ER

My Bug is sick. Check on him here.

Costume help

Don't forget that I'm shifting gears and trading spaces, posting now at To Build This House! Mosey on over and help us choose the Bug's costume! We need your help!

New blog

After some thought, and a few sick days on the couch, I've created a new blog. You can go here to check it out. My plan is to eventually move over my archives from here to there, so it's kind of like I'm just moving.

So why the move? Since this one started as primarily baby update space, sometimes I feel cramped and unable to really grow and share how our family is growing these days. (No, I'm not expecting another babe!) Think of it as moving into a bigger space, where I have more room to be creative and expand on topics related to faith, family, and everything in-between.

Don't panic. The Bug will be all up in my new space. How could he not be? So much of my life is full of and fitted to his little one year old self. Now you can breathe easier, I'm sure.

Until I get things moved over, this one will still exist. You're welcome to come hang out here if you'd like. By yourself. Just kidding. Maybe not. Anyway, just join me over at the other blog, and all will be well.

Thanks for reading along!

Not Me! Monday

It's Monday again, and there's plenty I would love not to tell you - but I will. I'm certainly not going to blog and link to MckMama's "Not Me" Monday instead of cutting my husband's hair...the poor thing's ears are being eclipsed as I [do not] type.

That was NOT me at the restaurant last night whose toddler confiscated a steak knife while I prepared some bite-sized vittles unaware. *Gasp* That would be simply unthinkable. Nor was it me some moments later walking out of said restaurant with a toddler covered in whole milk, because I would have never in a million years forgotten my kid's sippy cup and tried to give him a real adult swig. I'm glad we cleared that up, just in case you thought it was me last night at Ruby Tuesdays, and totally judged.

If by chance you were at Kroger on this fine Monday, and saw someone veer a shopping cart into a blind man's grocery basket, rest assured that it surely was not me. Good heavens, who do you think I am? I never get distracted by packages of Oreos and chocolate chip cookies, and always stay perfectly to my side of the aisle, so that would be impossible. [But if it would have been me, no blind men would have been injured in the above scenario.]

Since my Saturn definately has a horn (because it would be illegal to take out the horn fuse - even IF there was a faulty something in there that caused the horn to spontaneously erupt even while driving or while sitting in the driveway in the middle of the night!!!), I certainly didn't honk at someone while driving Matt's car just to remember what horn-honking was like. And even if that would have been me (which it wasn't), the guy was totally asleep at the wheel, so to speak.

It wasn't me who left all the hubby's dress shirts in the dryer getting permanent wrinkles. I thought that's what permenant press was created to avoid.

It most definately was not me traipsing around my yard in running shorts, a crazy patterned night-shirt thing (partially covering running shorts), sweatshirt over that, and neon yellow flipflops. I always put my best foot forward, even while decorating my porch for fall. That must have been the neighbor.

I'm not about to end this post to partake in some kind of sugary, bad for me snack, either. Okay, who am I kidding? Maybe I will - but that is so not the norm. :)

Catchall

Our house has a new junk drawer of sorts. A catchall, if you will. As the Bug trucks along behind his shopping cart (which is his primary means of transportation from room to room since he is in no hurry to walk unassisted), he picks things up for me. He also swipes things, ferreting them away in his basket.

On several occasions as of late I have been scratching my head and looking everywhere for something - my phone, keys, shoes - only to find Haddon speeding them down the hall.

Look closely at this basket:

Mom's shoes? Check. Dad's college class lesson notes (swiped from his Bible)? Check. Stuffed cat-like toy from Maddie Carlisle? Check. Random assortment of pieces of other toys? Check.

So if you're ever at our place, or we at yours, and something goes missing...you know where to look.

The real question is, do you think Jack will fit in this thing???

Reading

You may have noticed I haven't been writing. That's because I've been reading. A lot. Like, neglecting housework and husband because-I-can't-put-it-down-honey-it's-just-that-good kind of reading. (There would have been some great Not Me Monday material, but I was too busy - you guessed it - reading!)

A few months ago I rediscovered my adoration of public libraries, and since then the Bug and I have spent some time roaming the stacks looking for good reads. And board books (for those of us who prefer chewing on the edges and flinging them across the room after the read). Add that to the three books at home I was already half through, and you have one delinquent blogger curled up on the couch with a fleece throw and cup of coffee, nose-deep in one (or four) good volumes.

My morning book of choice as of late has been a Bible study aid by Dwight Edwards, Experiencing Christ Within. After several months of "winging it," it's nice to have something structured for my time in the Word.

This thought was especially provoking for me this morning: "'Whatever you do, do all to the glory of God' (1 Corinthians 10:31). Our lives together in the body of Christ as well as individually - must find their first and greatest significance in how they enhance God's reputation. This is our primary calling, the very purpose of our existence." (p.36)

What am I doing today that should be done for the glory of God? How am I enhancing God's reputation (or maligning it) by the way I do those things? What about you?

I have also been reading Tim Keller's The Prodigal God, one that I heartily recommend to every Christian. I hope to do a full post on that one at some point.

***

Throughout the course of any given day I can be found frantically thumbing through an assortment of parenting books - Baby Wise II, Shepherding a Child's Heart, What to Expect the First Year, etc. I have a lot to learn. Like, for instance, what to do with the screaming little munchkin who is now finicky in his eating habits and hot-and-cold with his morning nap. (Suggestions welcome).

While praying for patience and feeling many moments like I am failing, one important lesson has jumped out to me in all my page-turning: "We don't see ourselves as God's agents. We, therefore, correct our children when the irritate us. When their behavior doesn't irritate us, we don't correct them. Thus our correction is not us rescuing our children from the path of danger; it is rather us airing our frustration," Ted Tripp explains. (Guilty as charged!)

In Shepherding a Child's Heart, Tripp further exhorts parents, "Your objective in discipline is to move toward your children, not against them. You move toward them with reproofs and entreaties of life. Discipline has a corrective objective. It is therapeutic, not penal. It is designed to produce growth, not pain."

***

For fun I have been reading (for about six months) Paris to the Moon by Adam Gopnik . It's a fun read about Gopnik's move to Paris with his wife and infant son, a tale of their American family in the City of Love. I enjoy the snippets on French culture. This is my bedside book, usually catching a few pages right before I drift off to sleep.


This week that one has been shelved for The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane, a newly released novel by Katherine Howe. I put this one on hold at the library, people. I read it in less than 48 hours (thus the bit about housework and husband neglect above). It's a story about a Harvard grad student who unearths some interesting new details about the Salem witch trials of 1692. The story shifts back and forth between 1991 and 1692. Great plot, a little hokey at times.

"Not me!" Monday

MckMama (Stellan's mama - see the button in my left sidebar) does something every week that I get a huge kick out of. She rats herself out. She tells all the things she did as if she didn't do them, because, well, they would be uncivilized, unrefined, or just plain embarrassing.

So I'm joining in, without any further ado:

I certainly didn't lay on the couch first thing this morning, trying to shake off the fog, while the Bug watched "Baby Mozart" and harassed the cat. I would never do that because I am a rise-before-the-sun-and-be-happy-about-it kind of morning person.

You'd better believe I didn't skip making the bed, washing breakfast dishes, and generally tidying up during nap-time in order to work on the Bug's baby book...and sneak in a few minutes on Facebook. Nope, not me.

Did I mention that I surely didn't accidentally leave a poopy (cloth) diaper to be dealt with until so much later that Matt ended up with the task when he got home? Shew! Glad that wasn't me!

I would never reorganize my recycling bin or forget to put laundry in the dryer. Nor would I ever take my coughing child to Target just to get out of the house, because the walls were closing in and the quarantine was causing hallucinations. (It's not swine flu, FYI.)

My dinner table was not buried so much so that dinner was had on a small corner of it, in fact, on top of a dirty high chair tray. That would go against my anti-clutter mentality. My well-planned crock-pot chicken certainly did not end up as a thrown together meal...of course not! Because I certainly did not forget that I had already used the cream of chicken soup (meaning we had none tonight). Not me, menu-planner extraordinaire!


I have not worn my hair in a ponytail, bangs so unfashionably pinned back for a week straight. Nope, never.

To top it all off, my child would never cry the entire day, clinging to my legs every.single.step. SIX of his teeth would not try to come in at the same time, because that would just be ridiculous!



Not my kid.


I'm not going to bed at 9 pm (right now). That would be pretty lame..................................