In this season....

I struggle so much in this life with doing big, being big. I want to be that person whose ministry is making a difference. I want to make a difference. But these days all I can do is just live. To make it through this day. I can't even organize my thoughts as to what I would do to make a difference, there are just too many needs. And how could I make a difference? I am just one person with no extra time. Actually, I am representative of 5 people with no extra time. (And I just spilled milk on my jeans.) I have to remind myself regularly that I cannot do all things.  I must do what I can do; well. Raising my kids. Supporting my husband. Fulfilling our call to expand our family through adoption. Homeschooling. Youth ministry. There it is; my plate is full. I can do those things well right now, with God's help. 

I wrote in my daughter's journal this morning that we go through seasons of our lives. There is a season for working, volunteering, creating, but this season right here is for loving and raising these babies. And that is a good thing. It isn't an easy season, it's the kind that earns you time alone when your husband gets home from work because you called him near tears with both toddlers screaming at you; demanding all of you at the exact same time.  It is the kind of season that breeds lots of laughter and silly faces and funny games. It is the season when you teach a two year old and a three year old that they have to share, and you teach a seven year old just how valuable and important she is even though her world is overrun with irrational siblings. It is the kind of season when you laugh and you cry; when you change more poopy diapers than you ever thought possible in a 2 hr time span. It is a hard and wonderful season and it may not feel like I'm doing anything big or changing the world, but I am changing their world so that they can do 


big too.

 I am in a season of multiplication and it is hard but good. Someday, someday... Someday there will be time for sitting and painting and praying and changing the lives of others outside of this tight knit little circle I live in, but not quite yet. A reminder from my devotions today Luke 16:10 “Whoever can be trusted with very little can also be trusted with much, and whoever is dishonest with very little will also be dishonest with much.”
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I can be faithful with these littles right now.

Not what I thought it would be....

PAIL Post

When I first started out on this parenting journey, just like many newbies, I had a lot of grand ideas of how awesome I was going to be (cue laughter)... 

I quickly, and I mean quickly, learned just how little I know about parenting, and even - dare I say - judgemental I had been towards other parents (ouch!). 

I thought Attachment Parenters (AP) were crazy, and I had several friends who used Babywise and I totally disagreed with a lot of it.  So, I didn't know which school of thought to follow. 

What I found out though, was that God equips us exactly as we need to be equiped.  Oh, I make mistakes, a lot of them, daily - but my daughter knows the truth about Jesus, she is full of love, and quick to share, and that strong-will she was blessed with? - its still there, and being shaped for God's purposes. 

Some of the things that make me the craziest about my daughter and parenting, are not wrong at all - they're just different than me.  Where I am introverted, my daughter knows no stranger... (seriously, we have the stranger talk all the time).  Where I am quiet, my daughter is boisterous.  Where I want to fit in, my daughter just wants to be herself.  *If you know my husband, you know where my daughter has inherited all of these, oh so wonderful traits.*

Sometimes, its not a matter of changing those traits in her, its a matter of changing those traits in me.  We've taught her to love, and love she does! 

And parenting?  It is HARD WORK.  This kid is no angel, just like the rest of them.  She tests the boundaries and makes me wonder if I really knew what I was getting into.  No, I didn't. 

I didn't know what it would feel like to get up in the middle of the night, 3 times - because she's thirsty, hungry, or has to pee.  (When they're 4 and you're pregnant, you have a lot less patience for these shenanigans.) 

I didn't know what it would be like to still have to give a consequence to the most adorable little face I've ever seen, that's crying becuase I looked at her sternly. 

I didn't know how much I would love this kid. 

And that love only grows every. single. day.

So parenting philosophy?

I lean more towards Attachment Parenting and I still disagree with Babywise.

But just like anything, I don't follow that perfectly either :)


*On that strong-willed child though - If you have one, I can tell you right now.  One of the BEST books out there is You Can't Make Me, But I Can Be Pursuaded by Cynthia Tobias. 

Go buy it.  now.  for real.  It will change your life and the way you parent.  It made a world of difference in our home and our daughter was just turning 4 when I read it.  I wish I'd read it when she was 2 though! 

  

getting her in her own bed....

I took a nap with in my bed with my 4 year old this afternoon, and then after waking and playing, hours later put her in her own bed for bed time. 

As I touched her super soft cheek and brushed hair away from her eyes I remembered a time when I couldn't nap with her because it would make bedtime a nightmare.  I remember a time when bedtime was just a nightmare, naptime too for that matter.  Those days when I would have to sit by her bed for what felt like hours and just keep putting her back in.  And a few days where I just had to give up becuase I couldn't take it anymore. 

During that time I would consol myself by saying "when she's six she'll go to bed no problem"  "we won't still be doing this when she's six" 

I gave myself a few extra years just incase we were still doing that when she was four...  but here we are, with our big girl four year old (who's always asking me how long till she turns 5...) and she can sleep in my bed for a nap and transition to her own bed for bedtime just fine. 

She sleeps great!  Whether it be taking a nap alone, together, in my bed, in hers...  whether it be bedtime at 7:00pm because she didn't have a nap or 8:30 because she did...  sleeping is no longer a problem for this kid.

And I love it.

And it just reminds me of something one of my cousins told me before I had her "this too shall pass". 

It did.  We survived, she survived, and she's a pretty amazing kid.