Tale of Two Cities

I woke up this morning with a simple phrase going through my head- "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times.." Of course we know this famous sentence as the opening line of A Tale of Two Cities. I haven't read this classic since high school, but the words have stuck with me. Sometimes life feels exactly like this, and the last few weeks have not been an exception. They have been.....interesting. Hard. Emotional. Tiring. And it some ways Wonderful. All of these things combined. Some moments seem like the best times of our life. Others seem like the worst. But that, my friends, is this wonderful ride we're on called LIFE. All of our experiences (both the peaks and the valleys), our day-to-day routines, and the good, the bad and the ugly things that happen our shaping our lives. Building our character. Strengthening or weakening us.
Who is it shaping us into? And who are we turning to for our strength?
Dave and I have been worried about family situations- but God is in control. I know He is. I'm putting my hope in HIM. He is with us through our best times and our worst times, we just need to stop trying to do it ourselves, and take the leap into His loving arms- He's waiting to catch us....

Emma's 9th Birthday

I Seriously can't believe our oldest girl is 9! She had her birthday planned for months, and I'm pretty sure it went EXACTLY how she wanted it to go :) We picked up her best friend Preslie and headed to Firstenberg Community Center to go swimming! I think the two of them went down the slide about 50 times. After that we headed to the mall for an afternoon of shopping. And thanks to generous Grandpas/Grandmas, Nana, Aunts/Uncles and Mom/Dad she had a whopping $96 to spend! And believe me, she spent it all. Then it was back to our house for pizza and cake, movies and a sleepover. Her words, not mine- "This day ROCKS mom!" Ahhh- music to my ears- Happy Birthday Emma! Here are somepictures of Emma and Preslie during their girls day out....

A few kiddo stories to share

Emma: “Mom, I want to tell you something without you getting your feelings hurt.”
Me: “Okaaaay.” (bracing myself for the all-out honesty that is so refreshing in children).
Emma: Well, I’m not saying this because I don’t think you know anything.”
Me: “Wow- all right…”
Emma: “I sometimes wish I had a mom that had all the answers to everything I want to know all the time.”
Me: (letting out a sigh of relief) “Oh, well, I can handle that. I wish I knew everything too. I think we all wish that. But then I’d be a superhero and probably be so busy that I wouldn’t have time to have these fun heart-to-hearts, right?”
Emma: (staring blankly at me for a few seconds)“Well, I‘m gonna go play outside now.”
Allrighty then….

    You know that phrase "the best laid plans of mice and men often go astray”? Well, that happened at my house tonight. I had GLORIOUS plans. FUN plans. I made a snap decision sometime around 7pm that I would surprise the kids with a game of hide-and-seek. Instead of our standard story time, we would run around the house giggling and having a ball.
    It sounded AMAZING in my head- it really did. Hard core bonding time is always a great idea right before bed, right? Anyway, things started out great. When I told the kids my idea they FREAKED. My announcement was met with awe and a round of applause. I felt like mom of the year.
    But then the game started. Fights broke out right away. There was one MAJOR temper tantrum. One shoving match. 2 skinned knees. 1 door slammed on a hand. A torn shower curtain. A bag of spilled coconut (don’t ask). About a million “Hey, that’s not fair’s!” And 1 mom with CRAZY I’m-about-to-lose-it eyes.
    Our game ended abruptly at 8:09. 21 minutes before it was supposed to end but ½ an hour too late. I tucked  3 crying and frustrated kids into bed, and am trying to process what just happened. It was scary, really. Apparently in my house when we play a game of hide and seek our motto is “Go big or go home.” I am now going to drown my sorrows in chocolate, and will be taking a permanent leave of absence from any and all games resembling hide and seek.

Me: “Why is Katie crying?”
Ben: “I gave her a hug, that’s all I know.”
Me: (with one eyebrow raised) “Why would she be crying if you gave her a hug?”
Ben: “Hmmm.. Well, I did hit her on accident first before I gave her the hug, so I think maybe that’s the real reason she‘s crying.”

Sunny Day

We actually had a warm sunny couple days a couple weeks ago, and Katie and Ben sure took advantage of it! They've been so sun-deprived that it felt like summer- ha! Emma was at school so she was not to happy about that :)

Finding my marbles

        If you come over to our house you will probably be wondering why we have 4 jars of marbles sitting on the counter. They do look pretty, but it’s not an attempt at new décor by any means. We have implemented a new system in our house in order to try and regain control of the use of all things electronic. After much thought and consideration, we came up with the idea of marbles. It’s tangible, it’s fun, and we had them already (bonus!).
In the morning each kid gets 6 marbles in their jar. Each marble represents 10 minutes of electronic time (computer, Ipod, DS, Ipad, and Wii). When they want to play a game, they have to move a marble into the “used up” jar and set the timer for 10 minutes. If they know that a game will take longer, they just take out more marbles. You get the idea, right? When the marbles are gone, they are GONE.
Now, we knew this would be an adjustment, and we knew that one of our children in particular was going to have a VERY hard time with this. If we’re honest we actually developed the system specifically for this kid, but there’s no way we could say that- we don’t want mutiny on our hands. If your curiosity is getting the best of you, I’ll give you a little hint- this kid is NOT female.
So, we sat them down. We explained the system. They all seemed a little shocked but willing to give it a try. Ben dove right in and transferred a marble so he could play the Ipad. When the timer went off he put another one in. He seemed to LOVE the new system. But by late afternoon his marbles were GONE. At this point he did NOT love the new system. As I was empting the dishwasher I saw him out of the corner of my eye. He was staring at the jars on the counter.
“Whatcha doing?” I asked.
“I’m sad all my marbles are gone,” he said, “Can I buy more marbles? I have like 43 cents?”
“Nope. It doesn’t work that way.”
“But look how many Emma has! She’s only used one! Can’t I ask her if I can borrow some?”
“That’s not how it works either. You have to wait till tomorrow morning to get your marbles back,” I replied.
Grunts followed as he stomped away to his room. Throughout the evening we caught him staring longingly at his jar. That night only his was empty. Emma (who could really care less if she played electronics or not) still had 5 in her jar. Katie had one left. As I tucked him into bed he said, “I am SO excited to wake up and see all my marbles in the jar tomorrow!”
His anticipation was a little contagious, and I found myself excited to fill up his jar when I woke up. When he came out with crazy hair and sleepy eyes a few minutes later he went straight to his jar, lined his marbles up to count them, and then smiled at me.
I suddenly had a thought come into my mind- what if I was that excited to use my precious free time to go before the Lord? What if I couldn’t wait to wake up and see what amazing things he had in store for me? What if I wasn’t allowed to worship God? What if I was restricted in how I could worship? It seems in our human nature, when something is taken away or restricted, we begin to crave it even more.
We take so much for granted. Some people walk miles and risk certain death to proclaim that Jesus is Lord. Many people are thrown in jail for it. Many are worshiping “underground” because they have been told they cannot serve and worship God. But they do it anyway. They CRAVE to be in his presence. Nothing will get in their way.
What about me? And you? We live in a fast-paced culture. Time is money. You need to be busy and productive. Every day we make choices as to how we spend our time, how we are filling our “used up” jar. I can say with all honesty that my “used up” jar makes me cringe most of the time.
God wants a relationship with us. He wants us to fill our “used up” jars with time spent with Him, time using the gifts He has given us, and He wants those times where we just sit in silence at His feet. I want to go to bed humbly thanking God that He helped me spend my time wisely, and excited to wake up with new hope! And the AWESOME thing is, we wake up to a marble jar filled to the brim and OVERFLOWING with God’s promises for us.
Ben is excited to have his 6 marbles. God’s time with us is unlimited! Let’s take advantage of it and all He has planned for us! Let’s trade in some of our marbles that we spend on TV, movies, and magazines- let’s use as many of our marbles as we can to further God’s kingdom and make the most of every single day He has given us!
And say a prayer for Ben- he is still using up all his marbles by afternoon. And he’s still trying to negotiate a good price for all unused marbles.