Not my child...

I drug the kids with me to Target on Monday night.

Is that the right word? "Drug?"

Anyway, the only things on my list were 1. a birthday present and 2. sunblock.

I was so looking forward to this outing as we had been cooped up in our house all day - waiting on a phone call from our ISD which never came...

Also, I had not been to Target in quite a long time in an effort to keep our unnecessary expenses down.

I strolled around the store leisurely. I ran into seph and we had a marathon conversation - the kind that mommies who have a sum total of 3 1/2 kids with them do not ever get to have - and then the kids and I checked every nook and cranny that clearance items are usually stashed.

Finally, I realized that I had forgotten to look at something I had been meaning to look at - stalling for time - and as I went back to the area of Target where our journey began earlier that evening, A. said, "I am exhausted of this!"

How can this be? A child of mine getting 'exhausted' by being at Target? Not possible.

inconvenience.

Have you ever walked around a train of 5 or 6 laundry baskets in your bedroom for a week and huffed because they were so 'inconvenient' to have to walk around?

Your answer: Who has 5 or 6 laundry baskets?

the happenings.

Next week is a busy week for us.

Starting Thursday at 6pm, Chris will begin his last vacation for the calendar year.
I am going on a "Walk to Amaeus" - (I think that's how you spell it.)
I have never been on one of those, nor do I know much about it. A good friend of mine said she'd like to sponsor me and she handled getting me a scholarship to go, so I am going.
I don't really know what to expect, but I have been told that it's a 'personal spiritual journey of a lifetime.'
Aren't all of you girls excited about the potential there? Maybe I'll grow up a bit and re-emerge as a slightly less high-strung person. Revel in the possibilities! :)

Anyway, Chris is going camping with his high school buddies for a bachelor party that same weekend so our kids will be staying with my parents.
Can you imagine a sweeter deal?
My parents are awesome for being so available to us!!

Once all the chickens get back home, we'll turn around and go to the Dallas area to see my lovely sister and unleash the fury of the O. family at Hurricane Harbor!

We'll get back Thursday night, just in time to once again, deposit our children at my parents' house and take off for the wedding of some of our friends.
I am supposed to be singing at the wedding. I have yet to crack open a soundtrack and practice. I guess I am not too excited about what I'm singing, I don't know.

Also, I am hoping that whatever happens with our local ISD will happen before Thursday so I won't have to be a full-time nail-biter for the whole week while we're traveling.

I guess you all have our itinerary now...

roller coaster.

i am so exhausted by myself.

i have been having such enormously high highs and tremendously low lows today.

it's stinkin exhausting.

every 5 minutes i'm checking a certain web site for jobs.
there were three openings for my area of specialization two days ago. today there is ONE.
the one i want is the only one remaining. i have heard nothing.

i sit by the phone and every time it rings, my heart goes into my chest - then i realize that it's a friend or family member - and i'm relieved and disappointed all at once. thank God for caller id or everyone would have their feelings hurt by the all-too-obvious tone of pure dejection i would have once i realized it wasn't the school district...

i have the single most impatient personality of anyone i've ever known.
i want to have figured it out yesterday...

unfortunately, i know nothing. it's friday. i won't know anything for several more days. if, in fact, i am even under consideration for this job, i won't be given the opportunity for an interview for at least three more days.

three more days of this rollercoaster?

somebody call me and distract me from this ridiculousness.

oh wait - that might be too disappointing... ;)

Pray

If ever there was a time that we needed prayer, it's now.
Nothing dramatic. Nothing life or death.

There is an opening at our ISD.
An opening that I would click my heels together all the way to, if given the opportunity.
It's elementary.
It's an answer to prayer.

Pray that I will:

1. be given an interview.
2. not be a weirdo at the interview/ appear like I am the one for the job
3. be offered the job.

Those things are obvious - but sometimes in my prayers, I overlook the obvious...

God knows what we need.

Pray also that His Divine Purpose for our lives reigns supreme so that if this isn't as good as it looks, I will be shielded from it.

This looks like an opportunity that could get the ball rolling in the right direction for us. Chris would no longer be hamstrung to a dead end job. A job that sucks the life out of our family.

Yes, I'm being dramatic but just the mere taste of the possibility of freedom from that job makes my heart rate go up!

Thanks for your prayers! And thank you, Jenny, for looking out for us!

(She's the one who tipped me off about it.)

Living with Giggles.

if i were given full license to blog...
blog without sparing any detail...
you would never believe the stuff that goes on over here in my casa.
i must be married to the funniest human being alive!

Erma Bombeck style.

"Any man who would critique the way his wife mows the lawn ought to be flogged."

Spin Cycle.

I feel like my husband and I have been in the spin cycle with life for some time now.
While many things are happening that are good, there are issues that make me feel like a dog chasing its tail. Spinning round and round without any resolution.

This morning's church service was really something.
I went in hard and unwilling to break. The speaker was funny. He cracked joke after joke. I laughed. Then I remembered that I was supposed to be "hard."
Don't ask me how he was able to pack real substance into a gut-bustingly funny sermon. I honestly can't tell you how that happened. But it did.

Laughter. It was perhaps the only thing that could have softened me today and made me able to expose my spiritual underbelly.

I have personally been cycling in and out of very unhealthy thought processes for my entire married life.
Bitterness. Unforgiveness. Unwillingness to change. Resentment. Wishing things were different.
The whole nine.

I am not writing about this so I can hang out dirty laundry - I am writing about it because I would imagine that on one level or another, those thoughts are not isolated to my marriage, or my experiences. Everyone - in some form or fashion - has to confront disappointment. We all must confront unmet expectations.

Unmet Expectations and Disappointment could quite possibly be the hardest things I have had to deal with during the course of my marriage. The many separate issues have carried many name tags - but they have always fallen under one of the 2 aforementioned categories.

This post is in no way meant to attack my spouse. I am moreso referring to myself. Personal goals that remain unreached, unattainable.

I have mistakenly labelled things like social status, financial prosperity, likability, and outward appearance as more important than living a quality, peaceful life free from conflict and strife.
Things that aren't eternal have been emphasized as though they were.

I have neglected to spend enough time in prayer and reading God's Word, in favor of keeping up appearances - a clean house, a good marriage, well-maintained kids, 'getting ahead', etc.

Not that having a clean house, a hot meal, or plenty in your bank account are bad things to want - but if they are the only things you aspire to - you have certainly missed the mark.

The whole time my earthly house was clean, my spiritual one remained cluttered.

It's not easy to find those wonderful Scriptures that are tucked away in your heart when they are cluttered with feelings of bitterness or covered by unfair comparisons and the disappointment of your shortcomings.

This morning at church, God opened the washer's lid and stopped the relentless spin cycle.
The damaging cycle of my thoughts, the unhealthy cycle of our life, the unnecessary spin.

And now that I have had some time to reclaim my equilibrium, I have been able to adjust my thoughts to thoughts that are more productive.

There may not be any clearer resolution to some of life's quandaries - but at least I have a less dizzied focus on them.

So Thank You, Father, for opening the lid.

I said all that to say that even the most well-meaning people who want good things in life can lose focus while being bombarded by the things that happen everyday.

I never made the decision to get bitter. I woke up this morning and realized that the monster of bitterness had attached itself to my back while I fought back the monster called disappointment from the front side.

The spin cycle is not really a good place to linger.

I guess I need to get ready for a 'Rinse' cycle now.

Quitters~R~Us

At what point is it appropriate to stick up for yourself and say, "Hey pal, I quit.?!?!"
I put my two-weeks notice in over 4 weeks ago for my janitor job.

I'm not complaining. It just turned out to be less hours than I thought it was, therefore rendering itself merely annoying - not really overly financially helpful.
So - as all things go, I had to weigh the pros and cons.
Ultimately, I decided I'd rather reclaim my summer than to be tied to a job that was not only inconvenient but also added little in the way of cushion to our tight summer budget.

Since when does two-weeks notice translate to a month?

This is where all you fine-and-dandies tell me to stop being the idiot who keeps showing up to make sure the job gets done...

Touche'

Cuteness.

I was filling my coffee cup this morning as J. rounded the corner speedily.
I said, "Hey cuteness!"
He paused and looked up at me with a slightly confused look on his face and said, "Hey, Mom-ness."
He's a doll!