Still No Car

Day #4 without a car.  I read a devotional book in the morning (most mornings).  This morning, can you believe, the devotion is titled, "Queen of Your Home, part 2 - Watching the Home".  That doesn't sound too bad.  The points are, 1 - To observe, to keep watch and 2 - To lean forward, to peer into the distance.  Again, no big deal.  But the ENTIRE devotional was about STAYING HOME.  ARGH.  Seriously!!!  "Dear mother, don't look at all the other things that you could be doing outside your home."  "Better be there (in the home) than wear a queen's coronet.  Better be there than carry the purse of a princess..."  "Your home is not a prison to restrict your life.  It is a place where God can use you to influence many lives for Him, firstly your children, and multitudes of others who will come into your home over the years."

Sigh.  SIGH.  Ok God.  I think I'm getting the point.

Today is supposed to be 68 degrees.  I was thinking about how much fun it would be to DRIVE somewhere, get OUT of the house, take the kids to a park, take them hiking, take them ANYWHERE.  No car.  So, we will stay home.  We will get laundry done.  I will soak beans to make burritos for supper (since I don't have any canned beans and can't go to the store).  I will make a chocolate chip oatmeal cake (with kids help).  I will read books to the kids, play in the backyard.  I will stay home.  And learn this lesson God is teaching me.

The devotional I'm reading is 100 Days of Blessing, Devotions for Wives and Mothers, by Nancy Campbell.

A Lesson Maybe?

Let's say that you tell your husband on Saturday that you are sick of being in the house, hated being in the house and are going insane.  You miss church the next day due to sick kids and don't leave the house on Sunday.  Let's say that Monday you put one car in the shop, leaving you with no car on that day.  And that night you put the 2nd car in the shop, leaving you with no car for Tuesday.  And Wednesday.  And now possibly Thursday.  Would you say that maybe God is trying to teach you something?

I did leave the house yesterday for 2 hours.  Thank God I had an aunt and uncle in town for a couple of days to take me somewhere!

I Quit

Due to excessive fighting among my children and because I love my kids, I quit homeschooling today.  No, I'm not sending them to school.  I just quit trying to "do school" for a while. 

Lately, whenever I try to read to all my kids (devotions, science, history), there is fighting and interruptions.  I end up in tears pretty much every single time we attempt to "do school".  By the time we are done, I am done for the day. I have no energy left to deal with the kids.  I let them watch videos, tell them to play outside, let them get on the computer.  Anything to keep them quiet and hopefully not fighting.

What will I do instead?  Play games.  Make cookies.  Go to the park.  Read books (but only what we want to read and only what they want to listen to).  Plan our garden.  Plant a garden.  Maybe I will finally have the energy to deal with my kids fighting instead of just hoping it goes away.

First thing on the list?  Make cookies with my 2nd born child.

Mid-Life ???

I think I'm having some sort of a mid-life crisis.  I read a book the other day about "emotional phases of a woman's life" (that might be the exact title, but I'm not sure).  She termed it mid-life malaise.  Call it whatever you want, I think I have it.

It's funny.  I'm content.  I love my husband, love my kids.  I even love having my kids with me all the time and seriously do NOT think about sending them to school.  Yet I keep having this thought.  This is it.  This is life.  This repetitious, boring, mundane, unexciting, hard hard work.  It is life.  We're constantly behind in everything.  Eric works hard, long hours.  The kids are kids.  They squabble and argue and need to be trained and disciplined.  I spend my days cooking, cleaning, teaching, doing laundry, ...  Blah.  And since I have a 2 year old, this is it for the next 16 years.

All this makes me wish we could take a month and just go to Hawaii.  Or California.  Or Florida.  Definitely a beach.  One where the wind doesn't blow constantly.  One where the kids can play outside and Eric and I can just sit, watch the kids, hold hands and talk.  Eat delicious seafood, drink wine, take a walk on the beach.  Anyone else want to join us?  We could rent a bunch of cottages on a remote beach and have a month long vacation.

Teamwork

I think we are in need of some team building ideas for our family.  Does anyone have good ideas or good resources for encouraging teamwork in families?

A Normal Day

With kids around, even a normal day has very odd and funny moments.  Today, as Abigail and I were doing grammar, Josiah kept bugging me.  He finally had his head between my knees and I was squeezing his head, just to keep him occupied.  At one point he looked up at me and said, "nice butt".  Yep.  He's 4.

Later, I told the kids I needed 10 minutes of quiet.  Just 10 minutes to lay down, read a homeschooling magazine and have silence.  Within a couple of minutes, in comes Seth.  He cuddles up next to me and says, "Mom, during church they said that if we live with God we will have joy.  So why am I always unhappy?"  Sigh.  This is not a little conversation and it certainly isn't one I can read my magazine and give a "uh huh" kind of answer through.  So I put down my magazine and chatted with Seth.

Then there's Liza.  Yesterday I said, "aren't you being nice?"  And I meant that she was being nice.  She said, "Yes.  Actually no.  I was mean to Siah and to the Arnica."  (Arnica is a homeopath and she got into the homeopaths and ate some the other day.)

Abigail looked at me today and said, "Mom, I know what causes bruises."  I'm looked at her and said, "O.K.", thinking she's going to tell me how it's internal bleeding...  She said, "Falling out of a tree."  Very very funny.

So there you have it.  A normal day.  I'm sure Rebekah said something funny or profound in the last few days too, but my brain cells are dead tonight!

How Much Grace?

We have a child who struggles with being mean.  She hits, says mean things and can be downright cruel to her siblings.  We have struggled for years now to know exactly how to discipline and train this child for this kind of behavior.  We've tried numerous things and many many days it feels like we are failing.  Today, after she hit her brother, she was put in time out.  I was trying to be creative and called it "prison" and told her that in real life, hitting a person is something you can be put in jail for.  She was livid with me.  Understand, I did this not in anger, but in an attempt to fix a long standing problem.  I let her out of the room after about an hour, when her little sister needed a nap.  She promptly went downstairs to another room and locked herself in (including taking all the door keys in the room with her!).  A funny aside, she even had the nerve to call me to her, through the door, and tell me she needed matches to light a candle in her room.  FAT CHANCE. 

About an hour after locking herself in her room, she called to me again.  I went to her and she had a note in her hand.  I asked her if it was for me and she handed it to me.  This is what it said, "Mercy triumphs over judgment!!!  That is why scripture says:  'God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.' "

Woah.  What did THAT mean?  Since we had extra kids around at the time, I didn't get to talk to her about it until much later.  In the meantime, I obviously spent time thinking about what she meant.  I have given this child ample grace - too much some people think.  I haven't punished enough, haven't been consistent enough, haven't had big enough consequences.  I mean, obviously if I had done a better job she would not behave this way still, right?  Last year, while talking to Eric about all this and praying over this, we both felt convicted that she needed even more grace.  Today I found myself asking "how much grace is enough?  Can you give too much grace?"  Wow.  What a question!  Think about it!!!  How much grace do we want God to give us for our sin? 

Part of all this story is that this child feels her mistakes very strongly.  She agonizes over them, but what she shows everyone is anger.  Not remorse.  ANGER.  She apologizes with an angry tone of voice, she glares at people.  But I know that in her heart she hates what she's doing.  But as her mother, I am supposed to teach her that there is a consequence for what she's doing!!!  How?

I finally got to talk to her tonight.  She told me she wrote the note to encourage me.  And then she said, "you give me more grace and mercy than most people would."  And yet, I don't think I've shown her enough.

So, how do you temper grace, mercy and consequence?  How do you train up a child in the way she should go and extend grace in the midst of it?  How do you teach a child to be kind, loving and not to hit, say mean things and be cruel and yet extend grace?

We ended our conversation with me asking her to come up with some good ideas to figure out how to teach her to not do this.  We prayed together.  I told her that we are on her side - and this she needed to hear.  We hugged and all feels right for the moment.