Sharing

Stumbled across this great article and had to share!  I just love her blog. It always has so many encouraging posts..... I have wanted to link and quote her many times but I find that getting time at the comp is increasingly difficult and I am left with nothing to do but write posts in my head. Wonderful, intriguing, insightful, genius posts that I know you all are just dying to read (sorry, sarcasm was a bit much there, wasn't it?).

 Speaking of unwritten posts...... I am still getting in more reading than normal and have to laugh at myself. If I were to write a post every day I am sure that you could tell which author I am currently immersed in..... One day you would read and laugh to yourself  'Oh, she is in the midst of a Bronte' book' or 'Definitely reading Kate Douglas Wiggins' or perhaps you would nod your pretty little head and say 'She is definitely reading Prentiss today' and then filled with horror you would say something like 'Good gracious! Please tell me she isn't reading Jeanette Oake!!!!' (that is for you E! :o) I find that, when I read, my thoughts change patterns to match that of the book which I am reading. If the author(ess) is generous in it's use of good language and a higher level of vocabulary then I find myself thinking in a like manner, if the writer is large in religious sentiment I find my thoughts mulling over the ideas presented and spending more time thinking about my stand on the arguments presented, etc...... Now, maybe this is more noticeable to me because I spend so much of my time with small children, I sometimes wonder if I have been reduced to thinking like a 6 yo! :o) It is also why I choose to be very careful with what I read. Much of the current popular literature would not lend itself to improving my mind but would instead lend itself to the hindrance of the growth in my faith that I desire. If my thoughts are filled with romantic trash that does nothing but excite the flesh and lend itself to discontentment with my spouse and/or my surroundings, what have I gained? If my thoughts are focused on that which are diametrically opposed (though oft times cloaked as the newest and greatest in "christian" literature) to the Christian walk, will my Christian faith grow as it aught?  Or will I, though the battle is hard enough without sabotage, make myself stumble and scatter so many stones in my path that I refuse to walk the path and instead stay as an infant in my faith?

 Anyhow, enough of my ramblings. My time on the comp is up.....  Hope you enjoy the link :o)

Amnesia?

 I am beginning to wonder if I have amnesia...... I thought I lived in the Pacific NW, where the weather never varies too much - never too hot or too cold, where Dec. is synonymous with gray, rainy days, where our river NEVER froze, where cold spells lasted only 1, maybe  2 days, where bundling up in 16 layers was never necessary,  where where wind so cold it takes your breath away was something you only read about, and where frozen water pipes were so rare they were almost unheard of.......... I must have been mistaken...... or maybe I moved and don't remember!  Seriously. what is happening?!??!  The river outside our house (which is a tidal river) has been frozen over the last few mornings and we are seeing temps in the teens!!!  It is absolutely crazy.  I wanted to post pics but they are all still on my camera. Oh well, I didn't go out early enough today to get a pic of the river frozen all the way across anyways. The kiddie pool on my parents deck was full of rainwater that froze solid. There is less now because the kids think it great fun to chip ice out of it.:o) Milo's (our bunny) water bottle is frozen solid every morning and the water bottles in our car are too, the aforementioned ice chips don't melt, and everything crunches when you walk. ( I thought about waxing poetic on you but my brain can't seem to think of the right words to glamorize the cold :oP ) This weather is amazing and I find the cold isn't so bad (since I don't have to go out! lol). At least it is dry and the sun has been shining! :o) I think that I prefer sunny and cold to the normal gray, dreary, moderate temperature rain.

  On another train of thought...... we went to the zoo this week!!!! It was too cold for most of the African animals but we still had a great time. I know there are many families that make regular visits to the zoo but we have never been able to do that.  We had been given tickets so that we could all get in free so we went. It has been 3.5 yrs since we were last there.  J (now 6.5) remembers it a little, B (now 5) not at all and of course my little man (now 2.5) wasn't even there.... Hopefully I will be able to write another post on our trip, complete with pics(of which I took an embarrassing 300+, don't worry you will not have to see them all! lol).  My SIL and her kids met us there and that really made our trip extra special. Woohoo for fun days! They are way too too few and far between....... but I guess that just means we appreciate them all the more when they come.  :o)

*Blush*

 I must apologize for my post yesterday.... obviously stress was getting to me and I was rather whiny. Your kind words are MUCH appreciated though. I am feeling better today about life in general and am actually really liking our current set up. Even the kitchen is going to be o.k. :oP  When we were upstairs I had to constantly worry about the kids getting into my parents and/or sibling stuff, breaking things, etc.... downstairs they really can't get into too much trouble. :o) The space is actually bigger than my house (even after the remodel) and I get to sleep in my bed!!!  I missed my bed. There are couches down there. We haven't had a couch in ever so long and I am really liking it.  Mom's library is down there too and, since I can't seem to sleep when my hubby is out working, I am reading after the kids get to bed! Right now I am reading Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte and am enjoying it. I somehow missed that one in highschool..... Mom said that I didn't want to read it because of some negative impression I had of it. :o/  
I love to read........   
 

Moving

 Well, today is the day my folks return! We have missed them like crazy!!! Last night at dinner my 2.5 yo prayed "Papa home, Papa home. Amen!"  :o)  Now the plan has been that we would have our demolding and refinishing of the interior finished and would move back to our house when the came home. Is this the move we make today? No. Sometimes I wonder why we bother to plan. NOTHING ever goes as it should. The disasters that were hiding beneath our sheet rock were too much to conquer in 1 short month. *SIGH* So, my brother, T, has generously agreed to moving out of the basement and is moving to my brother J's house with his family (J has been an a lot of help on the house and I really appreciate him housing T also) . We are going to the basement. I am trying to be filled with gratitude that we have a place to stay and our own space but I am struggling with frustration. I hate moving and did not want yet another upheaval in the kids lives. Then there is the very limited kitchen downstairs...... with our diet cooking 3 meals a day is monumentous anyways, top that with a tiny kitchen and no dishwasher and you have a stressed out mama. Most of our food stuffs is packed away and what we didn't pack has been consumed.  To top it all off the kids and I have colds and I feel cruddy. I have such a hard time having the right attitude when I don't feel good. Sigh, probably an area I need to work on........ Anyhow, all that to say that the comp I have been using to post is upstairs in Mom's office so I will probably not be on here much until we move into our house.
 Well, off to hauling my stuff downstairs!