Living Life

Such emotions lately.  Naughty kids are rough to parent.  Yes, I may be dealing with kid issues, but there have been those moments that are fresh in my mind a week later.  I am so thankful to be living in the moment.  Some moments are sweet victories simply because I have felt like I'm failing as a parent.  We try to teach our kids hard work, selfless-ness, and some of those things.  Even so, our kids seem greedy, all about "things", self-centered, and think they deserve EVERYTHING.  I'm not trying to have a pity party about my parenting.  I'm also well aware that we're not perfect examples.  But 11 days in a poor country kind of changes your perspective.  Even if it's your 4th trip there.  Ethiopia reminded me of that perspective many times.

We all know how those issues reveal themselves in kids' attitudes and our responses so there's no need for detail here.  What I really wanted to share are the small victories that occurred today.

If you know us, you probably don't see the attachment struggles between Judah and me.  If you know us real well, you've heard about or seen them.  This past week has been good.  And fun.  And I get smiles from Judah on a regular basis, not just blank stares.  Tonight he came around the corner and when we made eye contact, he smiled and my heart warmed.  I'll take that again son!

This morning Scott was discontent about something.  About everything actually.  My reaction was frustration.    When I left in a hurry this morning, he ran to me and hugged me tight.  As we started our seperate ways, he stepped back, looked at me, and hugged me again.  My sweet boy.  He is so considerate of others but tires of being the oldest child who the others follow around.

This afternoon, Bethany asked me more than once if I would just sit with her.  We did that multiple times.  I snuggled her close, she giggled and we both breathed in the moments.  She may have not been feeling good but even so, it was a moment to remember.  She won't always ask me to hug and hold her.

While I love these moments and think they're healthy and necessary, I'm not naive enough to think it will be the fix to the heart issues that have been revealing themselves in the kids and myself.  This week our small group families will be starting to go through the book, Shepherding a Child's Heart by Paul David Tripp.  I'm eagerly awaiting this study and think that deep down my kids are too!

Catching Up

I keep thinking that I really need to write a blog post.  As you can see, that never happens and then I get so behind that I don't know where to begin.  For some odd reason, I think I have to be up to date which is so not true.  After all, when have I ever been up to date??? This can be evidenced by my wardrobe, hair color, etc.  But this isn't confessions of a mom who needs a make-over.

Moving on.

We are were enjoying spring.  The weekend weather was beautiful.  We spent a fair amount of time outside on Sunday.  We followed lunch at mom & papa's by working on our soccer skills.  I am coaching one of the U-8 boys teams and my U-8 boy has some serious room for improvement.  It is clear that he did not get any of his momma's athletic ability. 

My kids have been horribly behaved lately.  I think it's a mix of spring fever, us parents being away for two weeks, and regular 'ol disobedience.  Monday when we got home for the day, I thought it would be beneficial to spend some quality time with them.  Supper would have to wait.  My icky stomach would have to be ignored.  These three little ones needed momma time and boy did we have fun:

Trampoline fun usually involves their Daddy.  But this time, I jumped in on the fun.  They have this little game they play and the kids love it.  Oddly enough, the game is the kids getting pushed over or tripped by Daddy. Pinch hitting in this wonderful little game, I had to attract the kids to the edge of the trampoline so I could push them over and trip them up.  I pulled a creative pinterest idea from the recesses of my brain to add to the fun.  With chalk, I drew a square at the edge of the trampoline and wrote "mom's square" in it and "STAY OFF" around it.  Those two little phrases had magnetic action to my babes.  I put my rockstar drawing abilities to work and continued to decorate the trampoline with chalk.  We had a blast... except for the part where they had to sit still so I could draw a straight line.  

Did you catch that last sentence?  Normally the kids have fun and I assist.  But this time, I had fun too.  Because I was pulling out all the tricks during this quality time, I even did some head stands for the kids:

The last few days were cool but beautiful.  Spring arrived but winter must have been jealous.  They were apparently having a little battle today because we enjoyed a lightning/thunder/rain storm this morning.  The remainder of the week will be cold with chances of snow in the forcast... oh dear!