Speaking of being a pack rat: I can not throw away half-used coloring books. They rank right up there with unread magazines. Even if there are only like 3 pages left, I just can't bring myself to get rid of them. The problem is that my girls are always getting new coloring/workbooks so we have tons of them that are half done. I decided, in an effort to get rid of some of them, I would offer a reward to any of my girls who would actually finish a coloring book. If they did their best work and showed me that it all had been done then they would get a candy bar. I know, it really boils down to bribery to make life easier for me, but hey, it is worth it. And you should see how much my girls have been coloring. Kate actually finished one of hers and Mary, Emma, and Ruth have spent a lot of time working on some of theirs. The side benefit has been that I've gotten a lot of quiet time out of the whole plan. I know I'm crazy but there you have it.
(My plan for unread magazines is that I put them in the bathroom, and when I get stressed out, I go in the bathroom, lock the door and read a few articles. Then when I'm done reading them, I don't feel so bad tossing them in the recycling bin. It has really worked very well, and I've read A LOT of magazines if that gives you a clue to my emotional state over the past few months.)
Sunday, April 20, 2008
Pack Rat Purging
I am a pack rat. I have a really hard time giving away or throwing away anything. I have gotten better over the years, but I'm still pretty bad. Well, the last two years our Relief Society has had something they call "Brunch and Swap" where you can clean your house, bring your stuff you want to give away, and they put it out so any sisters in the ward can take it home if they need it. Then whatever is left over, they donate to our local elementary school which has a huge Rummage Sale each spring as their big fundraiser for the year, and whatever they have left over, they take to DI.
So I used this as an excuse to clean out some stuff in our house. Somehow it makes me feel better giving stuff away if I know it is going to a good cause. When I mentioned that I would be willing to go through clothes and give away lots, John jumped on it and brought up ALL of our boxes of clothes from the basement. So I was so good and I sorted through all of them, plus the girls' drawers and closet and I ended up giving away a lot!! 5 big boxes (5foot x 3 foot x 1 1/2 foot deep) and a whole truckload of bikes, baby stuff, random stuff and a couch. The Relief Society thought we had gone around and collected stuff. Nope, it was all ours. And the saddest part is, our house doesn't look like we gave that much stuff away. Oh well. Some is better than nothing and I was very proud of myself because it kind of stresses me out. We can always give away more next year.
So I used this as an excuse to clean out some stuff in our house. Somehow it makes me feel better giving stuff away if I know it is going to a good cause. When I mentioned that I would be willing to go through clothes and give away lots, John jumped on it and brought up ALL of our boxes of clothes from the basement. So I was so good and I sorted through all of them, plus the girls' drawers and closet and I ended up giving away a lot!! 5 big boxes (5foot x 3 foot x 1 1/2 foot deep) and a whole truckload of bikes, baby stuff, random stuff and a couch. The Relief Society thought we had gone around and collected stuff. Nope, it was all ours. And the saddest part is, our house doesn't look like we gave that much stuff away. Oh well. Some is better than nothing and I was very proud of myself because it kind of stresses me out. We can always give away more next year.
Book Review: Twilight by Stephanie Meyer
So I really didn't want to read this book in the first place, but my book club was reading it, and I know lots of people who LOVE it, so I did. Having said that, I have to say for a vampire book it is a pretty good read. I'm not a scary book/ horror book lover at all and I still liked it. It is not scary and the author's concept of vampire life is very interesting and thought provoking and surprisingly non-bloody. If you can get over the fact that the 17 year old girl in the book is willing to give up her life for the love of her life (the vampire), and that this guys sits in her room and watches her sleep all night every night (which I found less romantic and more creepy), I think it's a pretty good, and easy read. I will be reading the next 3 books in the series.
However, I am not a Twilight addict. I have a friend that has a shirt that says "I love Edward" and the Twilight logo on her laptop. And when I took the book with me to a local restaurant to read while I stood in line, I had at least 3 people come up and talk to me and tell me how good they thought it was. Apparently carrying it around is a good way to start conversations and make friends with complete strangers who are Twilight addicts. But I think everyone has their favorite books. Personally I don't think I could ever be in love with Edward because his skin is ice cold all the time. I like warmth. That's why I married John. That and he doesn't suck blood.
(Oh yeah, interesting side note. Stephanie Meyer said that she loves Jane Austen and that Edward is most like Mr. Darcy and parts of the novel are loosely based on Pride and Prejudice. You see, Pride and Prejudice and Jane Austen ARE everywhere)
Sunday, April 13, 2008
Baby Brother
A couple of weeks ago my sister gave me a whole bunch of boy clothes. A friend of hers had had a premie baby and had put away all the regular size clothes, and then, when the boy got big enough, she couldn't find them, so she went out and bought new ones. (I think it is the strangest story I've ever heard. I would have looked a little harder, and these people are kind of on the poor side, but it is great for me and very generous of her to give them to me.) Anyway, so most of these clothes were still on the hangers from the store with the tags on them. It was amazing!! And the clothes are pretty nice and pretty much filled up our whole dresser.
ANYWAY, so last week I washed all the clothes and sorted them and put them away. As I was doing this Ruth was very excited about the whole thing. She asked me who the clothes were for, and I told her they were for the baby brother. So after that, she would come by periodically and tell anyone in ear shot, "These clothes are for our baby brother. Aren't they cute?"
Later that same day, some one knocked on the door. As I was getting up to answer it, Ruth said, "Hurry, Mom. I think it's our baby brother. I think he's here." I tried to explain to her why that probably wasn't going to happen, but she stayed pretty excited.
Then yesterday, Ruth told me out of the blue, "Mom, our baby brother is going to be here in a few days!!" I told her that it was more like a few months and that the baby brother was in my tummy and she could feel him kick if she wanted. She proceeded to give me a disgusted look, say, "Whatever!" and run off. Apparantly she will only accept an in-person appearance. Oh well, it is good to know that she is excited. And she's not the only one, just the most vocal.
ANYWAY, so last week I washed all the clothes and sorted them and put them away. As I was doing this Ruth was very excited about the whole thing. She asked me who the clothes were for, and I told her they were for the baby brother. So after that, she would come by periodically and tell anyone in ear shot, "These clothes are for our baby brother. Aren't they cute?"
Later that same day, some one knocked on the door. As I was getting up to answer it, Ruth said, "Hurry, Mom. I think it's our baby brother. I think he's here." I tried to explain to her why that probably wasn't going to happen, but she stayed pretty excited.
Then yesterday, Ruth told me out of the blue, "Mom, our baby brother is going to be here in a few days!!" I told her that it was more like a few months and that the baby brother was in my tummy and she could feel him kick if she wanted. She proceeded to give me a disgusted look, say, "Whatever!" and run off. Apparantly she will only accept an in-person appearance. Oh well, it is good to know that she is excited. And she's not the only one, just the most vocal.
We should be happy
The scripture that we just finished memorizing is 2 Nephi 2:27. It says, "Wherefore, men are free according to the flesh, and all things are given them which are expedient unto man. And they are free to choose liberty and eternal life through the great Mediator of all men, or to choose captivity and death, according to the captivity and power of the devil. For he seeketh that all men might be miserable like unto himself."
Surprisingly to me, this scripture seems to be particularly disturbing to Emma and Ruth (the 4 and 2 year old). When we first started memorizing it, Ruth would say after every time that we repeated it, "That's not true. Heavenly Father doesn't want us to be miserable." Emma was also quick to complain that she didn't think it was true either. So after we talked about the meaning of the scripture and that it was the devil and not Heavenly Father who wanted us to be miserable, they seemed to feel a little better about the whole thing.
But still, every night when we repeat the scripture Ruth adds on the end, "Heavenly Father doesn't want us to be miserable, He wants us to be happy!" As soon as I agree to this, she seems happy enough.
And Emma says consistantly after the scripture, "The devil is so silly. We are not all going to be miserable. Nephi wasn't miserable." You can't argue with that logic.
Surprisingly to me, this scripture seems to be particularly disturbing to Emma and Ruth (the 4 and 2 year old). When we first started memorizing it, Ruth would say after every time that we repeated it, "That's not true. Heavenly Father doesn't want us to be miserable." Emma was also quick to complain that she didn't think it was true either. So after we talked about the meaning of the scripture and that it was the devil and not Heavenly Father who wanted us to be miserable, they seemed to feel a little better about the whole thing.
But still, every night when we repeat the scripture Ruth adds on the end, "Heavenly Father doesn't want us to be miserable, He wants us to be happy!" As soon as I agree to this, she seems happy enough.
And Emma says consistantly after the scripture, "The devil is so silly. We are not all going to be miserable. Nephi wasn't miserable." You can't argue with that logic.
Sunday, April 06, 2008
Motherhood
My friend asked me to make a post about what I do with my girls. Now I wouldn't really consider myself a "great" mom. I have some real struggles, especially with my temper and yelling. I'm definitely not going to be the mom that my kids say (when they're 40), "I never heard my mother raise her voice." But I'm working on it. I do have to say that my voice has gotten louder with every kid. I don't think I really ever yelled until I had 3 kids, but alas, oh well. It is kind of unfortunate though that Kate and Mary will never remember the nice mom when they were little. I guess I'll just have them read my journal so they can appreciate all the good years.
Anyway, I loved Elder Ballard's talk today. It gave me some good things to work on.
When I get frustrated about motherhood, I pretty much go with my theme, "Play to your strengths." That always runs through my head when I get upset and I think it is the Lord's way of saying, "It's all right. You're doing ok. You just have to focus on what you like and do well." And I think that's pretty true. And I also think everyone has different strengths and things they like and do well. So sometimes if I go to a meeting and listen to someone talk and I start to feel guilty that I'm not as organized or energetic or something, I just have to tell myself, "Those are some really good ideas. That's not my strength, but I can work on it a little but I don't need to psyche myself out about it."
So, two things I really like are reading and music. So we do a lot of reading and music. It's kind of relaxing for me and that's when I have the most fun with my girls. We love going to the library and picking out books together and reading books together as a family. I just love it. We read picture books and chapter books and even regular childrens' fiction like right now we're reading National Velvet. We only read a little a night, and if I'm too tired or don't feel like it we don't read as much. We read non-fiction too. Recently we've found some great math books that have story problems in them with great pictures that my kids love and so do I. (I like math too.)
Going along with that, my best time of the day is the evening. Now I get tired and cranky sometimes, but I like doing things in the early evenings best. So I do a pretty complex bedtime routine. It takes me a little while, but hopefully my kids will remember this time of the day and not the rest when I was yelling at them. We put our kids to bed pretty early, but we start early doing stuff. Basically our kids' bedtime is after dinner and bedtime stuff. Usually it is around 7 or 7:30. We read stories, read scriptures, sing our weekly hymn, say the scriptures we're trying to memorize, say prayers and then they go to their beds. Then I tuck them each in by saying the memorizing scriptures with them, and singing them their bedtime song. Now I know this sounds crazy, but we're pretty flexible. We don't always do everything, but we try. If I have to leave, John puts them to bed and he does what he wants to. Sometimes we do all the stuff in the car on the way home from somewhere and I just tuck them in. I guess the key is that I enjoy this stuff. I like singing and reading stories so that's what I focus on.
So for their bedtime song, each of the girls has their own song. Like I said, I like to sing, so when I had Kate, I just sang to her all the time. I got a little Children's Songbook and I would just sit and sing through the whole book with her and I started memorizing the words for the different songs. I also made her up a song with a familiar tune but words all her own because I heard that kids like to hear their own names in songs. Anyway, the pattern kind of stuck. With every girl, I've picked out a favorite church song for their lullaby that I sing to them to put them to bed at night and I make them up a song to a tune I like. And when the girls get old enough they can pick the song I sing to them at night. Sometimes they're the songs I sang when they were little and sometimes not. I went through a whole year I think of singing "A, You're Adorable" because Kate learned it at preschool and the other girls loved it. I like doing it and the girls like it and they can even talk John into singing to them once in a while when I'm not home.
And about 2 years ago, we started the memorizing scripture thing. We started with the Articles of Faith and now we're doing the Book of Mormon scripture mastery scriptures and primary theme scriptures. We started because the primary was doing it and my kids liked it so much that we've just added it to the routine. We say it together as a family and then as I tuck them in I repeat it individually with each one of them until they can say it on their own. I have a prize box that they can pick something out of once they can say the whole thing word for word on their own. It's pretty good incentive and I just put in dollar store stuff mostly. I also make the older girls keep doing a scripture until everyone has passed it off, even if they've already gotten their prize. And we're doing the Primary scripture by month, so we don't change those until a new month starts. It works out great! I learn these scriptures which is good for me and I get to hear my girls learn them too, which makes you feel really good as a mother. I'm most amazed at my little girls. Ruth and Emma (2 and 4) do great. They take about 2 weeks longer than the older girls to memorize scriptures, but come on, two weeks. That's awesome. And I'm just saying this because it is all them. They love it. And Emma heard one of the scriptures in Conference today and she about jumped off the couch, she was so excited. It was fun to see.
Anyway, these are just some of the things I enjoy doing with my girls. I hope it doesn't make anyone feel overwhelmed because these are just my strengths. If you need to feel better, ask me and I'll help you feel better, because I probably don't do a lot of things that you do great. I love my girls and my husband and it all works out.
Anyway, I loved Elder Ballard's talk today. It gave me some good things to work on.
When I get frustrated about motherhood, I pretty much go with my theme, "Play to your strengths." That always runs through my head when I get upset and I think it is the Lord's way of saying, "It's all right. You're doing ok. You just have to focus on what you like and do well." And I think that's pretty true. And I also think everyone has different strengths and things they like and do well. So sometimes if I go to a meeting and listen to someone talk and I start to feel guilty that I'm not as organized or energetic or something, I just have to tell myself, "Those are some really good ideas. That's not my strength, but I can work on it a little but I don't need to psyche myself out about it."
So, two things I really like are reading and music. So we do a lot of reading and music. It's kind of relaxing for me and that's when I have the most fun with my girls. We love going to the library and picking out books together and reading books together as a family. I just love it. We read picture books and chapter books and even regular childrens' fiction like right now we're reading National Velvet. We only read a little a night, and if I'm too tired or don't feel like it we don't read as much. We read non-fiction too. Recently we've found some great math books that have story problems in them with great pictures that my kids love and so do I. (I like math too.)
Going along with that, my best time of the day is the evening. Now I get tired and cranky sometimes, but I like doing things in the early evenings best. So I do a pretty complex bedtime routine. It takes me a little while, but hopefully my kids will remember this time of the day and not the rest when I was yelling at them. We put our kids to bed pretty early, but we start early doing stuff. Basically our kids' bedtime is after dinner and bedtime stuff. Usually it is around 7 or 7:30. We read stories, read scriptures, sing our weekly hymn, say the scriptures we're trying to memorize, say prayers and then they go to their beds. Then I tuck them each in by saying the memorizing scriptures with them, and singing them their bedtime song. Now I know this sounds crazy, but we're pretty flexible. We don't always do everything, but we try. If I have to leave, John puts them to bed and he does what he wants to. Sometimes we do all the stuff in the car on the way home from somewhere and I just tuck them in. I guess the key is that I enjoy this stuff. I like singing and reading stories so that's what I focus on.
So for their bedtime song, each of the girls has their own song. Like I said, I like to sing, so when I had Kate, I just sang to her all the time. I got a little Children's Songbook and I would just sit and sing through the whole book with her and I started memorizing the words for the different songs. I also made her up a song with a familiar tune but words all her own because I heard that kids like to hear their own names in songs. Anyway, the pattern kind of stuck. With every girl, I've picked out a favorite church song for their lullaby that I sing to them to put them to bed at night and I make them up a song to a tune I like. And when the girls get old enough they can pick the song I sing to them at night. Sometimes they're the songs I sang when they were little and sometimes not. I went through a whole year I think of singing "A, You're Adorable" because Kate learned it at preschool and the other girls loved it. I like doing it and the girls like it and they can even talk John into singing to them once in a while when I'm not home.
And about 2 years ago, we started the memorizing scripture thing. We started with the Articles of Faith and now we're doing the Book of Mormon scripture mastery scriptures and primary theme scriptures. We started because the primary was doing it and my kids liked it so much that we've just added it to the routine. We say it together as a family and then as I tuck them in I repeat it individually with each one of them until they can say it on their own. I have a prize box that they can pick something out of once they can say the whole thing word for word on their own. It's pretty good incentive and I just put in dollar store stuff mostly. I also make the older girls keep doing a scripture until everyone has passed it off, even if they've already gotten their prize. And we're doing the Primary scripture by month, so we don't change those until a new month starts. It works out great! I learn these scriptures which is good for me and I get to hear my girls learn them too, which makes you feel really good as a mother. I'm most amazed at my little girls. Ruth and Emma (2 and 4) do great. They take about 2 weeks longer than the older girls to memorize scriptures, but come on, two weeks. That's awesome. And I'm just saying this because it is all them. They love it. And Emma heard one of the scriptures in Conference today and she about jumped off the couch, she was so excited. It was fun to see.
Anyway, these are just some of the things I enjoy doing with my girls. I hope it doesn't make anyone feel overwhelmed because these are just my strengths. If you need to feel better, ask me and I'll help you feel better, because I probably don't do a lot of things that you do great. I love my girls and my husband and it all works out.
I Will Survive
Does anyone remember the Gloria Gaynor song "I will survive"? When I was single, this was my favorite girl power song. I still really like it although I am no longer bitter about guys; John is great!! (My girls know almost all the lyrics because I sing it really loud and play it at least twice when it comes up on the ipod.)
But ANYHOW, I survived the rest of the week without John. It was hard but with a lot of visits to my parents' house for free food and good distractions for the girls, everything turned out good. I even watched the whole Christy trilogy of movies (if you don't know what this is, ask me). They are definitely girl movies that I'm sure John could do without. They are really cheesy but I love them. They're right up there with Anne of Green Gables and all Jane Austen movies. Ruth watched most of them with me and seemed to like them. (Never mind the fact that she was supposed to be in bed. At that point at night I was too tired to care and she was mostly quietly watching the movie so I let it ride. I have a short fuse that late at night so I have to just avoid it sometimes to preserve the well-being of all involved.)
Anyway, it was all good. I only had one breakdown and that was John's fault so you can ask him about it. Everything else went really well and the girls tried hard to be good. They were a little mystified as to where John went though. Every once in a while Ruth would pop up with things like, "Where's dad? Is he STILL at work?" or "Where's Dad? Oh, he must be sleeping." Stuff like that.
So we're really glad John's home. We like having him around. And I'm glad he had a good time. He deserves a little fun in his life. For more details see his blog. He's got some great stories.
But ANYHOW, I survived the rest of the week without John. It was hard but with a lot of visits to my parents' house for free food and good distractions for the girls, everything turned out good. I even watched the whole Christy trilogy of movies (if you don't know what this is, ask me). They are definitely girl movies that I'm sure John could do without. They are really cheesy but I love them. They're right up there with Anne of Green Gables and all Jane Austen movies. Ruth watched most of them with me and seemed to like them. (Never mind the fact that she was supposed to be in bed. At that point at night I was too tired to care and she was mostly quietly watching the movie so I let it ride. I have a short fuse that late at night so I have to just avoid it sometimes to preserve the well-being of all involved.)
Anyway, it was all good. I only had one breakdown and that was John's fault so you can ask him about it. Everything else went really well and the girls tried hard to be good. They were a little mystified as to where John went though. Every once in a while Ruth would pop up with things like, "Where's dad? Is he STILL at work?" or "Where's Dad? Oh, he must be sleeping." Stuff like that.
So we're really glad John's home. We like having him around. And I'm glad he had a good time. He deserves a little fun in his life. For more details see his blog. He's got some great stories.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
