My Ministry

There is something about getting out in the fresh air that clears the mind and enables you to think a little more straight, which is just what Crewe and I needed. I keep making excuses as to why not to get out of the house, when if really just boils down to the fact that I hate to be cold.
 

 

Yesterday I made it happen. Crewe has been my little hip baby ever since Daddy came home and his sleep has been hit or miss, so I have been feeling sorry for myself lately.

 

We got out the little wagon he got for Christmas and walked and walked and walked and it was glorious. I wasn't telling him "no"  every other sentence and we were able to just enjoy each other completely.
 

 

The more my negative days are mixed in with the good, granted the negative are far outweighed by the good, the more I am understanding that my ministry right now is in my home.

 

I have been going through a search, so to say, of way I feel like everyday is the same thing over and over. Asking things like....Is what I do everyday even going to make a difference in the world or would I be better off at an 8-5 (cry me a river), but that is how I have felt.
 

 

 There is good in this search though because it is stretching me, molding me, changing me and the good kind of change. The change that makes you a better you. The change that makes you want to go climb Mount Everest and scream your heart out that you did it, when you get to the top.

 

 The search is leading me to learn that my ministry IS doing the laundry, cooking the meals (with a glass of wine), making the beds, nurturing Crewe, taking care of my husband.

 

It IS making our house a home.. a warm, welcoming place for us to escape the world.

 

It IS making sure my desires and heart are lined up with God and nurturing Crewe's little desires and heart to be the same.

 

It IS to provide a center of life for all who live here.

 

It IS being all the things that I have felt for the last 2 years are not contributing to my family in a big way or having much of a ministry at all.
 

 

But you see if I can make my home my ministry and find joy in that task everyday I CAN affect eternity! Because the home I am creating for Crewe WILL effect who he chooses for a wife and the values of a mate he holds high. It WILL effect the home he wants to create for his children and it is a domino effect from there.

 

And you know what??? I hold all of that in the palm of my hand right now, it is mine to decide what I want to do with it. It is completely and utterly my choice. Oh how that makes my heart flutter with excitement and realize just how big my ministry, that I once thought was nothing, IS.
 

I think back on starting my journey with the Crazy Wrap Thang and my "why" for wanting to work from home. I wanted to be able to bring a little bit of income in to save for a family vacation once a year. In my head I HAD to have these monumental vacations once a year so that my son would have fond memories of his childhood.

And while that "side job" has allowed us to take a monthly vacation if we chose... it is not some once a year BIG vacation/ memory that is going to shape my sweet babe... it is the day to day little moments that are going to shape him the most. The kissing of ouwies, the rocking at night, the dinner time prayers, the patience through fits, the walks around the park, playing peek-a-boo behind a tree.

Oh how I had it so backwards.
 

So Crewe, thank you for taking me to the edge and back with your sporadic sleep and 24 hour need of me. I will never have these years back with you and one day I will be wishing you were under my roof, wanting to sit in my lap, on my head, and pulling on my pants. God is doing big things in me, through you.

"Wherever you are right now - BE THERE ... that is where God is - with you - right there - right now"- Christine Caine 

 

Insignificant

It is amazing how wrapped up I can get in the insignificant happenings of life, that seem so huge at the time.

Crewe has been waking up again at night and it has utterly thrown me for a loop. I love my sleep and felt so blessed when, at 14 months, he decided to start sleeping through the night and I feel I live in fear any night he wakes up that we are going to start the cycle again. It is not so much the getting up that bothers me, it is the fact then when he goes back to sleep around 4, I am wide awake. Losing sleep is not my favorite.

I am not greatest at segwaying (don't really  even know if that's a word) so hang with me on this.

Loss seems to be a prevalent happening right now. Just this week I have learned of a sweet baby girl who was born early and lost her battle and was taken far too soon... to a young man who's life was  lost in a car accident just 2 days ago, leaving behind a wife and precious 11 month old daughter. 

It really has put some perspective in my head about what the signigicant and insignicant things of life are. How that momma that lost her sweet newborn would give anything to hear a crying baby through a monitor wanting to be rocked or how the wife who lost her husband would  love to crawl back into bed, after rocking her baby, to her husband peacefully sleeping.

THOSE are significant, life changing, tragic events.... no matter how much I would like to think a waking toddler is.

 

It causes me to question the decisions God makes for our life. I know that God is soveriegn and would never make a wrong decision, but I just don't understand and know in this lifetime I never will. All  I can do (and am called to do) is trust and work daily not let fear dominate my thoughts.

 

THAT is a daily battle for me... when there are people on this earth that I cannot even fully grasp my love for or thought of them not being here.

 

This statement that I stumbled upon calmed my heart a bit in my fear of not fully trusting God.... 

 

"Faith is not the absence of doubt, but still walking towards the presence of God so He can deal with the doubt.."

 

Just some of my thoughts before bed. I will definitely have a different perspective when my sweet boy whines through the monitor at 3am.

 

 

 

Wee bit of honesty

Ok I really need to get this off of my chest because everytime I get one of these comments it kind of drives me crazy.... and that is putting it nicely.

 

Is it just me that hates these comments..."Hi, I am a new follower and would love a follow back"... that's it, nothing beyond that. Basically what I get from that is. "I really have not even looked at your post and just want to increase my followers so I am following you."

 

Can I get an Amen?

 

Drives my Cra-Cra-Crazy! The comment has nothing to do with the post or anything. I understand in  blog world we are all wanting to grow our blog readership and I do too, but please... if it is clear that you have not even read the post, do not send me these comments.

 

I do love new followers... I really do, but I want people who enjoy what I have to say.

 

And I will end with a sweet picture of my boy!

Stay tuned, I have a special person joining me on my blog tomorrow. You won't want to miss what she has to say!

Epiphany (brace yourselves)

Yes that, I had one of those tonight. After a long day full of thinking these wonderful thoughts.... "what is wrong with me... what is wrong with who I am... how I handle situations???"

 

 Repeat that about 51 times and you have my day.

 

 My husband came home to a crying wife which resulted into, a freeing, 2 hour conversation... about faith, parenting, tough decisions and the person I am and want to be.

I realized today that up until today I have lived my entire life (seriously the ENTIRE thing) seeking the approval of others and worrying a ridiculous amount about offending others.

 It occurred to me that I over analyze every.thing.I.do.

 I questions everything I post on facebook, my blog, send in text, email, etc.... I run phone conversations through my head 10 times before I call the person or don't say how I really feel because I am afraid I might lose a friend.

 

I questioned myself to the point of tears today and that is when my sweet husband helped me work through all of my insecurities.

I even question posting this in fear if will come off as me seeming weird, but none-the-less, it is me. Not something that I fully accept or love, but me.

 

There is something so freeing about vocalizing your insecurities to someone rather than, what I have done 6,246 times in the past and kept them bottled up inside.

 

Correct! It doesn't change who I am overnight, but it sure helps me feel a hell of a lot more confident in tackling this in the days to come.

 

I will still be nice and tactful for the most part on this blog, but there may be a bit more vulnerability too.

My desire is that Crewe can look back on this timeline of his life and learn from me,

what he is too young to understand now... that life is hard, but life is beautiful and you have to embrace it all to fully live.

MAN THAT FELT GOOD! Like digging the dirt out of a concrete crack good!

Yes, I realize that these pictures have absolutely nothing to do with the post,

but they help lighten the mood some.

Linking up with:

What pecans can teach you

Nothing can get me in a tizzy quite like running late. I have a hard time feeling like I do not have plenty of time to get something completed before I have to be somewhere or enough time in my day to get the dreaded to do list completed.

Some days I just throw the to do list out the window, but it never fails to catch on a wind current and blow right back in my face, "Screaming you cannot function without me". It is madness I tell you. Learning to function and go with the flow has never been a strong point for me, but that's okay because I have made it work up until about 15 months ago.

Everyday I function off a to do list much like what I did prior to becoming a momma and I still to think it is appropriate to do the same. Really? Yes I really think that everyday I can complete the same number of tasks that I could before I had a baby. Times change when you have Dr. Appts and such to fit in. (15 month post coming soon).

Something has to change, but change is hard. It is like a bad habit that I can't quit, but I am noticing myself getting a little more irritated as the days go on and it is all from the dreaded, mile long to do list always looming over my head. Somedays it seems like my to do list is just daily life and wish I didn't feel so frustrated because, HELLO, everyone has stuff to do! 

My word of the year has been intentional. I want to be intentional in all aspects of my life therefore the to do list must be cut down, not eliminated all together, YET. Baby steps here.

 I have been going to bed (I am a thinker at bedtime) remembering the day and feeling that so many of the days are spent shuffling Crewe around the house just so I can mark stuff off my to do list. Or I am frustrated right when my husband walks through the door because I still have (fill in a number) things to get done. That is when I realized a change is in order.

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Crewe helped his momma figure this out today during our daily pecan hoarding.  

He is a pecan fanatic. I mean call in an intervention kind of fanatic. I watched him toddle around filling his chubby little hands with as many pecans as he could carry. Then out of the corner of his eye he would see one more he just had to try a squish in his already full hands. This is when it dawned on me. This is just what I do with my days everyday. Always trying to fit one more thing into an already full  to do list, where there is just no room left.

Crewe was unwilling to leave any pecan behind and determined to keep them all held close to his body, safe from falling. It didn't matter how frustrated he got when he picked a new pecan up only to have another fall out of his hand. He was going to keep trying to find a way to make them all fit rather than picking the one's that he wanted the most and leaving the other's behind.

 

Then he could have given the most important pecans more attention.

 

Granted his thought process is not that developed yet, but it reminded me so much of what I do to myself every.single.day in having an unachievable to do list. Adding and adding, refusing to let the subpar take a back seat or simply be put into a pocket for a later date. (Crewe puts overflow pecans into pockets).

 

I am beginning to realize they will always be there to go back to.  

Thank you my sweet 15 month old for keeping your momma in check!

Pretty sure I just said "to do list" fifty times in this post.

How to put it nicely

I am going to get on my soapbox for 1 blog post. It is something that weighs on my heart and I feel makes everybody have just a tinge of insecurity about themselves. I have fallen quilty many times to comparing my life, marriage, parenting to other peoples through social medias, to the point that it has effected my daily life because I wonder what is wrong with x, y, or z in my life.  I have never been able to figure out why everyone always feels the need to act like their life is perfect. So many people constantly only post the positive and don't get me wrong I think trying to be positive is always good, but I don't get the vibe that is their intention. It is as if they want everybody to think they are not human in how perfect they make their life out to be. The perfect marriage, house, job, kids, you know the people. I think we would all feel a little more secure in ourselves if everyone, who chooses to expose their life whether it be through facebook, blogging, twitter, etc..., was honest about their life.

 I just think people have stopped acting REAL! What is so wrong with other people knowing you have struggles in your life?!? Life can be joyous and life can be hard. I would much rather have people around me in the joyous and even more so in the hard than try to keep up with the perfect persona and be isolated when life gets hard.

I can't tell you how many times I have read something that I completely relate to that somebody has posted and it makes me feel a little more secure and normal in the person I am. It is my goal in 2012 to find my balance in between being honestly happy and honestly real. For people to feel like they can relate to me and know I have my struggles in my marriage, in parenting, and there are skeletons in my closet too.

Here is where I will start. I struggle sooo much with my body image. When I was pregnant I was obssessed with not gaining to much weight and gave myself a 12 week window after delivery to get back to my pre pregnancy weight. I have been like this as long as I remember. Body image has always been one of the tops things on my list. Sometimes when I look at myself it breaks my heart a little that it is soo important to me. In my head I know there are so many more important things in life than body image and my goal in 2012 is to let go and focus the energy that I am no longer using on obssessing about my body image to reading the Bible, playing with Crewe, and being okay if I miss a work-out.

Ok I am steppin down :)

I would love to hear about goals you have set to make you a better you.

And just so I don't have a post without a picture.I Love, Love, Love when this little guy sits with one leg tucked up and the other sticking straight out.