Cheesecake is sitting next to me on the couch, filling out her application to attend a leadership school sponsored through our church.  It’s interesting…as she worked through the application, she came to a question that was running through my mind just last night.

The question asks to what extent they have been involved in alcohol, drugs, the occult, sexual activity, or same sex attraction.  Now…for the most part, I get to brag extensively about Cheesecake.  She has never consumed alcohol, she’s never smoked or tried illegal drugs, she’s never even had someone she was really interested in dating (regardless of gender), so none of that applies.

There is one glaring omission there.

Years ago, when we practiced an ecclectic collection of pagan beliefs, Cheesecake was a tween/teen who was also trying to figure out who she was.  As with many children, she wanted to do what we did.  Admittedly, our pagan practices were generally fairly benign and limited to positive things – usually just to acknowledge the equinox or solstice.  Regardless, we were NOT Christian, and we certainly were not educating our children about Jesus. 

As I thought about it last night, though, I remembered something.  At some point, Cheesecake had decided she wanted to be pagan too, and I took her out to purchase a pentagram necklace to wear.  At the time, I brushed it aside, but I very distinctly remember feeling slight horror at it.  I couldn’t tell her no – it was the faith I had chosen, and proclaimed to love.  How could I NOT want her to participate?  I bought her the necklace, educated her here and there about our beliefs, and gave every outwards sign that I was happy with her choice.

I was anything but happy about it.

Somewhere in the deepest, darkest corner of my brain, a verse was nagging at me. 

“Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him if a great millstone were hung around his neck and he were thrown into the sea.”  Mark 9:42 (ESV)

I knew what I was leading her into – and I think, even then, I knew I was wrong in my belief.  I wasn’t ready to lay down my own ego, my own ‘self’ yet…but there was a part of me that knew teaching my child to turn from Jesus was wrong. 

Years later, when I was finally broken enough to realize I couldn’t control my own life, Cheesecake never batted an eye.  When I went back to church three days later, she went with me.  She became heavily involved in her youth group, and a few months later, gave her own life to Jesus. 

We have never, at any point, told our children what they had to believe.  We have allowed them to walk their own spiritual journey.

Two and a half years later, I am thrilled at the woman she chooses to be.  I am thrilled at the choices she makes.  She has decided that, after high school, she would like to spend 10 months in our church’s leadership school.  That means eight months of intensive training in ministry, serving, and even physical fitness, followed by two months serving internationally in different global outreach opportunities. 

I try not to sit and marinate in ‘what could have happened’, but the reality is, it could have turned out much, much differently.  The people we associated with ‘back in the day’ were often people who chose to live by a different, far less socially acceptable manner.  She could have fallen in love with that lifestyle, and chosen to pursue that.  And really, how could I have told her she shouldn’t, when I had? 

Many years ago (18 years ago, approximately), when I made the decision, as an unmarried 19-year-old, to keep my baby, I cried out to God.  I didn’t cry out to some pagan diety, I cried out to the ALMIGHTY GOD.  I asked Him to make her an easy baby, because I had no idea how I was going to handle a difficult child.  To be honest, I didn’t like children.  Years of my mother running a daycare out of our house had convinced me that I NEVER wanted to be a parent. 

And yet, here she is.  I am sitting here next to a beautiful, intelligent, loving, courageous, servant of the Most High God.  At 17, when I was getting kicked out of my mom’s house, moving in with a boyfriend, eventually dropping out of college and having a baby…she’s making the decision to devote everything to God.  It just…could have turned out so differently. 

I know there’s no point in rehashing the past…I can’t do a thing to change it, and who knows, even if I could, that the outcome would have been better.

God has blessed me with her – far beyond what I ever could imagine, and far beyond what I ever deserved.

I’ve been struggling a lot lately. 

Struggling with the expectations I put on myself, and my percieved failures in each. 

I have this perception, see…of what a ‘good’ stay at home mom should be able to accomplish in a day.  I have this perception that if I try hard enough, if I work hard enough, my house will be clean, all my bills will be made, my children will all be doing what they should do, my marriage will be perfect, and I can sit and reflect, and be at peace and happy with the fact that there is NOTHING to do.

But there is NEVER nothing to do!!! 

There is always MORE!!!

It came to a head the other day, with the 25 million things I have to not forget, or keep in mind, or plan, or finish, or start all bumping all over each other in my head.  I AM a perfectionist, see – but also a realist – so while I WANT everything I do to be perfect, the realist says ‘this has to be good enough, because we’re out of time, and have other things that must have our attention’.  And so in my head – that imperfect job is a failure.  Not a ‘good enough’ – a failure. 

I know it’s dumb.

Intellectually, I know that.

But in my heart – I feel like I am letting someone (probably usually just me) down. 

I listened to a gread sermon the other day – (Search daily audio bible, listen, select ‘the fight for life, week 1′ from the player list).  It hit on everything that had been weighing me down all day.  I cried like a baby.  I jumped in and really prayed along with their prayer.  It hit home.

I am once again trying to be superwoman.  I am trying to be the superwoman I KNOW doesn’t exist!  I am juggling home stuff and school stuff and church stuff and work stuff and marriage stuff and family (mother/grandmother) stuff – and WHAT THE HECK I AM NOT A CIRCUS CLOWN AND CANNOT JUGGLE!!!   I am not extending myself grace for the mere fact that – hello – FIVE children, husband, two with ADD, one with ADHD, toddler going through potty training, trying to start not one but TWO businesses AT THE SAME TIME…plus I am, in general, kind of over-committed at work.  (Everyone keeps telling me I have to learn to say ‘no’ – which I have no problem with at home – but at church?  If I don’t do it, who will?) 

So I need to learn to be ok with ‘good enough’.  But even typing it makes my skin crawl. 

I don’t want to be good enough.  I want to be someone who can do it all.  Everything…

Why can’t I just accept that’s not who I was made to be?

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I’m sitting here eating a great, fat, creamy spoonful of peanut butter. It’s not what I want, really, but it’s what’s handy, and I’m too lazy at the moment to make myself something else. So it is what it is. It is my peanut butter, and for now, it is making me moderately happy.

Today is one of those days…where every failure I have ever had is poking it’s head up, and cast it down and stomp on it though I may – there are more behind, waiting their turn. I have prayed. I have cried. I have told myself I am being silly. I have told myself this must be PMS. (Timing’s wrong, but that WOULD be a lovely excuse.)

The entire world has imploded in on me this week. I have a million deadlines for things due to others – and most of them are incomplete. I’m fighting a virus – and it won’t go away. I’m feeling inadequate as a wife, mother, woman, Christian – heck, you name a role in my life and I will tell you how I’ve screwed it up in the last month.

I’m having a huge, weepy pity party, when it comes down to it, and I’ve no one to pass me the tissues.

It’s led me to a great speculation on the nature of really LOVING each other. I’m not talking sexually, or mother to child – but loving those around us – truly being there for them when it’s really, really needed.

~~hold on – just noticed the time – I must go put pants on before the kids get home from school~~

(another failure – pants wearing)

(Oh stop judging me! I got up and dressed at 6 am – just threw my pants in with the load of laundry I did this afternoon, and hadn’t put real clothes back on yet!)

~~ Anyway ~~

(now that I have pants on)

I went to a baby shower yesterday for one of the new mamas-to-be at our church (Seriously – there are about 100, I swear), whom I think is super-awesome, as do about 50 other women who were also at the shower! One of the women who coordinated read this really awesome poem that struck me pretty hard:
It’s called “Loving Jesus” by Megan Breedlove. I would cut and paste it here, but it’s pretty long – so go read…I’ll wait…
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Wow, you’re a fast reader!

Anyway – I listened to that poem – and it’s been a rough week around these parts. School has only just started, and we’re already fighting to get homework turned in on time, reading done, etc, and still get the things done that need to be done at home. We’ve had plenty of hard parenting moments, and I do believe my 11-year-old’s teacher probably beleives I am the most lazy parent EVER because I have forgotten on a few occasions to check his assignment book (or taken said 11-year-old at his word that he was done! He wasn’t, despite his assertions to me!). The tone of her last email was rather “Could you PLEASE just check his assignment book nightly and MAKE SURE that he has completed all of his assignments.” She tried to make it sound like she knows what I’m going through – because she has kids too. I just wanted to say – Lady – I will bet you FIVE STINKING DOLLARS you have never gone through with this kid what I have gone through – and that’s not even MENTIONING his older siblings.

BACK TO MY POINT.

Loving one another – so the poem – made me really think about what it means to love my children. I mean – loving them – it just comes naturally. But REALLY loving them – and showing it – being God’s hands and feet to them – well…I will admit there are days when I would be ashamed to stand before God and have HIM see how frustrated I was with HIS sons and daughters.

And that brought me around to others. Sure, we’re great about trying to show God’s love to the homeless now and then, or to someone at church who is hurting – but what about those around us every day? What about those who have been with us through thick and thin? What about those who know every fault we have, and love us anyway? What about those whose faults drive us nuts on a fairly regular basis, but whom we choose to love anyway?

I think it’s easy to take for granted the people in our life who love us anyway. It’s easy to get frustrated and walk away from those who have given us the most of themselves. I think it’s important to remember, when we run off being “the hands and feet of Jesus”, to remember to be that to our kids, to our spouses, to our parents, and to our friends.

It’s easy to talk the talk, but are you walking the walk?

The problem with sharing my blog address on Facebook is…well…family may read this, and family may be offended. But…I feel like writing, and I’m going to.

My mother called earlier, to tell me that my grandmother, my last living grandparent, has decided she is not long for this world. She’s had pneumonia of late, but her will to live died over 17 years ago, when my grandpa passed away. There’ve been scares here and there, but this time…this time I know it’s for real. She has wasted away, has no interest in life – no excitment about anything. She barely eats – food doesn’t taste good, she says. Monday night, her children gathered to go over all of her assets, to make sure all the i’s were dotted and t’s were crossed. She met with my cousin earlier this week to set up her funeral.

She is done. She has given up.

I can’t blame her – she is 85. She has lived 16 years without her husband. She is alone most of the time, and doesn’t have the energy anymore to do much. But it’s frustrating. She gave up on life along timie ago, and quit living. She quit going out regularly, and wouldn’t cooperate when she was told she needed to exercise to keep her lungs working properly.

And so she has wasted away. We’ve been told to stay away any time we’re sick – and in this family (with 5 kids in 4 different schools, plus a toddler) there are a LOT of germs flying around. I get sick all the time. Plus, in her senior years, she has gotten a touch on the cranky side, and sometimes will say rather harsh, blunt things – and it’s just been easier to shield my family from that.

But it leaves me feeling like I’ve been a bad granddaughter. She lives 5 minutes from me, and I visit her once every few months. I only take her meals now and then. Even when our youngest is not sick, it always seems like naptime or other errands get in the way of time to go visit.

Secondly, Grandma’s house has always been the place everybody comes back to. It’s the place where we have our big family Christmas. Admittedly, as my cousins have stopped bringing their families home every year, that has dwindled – but it’s still a very special time. When grandma is gone, and the house my grandparents designed and my uncle helped build is gone – what reason will there be for them to come back at all? It was one of my grandpa’s biggest fears before he died – that our family would fall apart, and that my cousins would stop coming home, when he was gone. It took awhile, but he was right. When Grandma goes – well what reason will there be at all? Soon we’ll be a family who only sees each other on facebook, or for the occasional reunion, and that’s that.

My kids won’t have the closeness to their family that I felt growing up…and there’s nothing that I can do to change that.

I know, grand scheme, that my grandma has had a good life. She’s lived 85 years, and she loves God – she will be in heaven and we’ll see her again. But she won’t be HERE…I won’t be able to pop in to her house when I have time. There won’t be a reason to wave as we go past her house. I just…it breaks my heart.

I’ve taken her presence in my life for granted, as I think we often do…and soon that presence will be no more.

bleh….

It’s just all come on me at once, and I’m overwhelmed. I don’t WANT this to change. I don’t want her to be gone. I don’t want my family to have to be redefined.

I love my grandma, and I will miss her. I wish I had been a better granddaughter. ::sigh::

I am in a place. If I move forward, there is fear. If I stay where I am, there is some security, but also fear. It’s like living life on a giant “simon says”…if I do the steps in the right ways, I win. If I do them wrong, I get that nasty buzz proving I am a failure!

I have a couple of things brewing. First and foremost, this is the beginning of a new school year. I have the opportunity to attempt to take the reins again, or I can let them go, and just let my children be who they’re going to be. That would be all well and good, if 3 of my 5 childen didn’t long for that just so they could turn into major poop heads about anything they’re asked to do.

{Also, should be noted, I am writing this 1/2 hour after taking my ambien. Normally it doesn’t do much for me, but toinght, on top of the migrain meds, it’s doing somethig. This is like writing intoxicated! But without the giggling.)

Anyway —-on my plate right now I have:
1.) Sneak Peek at younger son’s school tomorrow
2.) Media – practice tomorrow and live performance this week
3.) Committment to get some things ironed out for our church dinners
4.) Committment to New Mom’s ministry to get a bag to someone. My dogs ate the bag tonight.
5.) My Thirty-one kick off party
6.) A Thirty-one party a friend of mine is going to hostess, in exchange for me hosting a Scentsy party for her.
7.) My web design business, which requires some administrative business work, deciding what platforms and languages I am going to tackle, LEARNING THEM, and then getting work.

All very exciting things. and just….overwhelming. I am paralyzed. IF I go one way – …I might fail. IF I go another…I might succeed – almost as scary as failing…I just ….am stuck in the middle…afraid to move. But things will never change if I don’t. I know this.

I am going to go pass out now.

I’m writing this, knowing my husband is probably going to read it, and in some ways, it’s unfair.

God keeps telling me to write, though – and I’m not sure how to do it other than here. I have this vague longing to write a book, but…ideas, they aren’t coming. Well, that’s not true. I have ONE idea, so I might start with that.

I am struggling today, and have had a good long cry. Hubs and I are going through Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University. To give you a picture of our financial situation, I quit working three years ago, so that we could have BonBon. The decision for me not to work removed a hefty almost six figure salary from our income. It also meant that rather than travelling 4-5 days every week, I would be the primary caregiver to our (now) 5 children. We have always struggled with our finances – even when I was working. We’ve lacked the discipline to pay the right things at the right times. Sadly, when you have two incomes, it’s a little easier to catch up when you get behind.

Since 2008, our financial picture has gone downhill, culminating in the foreclosure of our house in January of 2011. It wasn’t the end of the world, the way it seemed at the time, and it actually ended up feeling like a burden had been lifted in some regards. I am sad the first house I was able to purchase on my own is gone, but I had been praying for God to get us into a bigger house that fit us all better, and we do have that now. It’s not how I would have liked it to happen, but alas – we do love the new house and the new neighborhood more than the old one!

That brings me to where we are now. Budget-wise, we’ve cut out a lot of the extras we could have. We don’t have cable or a land-line phone. We do have an expensive cell plan, 2 gym memberships, and about $100 in entertainment expenses that could go. We also have a food budget that is fairly expensive – but it’s difficult planning 3 meals a day for 7 people for the amount that is suggested we budget for food.

We also have a lot of bills that are yet to be paid. Thankfully, our credit card debt is less than $500, but our school loan debt is near $30K, and our collection accounts are not small. Pretty ugly, huh?

The obvious solution for this is for me to go back to work. I can earn a fairly substantial salary that would allow us to be out of debt within a year or two. Easy, right?

The problem is, I have a two year old I wanted to be home raising. I have (almost) 3 teenagers (17, 15, and 13 next week). I have a “tween” with a massive ADHD issue who could test the patience of Mother Theresa. As much as they may drive me batty from time to time, I love being home with them. I love hearing about their day as we drive to or from school. I love watching Ponyo for the 8 billionth time because BonBon loves it. I love every little thing about being a stay at home mom.

The other issue is, I know that if we don’t develop the discipline to live within the budget we have now, we won’t live within that budget if I get a job. That means, it isn’t really a matter of having that extra income for savings and paying off bad debt. It means we WILL eat out more, because neither one of us will feel like cooking. It means we will both feel more stressed out, and that will take it’s toll on our marriage.

I know, if I have to work, BonBon will be in great hands. My mother and bestie have already offered to watch her so I can work – so it’s not a matter of her suddenly having to go to daycare. I guess what it really comes down to is…I won’t be the one home with her, or with the other kids, and that’s just pretty selfish on my part.

I need to fix up my resume, and start looking. There won’t be a job here in town that perfectly fits my skillset, so I will find one that imperfectly fits. I know the peace of being out of debt will be worth it, but for now, I just need to cry for a little while. How overly dramatic of me.

Having a hard time finding my “UP”.

Started off today with a rejection letter from a job I didn’t really want in the first place and for which I am GROSSLY over-qualified. Rejection hurts either way.

Don’t know yet on either property we like. So I continue to constantly refresh Craigslist, looking for suitable homes.

We have a source for our boxes, but don’t have them yet, so I’m kind of in limbo waiting for those. I’m going to start clearing out drawers today – getting rid of what we aren’t using, hopefully. If we get into either house, it will be kind of funny – the houses we like are so much larger, we don’t really NEED to get rid of things, but the moving process – I hate – so fewer boxes = happier me.

Anyway – million things to do to day, and they’re not getting done with me sitting here.

So…we’re entering a bit of a bad time. Within the next 30 days, we will be moving. Not how we had hoped to resolve issues with our current mortgage, but it is what it is. So, the search is on. While this home has been too small for us for a long time, it is still scary to know we’ve got to get this done in the next month. Plus, it’s kind of heart-wrenching for Cheesecake and me. This was the first house I ever bought – and that was a big accomplishment for me. SO – losing it hurts. For Cheesecake – this is the longest she lived in any one place, and her room is very definitely HER room. She’s decorated it, she’s squirreled away all her treasures there. She is very sad that that has to change, and I don’t blame her.

SO we’re looking for something new. And I am praising God that He has a plan for us – one we can’t see right now, somewhere else.

Doing my best to not freak out. One of the things I have chosen to fast is worry – and it’s REALLY hard to not worry right now. But I’m going to do my best!

Today I am feeling very much like Professor Umbridge. NO, I am not making Pez write “I will not tell lies.” into the back of his hand, but I do have to keep disciplining him, and it’s just NO FUN.

One of the particular challenges with Pez is keeping him on task. His ADHD makes this a much harder task than you would think. You literally would have to be sitting next to him, staring at his screen and him at all times to keep him on task all day. As you can imagine, with a toddler around and the rest of the household to run, that’s not happening. Prior to this week, it was even harder, as a snafu with our medical spending account left us without his ADHD medication for 2 weeks.

I have been struggling to make progress with his studies even when he IS medicated – so the lack of medication really set us back. The problem is corrected now, but we still struggle.

Two of Pez’s courses are done using the Alpha Omega Switched On Schoolhouse software – so the entire course is done on his laptop. Every morning, he logs in to SOS, and the computer tells him what he needs to work on for the day. Well – he figured out how to skip problems, and was skipping entire assignments. I was just looking at the percentages in the student version, and missed that he was doing this until I had almost 300 problems that I had to individually go through and reassign to him.

Sadly, this version of the software does not have an option to not allow him to skip. Hubs and I both lectured him about the skipping, told him never to do it again, and sat him back down at the computer to fix everything. Hubs even tried sitting next to him last week.

When he said he was done, I logged in and checked. ANOTHER 241 skipped problems.

::sigh::

In addition, we’ve had problems with him getting on the internet and playing games, or bringing up games on his computer to play when he thinks I’m not looking. Frustrating, but I blocked the internet, and figured we were done with the issues.

Yesterday, I told him if he got caught up with everything (which was very doable), we would go see Harry Potter on Friday. I reminded him of that this morning when he started his schoolwork.

Less than an hour later, I caught him playing Solitaire instead of finishing his work.

SO – HP is off the table. I chewed him out. I called Hubs, and made Pez tell Hubs what he was doing. I’m just kind of at a loss, and having to play the enforcer of the rules rather than the fun, exciting teacher is just…a downer.

I’m feeling pretty discouraged at this point, and not sure what to do about him. I really, really felt this was the best option for him, but with the way he abuses it, I just don’t know. I’ve dangled so many golden carrots – playdates with friends, movies, computer time playing games, xbox/wii time, etc….and none of it seems to make a difference with him. I’ve pumped him up for the good things he does…and he still chooses to not do what he’s asked to do. The really frustrating thing is – none of this is HARD for him. He can figure it all out if he chooses to.

I have threatened him with going back to regular school. The therapist told me I had made a mistake in pulling him out of the art/music/gym class he was doing daily when he was having behavior problems there. I didn’t know it at the time, but he had told the therapist he didn’t want to go do them anymore. SO – he acted out and I gave him exactly what he wanted by pulling him out. It’s not a huge jump then to figure out that he thinks, if he just keeps misbehaving, I won’t make him do his schoolwork at home.

I don’t know – I knew this would be a challenge…and I’m not a quitter. I just….didn’t think it would be THIS hard to get him to do such basic things.

I am blogging just so Ren will have something to read!

Ok, so this is what is on my mind this morning.

I noticed when I got up this morning that my husband had left without taking one of his cell phones (he has 2 – the work phone and then his regular phone). So – he had one, he would have been fine, but I felt like taking it up there anyway. As I was driving, I thought about all the times he’s asked me to run something up to him, and I got annoyed, because I had something else to do, but today, since it is Friday and I didn’t have anything we HAD to be doing, I did it with a cheerful heart. I wish I could do that every day. And I wish I was saying I WILL do better – but we all know how that goes. When I have five children needing my attention, I need to get dinner going, and the dog has gotten out of the yard again, it’s unlikely that I will be very good at remaining cheerful if something my husband has once again forgotten needs to be delivered. But it did make me think – I want to feel that way all the time.

Also as we were driving, two things happened. First, we drove past Lake Zorinsky, and BonBon shouted “In da tubby! It da tubby!”. Tubby is what she calls a bath – so apparently Lake Zorinsky just looks like a big bath tub to her! She hasn’t really been swimming since she was big enough to understand what was going on, so, I guess we need to do that, so she can differentiate a bath from other water activities! Goofy kid.

Then, as we were driving, I looked in the rearview mirror at her, and the sun was hitting her hair just right, so I could see the strands in her hair that just look like pure gold. I was just slammed once again with how much I love her – and how thankful I am that we decided to have her, despite financial woes and time constraints! She is just so awesome. (As are all our kids, but today she got the focus!)

I was reading a blog post yesterday about “sighing as we serve our children”. In other words, when your children need you to do things, do you sigh about having to do things for them? I KNOW I do. As I pointed out up above, I do the same thing with my husband. When I am busy and trying to accomplish something, and have to stop to do something for kids or Hubs, I often sigh. It doesn’t mean I don’t love them or don’t want to do it for them – it’s just an expression of my frustration with not being able to complete one task before moving on to something else.

I realized, though, that I’m overly sensitive of when Hubs does it. He will often sit at the table and sigh heavily when he is tired or thinking about something. I always tend to take that as frustration with me – even though it frequently has absolutely nothing to do with me! For a moment I wondered if my husband or kids take it the same way – and I know our oldest is sensitive to my sighs of frustration. My husband, occasionally, does notice….but most of my children? Don’t notice! Even so, it’s probably a silly thing to do. So I’m not going to do it!

Also? I learned that “Empujen” means “Push” in Spanish.

We have watched A LOT of Dora this week. BonBon is OVER Blues Clues, and is now in love with Dora.