Sorting Things Out

If I were to describe life at this moment in time; it would be that I'm sorting things out.  I'm in the process of organizing my whole house starting with the kitchen with the help of an organizational book rented from the library.  Jeff says that I'm addicted to organizing now; purchasing all kinds of devices and tools to make life easier, but it's true.  It will save time and money later on in the future.  For example, what if we need to find a certain piece of important paperwork, or we can't find the keys?  Jeff might end up late for work, or we might need to reapply for an important document; a birth certifcate, for example (been there done that).  My house is not the only thing being sorted out; my homeschooling philosophy, my parenting philosophy, our schedule, home management issues, and certain endeavours I feel the Lord is leading me into.

One reason that I want to organize my home is so that when it comes time to officially "homeschool" my kids, the house will be running smoothly in working order.  I'm very excited about our choice to homeschool.  There are so many benefits; I can't even begin to list them, but there is one draw back, and that is the huge time and effort requirement which is soooooo worth it!  I can't think of anything more important to invest my time and energy in.  There is a homeschooling convention coming up at the end of July that seems very promising.  I hope to learn a lot and I hope it's an opportunity for Jeff and I to get on the same page.  It seems like Jeff just kind of goes with the flow on a lot of things, and doesn't really lead this family like we need.  It has really been grieving me for a while now, and I've been praying that God set his heart on fire for Him.  Little by little, I see different changes like reading a Proverb a day with the children and cancelling the Netflix subscription, but he still just seems to go along with whatever I want.  I don't know what to do; I just need to trust in You Lord.  I know that You have GOOD things planned for us... 

Anyway, I feel that the most important things I can teach my children right now is how to love the Lord their God with all their hearts, minds, and strength; and to love their neighbor as themselves, and to "drive the foolishness away from them."  It's truly daunting to think of what a huge responsibility I have as a parent, but Lord I trust in You alone, not my talents, my abilities, not my persuasions.  One way to do this is to teach God's character qualities to them, including truthfulness (one of Audrey's weaknesses), obedience, self-control, humility, etc using Bible verses, definitions, demonstrations, and Bible stories.  My biggest desire is for my children to know, love and serve the Lord and others in every area of their lives.  For curriculum, I'm using a learning board with a certain number, letter, theme, Bible verse, song, and character quality posted to it.  We also have a family devotional/prayer time and then a calendar time.  Here's what our schedule looks like:

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	Audrey	Claire
7:00	Wake/Quick Clean	Wake/Quick Clean	√
7:30	Dress/Groom/Bed	Dress/Groom/Bed
8:00	Breakfast	Breakfast
8:30	Devotion/Prayer	Devotion/Prayer
9:00	Calendar/Board	Calendar/Board
9:30	Workbook	Free Time
10:00	Free Time	Workbook
10:30	Quick Clean/Snack	Quick Clean/Snack
11:00	Outside/Free Time	Outside/Free Time
11:30	Outside/Free Time	Outside/Free Time
12:00	Quick Clean/Lunch	Quick Clean/Lunch
12:30	DEAR	DEAR
1:00	Nap	Nap
1:30	Nap	Nap
2:00	Nap/Free Time	Nap/Free Time
2:30	Sing-a-Long	Sing-a-Long
3:00	Quick Clean/Snack	Quick Clean/Snack
3:30	DEAR	Workbook
4:00	Workbook	DEAR
4:30	Craft	Craft
5:00	Quick Clean/Outside	Quick Clean/Outside
5:30	Outside/Free Time	Outside/Free Time
6:00	Quick Clean/Dinner	Quick Clean/Dinner
6:30	Bath	Bath
7:00	PJ's/Teeth	PJ's/Teeth
7:30	Read-Aloud/Prayer	Read-Aloud/Prayer
8:00	Good Night	Good Night

We don't follow it to a T, but it really helps us get more things done...

As for the "certain endeavors" I feel the Lord leading me to, I've been thinking a lot lately about mentoring teenage girls.  I remember being a teenager and feeling out of the loop because of my faith in God.  People thought I was a "weirdo" because I felt so strongly about God and His truth, the Bible.  It hurt to not fit in, but it was very necessary to develop my faith and passion in God.  I was ridiculed, persecuted, singled-out; Satan would throw everything my way to push me off balance, but God had a purpose and ended up using me to lead five girls to Him.  I give Him all the Glory.  I didn't want to switch schools in the middle of high school, but I totally see His purpose in retrospect!  Anyway, God's not done with me yet.  He is sooo good!  I feel a desire to teach and facilitate a class on worship.  The Lord has brought so many ideas into my head.  I want to teach them to worship in "spirit and in truth" reading a Psalm every class, to teach chords, to pick a worship song to play according to an attribute of God (faithfulness, truth, mercy), and to discover what these things really mean; not worshipping God with emptyness, but in truth.  I would give an assignment each week to embed His truth in their hearts.  It's all kind of jumbled in my head right now, but I'm excited about what the Lord has given me!  Oh Lord, lead me in Your ways...Your timing.

*Audrey's a daredevil: she put her choo-choo up on the slide, sat atop it, and came barreling down scraping the left side of her face and reopening a gash on her forehead
*Audrey came running into our room, tripped and plowed right into my hope chest (hence the gash on forehead)
*Over Madison's house, under Jeff's supervision, Audrey jumped on the trampoline, lost control, cut open her lip on the coils before flying off the trampoline
*conversation with Daddy:
*Claire said, "I will hit the bad people in the head with the trash can, stomp on them, and then I will eat them"
*Claire said as she's whipping a belt around in a ninja stance, "I will fight them, I will go to jail and hit them, and then I will drive them" Sounds like Jeff has made a good influence...! Hey... she said she will only fight the bad people in jail!

It's tough being a mom!

Wow, it's been a while...  With adjusting to life with a newborn and going through the holidays, things can get a little overwhelming, but boy am I enjoying it all.  Today especially seemed to grind on my nerves.  Namely, Audrey was a lot of drama. 
Josh's bedtime is at around 6pm and I tell the girls to go downstairs while I feed him and put him to bed just to let him wind down before bed.  The girls, however, decided it would be a better idea to stay upstairs and make lots of noise keeping their brother wound up.  I separated them and put them in timeout for disobeying.  Audrey thought it would be funny to carry on in her bedroom.  After feeding Josh, I put him down, then on to Audrey.  Because of her ongoing desobedience I decided she would get a spanking and on to bed a little early, but noooo.  Audrey threw the biggest fit I have ever seen from her.  She wanted the door open, and would not stop screaming until she got her way.  I knew from this point that I had to stick to my guns and win this battle.  I spanked her again and told her to stop screaming because brother was trying to fall asleep.  This happened back and forth four times until she switched the subject.  "I want you to tuck me in!!!!!"  But I said, "No, I already tucked you in, besides, you're in trouble."  I warned her, "Audrey, if you're still screaming when I leave this room it means more spankings...  Make the right choice; you don't want more spankings." But she wasn't ready to give that stubborn girl.  She earned four more spankings after that until finally she gave up.  Her little bottom was probably all red!  It's tough being a mom!

He's Here!!!

Yaay! He's finally here and so worth the wait.  He was born at 5:35 am on Wednesday, September 29th, 2010 at 8 lbs 2 oz and 21 inches in length.  I guess he didn't want to share a birthday with grandpa, but he came close. 
I had been experiencing regular and sporadic contractions all week long before his birth so it was so confusing when he would arrive.  We took dad out to Manuel's for his birthday and the contractions started again sporadically. 

They became more intense and regular at around 10 pm Tuesday night.  I let Jeff sleep a couple of hours in the beginning stages of labor, and then I woke him at around 1am Wednesday morning to take me to the Birth Center.  We arrived at around 2 am and I was 4-5 centimeters dilated.  I remember feeling soooo exhausted the whole night.  Jeff walked with me for about an hour.  It was so beautiful and cool outside, and the stars were crystal clear.  I came inside at around 3 am and laid on the bed for about another hour almost falling asleep in between contractions because I was soo tired.  I got in the tub at around 4 am and soon after sat foward and felt a different urge... which I thought was the urge to push.  Our midwife Ce Ce Dirks checked me and said I was only about 6 centimeters dilated.  It was disheartening to only make that little progress for all the hard work I was doing.  I would soon find out that that urge I was experiencing was the beginning of transition.  I felt the only way to cope was to make low moaning noises pushing the sound out of my mouth as if I was letting my body open up and push the baby out.  It was unbelievably hard.  It only took about two to three pushes for Josh to come out.  I held him in my arms and couldn't believe it.

He is so precious... so sweet.  I felt such a huge bond with him the moment he arrived.  So far, he has a very calm temperment, and he loves to cuddle and stare into my eyes.  I've been hogging him.  Poor Jeff hasn't been able to hold him that often.  I love to snuggle and take naps with him.

Everyone that was there at the birth mentioned how beautiful it all was.  The Lord gave me an immeasurable amount of strength and peace, especially during transition and delivery.  He answered my prayer during transition.  If I could use one word to descibe the way I felt, it would be joy... pure joy! It was pure joy to hold my son for the first time; to love him, cuddle, and kiss him.  Audrey and Claire love him, and they are both his little mothers.  They both want to hold him all the time. 

It hasn't been perfect though.  Breastfeeding is extremely hard this time.  I cannot get him to open his mouth wide enough to get a good latch, and it is extremely painful to nurse him.  My nipples and cracked and bleeding, and it is not fun at all.  I think I would definitely give up if I didn't love him so much.  I just have to perservere.

A Trying Day

I woke up this morning at 5 am with good contractions lasting 30 seconds to a minute and 6.5 minutes in between each contraction.  Of course the contractions decided to eventually taper off and get me all excited for no reason.  I want to have Joshua so badly on my dad's birthday.  It would be so special to me.  I guess there's still time and I know that God has a perfect plan.

The girls also have been giving us a lot of trouble today.  Claire wanted me to scoot her chair back so that she could get down from lunch, but when I scooted her back, she threw a fit threatening to hit her cereal bowl all over the floor.  Before I could take her cereal bowl away, she did just that.  I lost it!  I spanked her three times out of anger and dragged her to the time out corner.  I eventually sent her and Audrey upstairs because they were driving me crazy, and when Jeff passed by their room he had seen that they had gotten into the furniture oil.  It was everywhere; all over their beds, clothes, wood floors, and furniture.  I am so glad it is their nap time!   I am too exhausted and pregnant to deal with this mess.  I need some peace and quiet around here!!!  I know I'm eventually going to laugh at this moment, but for now I am just sick and tired.

Lord, thank you for my blessings...

new change to my blog

I love the way my friend Stephanie writes little moments throughout the day that make her smile.  I'm going to start adding comments at the end of my post with a * symbol starting now!

* the way Claire snuggles in Daddy's arms and pretends to be eating by smacking her lips and putting her fingers to her mouth while sleeping
* the way Claire whimpers like a little puppy when I cuddle and kiss her
*how much Audrey knows about letters and how to write them
* how Audrey writes a random row of letters and tells me, "It says I love you Mom"
* how Audrey dresses her and her sister up throughout the day and changes clothes 5 or 6 times a day!
* how Claire draws all over my painting because she wants to be able to draw something pretty like me
* the way Audrey and Claire still both fit on the toy choo choo train while Audrey pushes them around with her legs

I feel like I haven't been living victoriously in the last part of my pregnancy... I've been anxious, impatient,  selfish, and grumpy.  Instead of trusting God, I find myself questioning Him...  I'm sorry Lord for my attitude.  So many times I correct my daughters' attitudes when mine needs adjusting most.  I've been super impatient because I've been expecting Joshua for a couple of weeks now; probably because Claire came at 38 weeks and Audrey at 39, so I expected Joshua to come earlier.  Lord, I know You have great purposes in all that You do and don't do.  Please help me to trust You.  I'm sorry.

Thank you for all the blessings in my life.  Audrey and Claire make me so happy!  They are my sweet little girls and I know You love them even more!  Thank you for loving them and caring for them even more than I do.  I need all the help and guidance I can get Lord.  Show me how to lead them to You in all we do. 

Stephanie and Sarah came over for breakfast yesterday to celebrate Steph coming back from Iraq.  Jeff's sisters are so sweet.  Stephanie is thinking about applying to the Sheriff's department this month.  I think that would be awesome!  I'm so glad she's back home safe and sound...

Lord, I also pray that You keep me safe and sound during childbirth.  Heather, in small group, shared this verse from 1st Timothy 2:15 with me.  "Neverthless she will be saved in childbearing if they continue in faith, love, and holiness, with self-control."  "She will be saved" is translated from the greek "kept safe and sound."  I never understood that verse and always took it the wrong way.   I'm so glad Heather shared her wisdom with me.  Lord, help me to be content in You laying my anxiety down at the foot of the cross.  You are in control.  You are good.

Prayers Answered

Thank you Lord for making us well before Josh comes... You are so good.  I'm sorry I can be so impatient!  I just want him to come now!  David and Tiffany had Kynoah today in the late afternoon; 6 lbs 13 oz.  It just makes me want Josh even more...  Lord I trust in You...

Phillipians 4:6-7 brings me comfort, "Be anxious for nothing, but in everything, through prayer and supplication, with THANKSgiving, make your request known to God; and the peace that trancends all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus."  Lord please give me peace.  You know my heart and you know I want to have my baby in my arms right now; I'll just wait for Your timing and give thanks for everything you have done... Thank you that you have healed my family so quickly.  Thank you that Joshua and I are healthy.  Thank you for my two sweet daughters and the best husband and daddy in the world! Thank you a million times!

Jamie was over again this past weekend helping out and being there in case I go into labor.  What a big help! Even though this week has held record highs (105 degrees), it was still nice to get out and walk around the neighborhood.  We went to the park first thing this morning. I also washed the van today with the girls and really tried to move myself around; squatting and standing and leaning back and forth.  I'm doing all I can to go into labor.  Our neighbor Cody said, "Arizona, if this doesn't induce labor I don't know what will.  You're one tough woman!" 

So there it is...  I'm just waiting.  I should probably start up a project or something to distract myself.  Maybe I'll finish sewing the wet bags or start the artwork for Josh's room. Maybe I'll go to Michael's tomorrow!