Life

Today I am thinking about the chosen path for my life right now, I have chosen to be a stay at home mom and house wife, and I will probably follow this path for the next 10-15 years.  Now I know in the grand scale of life that really is not a long time but from where I am sitting it feels like an eternity!  I went to college and I have a degree but I did not do anything with it until after school and it is less then useful with out a nice resume behind it.
I struggle with being a stay at home mom sometimes because this is not where I saw myself as I was growing up, that said, I do actually love being home!! But what I am going to do when all of my kids (if I have more) are in school?  Well, start over and try and find a career that I can start later in life or stay a house wife and volunteer, and I suppose I could just run our home and knit and read all day when I am not baking and cleaning.  So many choices and right now I want the easy road.
My husband just graduated a program that took him 2 years and more hardship then I can barely believe, but he now has an epic career and I am so proud of him!! He did not take the easy road, by any stretch of the imagination, what he accomplished very few people ever even attempt.  I struggle with the motivation that he has! I tend to want the easy answer and can not focus and do that hard work to achieve that goal I want, I usually give up after a small amount of time and go on to the next thing.  I can learn so much for him.
Right now I don't even know what my goal is!! It is hard for me to sit down and work hard when I am not even sure what the end will look like, so I come up with fantastical plans of what I could do, never follow through and just sit and wait for something amazing to fall in my lap.  This all sounds silly after realizing that I had to live with my husband while he was working for his goal.
So, how did you pick your career? Or, like me, are you still dreaming about what you will do when you grow up, all the while your life is not standing still?

God is real, and He has feelings

Last night I started reading Disappointment with God, by Philip Yancey, mostly because I am struggling with that very thing.  Yancey has written several books and I respect his thought process because he seems to think like a normal person and not a super-spiritual-know-all-the-answers person.
 
I learned that God is a real being and He has real feelings!!

This insight is causing reverberations in my soul that will continue for months!  Do you get that? I mean do you really understand the implications of the Fact that God is real and he has feelings?  I don't think I am even close to grasping what this actually means but the knowledge is seeping into every corner of my life and I am trying to soak it all up!!  I tried to explain to my husband what I have been dealing with, but Yancey describes it best when he says (paraphrased) 'that I had an expectation when I went into this relationship with God and his actions are not what I expected', hence the disappointment.

Surprise!!! the answers to all my questions are in... The Bible!!!  Who knew?!

In the 13 chapters I read last night, Yancey summarized the entire old Testament.  It was amazing to read versus that actually describe God's feelings and his mercy and his actions from a person who has dealt with disappointment.

I am still disappointed but I think the direction of those feelings are shifting away from a God who actually loves and cares about me, to focus on the earthly circumstances that just are.  Today I am choosing to believe that it is ok to be disappointed with the situation but I am learning that life got me here and not God, and He will help things turn around.

"In all their distress he too was distressed" Isaiah 63:9

P.S. Did you know that God tells us to test him and see if he will follow through with his promise? Malachi 3:10 says that if you tithe, God promises to bless you, and then he says "Test me in this"  I am chewing on this because I have asked for a 'sign' and here is a very big promise.  What do you think? Do you tithe?

This, too, shall pass! I promise!!

My little boy is 19 months old, not yet 2 but getting close.  I always thought that "Terrible Two's" was an urban legend.  As S started getting a little bit older, more toddler then baby, I started seeing less and less of children his own age out in public.  It seemed that I always saw babies and older kids but I could never figure out why I rarely see kids his age  Sure I would see families with multiple children, and they include a 2ish kid, but you don't ever see an only child his age.  WELL tonight J and I solved the mystery, those parents learned that the only way to stop the disaster that was our dinner tonight, is to not go out.
We went to a large group dinner and S melted, it was like I have yet to experience; blood, no eating, screaming, anything you can think of!  As I sat there trying to quickly finish my food, i was looking around and no other children were melting.  But now that I think about it all the families has multiple children or only one young baby.  So I don't think that I am a terrible mother, but I have never done this before, but tonight I felt totally incompetent!  Lots of things in our life have changed recently and the place we went was way more crowded then places we have gone before, and I know that all these factors contribute but Oh My Gracious!!
The hardest part I think about this is feeling helpless and the stress it places on J and I.  Neither of us know what to do, how to react, or how to help S calm down.  So we get stressed and frustrated and take out our crazy emotions on anyone and everyone close by.
All this to say that I sometimes wonder why I has a kid, I love S and he is apart of me that I can not live with out, but on days like today it helps me to stop and really think hard about why I spent 4 years praying for S.  I can't really put it into words but the feelings are still there and I hold on to that vison and promise and love when I want to pull my hair out and throw up my hands in defeat.  I sure have been doing that a lot this past month and I know, as with the previous hard times, this, too, shall pass:)

Conspiracy

Disclaimer: I am talking about off-the wall conspiracy here, not rational, well researched decisions! Yes there is a difference and I really hope no one gets offended by my ramblings today!

I love to watch Documentaries!! I adore learning how other people think and their reasons for certain actions they take!! I am always ready to take what someone believes and 'chew' on it for a while trying to understand their motives and beliefs and where they are coming from.  Lately I have come across 3 'conspiracy' theories that I just can't wrap my head around; Big Pharma, Processed Food, and Politics in Schools.  Ok, ok, I know that these three issues have lots of ground, but here I am talking about the crazy, off the wall ideas that there are people heading up the industries plotting, purposefully  behind a desk to make life for us lowly citizens more terrible and to take all of our money.  I totally get the the pharmaceutical industry is, at its base, a business, out to make money, and I know that food companies pack our food with preservatives and pesticides all to make food cheeper and more easy to produce, and I know that our government is way too involved in education that we are stifling the ability of great teachers to actual teach our children, I get all that!!

But have you listened to the long list of people that are supposed to be involved in the giant plot to 'kill us all'? Supposedly their are entire groups of scientists who take money to fake results, never tell anyone, and sleep soundly at night knowing that their lie leads to the death of millions? And Apparently an entire group of americans cares so little for their fellow man that they purposefully lie to the US population about what is in our food, they never get caught, and no one ever comes clean and says they are sorry, and their is so much money exchanging hands that no nice person steps in to stop the craziness.  And our politicians must each and every one of them be the most ignorant people on the planet or out to ruin the next generation that they really do not give to sticks if our kids are learning anything and again more money exchanges between what must be hundreds of thousands of people that anyone who speaks up gets, what, killed? Oh and dont forget that every single person who has ever written a published news story is in on all three of these, so thats another population of people who dont care.

The point I am trying to get at is that I can not sit in my house, and think of all the people that I know in all the different fields they work and believe that their are that many people who don't care?  For these to work humanity must be much worse off then I can possibly comprehend!  I hope you do not think me naive to say that I just can not understand how so many people could care so little.  And I know that money is a hard thing not to be tempted by but is it really powerful enough to do all of this?

 I would dearly love to hear what you have to say on this subject!! Mostly because I still can not fathom the possibility that this happens right under the nose of a huge population of people, it all seems more like the script of a movie then real life to me.

How Do You?

How do you deal with BIG news?  No I am not pregnant ;) I recently found out some information, before I probably should have, but it is not what i wanted it to be At. All. And the worst part is that I am not deal with it very well, at all.  I am crying and I am fussing, and complaining and finding everything wrong with it that I can.  The funny thing is that my Facebook status Yesterday was "Some days I am so, amazingly, and overwhelmingly glad that God is Sovereign and I dont have to worry what my future holds." Ya, yesterday was stressful and terrible and I tried to make the best but at the end of the day I cried and complained and learned a great lesson and went to bed feeling awesome!

And then I get this text and I fall apart:(   "Why is God doing this to me?" "Doesn't he know this is the last thing I wanted?" "I thought he answered the prayers of his children?" and most of all, "How does this benefit God's kingdom?" "Why does it have to be this?"  Ugh, why can't I be gracious and see the positives and actually trust that God knows what he is doing and has the best in mind?  Thankfully I have some Amazing friends who helped my process and think of positives.  Usually, I would just run away and pretend that life is great and not acknowledge the elephant in the room.  But I can't do that any more, I have to deal with the stuff of life as an adult and I don't want to deal with stuff that I don't like!  i have to process this, and I have to do it quick and positively  while still functioning and being the mother that S needs me to be. But I am still bummed and feel cheated and wish that the news was something different, but I have to remember what I learned yesterday and hopefully I will start dealing with Big news better!  Right now I am eating chocolate, watching silly tv shows and asking you, How do you deal with Big stuff?

Writing in the fall

A poet once told a little boy, that he would know if he was a writer if he "must write or die."  Today I feel this way.  My ever constant friends; paper, pen, and the written word call to me.  It matters not what I write, only that I write.  The weather is so chill today, the clouds hang low, the air is crisp and a coming hush has momentarily settled on this part of the earth.  I see now, how God is in the silent whisper.  Mystery and magic and myth come to life and all things seem possible on a day such as today.  Spring is delightful, new growth and new birth remind us of our own youthfulness.  Summer is a wonderful time, full of travels and adventures.  But Fall and Winter are for friends and family and being at home.  In cool air and stillness we can enjoy peace and love while we look for warmth.  I can not imagine a world without the seasons, the anticipation of the cycle marks our own journey, but Fall and Winter will always be my favorite.

Do you Remember Heaven?

My memory of heaven is really a life time of collected moments which, when added together, give me a memory of heaven.  The place is still there but everything else is gone, The evil one stole it from this world, but the memory is safe in my heart.
As a little girl, I believed that our church would go on forever just as it was.  When I dreamed of the future, I would live my whole live inside those beautiful, stone walls.  I pictured a wedding walking down that isle while the organ played my favorite hymn, I saw my children growing up and serving just as I had done.  I even believed that the same people would raise my children who raised me!  I looked forward to my kids growing up with the same experiences which I had, my only tatoo is of the cross I received after serving in my church.  I think this dream is why I feel lost as an adult.  It has been 10 years since I have even been there, but in my heart that is the fixed point which I truly call home.  My life revolves around change now, and we have yet to live in one place for more then a few years, I spent 18 years in that one place with those same people, little around me ever changed!  But that magical place is gone forever, the building, remains but without the people, it is only a shadow and visiting it breaks my heart.
But we live in a fallen world and even if I could go back and everything were to be exactly the same it would not be the heaven from my memory.  Heaven is perfect and nothing in this world, no matter how hard we try, will ever match Heaven's perfection.  My mind has created this place to be perfect but the reality is that our church, in the end, ripped itself apart over sin.
I suppose I can only remember heaven, on this earth I can not ever live it.  But these memories are what drive me, I have no fear of death or the future because I have seen a glimpse of something so great and amazing that the slightest glimpse changes my heart, moves me to depths I never knew I had.  I remember heaven only one other time, when I read that ending chapters of the Book of Revelation.  I read those words and heaven reaches down and hugs my soul, and I weep openly for the joy that is to come.  In those moments I can barely breath.  I have no words to describe the feel of touching what I know is my true home!
I pray with every fiber of my being that you, dear friend, have or will have someday, a memory of heaven.

Don't give up!

I have always thought, randomly ad totally not backed up by anything, that if you had enough faith all you had to do was; pray once, wait patiently, and God will answer in his own time. Today I learned, from the helpful ladies at Proverbs 31 ministries and Luke 18: 1 that Jesus to bug God!! That's right he told a parable about a women with such great faith that she bugged an unrighteous judge until he gave in, and God who is so much more awesome will answer your prayers so much more quickly then that mean old judge!!
This gives me more relief then you can imagine! Sometimes I pray for the same thing every day as a way to ask God but to also help me remember that it will be ok, and I thought I was terrible for not having enough faith to trust Him the first time I prayed! In steps Jesus to save the day and tell me that God wants me to 'bug' him!!!
I hope this helps anyone else who may have gotten their wires crossed somewhere!! I love you all!!!

Left Behind

No, I'm not going to talk about that book series! And in truth this may be a very short post. I feel left behind today. I love raising my son! Today I wish I could be doing a million more things; I want to meet my girl friends for encouragement, I want to be with my husband as he helps our friend move, I want to be in a bible study learning and discussing, I want to volunteer to help people in my community! Today I want to do everything but I am doing nothing. S and I are having a quite day of laundry peanut butter bread and music at home! You will say "oh that's the greatest thing of all!" and I know it is a great responsibility but today I feel left behind because most of my friends are off doing those other things and I am at home. My heart knows that this is where I am supposed to be and that soon I will be in another season, but some days I am impatient and not good at enjoying the moment! I am trying but days like today I make the choice because I sure will not do well if I do not choose to be ok! If you feel left behind, it is ok!! Call me! Uh oh! Got to go there is Peanut Butter everywhere:/

Learning something new

I do not always like to admit that I have just learned a lesson, especially when someone is there to point that whole thing out to me. Today my son had a hard day, those days where they wake up fussy and no one knows why, that's what today was! By the end of the day I resorted to taking S on a walk just so he was entertained and I didn't have to deal with anything. As we came back home I thought we'd sit on the front porch and play with rocks and empty flower pots, S loves putting the rocks in one and taking them out. All of a sudden, brilliance, I'll find something to put water in!! I found his baby bath tub!! He played supper hard, ate a huge dinner, did great for bed time and is peacefully sleeping!!!
Dear hubby decided to point out why I already had learned, our little man needs to get out and play, everyday! We had stated at home and inside today, I thought it would be fun and relaxing, I have never been wrong!! I love that J and I think a like and he had just realized this new stage as well. I just feel so humbled as a mom, everyday I learn a new lesson, some are great and some are not. Today was hard for all of us, but it ended in giggles because I learned something new.

Readjusting

My husband recently got home from a 10 day field training exercise. S and I have been adjusting to life with J back in the house, it seems to get both easier and harder each time we go through this.  Sometimes I feel like J has just been gone for one really long day and other times I feel as if he's been gone for ages!  Either way I am always excited when he is back home, I feel like my life is back to where it should be!!
I have so much fun watching my boys interact with each other! S is only 17 months old and he is so expressive and vocal and has such a funny little personality and he does somethings so differently with his dad!  Before J would do something I would tell him how Shad been acting with me and without fail, S would turn around and so the exact opposite with J?! It seems to crazy to me that at such a young age he does things so differently!
The other benefit to having both parents around is that you help each other notice things which you might not have seen otherwise.  J has been teaching S animal noises, I could only ever get S to make a dog sound and i fish sound (yes, its amazing but fish do have a sound) but J can get S to make horse, and chicken and duck sounds?!
My boys are amazing and I love having them in the same house!

Dreams vs. Vision

This morning I read a FB post from an old friend of mine, he will be teaching history at LMU, the post was a very very brief overview of his outline for a Western Civ. Course. I had to read it twice to understand exactly what he was saying.  I majored in History.  In that moment I realized that I need to give up my dream of becoming a historian.

The pastor on Sunday preached on Abraham and Vision.  One of the lines that struck me was "Dreams are not bad, however they are based on hope and the future, Vision is now and the present."

Ever since I was a little girl, my dream has been to have my PHD in History.  However, it always remained a dream, even while I was in college I never really did anything proactive to make the dream become a reality.  I never had a vision, I never knew what it would look like or how to get there.  In my mind it was only ever the answer to a question, "What do you want to be when you grow up?" and for me, the "grow up" part was a mystical date in the future when things would just happen.  I would like to say that I blame my husband for distracting me in college and I would like to blame my son for taking all my time away, but the reality is that J was supper supportive and S, well, the dream was gone long before he showed up.  I lost out on the dream, me and only me.
Please don't take this the wrong way! I love my life!!! I love being a stay at home mom and watching my son grow up and planning what our future will look like, I have a vision for our family!  But until today the dream was always in the back of my mind.  But thats all it ever stayed, a dream, something to fuel grumpy about on mornings when i read about other people living out the dream I wish I had.  Does this mean I can never have my PHD? Heck No!!  Lately I have been trying to figure out a vision for the future and this time will be different because I understand that for a dream to become reality you need a vision!  You need to see where you are going, see where the end is, see the steps you will take to get there and you need to do them today! I need to act, because that is what you do with a vision! Will things change along the way? Possibly, but the point is that you are working toward a goal and not sitting waiting for something to happen to you, you are making it happen for your self.

I am sure that countless friends and family have tried to explain this to me and I apologize for not understanding, because now I totally get it! If you have always struggled with this and want me to help we can work on it together!! I want people to really understand that Dreams are great but for the dream to become a reality you need a Vision!

Sadly, and I think I may be ok with it now, one of my Dreams has been shelved.  But it has taught me so much that hopefully other dreams will escape its fate!

The World

I was on this blog today looking at pictures taken all over the world, and the thought occurred to me that I have seen nothing of this world.  I have never traveled, although I have my passport ready, and even within the US I have really only been a few places mostly in the midwest, and everything is similar; restaurants, shopping areas, homes, churches, culture, and the people.  The only really different place I have been to are  New York City, on a drama trip in 8th grade, and to downtown Albuquerque  for a mission trip to feed and clothe the homeless.  While I was looking at these pictures I had two thoughts, the first was of how awesome the internet is to open my eyes to the wider world, but the second was that if I am really honest with myself I don't believe the pictures.  

I sit in a very nice little home a million miles away from Lebanon, or Siria, or India and my mind can not seem to comprehend the images infront of me.  One picture was of a mother and daughter on a porch, in Lebanon, peeling potatoes, I've peeled potatoes, only the building in the background must have been either part of an explosion or earthquake because you could see into it, as in their was no outer wall on the building. And I gazed at the picture with unbelieving eyes, in my home of so many creature comforts how can that picture be telling a true story?

Have you ever traveled? I want to, but money, and life, and now a little kid seem like insurmountable barriers.  If the Military ever sends us overseas will I be able to truly handle experiencing another culture? I would like to think so, but then again a small part of me thinks I would sit in my house wishing for Target and Red Robin.  

Greener Grass

I've been dwelling a lot lately, J pointed this out to me a few weeks ago and I have been trying to figure things out ever since.  I was talking to him about how I missed our life in Alaska and all the great friends I had and how I don't really know anyone here, at least not like my AK friends.  And J stopped me dead in my tracks and said "Andrea, you said that all the time when we were in Alaska, about people in Colorado."  This really has gotten me thinking about that old saying 'the Grass in Always greener on the other side,' as well as 'You don't know what you got till it's gone.'  These really are rather sad, but even more sad I think because of how true they are!! Today, after 16 successful months, i managed to loose not 1 but 2 pacifiers, plus the little straps they are on.  One I lost at the National Airborne Day festivities and the other is lost somewhere in my house, to be found in 20 years.  Luckily i had a spare (no strap), but i have not realized how much i had become dependent on the pacifier and the strap until they were gone.

So how does one deal with this thing?  Are we just always fated to miss what we no longer have and never truly appreciate the here and now?  I do not have the answers to this, I wish I did because we will be moving again within a year and I really really don't want to be sitting at our new home lamenting this place!  i am not having a great time here, I have good friends but overall this is really hard and I will be very ashamed of myself if it is only once I'm gone that I realize that things were not so bad here.

I would love to hear ideas you have!! How do you appreciate the here and now?

                            National Airborne Day! (before we lost the pacifier)

Reddit and KLOVE

Those two entities are probably never going to be in the same sentence every again!!

Reddit is self titled as the front page of the internet, it is a place where all sorts of people come together and post links to random things on the interent on sub-pages; example r/atheism is a sub-page where people post pictures, jokes, discussions, articles, etc about atheism.  There are many other pages; r/funny, r/cat, r/tdl (today I learned) and almost anything else you can think of!  I don't want you to think it is totally an atheist web site, but a large number of its subscribers do lean that way.

K-Love is a christian radio station, which can be heard all over the country, and is supported by its listeners.  The hosts of K-Love pray on the air, talk about all things Christian, and allow local groups to advertise their christian events.

Now I suppose you are wondering why I am telling you all about these?! Firstly, I consider myself a Christian in that I follow Christ and Biblical teachings.  Here is where things get  funky.  I do not consider myself an evangelical Christian, or any other type because frankly i think they are silly.  When we moved with a 1 month old from Alaska we lost a very good Church home and in the year we have been here we have not found a church that we really like.  So having been out-of-the-loop for a while I have had a unique vision of the Church today.  It is very interesting to sit in a church service and try to experience things through the eyes of a person who has never been, while all the time knowing what they are trying to get across.  And here is where Reddit comes in.  I will liken it to "know thy enemy" or in this case, the target audience.  I am fairly sure that if churches read what people think about them and their "tactics" they would be very saddened.

The people who are posting on r/atheism are not the lost souls searching for answers I was told all 'non-believers' were.  These people do not think they need anything, in fact, they believe that they have the answers the Christians are looking for.  So many have been told "The message" with words that only someone who already believes would understand, that they did not get the intended message at all.  I hope that I am not discouraging anyone here, but my point is that these two sides are speaking such a completely different language that no real communication is ever going to happen unless we can all find common ground.

I thought of all this because K-Love has an add running for a local "Extravaganza" and one of the featured events is a "Professional Illusionist."   I understand why they are saying that, but at the same time I am imagining the fun that the people on  r/atheism would have with that, and in the end would forget what the add was even about.  And the poor christian would not understand why they are laughing at it.

Grown Up Decisions

My dear friend Q dedicated a post to a conversation we had the other day, I'd love for you to check it out!! Quinn's Life After kids

       Today I had to make, what I have dubbed, a Grown Up Decision.  I do not like to make these. You would think that being a mother, having a BA and being 27 years old I would be totally cool with making Grown Up Decisions; I am not.   These are the things that cause me to stop short and realize that the decision I am about to make might possibly have lasting impact on my future and I have absolutely no clue if I am making the right choice?!  So... I promptly called my mother! I grew up with her telling me a story.  When she was a little girl my mom thought that someday, when she became a mom, in that instant, she would know everything! She was so very disappointed when I was born and that knowledge of the universe did not pour into her as a mother!  She always told me this story when I would ask a question to which she did not know the answer, and I was always appalled that she did not, she is Mom, and everyone knows that Moms know everything.  Again she would tell me the story.
         Secretly I knew she was not telling the whole truth, and I waited for the day when I was "the Mom"  all knowing, without fear, calm in scary situations, ready for anything!!! I am a Mom and I still hate when I have to make Grown Up Decisions.  Maybe 40 is the magic age?!

Spiders and Crying

If you didn't know this about me, here goes, I am terriblly arachnophobic.  Yesterday the most giant spider I have yet to see on or near our house appeared outside the kitchen window, we did not kill it.  I went to sleep terrified that spiders were going to find their way into our house and kill us all.  Spiders, to me, tend to take on movie, cereal death killer-like qualities and can do amazing things like think and stare and terrify you on purpose.  Needless to say I had a sleepless night.  Then my son woke up, S is teething, and he has a cold, and he says no words only gets very very frustrated! By the time we hit breakfast his crying was getting to me pretty bad.  After lunch I could not handle much more.  I put S in his crib for 5 minutes, went to the bathroom and went to see if my bible could help me out, using my Child Trainning Bible (I'll post on this amazing thing later, for now google it!) and looked up Impatience. This was the first verse I turned to:
           
                   Be Still before the Lord and wait patiently for him.
                                                                                               Psalm 37:7

I held S for the next few minutes just repeating those words over and over to us.  The spiders are still out there and S still had a really hard day, but I was pretty ok with it.  As the book "Unglued" says, I think I made excellent "imperfect progress."

Not great thoughts

This is my first blog post, whew. My son, S, just turned 16 months and I'm some what at a loss for how to deal with all the new emotions that come with the adventure that is motherhood.  Frankly the last week has been a roller coaster of crying laughing and utter confusion.  I really thought that I was loosing it, going crazy or something worse.  So after days of telling my husband, J, that I didn't know how to handle this, I called two friends.  The first person I never even called, just writing her was comforting.  The second I called was Q, oh Q! She has a little girl and guess what?! She was having the same feelings as me!! That's right most moms have these feeling!  Today's lesson was "Get over your self and call a friend!" I didn't realize how much I needed my friends until I finally got over my pitty  party and called for help.

I've started reading a great book by Lysa Terkeurst, Unglued, and I'm really excited to start changing my thoughts to help change my attitude.  I'll be recording my thoughts about life,  kids, maybe politics and the normal girly things, here for your reading pleasure! I don't know where my life is headed but I have a vision of what I want it to look like!