She gets up while it is still night

Proverbs 31:15 She gets up while it is still night; she provides food for her family and portions for her female servants

I understand proverbs 31:15. It hit me this weekend and I wasn’t even trying to. I have been asking myself a question over and over again lately, kind of a test or a check of my vitals. Am I who I want to be when I grow up? The answer is always no or almost or not quite. Well that always brings on the next question, why? What is stopping me from being who I want to be or even being who I am called to be? The only answer is myself.

I have a fantastic job. I am a home daycare provider. I get to be home with my two children and am paid to watch 5 other kids while I am watching my own. My morning commute is fantastic. I walk from my bedroom, down a set of stairs and to the living room couch. My daycare opens at 7:00 however the first kid usually doesn’t arrive until 7:30. I try to sleep or at least lay under a blanket and play games on my phone until that happens. My dress is casual. There is no traffic. The gas is free. Blah blah blah, I am getting somewhere. My point is I set my alarm at 6:57. I press snooze one time, which means I am out of my bed at 7:06. Once kid number one arrives my job is far less luxurious than I first described. I had envisioned all this free time since I was at my home all day, right. I am lucky to get the dishwasher loaded and maybe get a load of clothes completely cycled in the laundry. Have the house picked up, yeah right, maybe just the living room and ½ the kitchen, the area the parents see. 7 kids is a lot of work.

Well I started asking myself if I am not who I want to be when I grow up, why is that and take a step back, who is that. I made a list. I am a list person for sure. That is the way God wired me. Here is my list of things I want to daily. I feel that if I had focus and discipline to do these everyday, my answers might start changing to my questions.

Just a side note, I know that most of my blog entries are like dear journal, I will write to you every day and then the next entry is not until 8 months later. The direction this particular entry is taking sounds like it is going in the same direction and it also sounds very self-help. Please know a couple things. Again, this is who I am and how God wired me. I do not have everything figured out, you just are getting a glimpse of how God is speaking to me and direction he is giving me.

Ok back to my train of thought. Who do I want to be when I grow up? I want to be someone who daily does the things below:

Have time in the word; even if it is just 3 verses a day. I do not think the bible in a year is the program for me. I find that I am just reading it to check it off the list. I want to understand it. There has been a block before where I could not comprehend what I was reading and I think it is being lifted. Matthew 5:6 says I am blessed because I am hungry and thirsty for righteousness and I will be filled. I am hungry to really understand the word.

Have time in prayer.

Have time to pray specifically for my husband

Have time set aside to pray for Anna Beth

Have time set aside to pray for Lydia

Read a book (I’m thinking its time for a good fiction book, my brain needs a rest from my current reality)

Write. I am not a fantastic writer but I have a lot on my heart and lots of ideas swimming in my brain. I think if I release some to paper more will come. There is a book inside of me somewhere; I just need to find it.

Journal. I have put journaling on pause because I am trying to finish a catch up project. Its so silly. I feel behind, so I try to catch up but I am missing out on the current. The today. Do you know how many todays I have missed? Today I am going to jump in where I am.

Tapestry Admin / Tapestry planning stuff. I am my husband’s admin. Many would not like that but for me and my control freak issues, I cant imagine anyone else doing it. But I think I need to ramp it up before he fires me. Insert smile. He loves me, he needs me, I just need to give those duties a little more attention. If I set time aside each day to focus on it, I will be right on track.

Email. Current number of email in my inbox: 3,186. Enough said. Not acceptable. It is choking me.

LMNOP Planning. LMNOP is the name of my home daycare. It is pretty low maintenance but I do have records I need to keep and there is always the promise of surprise inspections. If I work on it a little each day, the fear of the surprise inspection will lesson. Or at least that is what I am telling myself.

IHOP Journaling. What the heck is IHOP journaling? It is something I made up. It has revolutionized my prayer life. So you know about the 24/7 prayer stream. Well what I do is turn it on and pull out a journal. I write down lyrics of songs, verses that are spoken from scriptures and prayers that are prayed that resonate with me. Here is an example,

Power and boldness

Anoint messengers

Let your word go forth

Signs and wonders

Release you spirit

I want to serve you with all my heart

Release boldness

Release your word

Release your power

Pour out your spirit

May I never be the same

Reveal Jesus

That’s what I wrote down. Now watch what I do with it. God release your

power in my life. Increase boldness in my life. I cannot do it on my own, I need your power and boldness. Anoint messengers. Let your word go forth ahead of me. Release signs and wonders. Release your spirit in my life (or I could even turn this into a prayer I could pray for someone else). Help me to serve you with a whole heart. Release boldness, release your word, release your power pour out your spirit. May I never be the same. Reveal Jesus, in my life. Reveal Jesus in the life of my neighbor. Reveal Jesus in the market place. Reveal Jesus to non-believers. Reveal your son. Let all come to know Him.

Whalaa there is a pray I can pray. Its kind of like a prayer 101 class for me. I

love being in his presence and Have learned so much in the process.

Household maintenance stuff. Chore charts, menu planning, laundry, systems and processes that help make our family unit and house run smoothly. Making sure clutter stays out and peace can come in. That kinda stuff. I figure its better to do a little each day instead of 3 hour marathons after I have noticed it slipping (which of course is too late)

Invest in others. I have heard it spoken from a pulpit twice in a month. A call for older to invest in younger. Not sure what it looks like but gonna set time aside for it.

AB prayer journal. I want my kids to know a life of prayer. I do not want them to have to teach themselves a prayer 101 crash course when they are in their 30s. I have a great prayer journal set up for her, its just a matter of me being consistent with helping her do it.

Tapestry Kiddos planning. Do you know I am entrusted with all the Tapestry Kiddos. Man I need to be faithful with the time I invest in this. These kids are amazing. I have a huge load I gladly get to carry. God is really showing me things about this role. I want to give myself to this calling.

Old journaling project. So I have issues, especially when it comes to journaling. Ever since I was little the sight of a blank journal gave me anxiety. I had much I wanted to write but was afraid if I said I was gonna do AB and C and then ½ way thru I wanted to add a D or change the order to BCA then I would have to start all over with a fresh journal. I also would think ½ way through that it wasn’t important or no one would want to read it, etc, etc. So basically I have about 20 journals ¼ used up and then empty. One day I lined them all up in chronological order, ripped out all the pages with writing and then threw the blank pages away. I have been taking the old entries and transferring them to a very nice leather book so they are all in one place. I started that project years ago. I would like to get it off my plate. How do I do that, one page a day right.

Write out Dustin’s health story. My husband wants to start blogging about the last 6 months of his life. However memory seems to be a small problem. I need to get some of the facts written out for him. Bless his heart and mine but we have been told so many different things in the past 6 months and still are not sure what the final diagnosis is. Stay tuned for more info. Not gonna write the spoiler before we even write the story.

What I love about ____. An idea I have had and I want to give a daily entry for all 3 of my loves. I did a what I love about you entry for Dustin in my blog years ago on our anniversary and he loved it. I wish I had written in it daily. I did one entry for AB when she was 18 months old. Lydia, well lets just say she is 20 months old and all my thoughts are still in my head.

Pheww, that’s a lot of daily things. Well after I wrote those all down this past Saturday I finally felt like that would start to change my answer of am I who I want to be. If I did all these things that are always on my mind that I think about each night as I go to be, then maybe just maybe I will be who I want to be when I grow up.

Am I gonna stress to get them all done, heck yes…for the first 3 days before I fall of the bandwagon but GRACE is so amazing isn’t it. Maybe I will be good to get those things all done in a week but ya know, it just feels right. So Saturday, I made my list but then it hit me. This is similar to a list (that was never written down) of what I had envisioned my life would be like when the daycare started and I quit my fancy job. When in the world would I get this all done. God quickly whispered to me. “She gets up while it is still night” And it hit me like a ton of bricks. That is why the 31 chick was so successful, she had time alone every morning just herself. Well If I am going to be the mom I need to be, the wife I need to be, the daycare provider, the tapestry kiddos pastor, the tapestry admin, my husband’s help, the runner of the home, and be myself, the person I want to be, I need more time to get this list done. I am going to have to wake up before my family gets up. Me and Jesus time.

Well if any of you know me you know I am a morning person and 5 years ago it wouldn’t have been an issue but let me tell you, the life I live takes a toll on you. I need sleep. I did the math and if I can go to bed at 10 and wake up at 6, I will have had 8 hours sleep.

I stand before you today (well actually sit) at my dining room table a chick who just completed her first morning of early extra alone time. The first daycare kiddo is here, Dustin is all ready for work and sitting in the living room putting his socks on. But I did it. I woke up at 6, went downstairs had my alone time and the first kiddo came at 7:30 (like clockwork). I am surrounded by an iPad (with the 24/7 stream), my prayer journal, my bible, my kindle, my phone, my journal, a pen and paper, my laptop and as soon as I figure out the automatic timer on my coffee pot in the future I can add a nice cup of coffee to the list.

Of course the proverbs 31 chick woke up while it was still night. Do you know how valuable an hour and a half of alone time is? I think I will be able to survive today. I have energy I cannot explain. I have peace of mind from all the writing. I have a plan. I have hope. I have life. I am renewed.

Planning ahead...what's for dinner.

So my deep freezer downstairs was starting to look bare and we were having questionable storms so I decided to gather all of my meat from my upstairs freezer and put it in the downstairs freezer. If you all remember the summer Lydia came home there was that massive storm that knocked out power for the whole county for a week. We lost our entire contents of our fridge/freezer combo.

Taking a count

Anyways, as I was moving it, I tallied up all of our meat and made a list. then I made a calendar in Excel and started plugging them in. So yes, I have a menu, but I did not plan out every side or component of the meal, just the main course. Then ideally, every Monday, I can go to the store and buy the salad or fresh corn or what have you for the whole week. So far, I haven't had to go to the store yet, we have been living off our our pantry and garden. Dear Jesus, please keep the squash and zucchini coming!

Saving time and saving costs

Tonight's menu reads Poppy's Hamburgers. Tomorrow it reads frozen pizza. LMNOP needed milk so I ran to the store and bought buns and corn for the hamburger meal and a bagged salad to go with the frozen pizza we already have. Minus the cost of the milk and juice I bought, I probably spent around $9 for the buns, salad, onions, corn to throw on the grill and the secret ingredient for his famous hamburgers. How many times have you planned what you were making for the week as you were going up and down the store's isles? This has taken the guess work out for me and is a much welcomed change.

Wow, it will last a while.

By just plugging in the meat, frozen entrees we have and things like frozen pizza into my calendar, our menu takes us through the end of July. Then you all know of my famous turkey ground turkey deal...ahhh, you don't that was on Facebook. Ok, soon I will post my story of the turkey. Anyways, and amazing deal and 14 lbs of ground turkey later, I rearranged the menu and was able to take us through the middle of August.

Repeat. Repeat. Repeat.

So to make my pastor's wife, mom of two, sunday school chick, business owner, crazy lady life easier, I made some days of the week the same meal every week. I think you might remember my tuesday taco nights. Sometimes I can find the food comforting and familiar and it just resets the tone of your week. Our current repeats are every Sunday (you know our Sundays are not predictable) we will be having noodles, pasta sauce with ground beef stirred in. For sides, we will just use whatever is left over from the week before. Aren't Sundays a great clean out the fridge day anyways. Its cheap, its super easy and I am currently debating wether I will ground 5 weeks worth of meat at a time and freeze it individually. I think I might try it.

Our other repeat meal this summer is wednesday night hot dogs. Wednesday night is our bowling night. It takes what a whole 5 minutes to grill a hotdog? At the end of the meal you are left with a plate to wash that you carried the hot dogs in from the grill. This past Wednesday we had grilled hotdogs, re-grilled pineapple, a can of baked beans, leftover coleslaw and finished off our leftover potato salad. By the way Lydia Grace can kill some potato salad.

Code Blue. Code Blue

I did color in the days I am not cooking blue. Of course you know we have our church's Leadership and Logistics meeting at my house on the second and forth Mondays and everyone takes turns cooking. We were just in Cumberland for a 2 day getaway. In the month of June we will be celebrating a very special Poppy. Also in the month of July, somebody special has a birthday and we will take her to whatever restaurant she wants.

Code Red....well more of a pink.

These are days that will require a special menu of its own...not just the entree planned out, but every component and will require a special budget. We have company staying at our house in June, AB's bday party and Lyd's party.

Going out to eat

I have feeling we will not be going out to eat as much. There really is not a need to. It is so tempting to. Man, last night was one of them. I can see my old habits. A long day, a long week, the last thing you want to do is cook. But because fish sticks were already on the menu, I forced myself to turn the oven on. Once the oven was on, I put frozen broccoli in the microwave, boiled water for our mac and cheese and opened a can of peas for lyds. Not the most glorious cooking, not the healthiest but this is how my family eats. Take it or leave it. Dinner was done in 14 minutes. It would have taken me 14 minutes to look up and decide on a pizza place that delivers and then to place the call. Then they say it takes 45 minutes to deliver. To celebrate the fact that we stuck to the plan and probably saved $35 in pizza delivery costs, I gave everyone an ice cream sandwich...that is if they ate all their fish sticks. (I see now how I can afford more treats like ice cream sandwiches if I am saving money by not going out to eat and by using what we already have in our pantry/freezer.)

Hug trees and go paperless.

I have not printed it yet. If you know me, you know the hug tree part was a joke, however if I did print it, it would be a waste. I would have to keep reprinting it. Like the time when I added 14 pounds of ground turkey. You know my family would kill me if we had ground turkey 14 days in a row, I had to reshuffle everything, throw in a pork chop here and there and mix it up. Also, the other night we were slated to have fish sticks, one of Dustin's favorites. That morning he informed me he was fasting. No point in me making them and tempting him. So I made my favorite meal, scrambled eggs and french toast. We moved the fish sticks to last night and moved whatever was on the menu for last night to two weeks from now. (and bonus, the eggs and french toast didn't use up a meat so it just prolonged the number of days we have groceries planned out) and breakfast for dinner isn't one of Dustin's favorites.

Here is what is slated for next week:

Tonight

Poppy's Hamburgers

Saturday

Frozen Pizza

(however we will probably do it for lunch and join America a day early

by taking our amazing Poppy to dinner and celebrating him)

Sunday

of course noodles, pasta sauce and ground turkey

Monday

a frozen entree in a bag

of sweet and sour chicken with rice

I have a small group I go to the 3rd monday of each month.

Just for moms.

Tuesday

NY Strip steak...to make up for the gross dinner

I left my family with the night before

Wednesday

Chicken n Dumplings

What?!? no hotdogs? you contradicted yourself. Well here is the deal. the other day i was craving (no I am not pregnant) my mom's chicken and dumplings. I bought the chicken and the biscuits for the dumplings but I forgot to buy the frozen peas and carrots. (my mom never added veggies that is my twist). Well, Dustin is NEVER a fan of chicken on the bone, even though I am going to remove it, and I know my family will welcome a hotdog break, and if I slip this meal in unexpectedly on him (pretty sure he does not read my blog) he will have no choice but to eat it and move on because we have to leave the house by 6:30 to get to bowling in time. I figured I would bite the bullet and try my hand at it. And I chose sooner than later because the biscuits are gonna expire if I don't.

Thursday

Lobster Ravoili

Its the frozen bertoli kind. My family loves it. It is usually $8 or $9 a box however the store had it on sale for $5 and I had a $1.5 coupon so woo hoo to fancy Lobster ravoili for only $3.5 a box. You will see it on our menu in the future. I have like 4 boxes of it.

Friday

the day our company arrives.

I have not yet planned out that menu.

Water x 8

If you know me, you know I do not drink near enough water...or any liquid for that fact. If I have come to your house for dinner and you ask me what I want to drink, I will often pass until after I have had my meal. I have gotten majorly dehydrated before and had heat exhaustion issues.

We are going on our first family vacation since we have become a family. Our last one (just Dustin and I) was September 2006. Well, I tried on a sun dress at Banana Republic (outlet of course) and it did not look pretty. I still have not gotten to my pre-Lyds weight, not to even mention my pre-AB weight. My vacation is 79 days away from today. Starting on Monday, I wrote on my closet door (mirrored) with a dry erase marker a little chart.

Current Weight

Goal Weight

Need to Lose

Days till Vacation

Each day I fill in the columns with my numbers. Its not like I am doing a strict diet. Any by no means am I starting a stenuious execrise plan. You can see in my previous entry, my plate is full with all those other dreams and ambitions. Exercise is not on my heart. Maybe if I can go a few weeks knocking out the other stuff, I could imagine it...anyways, my goal is to conscious of what I am eating, try to eat less and drink 8 glasses of water a day.

Yesterday till today, I did not lose any weight but I didn't gain. I wonder if I did not eat the 330 calorie Chocolate Sundae from McDonalds at 10pm last night, maybe I would have lost a few ounces.

Anyways, in the last 4 days, I have found the best way for me to get my 8 glasses in. My perfect glass of water is room temp, with a slice of lemon (a huge slice) and a straw. I am too cheap to buy the real lemons, so I have been exchanging the lemon slice for lemon juice.

Every morning, I make 2 bottles and 6 sippy cups of milk for LMNOP. Why not make my drink too. I set out 4 tall glasses. They measure 2 cups of water. I fill them up, squirt my lemon, and stick a straw in one of them. I leave them on the counter and drink them throughout the day.

Here is what I have found:

I do not have to keep track of how many I have had and how much more I have to go

I do not have to make a glass every time

A straw makes it go faster

I do not like things out on the counter so it motivates me to drink it quicker

If I finish it all by noon, I do not have to get up at all hours of the night to pee

I do not know the science behind why we need it, I just know everyone says we do. It helps with weight loss somehow. Oh well, I do not think it can hurt.

By the way, I bought one of the dresses that did not look so good. Monday, I started with 16.9 lbs to lose to get to pre-Lyds. Today I only have 13.3. Can I do it in 79 days by eating less and drinking more...only time will tell. Jesus, please help me have self-discipline.

Why so long since I wrote?

I have no idea. I am so hard on myself. I need everything to be perfect. Who cares if it is perfect? My ideal day would include the following:

• a blog entry into adayinthelifeoflor
• a blog entry into livinglighteronethingatatime
• organizing coupons
• entering my reward points (coke, pampers, huggies, etc.)
• straightening my house
• getting my inbox to zero
• knocking out projects for tapestry
• work diligently on getting my house completely organized and cleaned so it looks like a pottery barn magazine...yeah right.
• sending correspondence to friends and family on fancy stationary
• reading chapters and chapters of the Bible
• spending hours in prayer and worship
• read a novel
• read a non-fiction book
• write my book
• prepare for Sunday School lessons
• cooking fancy dinners that impress everyone
• pop over at someones house in our church and surprise them with a loaf of fresh made bread

I know it is silly but I feel defeated everyday and get to a dark place. I was thinking about this blog in particular today...a day in the life of Lor is nothing more than me blogging about my day. I do not need a fancy idea or concept before I can write. I am going to start just doing more snippets of my day...not for you, not for me, but for my girls...this is for them. For them to treasure, for them to laugh at, for them to devour when they are 31 with 2 kids wondering what the heck to do. I love you Anna Beth. I love you Lydia! Please know this, all my insanity and striving and searching...its for you. I want to be the best Mom you can have. Dear Jesus, please keep teaching me.

I do this every year: my pre-Birthday post

Two years ago it was a quest to have the most perfect day all to myself

Last year was a strive to have better relationships

This year.....fingers tapping....hmmm, off the top of my head, I just want to be better.

I want to be a better cook.

I want to be a better housekeeper.

I want to be a better homemaker.

I want to be a better mom.

I want to be a better wife.

I want to be a better friend.

I want to be a better pastor's wife. (Lord help us all, we know I am not good at that.)

I want to be a better LMNOP person.

I want to be a better listener.

I want to be a better encourager.

I want to be a better corresponder.

I want to be a better keeping the car cleaned out person.

I want to be a better organizer.

I want to be a better reader.

I want to be a better writer.

Am I horrible in all these areas? Heck no!

Am I great in all these areas? Heck no!

Will I ever meet my own standards? Heck no!

Will I write a post like this next year a few weeks before my birthday? Heck yes!

This is who I am. No sense in denying it!

Not bragging, just making a mark so I can come back to this moment

In no way am I bragging or boasting or anything close...I just have to mark this day so that I can come back here and be encouraged.

This Saturday I will have been married for 11 years to a pretty amazing guy.

I no longer have to work at my past job that was filled with such negativity and at times was hostile.

I am about to have a birthday this month and do not mind getting older.

I am a business owner.

I get to stay home with my 2 daughters.

I have 2 daughters.

We have a nice home.

My husband has a nice job.

We have a great church that is only getting greater.

I live in a place where we get snow.

I can wear pre-pregnancy jeans.

My husband loves me.

I do not need anything.

God hears my prayers and knows my heart.

I have 2 arms and 2 legs.

I have good friendships.

I know Jesus.

We get a family vacation in September and it is almost completely paid for.

My husband trusts me.

today I sit here humbled by thankfulness.

A great beginning to a life long journey

Dustin and I have always openly talked about what it means to have Jesus in your heart and she has always made comments like He can be in our hearts but she doesn't want Him in hers yet or she will tell me that Jesus is in my heart but the color green is in hers. Obviously she is young and we do not want to push it, we just continue to make it part of our conversations.

One thing that we do is pray over our children each day and one of the main things we pray is that "one day she will choose you (Jesus)".

Imagine my excitement when this Sunday, before church started, AB hollered across the sanctuary to me that Jesus was in her heart. I asked her how he got there and she said all by himself. I said, wow that is great, let's tell Poppy!

I sat back as she walked up to him. Of course he was busy setting up the sound system and making sure everything was all set for the service that was to start in 30 minutes. "Poppy, Jesus is in my heart". You could see the exact moment it registered in his brain. He dropped everything and took her behind stage. I of course made my way back there with them. He grilled her with a million questions and explained to her what it means to have Jesus in her heart. The coolest part was when she interrupted him and she explained parts of it to him. He explained that when Jesus is in her heart, he is her Lord and Savior and he protects her...she said and Poppy it also means that he is my friend.

We closed the little time with a precious prayer that she repeated. Was this real? Does this count? She is 3. Can a 3 year old really know what they are doing? Everyone will ask these questions, but you know what, who cares? What a precious precious day in our family! What a precious moment that Anna Elizabeth had. She wanted to connect with Jesus.

I will never forget Sunday, January 30th, 2011 at 10:30am. What a great beginning to a life long journey of knowing him! Congratulations Anna Beth!