On Cherishing Every Moment in Motherhood

Over the past several years, I’ve noticed a trend in the themes of many of the blog posts and articles popping up on my social media feeds. The theme? Moms of young kids who have been stopped by someone (usually an older person) who reminded them to “cherish every moment” while their children are young, and who feel the need to revolt at such an admonishment. “NO! Motherhood is hard and full of lots of challenging, stressful, difficult moments! How dare someone guilt me into cherishing every single moment!! These darn older people are out of touch!!!” (OK, so I’m paraphrasing there. But you get my drift. ;)).

On one hand, I understand this response. Mommying little ones is really, really hard. There are a ton of stressful and difficult moments! I know this—I’m living it! For all the amazing moments that make my heart burst, there are many moments where I want to collapse into a pile of tears. It is good to acknowledge that our life isn’t Pinterest-perfect, that we need Jesus in every one of those moments, and that His grace is sufficient in our weakness.

The thing is…what if these older folks are onto something?

What if they’re not trying to “guilt us” when they tell us to cherish every moment, but are reminding us that these tough times are fleeting, and that finding the good in them is worth it?

What if we acknowledged that they possess something we don’t yet have: perspective?

What if God is using them as a mouthpiece to whisper to us the Scriptural call to “be joyful always”?

What if, instead of bristling in defense, we stopped, breathed, and thanked God for that reminder to choose joy?

Just a thought.

Hang in there, moms. ❤

 

Who Moved My Blog…?

Well, I guess I did!

Find me at The Dazzled Life.

Hope to see you there!

The Family Book of Advent

There were giggles in our living room the other night. They emanated from my pajama-clad kids as they watched the orange balloon swirl and sputter aimlessly about the room in a merry, joyful dance.

We’d just been reading about joy, you see — the joy of the Spirit of God. How it fills us. How it filled the babe in Mary’s cousin Elizabeth’s womb, so that even the unborn John the Baptist couldn’t help but dance for joy. How sometimes His gladness is so great and so powerful we can’t contain ourselves — we just have to let it out. Kind of like a balloon.

So we took turns blowing air into the balloon, til it was round and full — then, WHOOOSH! Let it go into it’s crazy, joyful, noisy, giggle-inducing swirl. 

What a perfect, memorable illustration. I got it from this fabulous book: “The Family Book of Advent”, by longtime friend Carol Garborg.

I’d had my eye on this book for awhile, so when Carol asked if I’d be willing to review it, I jumped at the chance! Advent calendars/devotionals that are designed to help little ones really grasp the true meaning of the season have been hard for me to come by — most seem to be focused on either the commercial or adults/older children — so this really hits the spot for me. 25 days of devotions, illustrations and simple activities (using mostly basic, household items) to help get kids excited for what Christmas is REALLY all about. Just paging through the book gets me excited!

(plus, it’s just a beautiful book!)

I’m definitely planning on giving this one a go with my kids this year — maybe it’s something that would work for you, too!

“The Family Book of Advent” by Carol Garborg is available at many Christian bookstores. You can also check out the website for Carol’s ministry, Faith Family Style.

Happy Advent!

Strawberry Shortcake & Baking Therapy

I’ve been getting into baking a tiny bit lately, which is kind of funny because if there is one room I typically try to get myself out of as quickly as possible, it’s the kitchen. The dishes. The endless dishes…

Added to that is the fact that, while I’m OK at cookies and bars, I’ve made my share of cake wrecks. I give you exhibit A:

(note: That is not a key-lime pie. it is a cookie cake. A cookie cake that, as it turned out,
was primarily filled with raw cookie dough. Ugh. )

Let’s just say I’ve made more than one last-minute trip to CUB to pick up a box of cookies when it was my turn to bring treats to the gathering. And…seriously, it just takes way less time to make it from a box, and with my crazy life these days, time is a precious commodity.

But a couple weeks ago, I made my daughter’s birthday party cake. From scratch. And it worked (after two tries. -Ahem-). And it was FUN.

(important note: anything looks pretty if you put roses on the top.)

Then, tonight, for no good reason at all other than I had whipping cream and strawberries in my fridge, I made strawberry shortcake. And it was good. Really good. Like, so good I had to sit down as I took a bite good (*I don’t think that’s boasting…? All I did was follow the instructions in the recipe, and voila! :)). And it was oddly and surprisingly therapeutic. Who knew?!

Anyway, I was kind of excited about it, so I thought I’d blog about it, because if I can bake it, you can too. Seriously. You can. Try it and tell me what you think!

I used the recipe from the amazing Magnolia Bakery cookbook, but it’s posted here as well.

Cheers! ❤

Grace.

Do you have your own special language that you speak in your family? Words that evolved from kid-speak to commonplace in your home, yet would draw a quizzical look from anyone on the outside?

We have some of those. In our home we eat “Chicka bars” (nutrigrain bars) and we routinely call the grandparents “Mow Grandma & Grandpa” and “Kay Bop-Bop” (there’s a story behind each, but that’s another blog post for another day :)).

And then there’s “grace”.

Awhile back, our 3-year-old girl received a red, plastic cross necklace as a Christmas gift from her teachers in the BSF group we are a part of. Somehow — and we’re still not sure how — she started calling it her “grace”…and now, any time she sees a cross, that’s what it is: a “grace”.

This past Friday, as I was reading the story of the crucifixion from her children’s Bible, she saw the illustration of the three crosses on the hill, and she asked me “Why are there three graces?”.

I don’t think I’ll correct her, because I love it. We see a cross — she sees grace.

 For by grace you have been saved through faith. And this is not your own doing;
it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

Ephesians 2:8-9

 

The Lost Blanket Adventure

Oh my, somehow I forgot to post my favorite blanket picture of them all! Here it is:

Pizza!

photo from threadedbasil.blogspot.com

Do yourself a favor and try out this great homemade pizza recipe from over at Threaded Basil. I decided to try it out yesterday and it was delicious! I am NOT a great cook, but this recipe was really simple yet delicious and fun to make — and (most importantly) the kids and hubby loved it. Yay!

Figure Skating

It is a little known fact that I used to be a figure skater.

Yes, once upon a time I frequented the illustrious Bloomington Ice Garden, where my parents enrolled my brother and I in Saturday morning skating lessons. Naturally, as we’d never been in skating lessons before, they enrolled us in the beginners level.

The only trouble was that the rest of the class consisted of kindergartners.

I was in 4th grade. This is a big deal in elementary school.

And then, to add insult to injury* (*don’t worry mom, I was neither insulted nor injured; just a figure of speech), we didn’t even pass the class. I distinctly remember the stern, grey-haired gentleman with a thick European accent making swift check marks upon the pad of paper he held fiercely as I did my best to display my newly learned skills of Schwizzles (skating while moving your feet in and out) and skating in a straight line, and I recall my horror when he told me I hadn’t passed. I mean COME ON. I mean, I was no Katarina Witt, but seriously. I was 9. To this day I swear I was jipped.

But I digress.

The lessons didn’t really matter. What did matter was the letter that I receieved shortly after my classes ended, inviting all skating lesson participants to take part in the spring skating show, along with the figure skating club (the “clubbers” were the REALLY good skaters).

I was so excited! I remember begging my parents to allow me to participate, but not because I loved skating or wanted to grow in my “craft”.

No. I mean really. I was a 9 year old girl. I’d seen the Olympics. I wanted a cool costume. Something…sparkly…frilly…maybe even pink?!

My parents relented. They paid the little fee and signed me up. I started going to the practices. I was part of a group of skaters who would be performing a number called “Ragtime Rhythm”. The other girls in my group were 5. I was awkwardly tall compared to them. So very awkwardly tall. But “it will be worth it”, I told myself “once I get to wear that beautiful costume, it will be worth it!”.

Finally it happened…I remember well the first time I got to get a glimpse of our groups costumes. I’d seen my friend Jacquie’s costume — a frilly, tassled, pink number that screamed “roaring 20s”. So cute…so pretty. I couldn’t wait to see what mine would be!

Then I saw it.

It was orange.

Shimmery, metallic, orange, with a few black and white sequins on it. And it had…it’s almost so painful to type…a large black and white checkered foof right on the bum.

I was sorely disappointed.

Still, I skated with my kindergarten friends.

And that was the end of my figure skating career. And kind of par for the course for me for the many awkward years to come (ha ha!) 🙂

Giveaway Winner

So…last weekend ended up being crazy, as all 4 members of our family got hit with that nasty cold-that-just-won’t-go-away bug that’s going around here. We were a sad, sorry, sight, people. Not much was accomplished last weekend aside from laying around, watching movies, snuggling, devouring cough drops, wiping little noses, and watching a sad, sad Vikings game. Now we are on the upswing, thankfully, but we are not fully recovered and I am *definitely* in “catch-up mode” right now. Needless to say, I just didn’t get around to announcing the winner to my little giveaway like I said I would last Sunday night. So I am now.

Thank you to all 3 of you who entered. Thanks to random.org, a random number has been generated to determine the winner (yes, I seriously used a random number generator even though there were only 3 entries…dont’ judge!)…and that number is…(drumroll….)

3!

Congratulations, Jennifer! I don’t think I have your mailing address, so just send it to me (via the “contact me” button the blog) and I will get the book out to you ASAP (which, at this rate, may not be THAT soon… ha ha! :)). Hope you enjoy the book as much as I did!

Deck the Halls…and walls…and floors…and such…

There’s nothing that warms a home quite like Christmas decorations do, is there? Here’s what we’ve got in our house this year:

1. A Tree

I’m a big believer in real Christmas trees, but for the 3rd year in a row we opted to go with our artificial little friend. His fragrance isn’t nearly as lovely as a real tree’s would be, but he’s a lot simpler to assemble and decorate, and — with 2 tiny ones around — I’m not as worried about someone pulling it over on him/herself or eating some needles or me being so scatterbrained that I forget to turn the Christmas lights off and our house burns down. So, fake tree it was this year. It was sort of an impulsive decision that we are already feeling a bit bad about. We do love them balsams (*name that movie). Oh well…”maybe yater” (as W would say :)).

Fake tree or real, the ornaments that adorn it are my favorite part. Our ornaments are a collection comprised of ornaments from our childhoods…and more recently too, I suppose. My family was *big* on ornaments as I grew up. My 4 siblings and I each had a box of our own ornaments, along with an itemized list of our ornaments reminding us of what year we got each one and who/where they were from. It sounds SO “type A”, but I am really thankful for it, and it’s a tradition I’d love to pass down to our kids. I love how so many of my ornaments bring back glimmers of memories from different times in my life. On our tree we’ve got pasta wreaths spray-painted gold and beaded pipe cleaner candy canes and loosely stitched stockings…and I love it.  Those “department store” type trees are beautiful — with the matching glass ornaments and ribbon and all that — but in my home I’ll take a personalized tree any year.

W had a great time helping us decorate the tree. As you can see, he decided that all the ornaments would look good on one branch 🙂 :

2. Nativity Scene

This was my “dream” nativity scene — I first eyed it while I was working at a Christian bookstore…and finally it became mine! It’s original home during the holiday season was in our bay window, with a lovely lighted garland behind it giving it just the right solemn glow.

However now that we’ve got a 2-year-old it’s new home is way up high on top of my china cabinet. 🙂

3. Advent Calendar(s)

Last year I set out on a quest for the perfect advent calendar — something that would tell the Christmas story in a simple yet fun (yet not overly cutesy) way. I didn’t come up with much. So far the best I’ve been able to do is find the cheap little cardboard kind with the perforated “doors” to open each day, along with this little number I scored after Christmas at Marshall’s last year:

It’s basically just a hanging tapestry with 25 square pockets on it and a little wooden thing-a-ma-jig that you move to a new pocket each day. It doesn’t do anything to tell the Christmas/advent story at all, and M has nicknamed it “house of the rising sun”…but W likes it, it’s a fun little way to count down the days til Christmas, and — I have to admit — it’s growing on me.

Those are the big decorations we’ve got going on in our house this year — what about you?