Being Mom to a Teenager

This is a record for me! Blogging two days in a row!

I just had to share how funny I find it to be a mom of a teenage daughter.

1. Her time in the bathroom has increased tenfold!
2. She can't pronounce "mom" the same way anymore. It comes out more like "moooom".
3. She has forgotten how to clean up behind herself.
4. Suddenly the opinion of how I dress has changed. I used to be beautiful. Now I need to stay in style.
5. She is worried that I purchased matching pajamas for her and her sisters this Christmas.
6. Her Christmas list is half as long now, but everything on it costs twice as much.
7. She has to look good everywhere we go now.
8. She makes these weird distorted faces when I tell her my opinions.
9. What's cool to her is patterned duct tape and colored pens.
10. I can't kiss her in public anymore.

What's really cool about being a mom of a teenage daughter:
1. She tells me everything.
2. I know I'll look good leaving the house if she sees me first.
3. Being silly together.
4. Enjoying the same movies together.
5. She can cook and clean!
6. She's a great big sister.
7. She still likes to hug me and cuddle up on the couch with me.
8. Seeing her grow into a beautiful young lady.
9. Watching her grow in her faith and love for Christ.
10. She is learning how to earn and spend her OWN money. :)

I am enjoying this stage! I'm so thankful for each of my girls and the lessons I learn in parenting along the way! God has blessed me so richly.

New beginnings...

I've never gone this long without posting a blog. As much as I enjoy having a blog, I find it hard to have time to get it done!

So what has been happening? Well, I've spent the last three weeks readjusting to life in the working world again. I am enjoying being in the classroom again, but it is very tiring. It does make me appreciate my evenings with my family and I find myself getting most of my chores done on weekends. The girls are really enjoying the change of schooling. It's a big transition going from homeschooling back into an actual classroom not run by mom. I do still enjoy being very actively involved in their schooling still, especially as I have the two younger ones with me where I teach. The oldest one gets to be with her dad, so I'm very grateful that we are still able to be a huge part of their education.

Hard to believe summer is almost at an end, but I do love fall! We really didn't do anything exciting this summer. We held off on vacations and trips for a couple of reasons this year. We ended up replacing our roof on our house which turned into a bigger job than we originally expected! Our house was built in 1921 and has been wonderfully maintained with various remodels through the years. We did not expect, however, to have the original shingles still on our house under two more labels. I guess previous owners wanted to do the job themselves. :( We are thankful that we have a beautiful new roof. We also held off because of my grandmother. Praise God she is still with us, but she is in a downhill battle with cancer. We wanted to be available in case we had to leave quickly. My family is in the South about 17 hours from where we live. I know in my heart she is dying a little more each day, but I am being thankful for every moment she continues to go on and for the impacts she is having on others.

My sweet little GEM is so exhausted after a day of preschool. She comes home and lays on the couch or floor. It's rather funny. I spend other time going over homework with the other two. HEM is making friends well and getting very involved at her school. EMM is also making friends and adjusting better than I thought she would (she's my dramatic, emotional one).

I don't feel I live a very exciting life, but it is still a very blessed life. I hope to have more to post in the future.

Blech!

The title pretty much sums up my day. I am not feeling too well and of course that signaled the 3 year old to being in a rotten mood. I was NOT up for mom of the year award today! Of course to top it off the hubby is out of town.

It was a rough day yesterday, too. We went before the school board to appeal our oldest daughter's open enrollment request to the district where my husband teaches. There were other people there appealing their denials, too. We are one of 5 districts in the state that has a Diversity Plan which prohibits most people from leaving if they are not free/reduced lunch or not low test scores. There was another father there that my heart broke for. His daughter (same age as our oldest, going to 6th grade) had been bullied all year and was actually beaten up in class by 2 other girls. He did everything the district asked yet nothing had been done all year about it. The girls were apparently never removed or punished. He had no trouble with his 5 children in the district until this year so now he wanted his daughter out for her safety. Sadly, the board made a unanimous vote against the group as a whole to be denied without any quetions or further looking into any one case. Instead they had someone explain the Diversity Plan and why we were rejected. I am contemplating writing a letter to send each board member. I need to think carefully how I want to word it as I am angry at the moment.

I hope I feel better soon. I am suppose to go to Chicago to stay with a friend this week. There's a big homeschool sale Saturday morning and I want to sell quite a bit of stuff since I am returning to work in August. For now I will go relax and enjoy my comfy bed.

Good Friday

HEM asked me today why it's "Good" Friday? It wasn't "good" for Jesus. I replied to her that it was good for us though. Maybe it's not the deed to think of as good on this day, but the person that made it good, Jesus. I looked up "good" in the dictionary and I would certainly attribute many of these meanings to Jesus. Here are a few:
morally excellent
virtuous
righteous
of high quality
honorable
worthy
genuine
not spoiled or tainted

This is what made Jesus the perfect sacrifice for us. He was the One that could take on our sin because He had no sin. Maybe if I visualized His journey to the cross more frequently, I would examine my daily behaviors more closely. Thank you, Jesus, for dying for me.

Wanting Our Own Way

It's been a hard journey in parenting my now 3 year old, GEM. She is strong willed to say the least. Yesterday I loaded up the girls and headed to the park to meet up with friends. I specifically told GEM when we arrived we were not feeding ducks and to stay with Mommy or HEM. Not 2 minutes into our playtime GEM had walked herself down to the pond where the ducks were causing my heart to skip a beat. I began to run toward her and call her to me seeing the potential danger that lie ahead. Instead of coming to me she began to run away from me along the water's edge. Instead of playing she rested in my arms the rest of our time at the park. Today it we had an uphill battle all morning because she didn't like the answers I gave her. She was being very disrespectful and screaming so in order to not lose my temper inappropriately I put her in her room and didn't let her out until she stopped crying and could talk to me.

As I reflect on what I can do to be more effective with GEM I also wonder if this is how our heavenly Father sees us at times, too. We, too, are strong willed and do not obey what He has asked us to do. We want to go our own way. We also run the opposite direction from Him at times. There are times where God has to tell us "enough" and shut us in a room so to speak. Sometimes we can't see that what He is doing is because He knows what is best for us.

Now as we begin to prepare for Easter we can remember what a great Savior we have. No matter how many bad deeds my children perform, I am still their mother and willing to give my life for them. Jesus did this for us. He DID have to give His life for us.

"But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; the chastening for our well-being fell upon Him, and by His scourging we are healed. All of us like sheep have gone astray, each of us has turned to his own way; but the Lord has caused the iniquity of us all to fall on Him." Isaiah 53:5-6

A Lesson in Smushed Bread

Today I loaded the girls in the minivan and off we went to the land of roll back pricing to pick up a few groceries. As we were preparing to check out I noticed my 3 year old had grabbed the loaf of bread and put it in the front with her. Right in the middle of the loaf were a couple of pieces of mangled looking bread. I sighed and my oldest asked if I'd like her to go get another loaf real quick. In that split second I realized a teaching moment.

How often have you found yourself in that kind of situation where you are tempted to trade in the goods you damaged for one more perfect? Is it really a big deal?

Let's look at it from a spiritual perspective. Could you imagine if God took that attitude with us? We know we have all sinned, made mistakes in our lives we regret, etc. When we come to know Christ, He wipes our slate clean and forgives us our every sin. But what if He used our mistakes to judge whether or not we were worth keeping or passing us by for another? It seems to me that God has used some of the most "mangled people" to do the most honoring work for Him. When we are repentant in our hearts for what we've done we are made perfect once again. It's a continual process of forgiveness. We never arrive at perfection until we leave our earthly bodies.

"As far as the east is from the west, So far has He removed our transgressions from us." Psalm 103:12
"For He rescued us from the domain of darkness, and transferred us to the kingdom of His beloved Son, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins." Colossians 1:13-14

My conclusion? We left the store with the mangled bread in hand. After all, it was a result of my child so why shouldn't I take responsibility for it? I've learned that mangled bread is still edible. :)

Our First Letterboxing Experience

First of all I have to thank my friend, Kathy, for giving me this idea. I first heard about this from her blog. She's very creative with a beautiful family. I have her blog listed under people I follow. =)

I went to www.letterboxing.org and looked up locations in our area for letterboxes. I was amazed at just how many locations there are around us!! We picked one that was easy to find for our first. It was the first one on the list and it was on the same road as our church so we went for it.

It is a beautiful day here today! We couldn't have asked for a better day to be out. We did find the letterbox and it was very easy to spot. The girls stamped their notebooks and we signed the notebook in the box and the girls brought cute pencils to leave in the box. They thought it was pretty cool and are asking when we can do that again.

Here's some pictures of our experience.


When we first arrived at the site.


We spotted it right away!


The kids wanted to get it open, but mom just had to have a picture!


The girls were excited at all the trade items in the container.


The girls stamped the "smile" into their notebooks.


Such a pretty little spot...


You can see the letterbox in the bottom left of this picture...and the semi up above going on I-80. Interesting location!