Extraordinary Faith for Everyday Life
Emma’s 9 month old toes, freshly painted, ensconced by my own, as I hold her, help her be.
Emma’s toes 8 years later on the same brown carpet in the same gray beach house looking all grown up, too much like her mother’s but without her.
I may not be holding her, but I’m there. She’s inescapably mine. And I miss her.
It’s been a different week, that’s for sure. It’s been quiet around here. And I don’t just mean my blog.
This week is the annual beach trip for Scott’s family. One of the downsides to being a full-time employee is I can’t just take off whenever I want. I have a set number of vacation days and I have to plan out when I’m taking them. (I KNOW. It’s like a real job and everything!) As a contractor for 10 years, I was used to just saying I’m not going to be here this day and using extra money set aside to handle the loss of income. All that to say: I didn’t get to go to the beach this week. Emma decided to go ahead with my in-laws Sunday and then very last minute Lexi decided to go with her.
So *I* am having quite the staycation. At times, it’s exactly what I need and at others, I’m downright bored and a little lonely. I’ve stayed busy, busy getting some things done that I never have time to like cleaning the oven and finally moving all my bathroom stuff over to the new bathroom. I am definitely enjoying the freedom to do what I want when I want and also don’t find myself guilty over being gone at work all day. However, cleaning the oven is really not too fun overall. I guess maybe I should have just parked myself in front of the TV or book and refused to move to really get some rest. I will do that some tonight. The thing I’m most excited about is heading out to see Beth Moore last minute tomorrow night since the kids will be gone. I hope to be fully refreshed when they get home this weekend!
Tomorrow is our big Department of Health inspection for the adoption so say a prayer about 10am! God already performed a small miracle by getting Scott to finally agree to put his guns and bullets in two different locked locations. I finally had to half-yell things like “THEY DON’T CARE THAT YOU’RE A POLICE OFFICER! IF A KID WANTS TO USE A GUN HE WON’T CARE IF YOU HAVE A BADGE! IF YOU DON’T WANT TO DO THIS, WE DON’T HAVE TO ADOPT! YOU REALIZE YOU’RE JUST MAKING THIS HARD FOR ME WHEN SHE DOES THE INSPECTION!” Holy cow. Other than that, I think we’re pretty compliant unless they get extremely picky but obviously we could use some prayer 🙂 Hope you’re having a great week!
I started The Me I Want To Be, on my birthday eve last night. And this paragraph seemed to really resonate with me.
Here is the good news: When you flourish, you become more you. You become more that person God had in mind when he thought you up. You don’t just become holier. You become you-ier. You will change; God wants you to become a “new creation.” But “new” doesn’t mean completely different; instead it’s like an old piece of furniture that gets restored to its intended beauty.
I’ve spent a lot of my life trying to be a me that really is a them. In childhood, my parents; in teenagehood, my friends, or those I wanted to be my friends; in my 20s, a me that was a different me. I think in my 30s I’m really starting to understanding what it means to be God-driven you-ier. I don’t have it all figured out, but so far, I like my 30s a whole bunch more than I thought I would.
It turns out a lot of becoming me is not about me at all. Back at Catalyst I signed a card that my birthday gifts would go to Charity: Water. I’ve made a donation for my birthday and have a campaign page set up. It’s a lofty goal, but I’d love to provide 33 people with water for my 33rd birthday. That’s $660 to raise. Consider donating to my birthday page here and set up your own birthday campaign while you’re there.
So here’s to another year of becoming you-ier. Thank you for taking this ride with me.
What in the world is Spotify? That was my first though upon seeing it and probably your question right now too. I am super pumped about it and let me tell you why. Well, let me tell you WHAT first.
When you think of Spotify, think of iTunes. Now instead of there being an iTunes store, think of all your favorite music available for FREE. Yes, FREE. And not even a download is needed.
Just a quick search of Adele and all her albums show up:
And…and…you can add almost any of them to any of your playlists. WITHOUT BUYING THEM.
And…and…you have friends! And you can subscribe to THEIR playlists. For those of us that are playlist challenged, it’s fantastic…you get their playlist AND the music. Below is my friend Sarah’s profile. She published a “Let’s Dance” playlist. I can see all the songs PLUS play them and PLUS add them as a playlist in my sidebar if I choose to subscribe to it.
Is anyone getting how cool this is yet? So what’s the catch?
Well, the free version has advertisements that play in between songs (which I have not found intrusive yet and I hate ads), a limited number of hours you can play it and no, not all the record labels have jumped on board so some songs are grayed out and you can’t play them.
There are 2 upgrade options. The first is the Unlimited plan at $4.99 a month which removes the number of hours. Then the Premium at $9.99 allows not only unlimited time but you can also listen to all these songs offline (you don’t have to be connected to WIFI) AND it will wirelessly sync your music from your computer in their mobile app. No longer do you have to plug your iPod/iPhone up to your computer and sync the whole darn thing.
I can’t imagjne you’re not sold on this yet if you’re an iTunes user. They have some stiff competition here! Now. Spotify is invite only right now but I have great news! I have some invites through my Klout perks I get. You sign up for Klout (simply measures your online “worth”) and get an invite to Spotify as well. If 5 of you happen to sign up, I get the Premium upgrade of Spotify. Win-win. Use THIS LINK to sign up.
Seriously, I was just telling (a different) Sarah this morning that I love it so much that I feel sneaky that I’m using it! It’s been so engrained in our brains over the last 10 years to BUY YOUR MUSIC that playing music for FREE seems oh so wrong. But trust me, it’s all legit. This has been around in Europe for years and it was just released in the US this week.
So go on, sign up and make some playlists. Playlists challenged folks like me are counting on it!
This is an example of the kid conversations you just can’t make up and make parenting FUN. Forewarned it may embarrass some of you. Especially you boys. FOREWARNED.
Emma finds my lipstick bag in one of my old purses and asks if she can have the lipstick. Seeing that I haven’t used that bag or the lipstick in it for approximately 2.8 years I’m guessing I don’t really need it so I say sure. I hear Emma excitedly telling Lexi back in the hall that I let her have ALL the lipstick. A minute later Lexi comes walking in holding up a tampon.
“I think you’re going to need this.” She hands it to me over my computer monitor.
“Yeah, thanks.” I say, hoping she leaves it alone and walks away.
But no.
“Do you use that to go to the bathroom?”
“No.” Lord, please let her leave it alone.
“Do you pee on it?”
Knowing that sometimes it’s just better to go direct with the answers I take a deep breath. “No. I put it inside me.”
Her face scrunches up and she points at her throat. “You EAT THAT?”
More deep breaths. “No, I put it in my vagina. Do you remember me telling you how I bleed a few days every month?” No reactions so I just keep going, “I put that in my vagina so the blood won’t come out. It’s like a cork!”
Her face scrunches even more. “EWWW!” She walks away as fast as she can. And only a few sentences too late.
Deep breath.
*This* is parenting.
OK, first off, I should say thank you. Between the emails, comments and conversations, I feel so loved. So thank you, thank you, thank you for reading, showing support and most of all, praying. Every time a new one would pop up I was all, “Oh, I’m so glad SHE commented!” Seriously, I might freak out more often so I can hear from you guys 🙂
Yesterday the girls got home from their outing and the plan was for Lexi and I having our one-on-one time while Emma went swimming with our guests (more on that in a minute). However, Lexi was immediately putting on her bathing suit and excitedly talking about going out. I was like, “Lexi, I thought we were going to spend some time together?” She thought for half a second and said something like, “Well, I’ll just go out with them for a little bit and we can do it later.” We never did. *sigh* I guess she was FINE after all.
Since last week, one thing I decided to do was have one of two teenage girls that are family friends come over the days I’m at home. That way they are not constantly hearing me say, I have a meeting, be quiet, I can’t right now, hang on and I’m not endlessly getting up to fix some sort of snack. Not that that’s bad for them to learn some patience but all day every day I’m at home is a lot. And it’s too darn hot for me to sit out at the pool these days and work (I know, whine, whine, whine). So one of them is here the days I’m working and so far it’s working like a charm. We did this several years ago when Lexi was about 3 and they still talk about having her over. Summer is only a few weeks more and I think this will be the trick to surviving.
And of course, all your wonderful support and prayers. xoxo
And last night was another mini-meltdown by Lexi. A family friend had invited her on an outing this morning but when I said I’d be home all day, she wanted to stay home. Even giving up a meal at McDonald’s! When I clarified that I’d be home, but would have to work, she lost it and just shouted, “Now I don’t know what to do! I wanted to spend time with just me and yooo-uuuu!!” So we worked it out that she would go on the outing and then her and I would definitely do something with just the two of us later. I can’t tell you how much that squeezes my heart dry.
Thank you for all your support and prayers on yesterday’s post. I joined you in prayer last night and finally feel like I got a smidgeon of a word. He said, “Hang in there. Don’t quit yet,” and of course he finished it off with, “Don’t worry about the kids. They are FINE.” I wasn’t sure whether to roll my eyes or laugh. In any case when he said they were fine, it felt ok.
So don’t quit praying, we’re going to have to figure out this last month of summer somehow. I do believe once school hits, this won’t be such an issue. And if you have any great ideas on things we can do during our one-on-one time, I’d be grateful. Until then, I guess I’ll go New Kids on the Block style and hang tough.
I want to blog about something great I made or wore or bought or read or something. Something besides all the things consuming my mind. I finally took a note from Aibileen in The Help and wrote down my prayer requests. It was a page long. And not wordy ones either. Just people or situations that are taking up headspace, many of which are not appropriate to blog about. I’ve met with at least 3 different friends this week for coffee. They save me from myself. I can’t live without those coffee dates and the $4 coffee is worth every single red cent to get some of that stuff out.
The one issue which I can talk about because it’s all about me is my job. I briefly mentioned Lexi’s break down about hating my job. I do think there were several factors that made it worse that particular night but I think some truth came out. And has since come out two more times since then. Bottom line is she’s having a really hard time with my new work schedule. And I am too.
I think this whole thing would be easier for them if I’d always worked away from home. I know many friends with children that work and know adults (including Scott) who had parents that worked and turned out fine. Better than fine. So I don’t think it’s working that’s so bad. It’s just this transition is really hard. For her entire little life she’s had me at home and now I’m not. I think the breakdown finally happened when it did because we had spent the first 2 weeks of summer on vacation and it wasn’t until the next 2 weeks I spent half the time in the office and she spent ALL DAY at home without me, sometimes not seeing me AT ALL until 5:15 that evening that she realized what was going on. When we started this deal in March, she was in school, saw me each morning and got filled up with love from her wonderful teacher and fun with friends all day. Now, it is very clear that I’m absent. And while Daddy is home with her when I’m gone, there’s just something about having your mother nearby. And my girls are such mommy girls that I think it’s especially hard.
Emma seems better with it. She seems to understand the concept that no work = no money = no Netflix, DirecTV,iphone, pool, movies, etc and etc. In fact, she admitted she LIKES my job for that reason (see yesterday’s post HA). And I guess Lexi isn’t willing to make that sacrifice. She has said very clearly on several occassions she wants me home and not working.
Everyone assures me that they will be fine. Well, to be honest, I don’t want them to be FINE. I want so much more than for them to be just FINE. I’m not looking to survive here, I want them to have the best possible chance they can get. And there’s the rub. If I quit, it’s going to be stressful and hard for us money-wise. Will I be a better mommy or worse without a job and money? If I’m home but we’re not doing much at all and the time I am home I’m constantly saying we can’t do things or get things and I’m stressed and irritable, am I really doing anyone any favors? Will they be just FINE that way too?
All I know is this has been a struggle since the day I started back from leave when I had Emma. I cried like a baby on my day back and follow my blog and you’ll see I’ve been wanting to quit since then. And yet, it’s been 8 years and I’m still holding on. Something has always stopped me from quitting. Greed maybe? Pride? Fear? Or divine guidance? I don’t know anymore. I really don’t know. And it’s upon my heart nearly every waking moment lately. I know, I know we will be FINE no matter what path I choose but right now I’m looking for BEST. What is God’s best for us right now particularly in the face of adding another child through adoption. Just typing that gives me heart palpitations.
I don’t know what to do. I just don’t. Please pray for us. And if you think the answer is clear…if you’re thinking “She just needs to quit” or maybe “She just needs to get over it, they really will be FINE” feel free to share that with me, by email if you feel necessary. I feel like I need some perspective, confirmation, something besides what’s in my head.