Too Fast

1 month

2 months

I remember when I was younger how anxious I was to grow-up, but now as a parent I think sometimes if time was going backwards it would not be slow enough for me. I see how quickly life goes by, how quickly these sweet babies grow (I think I still must be coming down off my pregnancy hormones, because there has been tears over this lately). I am trying my best to soak every bit of it up these days.

 I am enjoying watching my babies enjoy each other.











There is also something about watching my husband love on our babies that makes me fall even more in love with him!

I am very certain that each baby is more spoiled than the last ;)

Linking up with:

Raising Arrows 

The Modest Mom 

The Internet in a Positive Light

My son at 4 months old

The internet is a wonderful resource! I find myself spending way too much time on my computer because of it. Yes, it can become a black hole of time and something that can draw you away from your family and out of reality, but it can be good too! Here are some positive ways I enjoy it:

 I have been homeschooling my 3 and 2 year old, and thanks to the internet we have been able to do some fun things. We play games, and look at pictures of animals. There are also some of the bigger zoos that have live webcams on certain animals. My children love animals so they could watch these for hours. As we continue on our homeschool journey I know it will be an even better resource. Here are some of the live webcams we have enjoyed:

• National Zoo 
• Toledo Zoo 
• Memphis Zoo 
• Indianapolis Zoo 
• San Diego Zoo
• Minnesota Zoo  

I enjoy keeping up with friends and family through social media and e-mail. I have several friends on the mission field and it is amazing to see God work! I also use to as a way to know how to pray for people. One of my new year's resolutions was to pray everyday for a different friend on Facebook. I have been enjoying looking over each individual's page and praying for them throughout the day.

Pinterest is a growing favorite. I love all the ideas for recipes, crafts, decorating, and clothes. It is just an endless source of ideas. 

One of my favorite ways is searching. I use a Swagbucks search bar. Occasionally, I look for specific things I want an answer to, but I mostly use it for recipes. I have found recipes that I often tweak for my specific needs and my families tastes. I love that when I have made tacos and realize that we have no taco sauce I can just get online and find a recipe for it, or cream of chicken soup, or chicken chili, or salsa, or well I think you get it. These are just some of the ones I have found recently. I can also find out how to get nail polish off bed sheets, or how to get dry erase maker off walls (these are just for curiosity of course. You can also find natural cure for just about anything. I have learned if I am curious about something all I have to do is type it into the search bar and up pops a whole list of options.

Of course you have to be careful, not everything we read is true, not every website is going to be good, and not every recipe is going to taste great (just like some baked churros I tried recently.-had great reviews...yuck!). I caution you to read a little under each link before clicking because the world we live in is not honest or Christian, but the internet can be a great source for your family

The Truth About My Day

I have made this wonderful schedule for my family and this is what it looks like:

6:30 I wake up and exercise, do my devotions, take a shower, and start a load of laundry
8:00 Kids wake up, get them dressed, make beds, brush teeth, Breakfast
8:30 Clean-up, empty dishwasher, kids chores, start laundry, Nurse baby, big kids do a table activity
9:00 Husband wakes up, eats breakfast and exercises, Kids and I start school work, baby plays
9:30 Outside time (unless it is too cold or raining)
10:00 Laundry, school work, baby naps,
11:00 Kids play with Daddy, while I start lunch

My Attempt

11:45 Lunch,
12:30 Kids chores and clean up toys, dishes, Nurse baby
1:00 Nap Time, laundry, play time with baby
2:00 My and baby nap time
3:00 Husband leaves for work, laundry, computer time
3:30 Kids up, snack, play time
4:00 Nurse baby, laundry
4:30 Make dinner
5:00 Dinner
5:30 Chores
6-8:30 Free/Play time for kids, I clean and nurse the baby
8:30 Clean up toys, straighten up the house
9:00 Bath time
9:30 Story and Bible time, Nurse baby
10:00 Bedtime, and computer time for me

* My husband leaves for work at 3pm and comes home by 1am, so our schedule is adjusted based on our current situation. It works well for us to have our kids go to bed so late in order for them to wake up as late as they do. This gives my husband the most amount of sleep as well as the most time he can with us. He works Friday-Tuesday, so our schedule is really for those days, while Wednesday and Thursday is more like a weekend for us.
 We also do a big lunch and sandwich type things for dinner, about once a week I will try to cook something that we can eat off of for a couple of days to break up the sandwiches.

I am willing to admit that my day goes more like this:

I am woken up at 12, 2, 4, and 6 for baby to nurse
Sometime between 7:30-8:00 my kids wake me up and I sleepily manage to get them their cereal, while we are all still in our jammies
8:30 I manage to get the breakfast bowls to the sink and nurse the baby while the big kids play (only to be too loud and wake up daddy again, sigh)
9:00 Kids and I do a little school work, I might start some laundry,
9:30 Kids play while I empty the dishwasher
10:00 I stop to play on the computer and nurse the baby
10:30 Baby sleeps, I might do some more laundry, play with the kids
11:00 Start lunch
11:45 Lunch
12:30 Nurse baby and the big kids go down for their nap
1:00 Laundry, try to clean up the kitchen some, get distracted by the computer
2:00 nurse baby and pass out
3:00 wake up in time to kiss my husband goodbye, laundry and play on the computer
4:30 make dinner
5:00 dinner, nurse baby
5:30 clean up, chores, kids play, work on some projects around the house, kids play
7:00 sit down to nurse baby and get distracted by computer
8:00 try to get to whatever my current project is under control
8:30 clean up-house, toys, get the dishes in the dishwasher, finish any laundry
9:00 Bath time
9:30 Story and Bible time, nurse baby
10:00 Start the dishwasher, wipe down table and counter, usually find (with my foot) the one small toy left out on the floor, put away any laundry I did not put away during the day and start a load that I should have earlier, maybe take a shower, crawl into bed and try to continue writing the same blog post that I have been for the past two days...
11:30-12:00 pass out- sometimes I wake up when my husband gets home, but quickly go back to sleep

As you can not only is the nice clean schedule I made not working, but I am having trouble implementing it. I am convinced the more organized I make our home the more I will be able to organize our time. When there is disorganization around us our thoughts and time become disorganized as well.

I am continuing to work on organizing our home, and tweaking our schedule to make our day flow well. I know when there are three children 3 and under there is almost always a mess, an boo-boo, an emotional break down, a tantrum, a dirty diaper, and someone who is hungry........but we can still make it above survival mode. I will persevere!

Priorities

Cheering on Alabama for the Championship

This is a word you will find us using a lot more around our home lately. Most of Americans have their all wrong! Quite a few of the girls I attended high school and college with are envious of stay-at-home moms. I feel for these girls. Some of them I am sure are working because their husband's income is just not enough, but I am fairly certain that most of them have bought into the wrong priorities.

Priority means: precedence, something that comes first, a superiority

We have TVs, but no cable. This is a HUGE shock to most people! In a world of mixed up priorities it is more important to watch a game than to play one with your family. It is more important to relax by watch a TV show that is turning your mind to mush, than to read a book (I am totally guilty of this though, but I have been working on it). There is a couple of things I would enjoy watching if we had cable, like the Duggars or some Hallmark movies, but we cannot justify spending money we do not have (that is another blog post in itself) on something we would rarely use. Not to mention bringing something into our home full of things we do not approve of.

We currently have internet of our phones, but plan on getting rid of it in the next month. It again is something that is not a priority. It is something that takes time and attention away from my family. There very useful things we have access to because we have internet on our phones, but more often I find myself caught up in social media, checking blogs, among other things when I could be engaging in conversation and play with my children or husband.

We buy in bulk, and make many things from scratch. We buy only a few (every once in a while) convenience type foods. Yes, it would be nice to use a box to cook for my family, but if we can save some money to spend on something fun for our family, why not?!

We don't take big elaborate vacations we have to borrow to pay for. We would love to take our children to Disney World (having grown up less than an hour from it and going multiple times a year, it is part of me)! We are hoping to take them there later this year, but we will not go into debt to do it. If we do not get to go then our lives will still be the same. The world tells you that you have to take your family on so many vacations, and you should spend so much.

Too many Christians have bought into the lies of the world. You have to buy this house, send your kids to this school, wear this kind of clothing, and "keep up with the Joneses." Unfortunately these have become priorities in Christians lives and because of this many women have left the thought of being able to work from behind them. If they would prioritize many could cut budgets enough to be able to stay home.

I know that many women desire to be home, but cannot. I was one at one time, but if they prayerfully consider where there money is going I think that God can make a way. There is even a song.....

Oh, God will make a way
Where there seems to be no way
He works in ways we cannot see
He will make a way for me

He will be my guide
Hold me closely to his side
With love and strength for each new day
He will make a way
 by Don Moen

What Have I Been Doing

I have been.....failing! I am one of these people who cannot ask for help. I try to juggle all of these things in the air, and when I drop one I let them all fall only to pick them back up and try again. Now I am not saying that it is not honorable to "If at first you don't succeed, try, try again," but sometimes you cannot do it all by yourself.....there I said it! I have been trying to be a good wife, care for my husband and three children, keep the house clean, nurse an infant, cook, working on projects, laundry, potty training a two year old, and recently I added exercise and counting calories. Guess what I can't do all that, and I am willing to guess most of us can't (I applaud any of you who can!) I realized the other day that something has got to give.

I had to sit down and prioritize what was most important. Caring for my family is always the most important, but in this case I had to ask my husband for help. My husband is not one to help in our home (too many times in the first couple of years we were married when he tried to help I would tell him he was not doing it right, so he just stopped-cannot blame him). Now when I want help I have to ask him, and he sweetly does whatever I ask of him.

Then I still needed to figure out something I was going to have to let go of. My projects are important right now, because they are bringing peace to my home and making it a place where my family wants to be more. Prior to me working on organizing and purging we wanted to do things outside our home more than we wanted to be there, so it is important to make it a place everyone loves and enjoys, a place we can be a family. Exercise is important, but I learned that trying to lose weight while nursing does not work. I may be able to lose a pound or two, but there is just no way to lose the 25-30 pounds I would like to lose and still be able to nurse Cathy Belle for a year. No more dieting for me until she is weaned (but I am usually pregnant again by that time, so I may just have to learn to love those extra pounds). Also, potty training a two year old who seems to have no concept of when she goes to the bathroom until she is standing in a puddle or smells it.....well it is just not working.

I still have all these balls in the air, but they are more manageable thanks to my willingness to relinquish some control, and putting some things on the back burner for a while. I am hoping to blog some more too soon, when I can add that to my juggling ;)