Jesus Loves Me This I Know

I have a confession. I write a lot of blogs that I never publish. This was originally one of those blogs. 

I have always found writing to be highly cathartic. Even as a kid, my mom made me mad, I was writing about it! A boy I had a crush on didn't even know I existed and there would be a letter, a journal entry or a short story about it. I have always loved to write. 

The past couple of weeks, I have found amazing comfort and camaraderie in blogs that have shared life's painful and messy moments. I have spent a lot of time reading them and thanking the writers for them. They have been healing, full of very good ideas on navigating life and a sweet realization that I am not alone.

So be aware. This blog is messy, it is raw, it is me where I am at right now and that spot is broken and bleeding and full of emotion, but I am sharing in hopes that it might offer another broken heart the comforting knowledge of knowing you are not alone!

A little less than two years ago I was tried, convicted and condemned by some self appointed judges. I was deemed unworthy and sentenced to punishment until I got my act together and followed the guidelines that these self appointed judges had set for me. I spent 6 months incredible angry and bitter. I was angry because I knew that these judges were just as guilty as I was and just as deserving of condemnation and sentencing. I was angry because it confirmed the belief of God that I had held all my life that I wasn't good enough, and no matter how hard I tried I would never be good enough. I was hurting and facing rejection like I had my whole life, and I was done. 

I spent months thinking that if I could just convince people that these judges were not the perfect example of goodness and righteousness that they tried to project, that I would feel better. Amazingly it was not hard at all to uncover their facade. The more people I shared their rap sheet with, the more agreed that they were indeed grimy and mean. Startlingly enough this didn't make the hurt and anger go away; didn't even lessen it. One day a very wise woman looked at me and said, "Shelly, why are you wearing yourself out working so hard to accomplish a job that they have already accomplished?" In appointing themselves my judge and carrying out sentencing, they were allowing their true controlling nature to shine through all on their own! 

This bugged me, because that meant that my efforts to share their shortcomings with the world was doing the same for me. I was effectively letting my true colors out to play as well.       

Around this time I experienced a life altering trip to the Dominican Republic in which I experienced God's whole, pure, and unconditional love in a way that I never had. I began to entertain the belief that I was perhaps loved and accepted just the way I was. In that realization, tiny little pieces of my heart began to experience sweet sweet healing.  

Then we moved to Florida. This was yet another huge adjustment and I struggled with other insecurities and beliefs that I had drug around with me my whole life. But I came across a verse last summer that messed me up. I John 4:16. "God is love. Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in them." 

So I started reading the love chapter over and over. What was love?? Love is patient, kind, it does not dishonor others, It keeps no record of wrong, it always protects and hopes and never gives up!

Romans 8:1 completed the verses that totally shook up my view of God. "Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." 

So love and condemnation couldn't co-exist. And without love, I was without God.

Suddenly everything I had believed about who God was, cracked. I either had to believe my Bible or myself. God couldn't be a judging, condemning God waiting to dole out punishment at the slightest wrong doing, and be good, kind and accepting of  me right now. Without any requirements of change or certain behavior. 

God showed me this summer that I had two options. I could let people be my god. People would be condemning. They would be quick to point out wrongdoings and they would execute strict and swift punishment for failure to follow their rules. They would be imperfect.They would have a plan for my life, but that plan would be influenced by hurt, failures, and past experiences. If I chose to make God my god then I would get to experience true and complete acceptance. Right now, not down the road when I got my act together. His plan was huge and pure and full of only the best; unhindered by fear or pain. He was perfect!

Slowly I let go of the rap sheets I had been clinging to so ardently. Theirs and mine. I accepted myself and them as broken, hurting, yet incredibly loved and accepted beings created by an amazingly perfect and wonderful creator. 

I wish I could say that this is now how I live, but sometimes I find myself going back to that "courtroom" full of accusations and sentences directed at myself and my accusers. But God just smiles at me and reminds me when I feel frustrated at finding myself there yet again, that if I was able to live completely free of failures, I would have no need for him anymore. 

And today I can wholeheartedly say I am so so incredibly thankful for the pain I experienced almost two years ago.  Without it, my belief in God wouldn't have been shaken up and I wouldn't have had to choose between the truth and lies that I believed. I wouldn't have discovered the awesome love of my creator. I wouldn't have the strength that these last two months have required from me in a way that has never been required before. 

In escaping the prison of self doubt and the shackles of failure, I was able to revisit the dreams that God had placed in my heart from the time he made me. I had lived with the belief that I wasn't worthy of these dreams; didn't deserve them, but shaking up my beliefs in who I was in Christ brought me back to those deep desires.

As a kid, I dreamed of a huge family. I wanted tons of kids! At one point I even wanted to run an orphanage. Then I was told I wouldn't have children.

Amazingly I overcame infertility and conceived and delivered 4 healthy and huge baby boys. But I delivered them by C-section, once again putting limitations on the number of children I could have.

My grandpa is a father to 8 and he often jokes with me that maybe I'll be the next one in the family to have 8. My husband gets itchy and starts choking when he hears that, and that's probably why grandpa likes to say that more than anything. 

After I announced a 4th pregnancy I experienced the incredulity of others and the notion of 4 or more kids being grounds for ridicule and harsh opinions from others. It was yet another obstacle in achieving my dream of a large family.

This summer, however, I was able to talk my husband into the possibility of having another one. It was not without its struggles. We tried for a while and had to take medications and it was a discouraging walk at times. I wrestled really hard with the belief that I wasn't worthy or deserving of my dreams.

January 14th we finally got that positive that we had been praying so hard for, and looked forward to a September baby. We were so excited! That excitement was short lived as we walked through a week of bleeding and tests. We were told at the end of that week that the baby was fine. Levels were increasing and we would schedule an ultrasound to find where the bleeding was coming from. That weekend the bleeding increased and we were sent to the Emergency room. We were told that levels were no longer increasing like they should and that we had lost the baby. Two days later we got an urgent call from our doctor saying that the levels were again increasing and we needed to come in immediately. An ultrasound confirmed an ectopic pregnancy. We received a shot the next day to terminate the growing placenta, having been told that the baby's heart was no longer beating. The next weekend we were patients in the ER yet again, as the pain became excruciating. Levels at that point were slowly coming down and so we held off on surgery. Levels have continued to decrease and the doctor is very pleased that we avoided surgery.The fear and the pain dominated our lives, and we had no choice but to put all of our trust in a Father who has not promised to keep heartache from our lives, but has promised to never leave us. And as we cried and yelled and laid awake at night, the constant feeling of our hand cradled lovingly and firmly in that Fathers hand reminded us of that promise.

I write about my story, not to get your pity, but to share the valleys along with my mountaintops. I write my story not to dwell on the disappointment, but to share the hope that God has poured out on me these last several weeks. I write my story not to acquire accolades, but to reveal the glory of God even through pain.

I have been reminded so much over the last 18 months that what hate intended for evil, God has used for good, and I am so thankful. Knowing that God cared enough about me to use an incredibly painful time in my life to unveil the beauty and consistence of his love, for a time that I would need it most, brings tears to my eyes every time I think of it, and overwhelms me with gratitude!

I know my God could have prevented this. I know my God could have kept me from the pain I experienced 18 months ago, but I know that my God loved me enough and has such a perfectly good plan for my future, that EVERYTHING works for my good! He wasn't afraid to walk the valleys with me to get to the mountaintop!

I grieve for my sweet little one, but at the same time I look forward with anticipation to the day I will hold my baby and kiss my baby and say I love you to my baby. I have no doubt that a little Wilson is sitting patiently in heaven waiting to meet their loud crazy family!

And I know that there is no way I could have survived this time without the incredible strength and compassion of a daddy who loves me so completely and perfectly!

Life is precious, cherished, no matter how many failures it has under its belt; no matter how many weeks of life it has experienced. My life was created with a purpose and my baby's life was created with a purpose; YOUR life was created with a purpose, and that's AWESOME!

Happy New Year!

Hello world! Its me, Shelly! Its been a little while since I got on here, but I am hoping to do better this year! I am also hoping to lose the 5 pounds I resolved to lose last year along with the extra 5 I inadvertently added. 

Every year I make a few resolutions, but only so I don't feel so left out. All my friends have these amazing and inspirational goals for the year. i.e I resolve to get debt free (people do that???!?)I resolve to learn Spanish (I learned my numbers from Handy Many, does that count??) I resolve to travel to a place I have never been before (Does a new grocery store because my kids got us kicked out of our regular one count??) I resolve to get in shape. (Which shape? Does egg shape count?) I resolve to help all  the homeless dogs find a family, wipe out racism and save the whales.  (I give up!)

So this year I thought about what I wanted to make my resolutions. I had decided in early December that I wanted to stop yelling. (I know you all are shocked, that I yell right? at least pretend you are.) I fell asleep at 10pm on December 31st. At exactly 12:00 an impressive amount of fireworks were shot off in very close proximity to my house. I sat up and yelled: "what the heck!!!" Seriously?? Not even a minute in and I dropped the ball on my resolution?? Well then the next morning my kids got up and started fighting about who got to brush their teeth first and blue gooey toothpaste was squirted all over the mirror and I realized I had definitely overestimated myself and maybe I needed to get some more realistic resolutions! Maybe something like don't lose your voice from yelling more than once (or twice) a week! After all the in-laws are coming to visit in a few weeks!

January 1st I found myself handing out resolutions to my kids. Heck if I couldn't do it, at least I could be a helper for others right? Isn't there a verse about encouraging others to do good in the Bible?? I told Micah that his New Years Resolution was to be more encouraging to other people. He responded, "I would if they weren't so bad at stuff!" I told Kyler that his was to stop being so negative. After a lengthy conversation in which I tried at least 20 different ways of explaining the definition of negative to my son, we switched his to not tattling so much. The kid is currently down to 1,233 tattles a day! He's rocking this resolution thing!! Caleb acquired the resolution to stop screaming. He dropped to the floor yesterday screaming at the top of his lungs. He caught my stern eye, stopped mid scream and said "never mind" before sulking away. I gave Liam the resolution to cut back on the stubbornness, but my little over acheiver had already set his own resolution and it was, "win. every. time." I thought my husband was the most stubborn person I knew (aside from his mother of course) but Liam has never been OK with being second best.

I am pondering another resolution though. (I know I kind of missed that January 1st thing) I thought about all the people I admire. There is a couple in Tennessee (you know who you are!) whom I admire greatly. They are best friends, an incredible blessing to their kids and grand kids, and they are always happy! When unexpected things happen to them, they always seem to find the good, the happy and the funny about it! They take time to have fun together, never seeming to worry about what anyone else is thinking. The never seem worried about making sure people give them the credit or know they are right, instead they spend their energy building other people up. They enjoy life more than anyone I know!

So this year instead of focusing on all the people who have made my life difficult and feeling bitter about it, I'll let it go! I think I'll find time to think about the happy, look for the good, and stop to laugh every day!  After all the Bible says to think about excellent and praiseworthy things; perhaps there's something to that! And perhaps I'll give Kevin a New Year's Resolution to buy his wife more diamonds this year. That's excellent right??

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!!

Grandparents are God's Hugs

Being a mom is so weird! Things happen that you could never have guessed would happen like even in a million years! I kinda like it....most of the time! 

We went to Virginia a couple weeks ago to be at an award ceremony for my grandfather. He's almost 87 and he spent a large part of his life serving in Canada on the mission field. I don't get to see my  grandpa often, but I cherish the memories I do have and I love when my kids get to spend time with their grandparents as well. They get a taste of my childhood, I feel, when they climb up on the same knees I sat on, and hear the same stories I heard, and smell the same laundry soap on the shoulders that I did. There is something very sacred about it! For just a moment life's worry's, family disputes, and differing views fade away. I believe that a grandparents snuggles are a little piece of what Heaven must be like.

Well you know my kids and that the innocent peaceful and old fashioned picture I am painting right now didn't exist...at least for long. When we met up with my grandparents, one child had a 104 fever, another one ran up to Grandma and joyfully shouted "grandma!" effectively getting the entire rooms attention for the next thing that came out of his mouth. "How did you get so old??" Liam's entire plate of food was mushed into the floor and every one who owned an iphone went home with questionable photos on their devices!

Overall it was an evening more than a few people will likely never forget!

It was a quick weekend, and Sunday we went back to Mom and Dad's before heading home on Monday.

Middle of the night I was woken by a crying Caleb insisting that he was going to throw up. We sat in the bathroom together while he emptied his stomach. He looked up at me with tears in his eyes and said "I'm just homesick for Colorado mommy." Talk about guilt trip!

He went back to bed, but it was apparent that his fever was inching closer to that  gotta-take-him-in stage when he sat up and asked me if the tiger in the corner was real. 

Um I don't think so buddy! He mentioned that he also saw happy and sad in the corner, and I was flipping out! He rolled over and looked up into my frantic face, and said "don't be scared mommy, daddy can hit the tiger with his big hammer right there." Needless to say that was the end of sleep for me!

He lived though, and we drove home where Liam and Kyler decided it was the in thing to have 104 fevers, and we spent the next week popping Motrin like it was candy! Doctor confirmed it was flu, and just to make it interesting a case of pink eye and strep throat and I am hoping that we just decided to get all of our illnesses out at one time!

All in all the Wilson family is still going strong. Its weird to be carving pumpkins in t-shirts and shorts, but I'm sure by March those pictures of snowy Colorado will make us very thankful for our cold front temperatures of 75!

Your all more than welcome to come check those "chilly" temperatures out if you are so inclined! We'll leave the light on for ya!!

Dreams Come True

Its 7:04 am and there is a panicked child standing in my kitchen. His hair is standing on end and his little bare feet are poking out from under his jammie bottoms. "Mommy! The tooth fairy didn't come AGAIN!"

20 minutes later there is another child refusing to get out of bed, a baby feeding his pop tart to the dog and lunches in the wrong backpacks, which is kind of a big deal since the kid whose allergic to peanut butter is holding the lunch with a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. 

The dog runs off into the woods. A kid chases him. There are now muddy footprints from the back door through the kitchen. We are dangerously close to lateish for school. I will later realize that the clean underwear that was laid out for the oldest is still sitting on his bed, his body already sitting at school.

Its 9:20 am and my arms are full of groceries. There is a three year old with his pants around his ankles writing his name on the drive way in pee, waving at the poor elderly neighbor lady who looks like she's just seen a ghost. The only emotion I can muster is relief that he is finally not wetting his pants, so I just turn and lug my 5 gallons of milk into the house.

2 hours later I am making lunch. My towheaded toddler is scarfing down cookies and the older one is eating a sucker. I'm questioning why I even need to make lunch at this point. Around his sucker I'm asked if I have a baby in my tummy. "NO!" I exclaim. "Well it looks like it!" he smiles and red sucker drool drips onto my freshly scrubbed floor.

I require them both to eat their hotdogs before they get any more suckers. Caleb proclaims his hot dog is gone. Indeed it is, but there is an entire wiener sticking out of the dachshunds mouth! Oh well, nap time comes after lunch, I let it go. 

My living room is filled with teeny little and overwhelmingly contagious peals of giggles as my one year old tries to escape my tickling fingers. There are blocks everywhere that I will pick up probably another 6 times before the end of the day. I wouldn't trade it for anything!!

Later I will hear the story about the kid who peed his shorts at school and the math test that had almost all 11's for answers, and there will be a belching contest in my mini-van that has goldfish ground into the carpet and the dvd player that works only half the time before we get home. I will proudly display A+ math tests on my fridge, and gently remind that "of" does not have a "v" in it.

There will be countless "I love you's" a few "your the meanest mommy in the world" and at least a dozen, "Somebody wipe me's!!" by the end of my day.

Supper will be one kids favorite meal and another will refuse to eat it. Bath time may or may not happen.Wet towels will probably have mold on them by the time I discover them in a pile at the back of the closet. Hopefully the spiders won't be hiding in it too.

9:30 pm will probably find at least half of my offspring still giggling in their beds, dirty socks on bedroom floors, and a pile of dishes in the sink. I'll be tired, I'll probably feel frustrated, and I will climb in bed knowing that I have everything I have always wanted!!

School Shopping Secrets

I was recently asked what my secrets are to shopping for school for my boys and if I could share a few. Well here is my secret: SURVIVE IT! That's it! A good bottle of wine will definitely help!

It did get me thinking about my strategies and lessons learned and if I even had any! I decided I might have a few tricks up my sleeve that I could regale you all with, though I am sure that half of you are saying, "you didn't already know that??"

Kids clothes are some sort of conspiracy I am convinced! You wear them for two months before they grow out of them IF they last that long, and a pair of jeans for little legs is not that much less than what I pay for mine, though I assure you that there is about 5 times the amount of material on mine as there is on theirs!

My kids have to wear uniforms. There are several places that I have found that carry the specific colors my boys needed and I always sign up for their emails. Every one of them had a 30% family and friends sale, though it usually happened after school started, but if I you sign up for the emails, you will be sure to know when that is happening. You also will usually get coupons emailed to you from them. I am not a fan of credit cards AT ALL, but I must confess that I do have a Kohl's card. This is where I do the bulk of my shopping for clothes. With the card, you get a coupon for 15%, 20%, or 30% off every 6 weeks or so. You can only use the coupon with your card. Here is the secret, however. Take your check book along and after checking out whip that bad boy out and pay off your account. You have to do it with your checkbook though if you want to pay right there at the register. Check out your favorite store for perks of having a card, but make sure its one you don't have to carry a balance on or pay a fee for.

Perhaps one of my biggest lessons learned is one concerning those uniform pants; particularly for boys! My boys had to wear the Khaki dress pants, but those knees could only handle so many trips of crawling though the rocks of the playground and the gym floor and over cafeteria tables before they went belly up. I was buying new pants every month on average, for each boy! So I heard from someone that Lands End/Sears will replace the pants for the entire lifetime of the pant! I ordered some for each boy. I ordered during a 30% off sale and ordered enough to get free shipping. My boys went four months before little knobby knees started poking out through the reinforced patches. Sure enough, they replaced them for me free of charge, and they replaced those again 3 more times. They do know my name and we do swap weather reports every time I call, but their customer service is excellent! I am promised that they do this with all of their clothes!!

My number one secret on shopping for clothes has to be shopping at the end of the season! You can get name brand clothes for a fraction of what you would normally pay! Just make sure your not going to be moving across the country to a school where the uniform will change just enough so that you can't use all of the polo shirts you bought last year!

Then come the actual school supplies. School supplies when I was a kid was a package of crayons and some construction paper. Now, though, if your lists were anything like mine, there were the typical crayons and markers and also very specific white board pens and paper towels and enough hand sanitizer to fill a swimming pool! Here in Florida, I found out that there is a tax free weekend on all school supplies! However I researched that, and decided that the $5 I would be saving wasn't worth trying to brave the throng of other school shoppers and risk having the glue sticks run out before I got my own required 48! So I went a few weeks before.

However if you are shopping for a big item such as a computer, this weekend is totally when you want to shop for it!!

I have incredible friends who are very savvy in finding the best deals for their school supplies. I even have a friend who, when all was said and done, was paid $5 for doing all of her school shopping!! So please, if you are one of those people, we all want to hear your secrets!! Comment on this post so we all can join you in your school shopping heaven!

If you can get your school list early on, then you can be watching the circulars for the stores you usually shop at, and can snatch up the items on your lists whenever they go on sale, especially those Clorox wipes and Ziploc baggies! Find out if the store you shop at has a loyalty card. For example in Colorado you wanted to have the King Soopers (Kroger) card if you were shopping there (its free). Target now has a debit card that is linked to your checking account. You save 5% every time you use it, and you get free shipping when you order online. And clip those coupons!!

Amazon is also amazing when you get to those last few days before school and still haven't found illusive Learn-to-Letter notepads! Amazon doesn't charge tax, and if you sign up for an Amazon Prime Membership, you will get free two day shipping. You can also sign up for a trial of this if you know you are going to be buying a bunch of things and want to give it a try.  For those of you with kids in diapers, you can also save a ton on them if you have the Amazon Prime membership (and last time I checked they took coupons for those diapers)!

Backpacks are always a frustration for me. They are expensive! My plan is to always make them reuse their backpacks for a few years, but so far they haven't made them to the end of the year! If you watch Groupon, sometimes you can get good deals, but make sure they are quality backpacks and not ones where the zipper is going to fall out after a week! I tend to love Amazon for backpacks as well, but again you can't "feel" it before you buy it. Amazon, however, has reviews and I love reading what other moms have to say about the product before I incorporate it into my crazy life! Outlet stores are a great place to buy backpacks. I love shopping those outlets stores! Again sign up for the emails from the outlet stores, because you will know of sales and get coupons!

I have to admit that most of what I have learned has been through other moms who have gone before me. True some things you have to learn from experience, like the subtle noise of a diaper filling with a substance that doesn't have a chance of being contained in its thin elastic plastic, and how that noise can wake you from a dead sleep from clear across the room while your husband who is awake never even hears it, but in most "mommy moment" cases, I have learned so much from other moms! We would all love to learn from you who have more secrets so again, please comment below so we can all learn from you!
Check out this link for more tips! http://www.creditcardinsider.com/insider/top-5-ways-to-save-on-back-to-school-shopping/

HAVE ANOTHER GREAT SCHOOL YEAR!!

Girl Power

I love being a mom! I have to admit that I even enjoy the chaos! The crazy shocking things my kids do, the ER memories, even the embarrassing moments. I love being a mom!! I have always wanted to be a mom. I know people think I'm crazy for having as many kids as I do, and insane for wanting more, but every kid is so incredible and unique and adds so much to our family! People comment on how busy and hard it must be to go anywhere or do anything with all 4 of my boys, but I don't really think its that big of a deal. Sure I have my moments that I want to scream and shake a child until his brains rattle. Shopping with just one is faster, and having to get all four out just to mail a package sometimes gets annoying, but as far as I can tell from my mommy friends of one or two, this is true even for them!

I have been struggling lately with guilt. Pressure from other people to do, think, or believe something just because they do. Pressure from people to not want anymore children, because that's "stupid". Pressure to home school, because not to is "unchristian". Pressure to bake with all natural and no sugar and only vegetables, because not to is "unhealthy". Pressure to read a certain number of hours from the Bible to my children, pressure to shop at certain stores, pressure to have certain traditions, pressure to read certain books, pressure to speak a certain "language", pressure pressure pressure.

When I announced my pregnancy with Liam, someone actually told me, that they didn't know why anyone would have more than two children. In fact I was made fun of regularly, and the butt of many jokes because I was having a 4th child. I did not realize that there was a rule on how many kids a family should have before they were considered "idiots". I have had so many people freely share their opinion that I should not consider having anymore, even if I do want a little girl. Why? 

Why is "different" bad? When did we stop rejoicing in our diversity and differences and instead "shoot to kill" if someone has a different belief, different lifestyle, different view than our own?  The woman that chooses to have two children because that is all she can handle is an incredibly wise and generous woman! The woman who chooses to have 6 children because that's how many she can handle and delights in being a mom is an incredibly wise and generous woman. Why do we think that one is right and one is wrong?Why do we think it is our job to inform them that we are right and they are wrong?

Is it because we are worried that somehow we got it wrong? Is it because to gain some of the confidence that was shattered and lost along our life road, we have to have everyone doing the same thing we are, to somehow prove that we are in fact doing ok? Do we have to shatter the beautiful confidence of another woman to make ourselves feel less broken? 

I am so amazed lately at the epidemic I see among women, especially Christian women. Its like we have some how adopted the belief that a woman who holds any confidence or beauty or uniqueness or talent is a threat, an obstacle in our search for self worth and she must be annihilated at all costs. There are so many hurting and broken women who have been devoured by their own kind! Any time I hear a woman, even "jokingly" putting another woman or another type of woman down, I can't help but view her as insecure and weak. And that is exactly what we are when we choose to tear another precious female companion down.

What if we delighted in our differences. Instead of being threatened that she has more children, what if I recognize her strength in mothering and use her to learn more about becoming a better mom myself? Instead of being threatened that she has nicer clothes and cuter hair, what if I used her to teach me about style? What if instead of hating her for keeping a better house than mine, I used her to learn some secrets in improving in that area myself. Chances are huge that there is an area that she might eventually come to me on recognizing that I am stronger than her in that area.

Can you imagine a world in which every single woman was different and cheered on in her differences? Some worked out of the home, some stayed at home, some home-schooled, some didn't, some cooked, some didn't, some had 10 kids, some had 1 and we all started delighting in and encouraging each other on what we were doing well. Can you imagine the strength we would have together? Can you imagine how powerful we would be as a community of women knowing we were building up other women, and that there were dozens of other strong confident women building us up? The resources we would have because other women were growing in areas we had weaknesses in?

The other day I noticed a woman in line waiting to order her food. She was a little older and overweight, but she had this bright colorful dress on and I liked it. I mentioned to her that I liked her dress, and she stared at me for a few seconds with distrust all over her face. I smiled at her, and she tentatively said thank you to me and walked to her table. Several times through my meal she caught my eye and every time she did her smile got wider until it nearly stretched off of her face. I left wanting to cry that she wasn't celebrated every day for her unique beauty. The only reason for the strong emotion I felt was that God has been speaking to my own tattered heart about this so strongly lately.

As women we have such incredibly potent power. Power to build something strong and beautiful with surprisingly little effort, and power to completely demolish it. Why in the world would we choose not to build something of incredible lasting value?

I saw this on someones Facebook the other day. "Don't compare your life to others and don't judge them. You have no idea what their journey is all about."

School Daze

Well it is that time of year again. Back to school!! I have read some really inspirational blogs on school shopping, and helping your kids get ready to go back to the classroom, and how to have a good attitude while looking for illusive school supplies and emptying your bank account on them. I do love those blogs and will continue to read them! However my school shopping experience was sorely disappointing in the inspiration departement.

Every year I dream of making school shopping an exciting and bonding adventure for the child getting ready to head to the classroom. I picture happy skipping children trying on uniform pants which are on sale of course, and new crayons going in the cart with looks of rapture on innocent faces. I picture browsing through stores and finding deals on new backpacks that leave me feeling proud of my good stewardship, and ice cream cones after finding every item on the school supply list, telling stories of my own school days to captivated little boys.

WHY DOES THIS NEVER HAPPEN??

My babysitter couldn't watch the two little ones, so all four boys accompanied me on our school shopping trip. I had school supply lists that, rolled out, could have wound their way through the store and out the front door! I had a baby who had green snot crusted all over his face and kept trying to climb out of the cart. I had a three year old that ate the first package of washable markers that I put in the cart. A fist fight broke out over a backpack. A argument started over who got the blue scissors, and an entire bin of glue ended up on the floor!

Each child required 3 packages of 500 count computer paper! If there are 25 kids in a classroom that's 37,500 pieces of paper!! Per classroom!! If Al Gore is looking for someone to blame for environmental issues, call the schools, not the SUV owners! What in the world are they going to do with all of that paper??

Of course they didn't have every item on the list. No way that would be way too easy and stress free! I find myself every single year missing a handful of items from the list. I hate that feeling when walking out after having been in the store for well over an hour, kids with black eyes, other kids crying, bank account in the negative, pushing three carts and knowing your not finished yet!

Every year I do the same thing too. I walk through the aisle that has all of the notebooks, hoping that the learn to letter one will be there this time. So what if it wasn't there the last 35 times you looked, so what if the manager has assured you that yes he did check in the back every time you asked and they really didn't get any in the 5 minutes since then. They have to have one somewhere right??

So we bought the crayons and the glue and the paper towels. We didn't have ice cream, we didn't swap stories, because even Mama was under a no talking order by the time we left the store.

Thank God for Amazon! I ordered the few items, and felt relieved that I was finally done; until I realilzed I had them shipped to my old house in Colorado.

And then Kevin called. I couldn't really understand his hysterical voice, but I got the impression that he had looked at the bank account and was sure my bank card had been stolen. I assured him that I had been school shopping. He insisted that that wasn't school shopping, it was a student loan payment for college! He grumbled about not needing ziploc baggies or kleenex when he went to school for the next several days. He insisted that the only reason any child needed 24 glue sticks, was because they were going to be eating half of them. I kept the wall of computer paper hidden in the back of my closet. I don't think I even want to know his opinion on that!