Lainybug turns 10

My Lainy and her crazy emotions.  At 10, she's trying to wrangle the ups and downs that wrestle inside her little body.  She hasn't asked to put holes in her ears yet, but leg shaving is a requirement as of today.  My little bare legged beauty is growing up.  Her body was built to be an athlete (for which I was thrilled!) and maybe that is in her future, but her heart belongs to the furry four legged creatures of the earth.  It's all she talks, draws, writes, plays, and dreams about.  Even when I drove by her school and caught a glimpse of her and a handful of friends, she and the others were crawling around on hands and knees in the grass, as cheetahs if I had to guess.

I haven't always been thrilled with her natural and all consuming love of animals.  I was heart broken when her soccer coach and I agreed that she didn't love soccer as much as I wanted her to.  But if you ever have the chance to see her in action with animals, it's as if she was born to love them.  She struggles to get through a page of math homework.  But will spend hours researching and writing about a single creature, just for fun!

Lainy loves her brothers in spite of their boyish irritations.   I have no doubt that she has softened, shared bravery, joy, and imagination to her brothers, and they have been forever blessed by her being sandwiched between them as siblings.  

Some days she rocks my world and I am ready to string her up by her boot straps.  But I too am forever blessed by this little blonde haired child I am so grateful to call my daughter.

Love you so much my little Lainy!!

Be Still

Silence has never been my favorite thing.  I usually associate silence with impending doom, awkwardness, being unproductive, or just plain boredom.  Because of this I like mindless chatter and background or blaring music.   Today I read this. 

I almost didn't read it.  I wasn't in a churchy mood.  (Probably because my brain is on overload with all the music blaring)  But as soon as I read the first of 10 ways to recognize God's power in times of trouble, I was all in.  She begins by breaking down all of the words that are associated with the word still.  (Psalms 46:10) "Be still and know that I am God."

Still: free from noise or turbulence; untroubled

When we are free from outside noise or turbulence, we are able to hear the still small voice of God's Spirit as he comes to comfort and guide us through our trials. Some of the noise we experience that could be blocking our ability to feel God’s presence is our own worry. When we learn to change our thoughts from negative to positive, we are more able to feel God’s love because we are in harmony with him. The noise and turbulence is replaced by a sweet melody of peace.

I had a minute of crazy last week.  We are just finishing up the process of building our home and there was a hiccup along the way.  Everything has gone so smoothly throughout this whole process that when we hit that speed bump, my panic went sailing and landed in a huge pile of worry.  My initial reaction was loud, sometimes coming out in words of blame and anger.  I knew I was acting irrational.  You know when your vacuuming and your going along, la dee dah, and you think you hear something?  So you shut off the vacuum and listen.  Nothing.  Rev it up again, only to think you heard something again, and once you shut it off again you realize your phone was ringing?  Yeah, I had that.  Only it wasn't the vacuum, it was my worry.  And it wasn't the phone, it was the Spirit.  I felt as if I kept feeling like someone was there trying to tell me to have faith.  And I heard it.  Sort of.  I knelt on my knees and tried to pray.  It turned into more of a crazy persons rocking in the corner, but I was making an effort. 

So, when I read this article today, I realized I was creating so much noise, blocking my ability to feel God's presence, or to hear the Spirit whisper what I was trying so desperately to hear. 

I have this habit.  I used to call it my nature.  But I realize it's only a habit, and I have the ability to change it.  This habit is that I am loud.  I am reactive, quick to anger, and I use sarcasm.  These habits have trickled down to my children.  I often throw my hands into the air in exasperation when confronted with a loud, reactive, sarcastic child.  I have a dear friend who pointed out to me that it was time I made some changes. Oh yeah, also I am SUPER inconsistent.  She has been teaching me how to make small changes that have made gigantic results.  Then she sent me this.  What?  I haven't even scratched the surface of this lady's calm parenting tactics.  But just listening to the 9 minute intro helped me realize that it is NOT my nature.  It is merely a habit, and lack of intellect and practice. 

So silence.  I still don't love it.  An empty house with no noise stresses me out.  but there is a difference between silence and stillness.  There have to be moments and chapters of stillness in order for us to be able to hear the small voice trying to inspire and direct us. 

It was a week of field trips.  I attended with Lainy's class to the AZ Science center.  There were double the number chaperones needed, so Lainy and I ended up having a little day date!  We had a grand time.  We had season passes there last year, so we were right at home.

A few days later I went with Jayce's 6th grade class to the Renaissance Festival.  First, it is my very least favorite time period.  I can't stand their rude mannerisms (which all the workers adhered to very well) the wardrobes, the women's roles, the fact that the men would ride horses next to each other while all geared up in metal suits and try and ram one another with a giant pole.  I mean, really.  Jousting doesn't seem manly, it seems cowardly.  If I didn't already have a bad taste in my mouth, this field trip would have psychologically created a distain for the place. 

I arrived at the school and was handed the list of names that would be in my group.  9 boys.  The moms who had groups of 8 girls just looked at me empathetically.  Ok, 9 boys.  I can do this.  I scan the list.  Sebastian.  He is a doll.  And a handful.  His teacher approached at that moment to let me know that Sebastian came to school super pumped, and said that he didn't take his ADHD meds this morning because he wanted to have "the BEST day EVER!"  Super.  Thanks parents. 

The bus ride was uneventful, and as I am gathering my baseball team, another teacher calls me over.  This time with an epi-pen in hand, she asks me to keep it close by and does a run through on how to administer it.  I ask Jack what he's allergic to.  He say he doesn't really know.  Um, What?  He says they think it's environmental, but haven't pinpointed what sets him off.  Super.  Let's head off into a dustbowl full of crap in the air and hope you don't die. 

Ok, off we go and thus began the day of 123456789...123456789...123456789... I counted this all day long.  It was student day at the festival, so we were walking with a crowd the whole day.  It wasn't long before I realized I had a wanderer.  Christian.  And he wasn't listening when I called to him.  Which is when Jayce fed me the little morsel of info that he was partially deaf.  Christian was supposed to be wearing hearing aids, but probably wanted to have the best day ever too, and didn't wear them.  This was most definitely NOT my best day ever. 

I don't know what these boys went home and told their parents, and frankly, I don't care.  I count the day as a success because I didn't yell at or lose anyone. 

Quick story to remember for Jayce:

Jayce is my guy who is famous for kitchen pickpocketing.  He will have snaked a piece of gum from the inside zipper of my purse hanging on a hook without having missed a step.  Candy in the top cupboard behind other gross food he would never touch?  Swiped.  Chocolate chips are stored in my freezer.  They disappear by the handful.  Natural consequences are always better than inflicted ones. 

He and his dad were having a nice game of chocolate chip tossing one day.  You know, when you toss one in the air and try to catch in your mouth?  They had been at it for a while, and there were a handful of chocolate chips on the floor, so they scooped them up and recycled them into the game. (gross)  What Jayce didn't know, and Jason didn't remember, was that Flapjacks dog food had been spilled in that very spot in the kitchen earlier.  As the game came to a close, Jayce took his remaining handful of chocolate chips and popped them all into his mouth.  As he chomped away he knew there was something funky about it.  Jason started to tell him it was dog food, but after Jayce started to gag, he changed it to "probably just bad chocolate, just swallow it".

Quitters never prosper. And neither do their children.

We call today Crazy Thursday.  It's the day of the week that the kids have a nutso schedule.  I am usually a bit more tightly wound on these days due to the crazy.  We added a basketball game to the mix today for Jayce, and I was looking forward to watching him play. 

I played basketball through high school and have a bit of a hot streak by nature. Especially when it comes to sports.   Jayce doesn't see a whole lot of playing time.  He has played one season besides this one.  After last weeks game, I told Jason that if Jayce wasn't mad about not seeing much playing time that it was time to pull him.  After today's game, I was pretty bugged. From the stands I actually said to him while he was on the bench, "tell the coach you want in, or I will"  Yeah, I'm that mom.  So, after his whopping 3 minutes in the game we had this conversation. 

Me: Hey, you did awesome today.  How are you feeling about basketball? 
J: Good
M: So do you feel like maybe we ought to play the next session or give it a rest?
J: I want to play
M: You barely got any game time.  Do you even like playing?
J: I love basketball.  These kids have been playing for 5 or more years.  They are really good.  I just started.  I just need some more time. 

Oh. Duh. 

Flashback to my younger years.  I totally sucked at the game.  But I LOVED it.  I played as often as I could keep a ball in my hands.  And after 6 years, I remember when coach called my name to start. (First string)  I was not a starter; until that day. 

How did I develop this ridiculous thought that unless he was really good, that he should quit?  After swallowing my very large bite of humble pie, we talked about how we would work together to help him work hard and learn. 

Signed,  Parent in training.

It has been a week!   First, the (huge) young man who bullied Jayce last year apparently had not gotten it all out of his system and after many, many ding dong ditch attempts to irritate, he decided it would be a sly idea to dump a large amount of green goo onto my porch.  Solid idea dude.  Way to show me.  Would have been a good idea to not get caught by 2 neighbors and your own grandfather.  Hopefully, that will be the end of that.

Second (or maybe this was first...  It's a little blendy), after 3 days of thinking I smelled gas, I finally called the gas company.  Here's how it went down.  Brandon (the gas guy) shows up all ghost buster-like, wand in hand and after making a sweep of my house with it, informed me that we were not in danger of an explosion according to his wand readings.  Whew! Thanks for that.  After further assessment, his under control attitude developed a underlying level of panic.  His pace picked up as did his perspiration.  He told me later that he was trying to assess whether or not we should evacuate.  Seriously??  He had found a large gas leak in the attic next to the furnace.  Yeesh.  Smart man to recognize that the gas meter was running without the furnace or water heater being on.  Apparently, if you have to ask the homeowner (renter) to vacate, they have to call the fire dept.  After I saw him zipping to and fro, I took Flapjack outside with me. 

And Lastly, a little kung Fu gone awry.  I so badly wish I had the sense to have been filming when this happened...   Jared is the youngest, and by now I know that you cannot hinder a child's imagination by giggling at them.  So, when Jared asked me to come into the hallway to watch him, I had my game face on.   He started some karate moves, slicing, kicking, sweeping kicks,  it was all very fast and very intense.  He got going so fast that I was beginning to lose my straight face and encouraging tone, and just at that moment his front kick became his last, when it connected with his face.  It was really, really funny.   I'm laughing even now as I remember it.  Oh was he ever mad.  I could not get control of myself and the laughter.  I tried to pick him up and hug him to hide my laughing, no dice.  He was mad as a hornet.  He had quite a fat lip from it.  Love you little man.  Sorry, I know I shouldn't have laughed.  Hopefully, you'll laugh at it too someday.

 

Is this love, that I'm feelin'

Jared has a sweet friend nearby, and they play together often.   He and Hannah have been good buddies for quite some time, they are pretty well suited for one another in their equality for chaos, excitement, and joy.   Jared has recently bumped up a notch in his feelings for this little one.  Hannah, concerned, came to me to let me know that Jared had said those three little words to her.  I told her that yes, he does love her.  That they are such good friends.  "um, no he meant more than friends" came her response. 

In a chat with him later, I asked him about it, and indeed he was not talking friendship.  After a reminder about dating and the different kinds of love, I let him know that the kind of I love you he wanted to share was best kept until he is older.  To which he responded, "But mom!  I had to tell her, I was running out of time, we're moving! I had to tell her before it was too late!" 

Touché little buddy, touché.

Cuz I'm movin' out

The last 5 years have been pretty blurry as far as stability.  Not according to plan, well not according to my plan...  But an incredible journey tipping the scales with more happiness, friendships and growth than anything else.  See, I can say that in hindsight because I'm already through a whole lot of the crap that hit the fan.  I see the blessings that came out of it all. 

We landed here in this house nearly 2 years ago.  I LOVE IT HERE.  (In case heaven wants to change its mind, and I haven't been clear)  But alas, we are moving forward again.  This time, out of state.  Cedar City UT to be exact.  Yes.  Me.  Living in Utah.  It's beautiful and I love it there.  Most of the time I am filled with excitement and gratitude for the opportunity.   All of the other moments are filled with nausea, at the thought of leaving my sisters and so many dear friends. 

I am thankful my children were given the opportunity to learn how to accept change these past few years, they are such troopers.  We have spent some time up there already traipsing through the hills, hiking and exploring.  The kids were in heaven, snow and hiking?  They couldn't imagine why mom was grumbling.

So, Cheers to our last warm AZ winter.  I will miss you.