11/15/2005

Checkpoint (revised)

Finally...a moment to sit down. A checkpoint. Mom is taking the kids to school for me today. Wow! After her not doing that last week, I'm TRULY grateful! Seems like it added an hour to my morning, though I got up 45 minutes later than I'd intended. Still not hitting my "earlier" goal. Such a night owl at heart!

Our family is in a major restructuring right now, though...in everything. Fortunately, not in terms of numbers, but in terms of operation. Trying to find the "margins"...make the margins happen. Moments of better "together" for our family. Less tag teaming. I

Last night, my desire personally was to try to have a peaceful and orderly place ready when my husband walked through the door. Chicken precooked for the pot pie, errands run, kids dealt with, family shopping in order, things running more smoothly. Well, did that happen? No.

But, the effort felt good overall.

In reality, I'd just been lecturing the kids at full voice for fifteen minutes as we drove to seven stores all across the county trying to find those "easy to find" white shoes for goldilocks theme interp tonight at P.T.O.

That extra effort (and buying shoes the wrong size because that's all we could find) meant the chicken pot pie I'd prepared earlier in the day was not going to be sitting on the table steaming hot. Grrrr. I was grouchy.

It was ugly, and I was venting. The kids actually found my tryade quite amusing, not having seen it in that prolonged form before, and they just kept losing it, though I told them it was NOT funny...serious moment. Better listen to Mommy and pay attention! Ten hut!

Why did we wait until the last day to find the white shoes? Well, there was the little item of the birthday party over the weekend, crash day Sunday, no feet until Monday to take with me! that's how it happens!

So...there you go. Looking like a Mom I hate to be, enslaved by things that really don't matter eternally, like matching white shoes. I'm sure they will be darling tonight and I will be beaming and there will be other Moms who could not find the shoes and would not drive another hour to another city to find them.

Husband still had work left to do when he got home anyway, but less than a usual Monday load. He worked while I "speed cooked" the pie in the microwave and transferred it to the oven to brown.

Lord help that top pie crust. I wanted it to look like usual when I take pains to make it look all harvesty and pretty. It did not cooperate at all, and I was late, and there was flour all over tarnation. I was whacking at it and pounding on it and heating it...not like it was homemade...I just needed it to flip out on top of the other on, trim it, and make a little acorn and leaf on top...to really look all domestict and all. I re-rolled it and reheated it three times...not gonna happen. So, another mommy tyrade. "This will be a perfect pie, we'll just pit these peices up and place them delicated on the top, like so, and it will be beautiful, it will be tasty, it will be, a perfect pie."
But, boy, did it taste good!

The best part is: in tyrade number three, I'd prepared the kids, so no fussing about it looking"SICK", or them wanting to throw up, or not liking it, or gagging noises! None. Zerio. no warning. Peace at the table. Either they ate, or they were quiet and went to bed hungry tonight. I've had it with the complaining throughout mealtime...at least for last night.

So, we actually had a peaceful meal, all at the table, noone at the bar...with a fall spice 3 wic candle on a leaf plate in the center of the table. It was pictuesque. We talked about the events of the day, school problems, drank milk.

Well, unfortunately, my little "Red "didn't make the cut, he got sent to time out. Too much talk about getting sick and throwing up. He got to come out when we were done and I offered him leftover cheese pizza then. (Perhaps some incentive to conform.)

Everything just seemed a little more together. For one night.

Today's goal is to quiet my spirit again. I feel like a roar. Inside, just loud. I hunger for the sense of quiet again I found last week.

Tried to scan my Bible Study last night...more like speed reading. I just wanted to go to bed early to get up earlier to stay caught up with the day. Caught up with my husband. Ready to serve them, to bless them. That's all I want right now. My point of focus. Calendar out, pen loaded, on top of things. Grocery lists buzzing, preparing for the season. Feeling the "crunch" very much. Menu items coming in for this meal and that.

Yesterday, even general traffic showed signs of frustration. Fender benders, cranky people. You can sense it. In us all.

Thanksgiving...lost in the bussle of "holiday". No! I need a season of thanks. I'll seize that. Commemorate it. Not miss it. With all the change, time crunch, calendars....let my heart be glad, thankful, soaking in all I've been given and don't deserve.

Back to my speed reading: our memory verse in the study struck me more than anything else: "I urge you brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer yourselves as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God, for this is your spiritual act of worship. And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, then you will test and approve what God's will is, his good, pleasing, and perfect will." Romans 12:1-2

I've never picked up on the "holy and pleasing" part of that offering of our spiritual act of worship before. We are to offer ourselves up in a state of faith, a state of knowing that we are ALREADY BLESSED. Not to seek blessing. To know it, to know his great mercy GOING IN. Not always to find it. He loves it when we know his heart that well! We are holy...not as in perfect, but as in...set apart, special, appointed for a specified eternal purpose...KNOWING by God's mercy and calming grace...I a, somehow, ALREADY pleasing to Him.

Yes! Oh my. With all my need for growth? Yes! Just as I view my children! They are still in need of so much growth, yet I am SO pleased with them! And I also want them to know it, all the time, to the core of their being, coming to me, not with head hung low, but with confidence of who they are coming, who I am trying to shape them to be. And He wants the same from me...confidence in Him. Confidence in His plan, His work in me...even with my slipups. I still have his favor.

Well, suddenly I have a hunger to go sit with my Lord and sense his "pleased-ness." Wow!

Until Later (after a harried, but well anticipated day). I need to be at the school at 3:30, 4:30, 5:30, and 6:30 today.
Me

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