2 posts for today!

Today I am going to post twice!! First of all a short, but emphatic note to any and all readers to share with your friends and family.

I have 4 children. They are all younger than 7. Yes I am aware where they came from and what caused their existence. Yes they all have the same Dad. And YES FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS HOLY I KNOW I HAVE MY HANDS FULL!!!!! They are a lot of work and I stay quite busy each day loving and clothing and feeding and teaching and otherwise caring for them. I do that for a reason, and it isn't so that strangers in the street can make inane comments about my life. It is because I believe my children are one of God's most precious gifts to me and to Bob, from our loving creator. It is because I actually like my kids and value them as people. It is because I have lived through the loss of 2 of my unborn children and that ache makes me aware of how blessed I am to have 4 healthy children to care for each day. Furthermore, I do not feel any need to justify their existence to you, a stranger in the park or the grocery store. Bob and I happen to have 4 kids, and I really couldn't care less if you think that is too many or too few or just plain crazy. They're ours and we happen to think they're pretty great.

So kindly keep your infernal and incessant opinions and pithy remarks to yourself and let me get back to raising my children.

Thank you, I am done ranting now. I feel much better.

hitchhiking on someone else's idea

Today I watched a video about marriage, posted by a fellow blogger. She's a wise woman who thinks complicated issues through with a clarity I admire. The part that stood out to me was(paraphrased): "If you see marriage as a way to get your needs met, you will be disappointed. You have to learn to view marriage as a life of service."

Wow. Not that I didn't know that, but honestly wow. Serving others in any fashion isn't exactly a hot trend here in America, so to hear this about one of the most fundamental relationships in society is jarring. But I needed to hear this today, in this season. To be reminded that the important, relevant thing is to serve and not seek to be served. To hear that other people know how difficult this can be, when life is crazy and things feel topsy-turvy is a wonderful thing to hear. To know that my own needs, while important, should not be the focus of my life is as freeing as it is subversive. Sometimes I think my biggest problem in finding satisfaction or fulfillment(2 horrendously over-used jargon words I dislike using) is that I seek it out in all the wrong places. Rather than complain no one notices how hard I work, I should be noticing how hard others work, especially Bob and the kids.(yes all that playing kids do is hard work! But that's another post entirely)
Rather than resent people who seem to have it easier, I should try to help those who have it harder and see their struggles as opportunities for me to be Jesus to a hurting world. This kind of behavior does not come naturally to me; I admit it. I like to get my way and have things work out according my own plans and timelines. I don't enjoy struggles or un-met wants. I don't like when people who love me call me on my own shortcomings--especially if they're right.
But that is probably the point my blogger friend is making. Marriage--or life in general as this post seems to have become about--isn't supposed to be about giving me what I like or even what I want. It's supposed to be God's way of providing for what I need and growing me into the person He created me to be and helping display his extravagant love for us to the world.
Huh. All that from a few sentences on an 8 minute video. who knew?

ps the video can be seen here: http://shelaughsatthedays.blogspot.com/2011/07/husbands-are-not-accessories-plain-talk.html

Anyone?

Am I the only one who finds the "western" pursuit of more-ness exhausting? More money, more stuff, more leisure time, more excitement, more money and stuff. It all just makes me overwhelmed and sad and irritated and tired somehow. I suppose this is what makes me feel so constantly out of place in my own culture, which in itself can be exhausting. Honestly though, how many of us really need more of anything? Adding another person's belongings to our house, tiny though they are (little one being a baby and all) seems to have exacerbated my already tense relationship with our possessions and pushed me to the point of wanting to simply throw out or give away large portions of our household. Especially clothes and toys and shoes. Our shoes reproduce on their own when I'm not looking, I'm fairly certain. Even, on my more desperate days, books! Generally speaking I have a borderline obsessive connection to my books and therefore never want to be parted from them. Ever. Even when we've moved and the boxes they're in are insanely heavy. Books make my life feel complete. I hope to find a balance, and some motivation to actually get rid of a few things to ease the crowded state of our home.

Sigh. The "problems" of american life. Ridiculous no?

I need to post more, because it would mean I am writing more. Only whenever I think of something I want to say I am not able to sit down and write it, and then later I can no longer remember what I wanted to say.

I am in the midst of some tough emotional struggles right now, made worse by my still being smack dab in the middle of post-partum mood swings. I feel as though I spend nearly as much energy each day to drown out the lies that seem to appear in my head at every turn as I spend on my actual life. And lately--for some reason I cannot really identify--anytime more than 2 noises happen at once I begin to shut down. Sometimes I literally begin to freeze up physically and have to force myself not to cover my ears and hum to drown it all out. This does not make it easy to live in a house with 3 ridiculously verbal and articulate young children, a baby who cries occasionally, a husband who finds silence stifling and tends to fill it with loud music or games that include screaming children, and a teenager who isn't really all that loud but turns the volume up on every. single. thing. always. no matter what. I'm not sure what that's all about but it is frustrating and moderately inconvenient.
On the plus side I have noticed I am finally after nearly 30 years of work making progress on controlling my horrendously quick temper. I catch myself remembering to stop and breathe deeply and slowly in and out before I answer a child, so that my answer isn't ground out between clenched teeth or shouted out angrily as though said child has done something life threatening. Usually it is more along the lines of "Mom can I have more cereal?" or "Mom, if batman was a bad guy and fought Superman, who would win?" Thus not things that ought to elicit rage. Except, you know for the weird auditory overload thing.
Onward and upward, as my mother used to say.

A quote I must ponder:

"our brokenness is what our art is made of, that when we show our wounds, others will reveal theirs and in that authentic space, art is made where a wounded Savior is revealed" quoted from: adailyportion blog.

This is still not my birth story post.

Now the photos I promised: Baby & Little One, because they're beautiful




Lately I have been really struggling to overcome myself, to get out of my own way. It can be very frustrating for me to be constantly stuck with, well being me. As a wife and Mom and as our family's main housekeeper, I tend to be very lazy and selfish with my time. Why scrub the kitchen tile when I could watch a little tv during nap or waste time on facebook? So my house gets messier and messier and then suddenly I am living in a disaster area and the idea of cleaning it all up is so overwhelming that I just don't. I don't even try a lot of the time and I don't like it. For a long time I have made excuses based on our life circumstances; I've been pregnant or nursing or mourning a miscarriage for a minimum of 9 months of every year since 2004. Pregnancy is rough on my body and the emotional toll of various other things in our life plus being an introvert while being a Mom to very extroverted children are not small things I can just toss off.

Still.

Still I wake up so often and hear this little prompt in my head saying "maybe you're over-doing the whole I'm too tired thing". Generally I have squashed that voice like a bug and happily continued stepping over and around the heaping piles of toys and laundry and dishes that pile up. Overall I actually stay at least partially caught up on dishes and laundry purely by necessity(tough to eat and leave the house if you have no clean forks or pants) but months have often passed between toilet scrubbings and the floors get so crunchy and full of dirt we all just wear our shoes to keep from feeling the crud. Now that I have typed that sentence I am ashamed of myself, because that's just pretty gross. And unsanitary from a parenting perspective. And just icky. Wow.

So now that I'm completely embarassed, and all my readers(both of you!:) are mentally vowing to never set foot inside my house again let's move on shall we?

At any rate the whole point of all this is that since 'Little One'(aka my youngest child) was born I have been feeling pushed to do more, be better, set a more industrious example to my little tribe of future adults. I have no idea how to accomplish this but I am trying. And really trying, not just pretending I tried and it was too hard. Little One is such a delight and a blessing to us, she just fills my heart with light and joy and makes it tough for me to justify whining about a cleaning my kitchen or wiping down my bathroom. So many people would love to have a house full of babies, if it meant they could be parents. Or get back what they've lost. So many have to worry about whether their water is safe enough to drink or clean with, or whether there's any food to even cause dirty dishes. There are just so many things that could so easily be so much worse or more difficult. Maybe its time I stopped slacking off and starting living like I notice how blessed I am. If my pastor is right, and living from a place of joy is based first in my own choices then now is the time for me to choose. So I am working on choosing gratitude and contentment and resisting my instinctive tendency toward anger and indolence.

I have no clue if this will last or be a successful endeavor. I'd really like it to be though; I think I will find much more satisfaction if my days are spent actually doing something than when I just sit around grouching at my kids for interrupting my computer time. Plus my kids won't get lost or crushed under mounds of unfolded clothes.

I haven't forgotten I have a blog

Although it may seem that is true, I promise it isn't. However since my last post we have had: 1 brother visiting for roughly 12 days longer than I thought were planned--and he brought a 2nd houseguest; 1 precious baby girl born 4/20; 1 completely insane 4 day weekend in which we travelled to the east coast with all 4 children and Bill to watch (and participate in) Bob's little sister's wedding; 1 'Boy with a broken elbow. This last actually occurred during the insane weekend, although we didn't know it was broken until after we got back and brought him to the doctor. There were doctor's visits, x-rays, splinting and casting last week. Ahh the joys of parenthood. Boy is a trooper though, so he is doing well.

I will write out our birth story for this littlest one of ours soon. And maybe the other kids too, just so I don't forget. I may or may not include some photos, we'll see.

That's all for now.