I’ve Got Nothing

I have nothing, nothing to blog about, I tried getting inspiration from Pinterest, and yet I draw a blank.  Who draws a blank from Pinterest?  Apparently me.  I thought long and hard why I would be having bloggers block.  I think there are a few contributing factors.

Why I have bloggers block:

1 no pictures
I have used up all the storage I had for pictures in the free part of wordpress, so now I must pay the price to upgrade my storage.  It seems like an easy thing to do, but I am afraid to try new things, especially things that will cost me money on the computer without Keith near me, to fix my mistakes.  We all know I make plenty of computer mistakes.  I love sharing pictures of my kids, things I see, and things happening around me.  Actually when I do finally upgrade I should have plenty of things to blog about.  Until then… Bloggers Block

2 my house is a mess
I know that is not unusual, but really I cannot stand a messy house, if I cannot clean it and maintain it then I avoid it.  {I once read a blog about cleaning, the author said to keep that “one” area in your house clean, you would experience a sense of calm, people commented having their bathroom clean or their pantry or some small location was the trick for them.  I tried that, but in order for me to feel peaceful about my house, the entire thing must be clean.  I spent the last full month cleaning and maintaining the family room, it looks great most days, but you know what?  I only feel peace about it when I am in it, when I am in the sitting room or kitchen I feel no sense of calm.} I sit playing with PS, reading/coloring/listening/watching little A because I cannot get anything done in the house at this stage of PS’s life.  She crawls all over the house, which is not the problem, it is the fact that she finds each tiny thing on the floor sticking it in her mouth.  Which means I cannot leave her alone for any amount of time {I can go to the bathroom, only after I dump her in her crib}  Yes she naps, that helps, she takes a great morning nap, but at this time her morning nap time is consumed with other things, leaving me able to clean the house… ummm… never.  Until then… Bloggers Block

3 we are busy
Actually, we are not that busy, more than some families but then less than other families.  I know if I had time management skills we would feel less busy.  Until then… Bloggers Block

4 no wind in my sails
A few months ago the wind was knocked out of our sails, and while we know without a doubt that God has this planned out, that before time began God’s sovereign plan for our family was formed, and even though we were taken off guard, God was not.  But when you think things are happily humming along, suddenly life as you know it comes to a screeching stop, it catches you off guard, and honestly it takes some time before those events stop consuming your mind.  {If you want to pray about this, pray that Keith and I rest in the knowledge that God knows what is best in this situation and pray I can patiently wait on the Lord.}  While we say we trust God and we have faith He is in control, when things are out of our control and we cannot see what is happening next our faith is really put to the test.  Until then… Blogger Block

5 no creativity
I have taken a crafting break this last month, in hopes of cleaning up and cleaning out my crafting area.  With a shortness of time, and mess of a craft/sewing area my creativity is zapped.  It will come back, the other night as I cleaned the craft shelf and dresser I was motivated with the fun things I found in the drawer.  I know once I work on my sewing stuff I will be in full creative mood again.  Honestly I can’t wait.  Until then… Blogger Block

6 life
In the last few weeks I have been reminded over and over how very short life is, maybe that is weighing heavy on my mind?  I have wept for the families experiencing loss, I have prayed for their strength and comfort.  I think this has hit close to home, our school has experienced death at a whole new level, in the past 3 months 4 parents and a student have passed away.  When I sit down to blog and a child needs me I am more likely to get up and go play, I sit on the floor in the family room or on my bed with PS to use me to climb on and play with,  I color with little A, I listen to the stories,and things the children need to share with me, we snuggle, we comfort, we laugh.  I say every time I sign off, go hug your kids, tell someone you love them because life is just too short.  So I have been doing a whole lot of snuggling, loving and playing with my kids, you know practicing what I preach.  It has been so worth it.  Until then… Bloggers Block

7 I don’ know
I don’t know but I am sure there are at least 2 more reasons why I have blogger block.  I am sure it is lack of sleep, worry, fear, or just not even thinking about the blog?  Not exactly sure but Until then… Blogger Block

So what about you ever get stuck with writer’s block or bloggers block?  Ever feel like you are not going to get ahead but continue on knowing that sitting still is actually going backward {oh I know not really, but in a house full of people if you don’t keep going then when you do start back up you have lost even more ground.}

Go hug your kid life is just too short.  Tell someone you love them!
jen

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One Morning

One morning this last month I thought I had it all together, I thought my day was going to run smoothly…
I was mistaken,
at least I smelled nice.

When I was finally able to rush into the shower for the 3 minutes of alone time that my children give me while I shower.  Oh sure, I can shut the door, I can even lock my bedroom door but the knocking and banging is more annoying than the actual child coming in to tell me what is on Doc McStuffins, at that given moment.

So I was in the shower, with hot enough water, when I remembered that O borrowed my conditioner the night before.  Being a smart mom, I leaned out of the shower to open the bathroom cupboard and dig into the plastic bin of samples and extras from all of Keith’s travels.  {Let me just say the soap from France might be plain old cheap but it just smells wonderful}  I grabbed a yellow plastic bottle and squirted a handful of citrus conditioner into my hand.  I rubbed it all over my hair, and noticed that my hair was not silky smooth but rather ratty and cheap doll hair feeling.  I picked up the yellow tube of citrus LOTION…  Now my 3 minutes of alone time are up.  Little A came to chat while I re-washed my hair and picked up the citrus conditioner.  I did double-check.  My hair felt wonderful and had a faint citrus smell for the morning.

After my shower I needed to scramble some eggs up because J has not yet received the memo, NEVER SIGN UP FOR ANYTHING — E V E R!!!
The 5th grade Christmas party at school was a brunch, it was a huge spread and there were some pretty yummy things there.  I could have left my eggs at home.  How does one take scrambled eggs someplace and keep them hot?  I filled my crock pot with boiling water and left it for some time hot and bubbly, as soon as I finished scrambling my eggs I dumped the water and filled my very hot crock pot with fresh scrambled eggs.  I am happy to report they stayed hot through the brunch.

I had to balance between 5th grade party and 3rd grade party.
When I was a 3rd grade mom, I was visiting with another mom (let me say how old I am, I used to babysit her on weekends when her parents and their friends went to football games…  now we have children in the same class, and she actually had her last baby when I was still hanging out in the hospital with PS…) So anyway we were visiting about the normal things, messy house, sick kids, Christmas shopping and basketball hoops.  When I mentioned that so far no one was sick I was going to spend the last half day before Christmas break cleaning my house.  An hour later E asked to come home with me after her party, she promptly went to sleep on the couch…  Yeah, I did NOT have a day alone to clean my house.  But rather a house full of girls…  We are working on getting healthy.  Strep again before she was finally healthy for the rest of the break.In the past 13 Christmas party days that I have had a child in school, I have never had the day before Christmas break alone, I have always had a sick child…  Always.  How is that even possible?  How do the germs know I want to accomplish something, I want to get ahead of the game…

Speaking of game.  We have a game closet that is over flowing. Seriously I am astounded at the number of games.  I had E and Little A and J pull them all out.  They were stacked around the dining room.  Our goal for Christmas break was to play each game, and put the keepers away and sell the losers.  ***UPDATE*** we did not play all the games, there were just too many, once we started playing games, we would come back to a favorite game over and over.  After the Christmas holidays were over R sorted out the unplayed games,  I am happy to report we put 15 games into the JBF sale closet.

I made a declaration on December 14th that I would not make Mac-n-cheese for a full month.  What started that declaration you ask?  I knew you were curious…  Every month the night before payday I sit down with the menu for the month, and I ask the kids what they want to eat for the month.  Some “specialists” say if you let the child help choose healthy choices, and let the child help you cook the healthy choices, the child will choose to eat those healthy choices.  Those specialists need to come to my house and inform my kids that they are supposed to be eating them, not acting like I am trying to poison them.  I swear each meal some child acts like I am making an effort to poison them with a green vegetable, or chicken with out ranch dressing, or RICE *gasp*  So as I sat down with my lined school paper and my favorite sharpie pens, I asked “what do we want for dinner this next month?”  And the very first thing EVER said is Mac-n-cheese.  Seriously, every month E says mac-n-cheese, and honestly mac-n-cheese makes me want to puke.  We eat it every month.  Every single month.  To make it worse {if you can make mac-n-cheese worse} she never has any suggestions to go along with mac-n-cheese.  Just mac-n-cheese.  *gag*  So I made a declaration that I would not fix it all month.  One of the older children doubted it would happen, and let me say once I almost caved, I almost grabbed a box at Publix, I almost gave in, it is fast and easy but… I am so over it.  Never fear, we did have some, my mom makes a big Christmas meal some time in the week after Christmas, she made ham, mac-n-cheese, rolls, some veggies, more veggies, and rolls.  My kids were in heaven!  Ham, mac-n-cheese, and rolls, what more could my kids ask for?  She did send home the leftovers for the kids to enjoy, which they did.  But for a whole month I did not buy or fix it!  I am wondering if I can go two months now with out it?  I hope so!

 Then there was this last night, A turned 5 this year, in our house the 5-year-old gets a bike, not a trike, and not a tiny little bike, but a real bike {training wheels included} she has ridden around our lake more than the rest of our children at 5, she begs everyone to take her for a bike ride, who can refuse her adorable little face?  Today when Keith got home from school, she convinced him to go along, the other little kids grabbed their helmets to ride along.  While they were out riding little A charmed Keith with this statement:”Thanks dad. You’re the best dad I ever had.” Followed up by, “No one else has a dad as good as our dad.”

Tonight’s meal time prayer from little A.  “Thank you for the food and thank you that dad is having the yucky food so we don’t have to.” (Pork chops).

Please go hug your kids, tell someone you love them, we have had several sad things happen in our school families lately.  Time is just too short to hold a grudge or put off love for another day.
jen

Happy New Year, Lets Make a Resolution

Happy New Year!
2015

I’ll let that sink in, 2015 the older I get, the faster time moves.  Okay I know that technically it moves at the same rate of speed, maybe I should say the older I get the more aware of how fast time actually moves.  I remember when the year changed from 1979 to 1980 I won’t tell you how old I was, just that I remember talking in class with our teacher and classmates about how we would have to remember it was not 79 anymore but 8o.  It is the weird little things that I remember.

Lets talk Resolutions.  Do you make unrealistic resolutions or even realistic ones?  Do you make the poplar time management, weight loss, resolutions or do you set even better bigger goals.  A few years ago I decided to take a picture a day.  For the most part it was an easy, there were a few months in there where I struggled to get pictures every day.  By in large I loved it, I was looking for things to take pictures of, my kids were the subject most days, it reminded me to appreciate the simple things, the daily ness of our life.  That is my goal this year, to get at least 1 picture a day.  In today’s technology it should be easy, we all have cell phones, most of them have a good camera, most electronic devices also have a camera on them, some people are ‘old school’ and actually own a camera.  I float between my phone and my camera, which will make it easy to get at least one picture a day.

For Christmas Keith spent time and money fixing my computer, recovering the pictures on my computer hard drive, they are for the most part rescued.  A few pictures did not come through clear but the majority have survived!  I cried when I opened it and saw the work and recovery.  He also bought me an external hard drive.  He did the computer recovery at school in his conference room.  One day someone came into the room took one look at my old computer and asked if it really worked.  The missing enter key. The frame-work around the glass screen had broken loose and was taped with electrical tape to keep it framed in. A better look at the plastic frame around the screen.One more look.

It was a HOT mess, by HOT mess the computer would get so hot I was honestly afraid it would burn my lap, canceling out the benefit of a LAPtop…  He rescued the pictures off the old computer, transferred them to my new (not so new apple computer) and combed files and files for pictures from the lost brain of the apple computer.  He also installed another brain into my apple computer.  I am happy to have it back and working.  While he was kind to share his laptop I felt guilty using it when he was around.  So goal number 2 is to back up my computer monthly.

There you have it 2 goals for the year 2015.
1 A picture a day
2 A monthly back up on my computer files

What about you?  Do you have goals for the following year?  I hear that part of the solution is to have a plan, what is your plan to accomplish the goals you have set?  My plan for a picture a day is an easy no need for a plan of attack, the back up I have written on my calendar with an alert so that will help me remember.

Go hug your kids and share some love this next year
jen