family pic

family pic

Tuesday, April 24, 2012

I will NEVER..oops...

16 year old me... "I will NEVER...."

Let my kids watch power rangers. That's obviously what made my little brother so violent. I was never that violent. I never wanted to watch shows like that nor did I....soooo, clearly his desire to fight and use me as his punching bag has something to do with the mighty morphin power rangers

26 year old me...

Let my boys watch power rangers for 2 solid hours on my ipad.... Then proceed to let them reinact the fighting scenes and wrestle in the living room. Realize that's just what boys do!

16 year old me... "I will NEVER..."

Tell my kids they can't have friends over because the house is messy. Oh, I'll take it one step further.... I will have a clean house at ALL times. Really, how hard can it be?!....then my kids can have friends over when ever they want....

26 year old me....

"No, they can't come in the house. Why...because its a mess...when will it be clean you ask... I just don't forsee that EVER happening" (realize that when you clean one room, they destroy the whole rest of the house... and have come to grips with the fact that it will NEVER been entirely clean!)

16 year old me... "I will NEVER..."

dress my kids out of style. My kids are going to be the cool kids. I will style their hair every morning and dress them in name brand clothes. They will never wear sweat pants... Oh and NEVER EVER be mismatched"\

26 year old me....

"I KNOW the socks I gave you aren't matching, but they are close enough...grey and black are almost the same color..." and " sweetie, just because your sweat pants and shirt are both shades or red doesn't mean that they match...oh well, just get in the car...Yes, you can wear your green tie with it"

16 year old me... "I will NEVER..."
Do my kid's school project for them. Dad did my viking ship project for me and created a hand carved, carefully glued and constructed viking ship model. The teacher was so proud of it she had me stay for her other classes and show it to the upper classmen. I was PLAGUED with guilt because this was my job... (Dad) "no, don't try to cut that...no, dont try to put that together...here, you just hold the bottle of glue while I do it"

26 year old me...

"Quinton, are you SURE you don't want me to spray paint your castle that you made for school?... How about we make it out of popcycle sticks instead of the cardboard box?...Mommy could get some wood for you to use....what's that, you like it the way it is....ummmm.... you sure you don't want to color it or something?.."

So, I'm learning EVERYTHING changes when you become a parent. I guess its not as easy as I thought :P

Monday, April 9, 2012

Who I am

The past couple of months I had pretty much given up spiritually. I was just going through the motions for the sake of my children. One thing after another seemed to be going wrong. Just when I thought I couldn't take anymore, another trial would be thrown at me. And one day I grew numb to it all. There were no more tears, no more hurt, and no desire to edure the pain and continue serving the Lord. I went down a sinful path that I thought I couldn't get out of. What would people think of me if they knew who I really was behind my smiling pretend face?

I felt trapped in my sin, until one day I felt the Lord hammering on my heart after church one Sunday. I finally broke down and told my two best friends who I had become. They've been a great support system and I now know I can share anything with them and not have to be afraid of them running! I resolved to do whatever it took to get out of my sin, even if that meant exposing what a wretched sinner I was. I met with my pastor and shared with him where I was in life and he helped me get a game plan for getting things back on track.

Now I've been engulfed in guilt. I have an ideal of who I want to be spiritually and I pretend to be that. I try so hard to be blameless and perfect, but I've had to accept I've failed. That ideal just isn't me...no matter how hard I try. I can't pretend anymore. I've just gotta accept who I am, which is a girl who messes up and doesn't have it all together spiritually. That makes me cringe inside. I don't want to be that. I'm suppossed to be the girl you go to for advice, that helps people, involved in ministries. Not someone that needs to be ministered to a fed for the time being. Its so humbling, but it ultimately shows me a deeper issue going on in my soul. Why do I have to have everyone's approval? Why can nobody know about any of the sin inside of me? Because they may not like me. I long for unconditional love, but deep inside I believe that you have to have your act together to receive it. Now I'm in a very vulnerable place where I can't pretend I have it all together. Especially as I've been going through my divorce I see myself so desperately trying to look absolutely perfect. Its inevitable that I will face some judegment for the divorce, so I hope that by looking absolutely 100% blameless I might defer their judgment. (Typing that makes me realize how silly that sounds :) If I'm honest this has brought out the worst in me. I may, actually probably will, face some rejection, so how do I get through this. Well, I'm starting to get a glimpse of God's unconditional love. I have nothing to offer him right now and all He asks is that I accept His love. He's been so merciful on me and has taken care of me even when I wasn't giving Him credit for it or seeking Him out. I can't say I've found all comfort in Him yet, I think that's going to be a process.... but I feel like I'm going to gain a better understanding of the kind of love He has for me the next few months. So I guess this is all to be continued :)