A Gentle Rebuke

It's been a weird week to be one of my kids.

I've really been out of sorts and I don't even know exactly why.  I HATE when I can't pinpoint where my emotions and feelings are coming from.

Anyway, I would try so hard to keep it together and not lose my cool.  It was all the little things piling up, which made for a not-so-little reaction on my part.

I've been overly sensitive and underly compassionate!

So naturally I took it out on my poor kids.

I can talk about controlling the tongue to my littles until I'm blue in the face, but it isn't going to do a lick of good coming from a mama who can't control her own tongue.

I've been around long enough to know several things:
1 - I have got to get it together!
2 - I am allowing Satan to have a foothold in my life by continuing on this way.
3 - It is better to talk openly about my struggles than to try and pretend that everything is ok. (like my crankiness wasn't enough to give that one away, ha!)
4 - God will not allow us to deal with things that are too much for us to handle with His help.  You have to ask for help though!
5 - Children are WAY MORE SENSITIVE to what is going on in your life than you realize.

After spending some quiet moments (locked in my bathroom) praying about my attitude, I came out and  apologized to my kids.  They each gave me sweet hugs and told me they loved me and that it was okay.

A few minutes later, while cleaning up the house for the 4th time in an hour (that's just ONE of the "little things" that sent me over the edge) Zeke looked over at me with the most serious look in his eyes,  yet speaking in the most loving tone, and gently rebuked me.  He said, "Mommy, you have sin in your heart when you yell at us."

Yup, our little prophet strikes again!

I heard that!

I received it!

The Lord just used my sweet boy to gently rebuke my behavior and open my eyes to the fact that my kids are truly affected in so many ways by my actions.

You better believe I spent the better part of my evening last night asking God for forgiveness, wisdom and a breakthrough.

So, I took the 5 things I knew from above and formulated a game plan.

This game plan was going to help with #1 and eliminate #2.

I called a family meeting over mac-n-cheese at lunch today and put #3 into action.  The kids and I brainstormed about things that make mommy frustrated and grumpy and talked about how I need help from them and from God because I can't have a happy heart on my own.

We devised a secret code that only WE will be able to decode (along with my privileged readers, of course:).  When I feel overwhelmed and the urge to pull my hair and scream, all I have to do to enlist my little helpers is yell out "GM! GM!" That stands for "Grumpy Mom" and they will stop what they are doing and look around to assess the problem.  If they realize that it is a mess that is about to send me over the edge they have 3 minutes to straighten it up before "GM" comes with a trash bag and "cleans house".  If it is because of bickering they better work it out and quick.

It was very eye-opening to hear my kid's perspective about the things they think set me into a tizzy.

#4 is a true reality and I am embracing this on a daily basis as I learn to be the mommy that each of my littles need me to be, which will hopefully mean that #5 will be more positive next week than last.

Close And Personal

From Chaos To Control - Baskets

I may or may not have a basket fetish (to go along with my cute water bottle and pocket book fetishes).

Anything can be hidden and stored and organized in a basket!

I hate when I have a pile of little"ish" things that need a home but they look so messy just sitting in a pile for all to see.

I store EVERYTHING that loosely sits around in baskets.

Baskets for the kid's dishes.

Baskets for medicine and towels.

Baskets for entertainment center "stuff".

Even baskets for decoration

and easy access.

You pretty much can't go wrong with a basket and you don't have to spend a lot of money on them either:)

You can get really cool, cheap baskets from IKEA, Ross's and Marshalls.

Everyone Has A Voice

With so many little voices at the dinner table it can become nearly impossible to carry on a conversation with any one of them, much less have a family discussion about our day.

So, we came up with something to give everyone a voice at the table.

We now have a "speaking token".  Actually, it's just a random domino that I found under the couch cushion and was too lazy to put away:)  But it serves its purpose none-the-less.

When we had the "extended colony" last week this token was a LIFE SAVER on more than one occasion.  We used it to take drink orders, which I highly recommend.  The sanity level in the kitchen was much more manageable by passing our speaking token around to ask politely for something one at a time!

Not only does our speaking token give each one of us a chance to talk about what has been going on in our lives, it allows for the much-needed, but sometimes neglected, lesson of listening.

I love to see the kids faces when they are trying to think of just the right things to tell everyone.  Karis was the cutest!  She LOVED being able to express herself and have the floor all to herself.  We encourage responses to what others are saying and it helps us encourage one another.

I never want to lose sight of the fact that each one of my children have a voice.  They each have important things to say.  Whatever they may be going through may not seem like a big deal to me, but that is what has consumed their lives enough for them to bring up when they have their turn with the speaking token.  So, the fact that I love them means that what they ARE going through IS important.

I wish I could carry my speaking token around with me as a reminder that it isn't always about me.  It would be a great visual reminder, wouldn't it? Passing the token, giving up MY voice for just a moment, for SOMEONE ELSE to share their heart and what they are dealing with, ME listening and responding as if what they are really going through IS important?!

Hmmm...just a thought...

Not Me Monday

I did NOT have 7 (and at times more) kids to take care of this week.

My husband did NOT come down with the flu (or something like it) on Saturday and Sunday, adding to the chaos dynamics of this full fun house.

I am an endless source of energy and happy heartedness...

...therefore,

I DID NOT fall asleep while writing this pooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo

Friday Free-For-All : Numbers

***At this very moment there is 1 child bouncing, 5  children eating their hearts out on the 3rd box of cereal in 3 days, and 1 child in the fussy box***

I can't really think straight to formulate a good post, but I guess that is what Fridays are all about anyway:)

Josh's brother, Jonathan, and his wife, Kelly, have been in Uganda working on bringing their daughter home.  They are now the Legal Guardians of Chloe but like our story, they have been put on hold with the US Embassy.  (Insert growls and ugly faces from this mama)

***Now, 1 child is crying because 2 children both want to hold him, 1 child repeating, "I want my shoes on, I want my shoes on", 1 child running around as Thor singing the Thor theme song VERY loudly, while I help 1 child get dressed for the day***

We've added two more girls to the colony this week.  If anyone would have ever told me that I would be taking care of 7 children and enjoying it, YES, not just surviving, but ENJOYING IT, I would have told them they were crazy!!!

If you follow me on twitter you've probably seen the updates throughout the day on what 7 kids do to keep occupied, since we can't really go anywhere.  Our 1-car capacity is maxed out at 5, but we did make it to rehearsal last night.  We were quite the caravan.

And since it takes me a ridiculous amount of time to complete a single post this week, ha...

***1 sleeping, 3 playing a vey peculiar game behind closed doors (I'll have to go check on that in a minute:), 2 scrubbing their beautifully shiny rocks with Alethia's shampoo (yeah, don't know how that happened), and 1 crying because the other two rock-shiners did something she didn't fancy...oh wait, she's fine now:)***

This weekend is going to be a powerful weekend at Journey.  I've been feeling this heaviness, but not in something-bad-is-about-to-happen kind of way.  It's more like an I'm-excited-and-very-expectant-because-I-know-God-is-gonna-do-something-big kind of way.  Rehearsal last night was beyond just rehearsing songs.  The atmosphere was thick with the presence of God.  If you come, you are probably going to see mascara streaks down my face, but I ain't skured!

***2 showing off their now super-shiny "Gems" and "Moonrocks", 1 running around in his underwear between costume changes, 1 playing with squinkies that are NOT his, 1 still soundly sleeping and 2 happily playing house***

I caught myself putting coffee creamer in the dryer and sugar with the pans this week...no I'm NOT pregnant, I just don't think that you get it all back, even after the belly goes away.

Speaking of pregnant:
Alethia has never NOT seen me pregnant before and I'd not even thought about that fact until we got back from Memphis last month.  I've still been working on my pooch at the gym, curses on the slowing 33-year-old metabolism, and I guess she pictures the momma with the pooch when I'm gone.  So, when I got back and had a flat belly she kept coming up to me and petting my belly and smiling.  She kept saying, "Baby Jude not in there anymore".  I think it finally clicked.  I love the fact that Jude won't know life without his Alethia sister!

***6 piled in a van for a fun-filled afternoon with Mrs. Julie Shuler and 1 looking around the house wondering where his entertainment went***

Happy Friday Ya'll, it's gonna be a GREAT day!

Don't Air Your Dirty Laundry For All To See

But DO air your clean laundry

along with the stuffed animals that Cai thought wanted to go swimming:)

Grace Or Consistency

"It hurts me more than it hurts you."

I have only recently begun to grasp what the true meaning behind this so-often quoted saying is.

It has never really "hurt" me to give consequences before, especially when it was in times of utter frustration and exhaustion.  Sure, I have had my moments when it has really been sad, but not to the point where it actually "hurt" me.

But last week it did.

I think I've realized a pattern in the "hurt".  The "hurt" comes when you want so desperately to give grace just one more time but the best thing for the child is your consistency, even if it hurts.

Areyna was really dragging her feet during school.  I kept telling her that she was going to be working a lot longer than Zeke and that all the other kids would be playing outside while she sat doing her school work.  By the time she finally got motivated it was lunch time...and then all the other kids wanted to go outside.  Areyna sat back down to finish up her work until she realized that she was the only one left inside.  She came running to ask if she could finish her work later so she could play outside with her siblings.  It would have been so easy to just let it go this time and let her go play, but I KNEW that if she stopped now the reality of her actually finishing her work was pretty much non-existent.  I also knew that I've threatened before and not followed through, which is probably why she hadn't learned her lesson yet.  So, now it was my turn to stick to my guns and stay consistent.  It really hurt to have to tell her that she had to finish her work before going outside to play as she said, "but I feel left out" through sobs and tears.  My heart actually hurt.

The balance between giving grace and being consistent in parenting is hard.

Especially when your child is the one who tells you, "but God ALWAYS gives us grace!", ha!

Ultimately it is God's grace in our own lives that illuminates that fine line.

Friday Free-For-All

I've decided to change my Friday ramblings from "Fun Facts For Friday" to "Friday Free-For-All".  I feel like that better suits the uncategorized none-sense that I spew from my keyboard by the end of a long week:)

This week has been pretty normal around here...except for me and Josh's date night on Monday.  Mrs. Sweetie and her 2 littles (can you call middle and high schoolers littles?) came over here and played with our kids for Josh and I to get away.  The theme for our date was "Firsts".

Our first first was a trip to Blue Flame Tattoo Parlor, downtown Raleigh.  Don't worry, mom, it was oober sterile and the guys were super nice (even though you wouldn't want to meet them in a dark alley or anything!).  I mean really, nothing says "romantic" like getting inked up together, haha.

Our second first was across the street to a hole-in-the-wall burger joint.  It was the best calorie-filled fatty food I've eaten in weeks!  Plus, I had my first taste of chilly fries EVER! Yummm.

Then we found a fun Starbucks.  This wasn't exactly a first, as we always find ourselves sipping on coffee at the end of a date...but it was the FIRST time to sip on coffee with our new tattoos, ha!

In other news...

I was going through pictures on my computer the other night and came across these beauties from Jude's arrival.  I like how I went from a picture like this...

to the very next picture that looked like this...

Oh the joys of laboring a child:)

And just in case you thought YOUR husband was the coolest dad, check out what mine can do with a banana (this is family friendly BTW, get your minds out of the gutter!;)

Mr. Banana Man made his appearance at lunch the other day!  Pretty clever I'd say.

Now it's time for me to go ice myself...I took a class at the gym on Wed. night and my whole body hurts...

Oh the joys of losing the weight from laboring a child:)

Happy Friday ya'll!