The hazards of writer's block

I love to write.  Every November I reminded of this as I head into the Nano season.  (If you don't know what that is check it out: nanowrimo.org)  I love sharing what is on my mind.  I love developing characters.  I love telling stories.  If I am totally honest my least favorite part of writing is editing.

This November it is slightly different for me.  I am writing for the first time in months.   I have not gone this long in between writing since I fell in love with it in high school.  I would tell you how long ago that was, but then I am reminded about how old I am.  But writing again!  A small victory in my life.

After getting sick in August, and having my entire world shifted I couldn't bring myself to write.  I would pull up my blog to a fresh blank screen ready to write.  Ready to let the thoughts that had been zooming around in my head come spilling out on to the page, and yet nothing would come.  The thoughts vanished.

When October rolled around and my best friend asked if I had any ideas for Nano this year I hesitated.  I honestly didn't think I could do it.   I didn't have any ideas.  I hadn't been able to blog in a few months.  I hadn't picked up my journal, or written a poem.  Could I really write 50k words in one month after all this?

Thank God for best friends because she convinced me to try.  What was the worst thing that could happen?  I could fail.   But I would fail more if I didn't even try.  

Now I am sitting here. I am writing.  The words are coming, and they might not be great.  They might need a lot of editing, but I am writing.  

Celebrating Imperfection

Being a mom, and a wife, and having several jobs it is easy to get caught up in the day to day struggles.   I wake up and I have an idea in my head of how the day should go.  I have a list of things I want to accomplish.   I think: Today I will be patient, and kind.  Today I will stay focused on the Lord the entire day.    I will pray first, think after.   I will wake up and spend some much needed time resting in God's presence.  Then I will make breakfast and coffee.  The kids and I will sit together and eat, and shortly after breakfast everyone will get dressed and we will start the list of things we need to get done that day.    If all goes well, we get it all done and even have some extra time to just be together.

I should start by saying that I do have days that go this well.  I love these days.  They are amazing.  It is easy to stay focused.  It is easy to stay calm, and patient.  I can pray at all times, and even pray more than usual with the girls.

Then there are the other days...

I wake up an hour earlier than my kids to spend some time with God, and within 5 minutes I have been interrupted 6 times.  Little feet running around upstairs, or the 2-year-old trying to get out of bed early.  I still manage to get some time in, but it is not as relaxing and as fulfilling as it usually is.

Breakfast is chaos.  There is spilled milk all over the table and the floor.  My blessed 2-year-old is trying to clean up the milk before the dog licks it all up.  She of course, doesn't want help.  My older two daughters are already at each other's throats.   They have chosen to argue over who gets to sit at the head of the table since Dad is still in the shower.   I pour myself a cup of coffee, while quietly saying a prayer.

I know what is about to happen when breakfast is over, and everyone has to get dressed and do chores.  I know that there will be whining and arguing.  I can already tell that today is not going to be an "easy" day.  Today is going to be a day where each step of the way is going to be a challenge.   Today is going to be a day where my patience is tested every step of the way.  Today is likely going to be a day where I raise my voice in frustration at some point when no one is listening when I ask nicely.  Today I am going to be so tired by the time my husband comes home that it will be a struggle to be a joyful wife.

I could get stuck in the hard moments.  Sometimes I do.  Sometimes the struggle of the day overtakes me, and I forget to pray.  I forget to breathe.  I forget to enjoy the more amazing moments.   We all forget sometimes.

Today I am choosing to celebrate.

I am going to celebrate that even though milk was spilled everywhere my daughter offered to clean it up without being asked.

I am going to celebrate that even though my older two fight they love each other more as each day passes.

I am going to celebrate the moment at the end of the day where we sat down to watch a movie and all three of my kids piled on top of me and snuggled in.

I am going to celebrate the moment when I could have yelled, but I didn't.

Most importantly, I will celebrate the fact that through each struggle, and each moment I am choosing to lean more on the Lord.  To pray through the harder moments, to call on God's grace for myself and for my kids.  I am learning everyday that I cannot do it without Him.     I am constantly learning that I don't have to be perfect, but imperfect in the Lord.

I am not your friend

Dear Daughter,

I love hanging out with you.  I love having crazy dance parties.  I love talking about the books that we have read together.  I love the days where we bake, and play and sing.    I love that you confide in me.  That I am the person you trust most in the world.  I love knowing not only your favorite color, but also all your secrets.   I love all the laughter, and all the love between us.  But I need to be clear.  I am first and foremost, your mom...not your friend.

I am here to help you stretch the right boundaries.  To teach you which rules are made to follow.  To teach you to love.  I am here to work with you so that you can become the strongest, and most wonderful woman that God made you to be.

I am not always going to make it easy for you.  I know you don't want to help clean the house, or fold the laundry.  I know that you want to be able to have internet and a television in your room.  I am aware that I am infinitely mean for not buying you a phone when "like literally everyone has one."

When you come to me asking to read a book that is too mature for you, as you did today, I am going to say no.   I don't care how mad you are.  I don't care if you think I am mean.  I don't care if in that moment it doesn't feel like I care about what you want.  I care about you more by not letting you read that book, even if it doesn't feel like it right now.

The bottom line is I DO care.  And it is because I care that I am going to be your mom.    What you need right now is a Mom.    I am here to do just that.  It is not always going to be easy.  I cannot promise I will be perfect or never make mistakes. I hope you can learn from not only your mistakes, but mine as well.  I hope to be the kind of mom that teaches you it is ok to make a mistake.  I also, hope to teach you how to make amends for those mistakes.

What I can promise is to always be there for you no matter how bad you mess up, no matter what the problem big or small.   I promise I will always love you.  I will always be here to help you and guide you.  I promise to help you when you feel unsure, and to protect you when you need it.  I promise to give you a little push when you need to fly, and to hold you back when it is not quite time.

 One day when you grow up I do hope to not only be your mom but your friend as well.  Until then, I am going to stick with just being mom.

Love you!
Mom

Making a bigger story for my kids. Valentine's Day Edition.

I have been thinking a lot about the upcoming Valentine’s day, and what that means for our family.  Ordinarily, Valentine's day is a time when I make pink heart shaped pancakes.  It is a time when I help the girls make their class cards, and we each make cards for each other.    My favorite part is in the morning on Valentine's day before the kids go to school.  I make a bigger breakfast than usual and they each get a very small trinket.    

  I love the holidays and I find great happiness in spreading joy to my family and friends.  I know that my daughters see me loving other people, and they see me giving.  But in a world where they receive so many things I think it is important to show them that their life story is bigger.  Life is bigger than just getting pink pancakes and a Lalaloopsy doll.   

In order to really make this clear for my kids, and to make it fun I created a Valentine's Day challenge.  I created 7 daily challenges.  One for each day leading up to Valentine's day.   Each morning when the girls wake up they will open an envelope that gives them a challenge for that day.   I am hoping that by spending the next 7 days doing things for other people they will see a bigger story to loving other people.  After all,  Jesus came and told us to Love God, and Love Others.    Jesus taught us that love is the most important thing of all.  

I tried to incorporate the challenges with a verse each day.  That way the girls see where the challenges are coming from, and have a better understanding of why we are doing them.   

Here are the challenges:

Day One:   Say something kind to someone at school today.   "Kind words are like honey- sweet to the soul and healthy to the body."  Proverbs 16:24

I think with so many unkind words going around the schools, and the daily challenges and frustrations it is important that my daugthers practice kind words.  

Day Two:  Do a secret service for someone in your family.  "The seeds of good deeds become a tree of life; a wise person wins friends."  Proverbs 11:30

Secret service for us is just at term that means a favor.  Maybe they will choose to make someone else's bed, or do a chore.   It can be any basic act of service.

Day Three:  Bake cookies and deliver them to one of your neighbors.  "Love your neighbor as yourself."  Mark 12:31

This challenge is a little more time consuming, but the time we will spend baking the cookies and deciding who we will deliver them to will also open up a little time for more conversations about why we are doing the challenges.

Day Four:  Spend 10 minutes with Jesus today.  Thank Him for loving you so much.  "But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you."  Matthew 6:33

It is just as important to love God as it is to love others, and while it is more tangible for kids to deliver cookies, or help others I think it is also important to teach them to give time to God.

Day 5:    Call someone today just to tell them that you love them.  "And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love."  1 Corinthians 13:13

I love this challenge.  How much fun is it to get a call from someone just because they love you!

Day 6:  Write a letter or send a card to someone who might be lonely, or who you miss a lot.  "Let love and faithfulness never leave you; bind them around your neck, write them on the tablet of your heart."  Proverbs 3:3

Who doesn't love getting a letter in the mail?  

Day 7:  Think of your 3 favorite things about everyone in the family.  Share your words around the dinner table.  "Therefore encourage one another and build one another up, just as you are doing."  1 Thessalonians 5:11

I  love this challenge because I think it makes our family bonds stronger, encourages each other, and once again leaves us open for conversation.

When the challenge is over of course, I will still be making pink pancakes, and yes my daughters will still get a small trinket.  But I am excited to see how much more their hearts will change from the challenges!!

Rice and Beans Day 5: The day that broke me.

I have to admit it I started off the week pretty excited.  I was somewhat prideful thinking that I could make it an entire week on rice and beans.  I like rice and beans.  Well, I thought I liked rice and beans.  I am not sure that I will like them again after this week is complete.  Not for awhile anyways.  My pride is gone now.

Let me take a second to tell you what I have been feeling this week.  I am hungry.  Hungry all the time.  I can just eaten another plate of rice and beans and within an hour or two I am hungry again.   I am grumpy, and tired.  I have had a headache every single day.  My stomach hurts every single time I eat.

I know I am not alone in this feeling.  I know that everyone who is doing this experiment with me is feeling all of this on some level.  I know that there millions of people around the world are feeling what I am feeling, but worse.  Way worse.  There are people that have much worse than the little bit of suffering I have had this week.

Day five is the day that brought me to my knees.  Day five is the day that when I turned to God and said I need you today.  I need your strength and I need your guidance today.  I need your help to continue on this journey.  I need you to hold me together.  And I got His response.  He said no, you need to listen.   You need to stay in my presence.  You need to let me work through you today.   You need to stop worrying about what you think you need, and trust me.

So that is what I did.  And I broke.

I reached the level of compassion that surpasses charity.  I cried.  I cried a lot.   I prayed, and I prayed some more.

I cried out of thankfulness when my almost two-year-old daughter asked for more milk, and all I had to do was open the fridge to get her some.  I cried out of compassion when I ate my second meal of rice and beans and my stomach hurt so bad I didn't think I could go anywhere.

We started a thankful list at the beginning of the week.  A list of foods we are thankful for, and things we take for granted every day.  We have added a few items every night.  Items like pizza, fresh fruit, and chicken.  I had a whole new level of joy when my daughter asked to add rice and beans to that list.  Why?   Because she was so thankful that she had rice and beans when there was nothing else. And because she knows by eating the rice and beans she is helping someone who would otherwise have nothing.   "Someone out there is going to have clean water because of me mom.  Just because I ate these rice and beans."

Joy.  That is how day five ends for me....Joy.

Rice and Beans Day 3: Cheerful giving?

Day three is here, and I am not going to lie...    I am getting tired of rice and beans.  The good news is I am three days in, I have made it three whole days!   The bad news is that I have four more to go.  It is kind of funny because I start to complain about rice and beans a little bit.  I begin to wonder if I am going to make it an entire week.  And then I remind myself why we are doing this and I am a little ashamed.  

Am I really going to give up?  Can I really not go out of my comfort zone for one week?

The answer to that is no.  I alone, probably could not make it an entire week without cheating.  I am being totally honest here.    I have food in the freezer that I could use, and I have leftover Halloween candy that I could eat.   It wouldn't count towards the money we are saving, and I could argue that it won't hurt anyone if I eat some of it.  But I feel called to do this.  I feel that this week Christ is working through me as I experience this with my family, and with my friends.    It is Christ who is strengthening me enough to do this.   He is the one who extended his grace to me, and now I can extend that grace to others.  

  Below is what I have posted to read whenever I am feeling hungry.   Whenever I feel discouraged because my kids are grumbling about eating rice and beans again.  Whenever I want to remind myself why I am doing this, and whenever I want to pray for those who have taken the journey with me.


“Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
    and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set the oppressed free
    and break every yoke?
7 Is it not to share your food with the hungry
    and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter—
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
    and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?
8 Then your light will break forth like the dawn,
    and your healing will quickly appear;
then your righteousness will go before you,
    and the glory of the Lord will be your rear guard.
9 Then you will call, and the Lord will answer;
    you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I."

Isaiah 58: 6-9
#eatlessgivelife

Rice and Beans: The beginning of the journey

I am staring down an entire week of Rice and Beans.  I am not really sure if I am registering that as a complaint because I have never eaten rice and beans for an entire week before.    I am sure at some point when I am forcing myself to eat rice and beans for breakfast I am not going to 100% enjoy it, but I believe that the spiritual benefits this week are going to far out weigh the discomforts.

The girls and I went to the store and we bought rice, and several different kinds of beans.  (Because you have to have variety in beans, right?)  They are excited to try it out.   Again, I am not sure that they will be excited as the week goes on.  I am trying to include them in the process as much as possible.  We have pinned several recipes on pinterest to try, and I am going to let them help me with the cooking.

I am praying right now that the Lord speaks to my heart, and the heart of my family this week.  That the money we donate from this fast is put to good use.  I am praying for the hearts of the families that are walking down this road with us.  I am praying for the thousands of people that are going to be helped from this project.  That they know that we did this out of love.

Right now I am feeling excited to start, and excited to be a part of something that will bring love and care to so many pepople.  I will let you know as the week goes on what I am feeling.  But for today I will leave you with this!

"God's kingdom isn't about eating and drinking.  It is about pleasing God, about living in peace and about true happiness.  All this comes from the Holy Spirit."  Romans 14:17

#eatlessgivelife