I want her to fly and soar, I have to watch painfully and keep my hands off. It's so not easy. I really sense that God is building in her what she needs right now and I am even more scared to death to get in the way of that process.
So, I'm burdened to focus on getting active with her. To help her practice at home, to get out there and run a bit with her. To help her do exercises to build body strength. To support her in her dream to do something she loves.
If all I can do is cheer and run along side, then I'll do it. The rest I have to leave up to God.
Sometimes it's more selfish to guard them, and more loving to let them struggle.

BTW- Have you ever noticed the beautiful gold beading on a butterfly chrysalis? I learned last year from Emma's second grade teacher (who is a butterfly expert and wrote lovely children's book!) that if you mess with these gold beads at all the butterfly will come out black and white! It will not have the beautiful colorful array we see on them. Isn't that amazing? They don't really know why it's there but I think it's to remind us to keep our hands off! What's going on inside is GOLDEN!