Mommy Is Fierce…

Yesterday was our annual trip to Fort Wayne for “Last Minute Madness”! We take a busload of teenagers, usually a carload of college aged students, and our van… full of (of course) my family! Yesterday we also took Ms. Brandy (and baby Ella… inside Ms. Brandy) along, since I still have one available seat in the van if Phil is driving the bus!

The first part of the trip involves shopping at the mall, and the second part of the trip involves lazer tag (at which point, I go back to the mall with anyone who isn’t old enough/big enough to play lazer tag).

First part of the day went well…

Except for the fact that I had the worst food at Chick-Fil-A that I have ever had, which was a huge disappointment, because I love Chick-Fil-A and have never had a bad experience there before. I am guessing it was the combination of a mall based store mixed with the busyness of December 23^rd shoppers…

At any rate, I got a couple of great deals at Sears (a Christmas dress for Miah next year and footie PJs for Grace, because she has been begging for them and it’s hard to find them in her size!), and I enjoyed running around the mall, trying to figure out which stores to come back to once I’d left my 3 “big kids” with Phil at the lazer tag place!

This was the first year that Caleb was old enough to play lazer tag (although even Ian would be tall enough by their standards, but I cannot imagine him wearing the lazer tag gear)! Caleb was beyond excited about this adventure, and Seth and Grace were pretty stoked, too, because they look forward to this event for weeks… maybe months! We have a super amazing group of teens and college aged students, and my understanding is that they helped the kids a lot and didn’t get nasty if their teams got behind because of “little people” or anything like that… Seth actually even had one game in which he was the top scoring player! Exciting stuff!

Meanwhile… back at the mall…

Brandy (& Ella), Ian, Miah, and I had some fun at Build-A-Bear workshop, which is quickly becoming a tradition for my “less than lazer tag size” crew! Ian originally wanted to build an abominable snowman. I talked him out of that, so we ended up with a Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer that talks… and sings… and has a nose that lights up… and roller skates… and a hat and scarf… This was expensive. Miah got a Build-A-Bunny, whom we named “Snuggle”. Snuggle has a Christmas dress and hat, bows, and shiny red shoes. This also was expensive… but not as expensive. Thankfully, since I am a dork… my coupons and gift cards cut the total by 1/3 at the checkout. That’s all you really have to know about the price, because it was still outrageous!

We hit up the taffy and fudge counter (thus making me the hero of the day when we finally did hook up with the rest of the fam. again), I bought myself a Christmas present (100% organic soap… yeah… that “L” is showing up darker and darker on my forehead every day…), and then we stopped at Dairy Queen/Orange Julius, where I has a very large three berry smoothie, Ian had a very large, “small” chocolate ice cream cone, Brandy had a small Orange Julius, Ella had vanilla ice cream, and Miah had milk… After that it was a quick spin (quite literally) on the double decker carousel, and then we were off to re-claim my oldest three…

Phil had called me a little earlier to let me know that Caleb was exhausted. Later on, Caleb told me that he had fun, but lazer tag was nothing like he thought it would be. I asked him what he thought it would be like, but he wouldn’t tell me!

When I got there, I found Phil and Grace, and Grace was crying! This was surprising to me, because if I am going to find a crying child, Grace would be my last guess… every time! As it turns out, some lady accused her of swinging her lazer gun and hitting people with it… uh… this really doesn’t sound like Grace… at all. Now, don’t get me wrong. I am not one of those people who thinks her children can do no wrong. I discipline my kids when they’re out of line. Grace is an amazing kid, but she does do things, sometimes, that are not OK. If I had gotten there and found that someone had accused her of screaming at the top of her lungs when someone shot a lazer at her and then running through the room whining and insisting that she had not been hit and someone should turn her light back on because of the unfairness in the world, I would have immediately talked to her about her attitude and proper etiquette in public places. I would have known that she had done this. But intentionally swinging a gun at people and hitting them with it? No… just not Grace…

Apparently, the lady immediately exited that round of lazer tag and came to Phil, defending herself and telling him about Grace hitting people… We found that kind of weird, since no one had accused her of anything… yet…

Phil and I talked to Grace, got her calmed down, and figured this was the end of a silly little mishap… Our best guess, at this point, is that Grace really was “swinging” her gun… in a childlike, “hey lazer tag is so much fun and I’m excited” kind of way, and maybe it accidentally bumped the woman in question. Grace insists that even this did not happen, but I am pretty sure that in the dark (mind you) it could have and Grace wouldn’t have even realized it!

At any rate, I collected Caleb (and Seth, who was wearing out, too), and we went back to the van where Brandy (& Ella), Ian, and Miah were waiting. Grace had opted to play the last game of the day (which I considered playing, myself, but didn’t really want to pay the $7.00 for just one game). We ate some taffy and fudge and waited for the day to finish up…

Well… it wasn’t 10 minutes later, and Grace comes out to the van, really crying. In a state of confusion, I ask her what happened, and she tells me she hurt her toe. Really? OK… so I tell her to hop in, and we determine that the injury is not life threatening. I pass some taffy back to her, and she exclaims, “And that’s not all… one of the people who said I was hitting people with my lazer gun came up to me and started swinging her gun at me!” Now… that makes more sense as to why my lazer tag obsessed 9 year old daughter would leave the game early! She was scared!

I found Phil immediately and asked for more details about this woman who originally accused Grace. I then told him how inappropriate it is for an adult to swing a blunt object at my child (not that he didn’t already know this) and marched my way back into the building. Phil was right behind me within a second or two. It’s really no secret that I have a hot temper if you mess with my kids, and I think he wanted to make sure I didn’t totally ruin the reputation of our church at the lazer tag place… we do go there every year, you know… J

I went in and talked with the guy at the counter who is always there. I told him what was going on, and he was very, very nice. There wasn’t a whole lot he could do about it, since the last game of the day was already in progress, but he agreed with me that it wasn’t “very cool” of this woman, and I think I made it pretty clear that I was going to approach her when she exited the game.

When the game let out, Phil tried to figure out, from our own people, what had happened to Grace, and Connor told him that the lazer tag staff guy had brought Grace out of the game when she started crying. No harm there… thank you lazer tag guy for noticing that my child was distraught and helping her to get through the dark course… Definite kudos for the people who run this place…

Phil pointed out the lady to me who had talked to him earlier. She was with another woman (maybe 17-22 years old… I’m guessing a daughter) and a little boy who was probably around 8. I went up to her and said… very nicely and calmly, “Excuse me, ma’am (she looked to be in her mid-40s, so I thought ma’am was appropriate), I think you had a confrontation with my daughter.” She then got in my face and said sort of loudly and escalating, “I did not have a confrontation with your daughter. She hit me with her gun and I told her to stop!” Now… I don’t know… maybe she didn’t understand what the word confrontation meant. I’ll give her the benefit of the doubt… but that sounds like a confrontation to me. The girl next to her also got in my face and started talking about how Grace was going around swinging her gun at people and hitting them… (I did for a brief moment wonder at this point if they just didn’t understand lazer tag at all and were offended that Grace was hitting them with lazers and scoring more points than them…) I proceeded to say (still nicely, quietly, but perhaps slightly less calmly), “well… my daughter is 9 years old, and she doesn’t lie, and that’s not the story I heard.” I started to say, “She said that you accused her of hitting people with her gun and then that in this last game someone who was with you was swinging their gun at her.” At this point, the three of them started trotting for the front of the building and the door (I really think they were scared they were going to be kicked out and never allowed back in, and this is the point at which I knew I was right in believing Grace all along), and the lady starts shouting over her shoulder, “Well… I can see where she got her attitude!” I said (a little more loudly now, just so she could hear me), “That is not how you treat 9 year old little girls!” Then I said mostly to myself, and partly under my breath… “Attitude, you wanna see attitude… I’ve got attitude…”

Our amazing teenagers kinda parted the way for me, as I went after these people on the way out of the building… The scene was probably pretty funny, actually, because it had to have looked like they were running away from me… The lazer tag guy at the counter looked kind of amused…

As I got out the door, the woman was already in her car, driving away as quickly as she could. Unbelievable! Gosh, I thought to myself, “I’m glad I don’t have to work with her, because there are no conflict resolution skills there!” Plight of a business major, I guess, to have these conversations in my head…

Connor was standing on the sidewalk with a handful of our other teenagers, looking a little confused, and asked, “Was it one of our people who did this to Grace?” I laughed and said, “No… if it was one of you guys I would have just beat you!” There was a brief moment of awkward silence, and then we all burst out laughing! I am seriously a very non-violent person! In my 31 years of life, I have never been in a fist fight. I remember slapping an ex-boyfriend… once… and to this day I have no idea what he did but am relatively sure he deserved it…

However… it’s probably a good thing that I didn’t play that last round, because if I had seen a full grown adult taking a swing at my child with a lazer gun, I probably would have swung back… and ended up on the nightly news!

There are some occasions in which threatening children is appropriate…

For instance, it’s OK (if you’re the parent) to say, “If you don’t clean your room, I am going to take your DS and send it, with extra batteries, to Ethiopia, where some child will appreciate it!”

It is never OK to walk up to a child you do not know and threaten to hit them with a blunt object… just never…

Overall, I think everything turned out OK. Grace is even embarrassed, this morning, that I’m writing the story. She is decked out in her owl print footie pajamas and playing Build-A-Bear with Miah. Let me tell you, she looks like and enraged, cold blooded killer who might snap and go on a rampage, knocking people unconscious with squirt guns at any moment…

And now I have a house to clean… because there is no where for Santa to leave my coal, since I am such a ferocious, attitude filled Mommy!

Lisa

Why I Dread Snow…

Well… to begin with… let’s just make it clear that I am not really a “great outdoors” kind of person… at least not in extreme temperatures (I have, indeed come to love the outdoors in the spring and fall). There is way to much background to get into that right now, but I prefer my air conditioning in the summer and my heat, blankets (occasionally warmed in the dryer), and fireplace (we have yet to use) in the winter…

That said, I found my 9 year old daughter… at 8:00 this morning… sitting on the couch dressed in her winter coat, hat, thin gloves, and tennis shoes… proclaiming that she was ready to go play in the snow!

Oh yeah… I really did make that promise that we were going to play outside today right after breakfast, didn’t I?

And since a promise is a promise, I told her to get out of her coat, hat, etc, and that we would have breakfast… Then, I proceeded to explore the great mystery of the basement looking for appropriate winter attire for such a snow… To my delight (or maybe dismay… just really depends on how you look at it), I did, indeed, find everything we would need to enjoy our wintery morning… Our plan was to build seven snowmen today. I questioned whether I had either the energy or the carrots for such a feat…

Now comes the part I dislike…

Once I dragged enough gear up to outfit a pretty good chunk of the United States Army… in Siberia… The real fun began…

Grace and Caleb were ready first, so I threw them out in the snow…

Ian was ready next, so I threw him out, too… with a word to his big sister to keep an eye on him…

Seth had a great deal of difficulty finding gloves, but he was also… finally… vanquished to the snow…

And then I had to dress Miah. Miah did not… in any way… enjoy this process. Since I am pretty much obsessed with little baby hats and hair bows, I thought the hat wouldn’t be a problem (she is used to them, after all)… not today. And I thought she was just going to absolutely lose it when I tried to stuff her hands inside the glove like things that are attached to her snowsuit. On this point, I conceded, and just got our her little owl gloves (that, of course, match her hat), which were a slightly easier sell, as long as I kept tweeting like a bird the entire time I was putting them on. It occurred to me later that owls don’t really “tweet”… rather, they “who”… Oh well… I guess I’ll have to re-teach that one when we do animal sounds…

Somewhere during the “dress Miah like an Eskimo” adventure, Grace started screaming at the door that the snow wasn’t “packing snow”… How this was my fault, I don’t know. I guess I didn’t put my order in early enough for packing snow to have it delivered by today. I told her… through clenched teeth… that she had whined for two days to go outside… now she was there… and she’d better have fun or we were never going outside again!

I ran Miah outside and sat her down in the snow, immediately, hoping to snap a couple of good pictures before she started howling. To my surprise, she started looking around in amazement and smiling… I think she likes snow…

It was just about at this point that I was summoned by Grace to look at her snow angel (at least she found something fun to do, after all), by Seth to look at his snow volcano, and by Ian who was under the trampoline… freaking out because his hats (both of them) had been knocked off his head by Caleb. It was very difficult to take care of all of these requests simultaneously, but I think everyone was satisfied… eventually… until someone walked on the snow angel that Ian had created (and none of us knew was there) at which point the distress began all over again…

At which point, Seth was too cold to stay outside anymore…

And Miah’s face was turning pink…

So I sent Seth in with specific directions as to where he should put all of his snow covered things (which he followed… go figure…)

And I brought Miah in and proceeded to pull all of the snowy clothing items off of her, as well.

Many, many requests for hot chocolate were interjected in this process…

Just as I got ready to make the hot chocolate; Grace was at the door freezing to death in the way that only my little drama princess can, so I looked at her and called Ian inside. This sounds cruel but makes sense if you understand that Ian cannot be left outside without an adult or at the very least Seth or Grace!

After that, I called Caleb inside… who was quite distraught that our outdoor time was over (I think he must be our Boy Scout)…

And finally Grace came in…

And now everyone was begging for hot chocolate, so I made it very clear that they needed to play in the living room long enough for me to warm some water up, and I made it… finally… and let me tell you, I needed it, too, because I experienced this whole adventure in two pairs of sweatpants, a sweatshirt, and tennis shoes!

It seriously took us over an hour to get outside!

I think we played for 20 minutes… maybe!

And they want to do this again?

Well… let’s at least hope for some good packing snow and maybe a napping baby?

Lisa

Sometimes I Wonder…

… If this is really what I was created for…

It’s just been one of those days…

It didn’t really start out that bad… I mean, I managed to take a bath, wash my hair, put a minimal amount of make-up on, find clothes for the kids, and practice the song that Phil and I were to lead off worship with (twice)… all in about an hour. Ian’s socks didn’t match, but nobody’s perfect…

At this point, I turned my attention to throwing together what I needed for children’s church. The project supplies were in the new dining room, and as I was getting them I noticed that Ian was with me… and that he had shut the French doors behind him… and I just thought, “Oh, Ian… you didn’t”…

Now, this might not seem like that big of a deal to most people, but here’s the thing… Our new dining room is almost finished, but it is still a work in progress. There are only handles on the living room side of the doors, and to get out of the dining room, you must pull (not push) the doors… and they latch!

For the next three minutes, Ian pushed on the doors (even though I told him it wouldn’t work), while I screamed at the top of my lungs for Seth, Grace, or Caleb to let us out… They could not hear me over the Christmas music that was blaring in the kitchen. Thankfully, Seth finally made his way to the living room (only Heaven knows why), and I managed to catch his attention… He let us out… I considered the fact that my voice was now hoarse, and for a fleeting moment wondered whether or not I should put Ian back in the dining room… then I remembered that the good china is housed there…

Even though I have determined to wear shoes more often this winter, I started looking for my flip flops, because I didn’t think my tennis shoes would make a fashion statement with my dress (which, by the way, was a maternity dress, because I am still quite overweight from having Miah… and remember this, because it is important to a later part of this story)…

As the minutes ticked away, I decided that maybe the tennis shoes weren’t the worst option, and I put them on… without socks… I knew, instinctively, as I did this that I had just committed wardrobe suicide, because everyone in this church greets me with eye to foot contact, just to see whether or not I’ve given up on the flip flops for the winter… But I had to get moving…

I’m not sure if this is the appropriate place to digress, but last week… about fifteen minutes before we were supposed to sing… I realized that my keys were locked in the van and had to call the church to see if someone could find Phil… steal his keys… and bring them to me. George, our Senior Pastor, showed up at the back door within minutes. I am sure that is just what he needed to be doing (rescuing crazy woman with five children who also happen to be Associate Pastor’s family) right before worship… Thanks, George…

Today, I had my keys in hand. This is only useful if the doors aren’t frozen shut…

I am almost sure that as I pushed and pulled and grunted and snorted that I said something like, “You have got to be kidding me!” Seth said, “Let me try, Mom,” and in the world of cartoon animation and corny movies, it always works, so I stepped aside. Seth pushed and pulled and then said, “I can’t get it either.” I let out a scream (not an angry one, mind you… just kind of exasperated), and then Seth and I looked at each other and started cracking up and almost fell in the snow… I don’t think Miah found it all that funny. Grace, Caleb, and Ian were still in the house…

I finally did manage to get enough doors open to get everyone in the van.

An uneventful drive to “building church” was followed by the realization that there was only one parking spot left, and it was over ice… I took it.

When I got out of the van, I realized that the ice wasn’t all that frozen and that the kids were now going to have to exit into a slushy puddle. I informed them that Mommy just played a game of “Don’t Break the Ice” and lost. They thought that was hilarious… I didn’t, really, but I laughed anyway as I propelled them across the puddle, one by one, and realized that Seth and Grace are really getting too heavy for this. Grace proceeded to whine about how cold it was while I stood almost ankle deep in freezing cold water and got everything else we needed out of the van.

The kids ran in the door.

I took a deep breath and tried to think of something funny to say to the first person who commented on my tennis shoes… or my coat (which I haven’t mentioned until this point, because I like coats about as much as I like shoes… which isn’t very much. If you’ve seen the commercial for Head and Shoulders where the lady is wearing a huge, ugly, black coat and the announcer exposes the myth that “black is always flattering”… well… that’s my coat)…

I crossed the threshold and lost the coat (leaving me, of course, in my sleeveless maternity dress, which I thought was maybe the first good choice of the day, since it caused people to comment on how cold my arms must be; taking the attention away from my feet altogether!)

I dropped Miah off at the nursery, and almost immediately ran into a college aged girl who used to be part of our ministry to teenagers. She had her baby with her, whom I have only seen once before. I commented on how cute the baby is. The girl patted my tummy! This is awkward for me when I am pregnant. Awkward doesn’t even really describe the feeling when I am not pregnant… which I am not! The only thing I could think to do was to be honest, so I said, “There’s not a baby in there. That’s just baby fat. If you want to see my baby, she’s in the nursery.” What else can you really say?

I talked with a few more people here and there, and got ready to enter the sanctuary, take the stage, and sing the song I wasn’t sure I could sing with my waning voice… Remembered I was sucking a cough drop… almost spit it out in the aluminum can collection basket that is for raising funds for the Haiti mission trip (oops)… found a regular trash can (thanks, Ruth)… and took my position again…

Only to see Phil coming down the hall, who said something to the effect of, “Oh good… you’re here! You’re wearing your tennis shoes?” Good one, Phil…

I wish I could say that the rest of the morning wasn’t as interesting…

Every kid except ours who was at Children’s church is going on vacation somewhere cool for Christmas.

Miah was distraught in the nursery, and I finally had to flip my stupid dress around backwards to nurse her… long story… She also showed up at church with only one sock and left with none… epic fail, Mommy… cold toesies…

At least one other person made a reference that made me think she also thought I was pregnant… I think I’m burning the dress… did I mention that?

And I find myself sitting here… typing to beat the band… trying to get this story out before we start phase 2 of this day… Please, oh please let the mini musicale, children’s Christmas party, and whatever else we end up doing tonight go a little more smoothly…

Oh wait… Ian just ran by wearing only pants… Here we go again!

Lisa

This Book Is Draining Me…

I really didn’t expect to feel this way…

I mean, as I published certain chapters I knew there would be tears threatening to fall, and along those same lines, there were others that made me laugh out loud…

But I’m down to the last 12 chapters now, and I hate the ending…

Of course, I know it isn’t really the ending, but reading through these pages is causing me to feel a sense of urgency in writing the sequel.

I think everybody is going to hate how this book ends.

Blah…

Lisa

Sleep...

... is undoubtedly Step 2 in the "change your whole life in less than 17 years" program. I have been thinking about this for some time, but tonight it became increasingly evident that my sleep patterns have to change... HAVE... TO...

So, I was driving Seth and Grace to pre-teen retreat (driving Caleb, Ian, and Miah, too... but the reason we were driving was to get the "big kids" to retreat)... I tend to be a "car sleeper"... but NOT when I'm driving. I could hardly keep my eyes open, and it was 5:00 in the evening! That screams, "SOMETHING IS WRONG WITH YOUR SLEEP HABITS, LISA!"

Although it was a bit concerning when I realized I was so exhausted I could hardly get my kids to their destination, this was not the worst part. I did, indeed, arrive safely at retreat, got the kids registered, and dropped them off with a leaping hug and kiss from Grace and even a hug and, "I hope you have a great weekend, Mom!" from Seth... Good moment...

What really concerned me was what I did next...

I looked at my three "babies" and realized that in order to get us home safely, I was going to have to do something drastic. I drove through McDonalds and ordered a coffee. (dead pan to the audience)

LISA DOES NOT DRINK COFFEE... EVER...

If you do not know me, this probably sounds kind of stupid, but if you do know me, you understand. This was a big deal!

Now, granted, I ordered the least coffee like sounding coffee on the menu, but as I took that first sip, my body instinctively knew that we'd just escalated to a new level of exhaustion. If I'm going to become a coffee drinker, I might as well become a drug addict and an alcoholic while I'm at it. I'm not going to become any of these things... As I drove home, hoping that the caffeine would quickly find it's way to my bloodstream and keep me alert enough to make the whole drive, I knew this was a necessary fix... and a one time fix...

Step sleep is going to have to come in phases, but considering I never would have dreamed I'd even be ready to take another step only 5 days into this thing, I'm going with it. The first part of this step is going to be establishing a bed time.

It is at this point that I must admit that I don't like that. In comparison, step 1 was easy. I like God. I wanted to spend more time with Him. Truth told, I like sleep, too... and I want to spend more time doing it. But I am a night person. I'd like to sleep from... oh... maybe 2am until noon... consistently... Not gonna happen, Mommy...

I remember when I was a kid my mom used to tell me that I would have to wake up earlier when I grew up if I wanted to have a job. I told her I'd work the night shift. And in reality, if I had to work outside of our home, I'd choose 3rd shift every time. But unless I want to completely turn my kids' worlds upside-down, that's not gonna work right now... So I have to have a bed time (I'm avoiding this... can you tell?)...

I guess healthy adults are supposed to get 8 hours of sleep. I know people who do pretty well on 6 or 7. If I'm going to be real honest, I think I probably need 9. But I'm not going to get 9... There are just not enough hours in the day for that on a regular basis. So for now, I'm going to measure my progress based on 8 hours of sleep, but since I'm only going to start the bed time part of this right now, I'm only going to give myself credit for 4 productive hours. For awhile, I might actually get more than 8 hours, and considering the sleep deprivation I have subjected myself to over the years, that's OK... Setting an alarm will be another part in this process, completely. (Set the bed time, Lisa)...

I think it would be very healthy for me to go to bed at 10:00. Can't do it. For now, I'm going to set my bed time at 11:00... and that means that no matter what, that's when the light goes out... and the laptop goes off. This is going to require some serious discipline on my part, because that means my school work needs to be done by 11:00... and I have to stop clicking "refresh" on facebook by 11:00... and I have to be done watching "TV" (this is in quotes, because TV means something completely different at this house than it does to most people, but that's a story for another day)... and done shopping on-line... and done washing the dishes... and picking up the toys... and taking care of anything that needs to be in place for the following morning... by 11:00... And I guess to be fair, since I really think this is an hour later than it should be... I'm only going to count it as fixing 3 hours of my life... for now...

Assuming I can do it, this should bring my total "fixed life percentage" to 1.3%... OK... small... but progress...

Lisa

Any Mother...

... who can successfully pack two children for Pre-teen Retreat is worthy of a Nobel Peace Prize if she meets the following criteria...

1. She must not enter into a mid-life crisis when she realizes that she is old enough to send two children to pre-teen retreat.

2. She must not scream when it becomes evident that she will have to send all of her own hair product with her 9 year old daughter. She must also not complain that she is wearing a hat while said child is dressed to the 9s, and she must calmly explain why it would be more appropriate to wear jeans and a T-shirt to the retreat.

3. She must pack all of her 10 year old son's toiletries for him and remember to give ample instruction about what a toothbrush and soap are for... again...

4. She must not allow the baby to digest any toiletries during the packing process.

5. She must listen with great interest and respond appropriately to her 6 and 3 year olds who just said something about having a fireworks show as soon as their siblings are gone and issued some sort of warning regarding where she should stand with Miah when they begin throwing the fireworks in the living room.

I think that prize is mine for sure... Well... maybe minus the fireworks...

Uh... What was that you said again, Caleb?

Lisa

And So I Find Myself…

And I’m not where I’m supposed to be…

Again…

And it’s kind of getting old…

The other night I made a post on facebook about how I need to implement changes in my life. I insinuated that the changes were going to be slow and painful. It peaked the interest of at least a few friends, and although no one else said it quite this way, the question that’s been bouncing around in my head lately is, “What’s wrong with me that I need to make changes?” The answer is…

Everything.

I am not being too hard on myself. I am just taking inventory of my life, and before I can get into specific, grueling detail; I have to come to the realization that the very general level issue I am facing is that absolutely everything is wrong in my life! There… now that I know what the problem is, maybe I can fix it…

But not today…

No, this is something that took a long time to get into, and it’s going to take a long time to get out, too. I’m not talking like 12 step program long. I’m talking more like 150 step program long. But I’m going to do it…

Sort of…

Really, I don’t have the power to do anything… at all. But I’m going to go ahead and take God up on His offer to get it all worked out, because quite frankly, that’s the only way it’s ever going to get worked out. Yes… I know… very spiritual.

And so… as is generally the case with everything in life… God is step 1.

I am embarrassed to admit that I’m not even sure how long it’s been since I had regular, consistent quiet time with God. Please don’t misconstrue this to read that I have not had time with God. Really, that’s the dumbest thing anyone can say, because God is everywhere. If I’m anywhere, I’m with God. And generally speaking, I am usually somewhere. But the everyday, living and breathing His presence… being aware that I am somewhere with God… has been neglected as of late.

With this in mind; I returned, this week, to an old book, “My Utmost for His Highest,” written by Oswald Chambers. It was no surprise to me, really, that the first two readings hit me exactly where I am…

The challenge now, though, is to maintain this time without letting it become ritualistic or routine… for more than 3 or 4 days in a row…

And it’s a little scary to me how completely draining this is. Seriously? This is a change that affects maybe 10-15 minutes of my life every day, and it feels so gigantic that I can’t even begin to speculate about when I will be ready to move on to step 2.

In my defense, there are a lot of factors that are playing into the equation of why I am so worn down to begin with, but really… I don’t think I need a defense. That’s just the hugely human part of me that hates admitting what a mess I’ve become.

So let’s focus on what’s positive. Assuming I can keep carving out 10 minutes a day to meet with God, now only 23 hours and 50 minutes of every day of my existence are messed up. That means I’ve got 0.7% of my life straightened out. And not everything is wrong with it anymore. For today, I’ll take that.

Lisa

Romans 8:28:

“And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” (NIV)

Why Homeschooling Occasionally Sucks…

I love homeschooling my kids. Our family has chosen to homeschool for a variety of reasons that have evolved over the years. The number one reason I homeschool my children is that I believe they are getting a really good education at home individual instruction and learning that is tailored to their own strengths and weaknesses. I have a lot of respect for good teachers, and I believe that there are a good number of good teachers out there. Even the best teachers, however, cannot be expected to make 30 individual lesson plans dependant on the ability of each student and then spend hours of one-on-one time with each child, every day. That is ludicrous. Since I have the ability to homeschool my kids and give them that kind of attention; I do.

Of course, there are other perks. For example… if we’re sick, we can do school in our pajamas… we never miss the bus… we can chose to go on vacation in the middle of November if we want to and then make up the time on Saturdays or in July… and I never have to cry on the first day of Kindergarten… The list could go on and on…

But here’s the problem I seem to be having lately. I’m just going top put it right out there, and you can do with it what you may. Most homeschooling families seem to have vastly different reasoning than we do behind their decision to educate their children at home.

In recent years, I have identified a couple of different homeschooling “groups”. First of all, there are the ultra religious homeschoolers who aren’t allowed to associate with anyone else. Coming from a pastor’s wife, you might find this statement funny. There is nothing funny about it. In fact, we met some of these people, and they would hardly talk to us or acknowledge that we were in the room. At some point, a few weeks later, the “secret” came out that we were a pastor’s family, and suddenly they wanted to be friends! Uh… I just don’t work that way. I mean… not that I would be any better than anybody else if I refused to associate with them, but I don’t feel all that comfortable with people who only like me for my husband’s job. So sue me.

The bigger issue with this is that it really limits your sphere of influence. I did have to laugh the other day, though, because as I was sitting in Caleb’s music class I realized that 80% of the kids were homeschooled. And to be completely fair, I really do like one of those families and I don’t really know the others. The 20% that aren’t homeschooled come from a wonderful, Christian family, and I like them, too. I have heard members of that family express the pressure to homeschool, however, as if some people do not feel they are being good parents because they put their kids on the bus. Give me a break. That’s totally not what this is about.

Along those same lines, though, it occurred to me that our sphere of influence is pretty limited. Part of the reason I enrolled my kids in classes was to get them out there where we could meet different people. And here we find ourselves… every week… immersed in life with other homechooling Christians. I’m not pulling my kids out of classes because of it. That would be stupid… and judgmental… and discriminatory. But I am wondering where we can go for a little more diversity…

Now, the second “group” seems to be the high class, designer jeans, perfect Mary Kay make-up, professional hair cut, and I’ll one up you with 2 or 3 more perfectly behaved kids than you have to boot group… These are the ones I ran into today…

I have no class…

You know, most days I do manage to take a shower and comb through my outrageously wild curly mane of fluff. If we’re going somewhere I try to dress the kids in clothes that match and run the comb through their hair, too.

Today was not like that.

We had a couple of little issues that got us off to a rough start…

The first one was the broken washing machine. The washing machine has been broken all week. In our family, that is almost a crisis. Phil ordered the part we need to fix it, and it was supposed to be here today, except we forgot it was Veteran’s Day (no mail). Miah has been wearing her brothers’ old clothes for the past two days. There were precious few things to choose from, this morning. I think Seth just wore what he wore yesterday (which isn’t all that unusual for a 10 year old boy). At least he matched. I hope he changed his underwear. Caleb was completely out of pants, so he borrowed some from Seth. Ian was completely out of clothes except for pants, so he borrowed a shirt from Caleb. Grace… who is a diva… came down dressed to the 9s in a pink shirt and skirt, leggings, and matching shoes and socks. I don’t know where they came from. I mean, I do remember buying them… she didn’t rob a department store or anything… but the child has so many outfits it’s hard to keep track. The matching shoes and socks caused me to survey Caleb and Ian’s feet. They were bare, as expected. I sent them to the mismatched sock basket (where socks go in our house after the dryer eats one mate). Each of them put on two socks. The socks did not match. Mercifully, I found an outfit for Miah that is a size too big and stuffed her into it along with her nasty disposable diaper (I mean, it was clean. I just hate disposable diapers but had to give in and use them this week, because I can’t wash the cloth ones due to the broken washing machine).

The second issue was the backed up bathtub. Are you kidding me? Most of the kids shower, so no issue there, but I am not a shower person… and even if I was, I am not using their shower. I have lived in this house for almost 3 years and have avoided that shower completely (I think… although now that I wrote that I may have one memory of having to use the kids’ shower)… At any rate, it didn’t make much of a difference, because we were out of time, anyway. I threw on clean underwear, my clothes from yesterday, and a hat.

We then proceeded to drive an hour and a half away (after stopping at Dairy Queen for chicken strip baskets… I know the drive-through people by sight and they know me. I think it must have been pretty obvious that my day wasn’t going too great, because they gave us extra chicken). And our homeschool science adventure of the day began…

To be honest, Caleb, Ian, Miah, and I had a wonderful time for the first hour and 15 minutes or so. As far as I know, Seth and Grace had an enjoyable time, as well. Caleb participated in a demonstration about estimating and then we ventured around the science center taking part in various activities including a moon walk simulation, which was pretty cool. We sent Caleb off to his lab after that, passed Seth and Grace on their way to their demonstration, and Ian, Miah, and I headed for the toddler/preschool area. I proceeded to nurse Miah while Ian ran around like a tornado and got soaking wet in the water table. Ironically, this seemed irritating to some of the other parents. I am always a little shocked at parents who completely ignore their children while talking to their friends and then wonder why their kids are wet when they left them playing at the water table or in bubble solution unattended… I am almost sure that one mother thought that Ian had drenched her child, but the truth is her kid almost fell into the bubble table some 10 feet away from where Ian was playing. He had absolutely nothing to do with it (ahem… for once…)

As I attempted to get Ian out of a slide (easier said than done), Seth and Grace came running in (kind of loudly), and I instructed them to wait quietly… and without motion… while I coaxed their brother down the slide and out of the area. They did. It took awhile. We all headed to another level and picked up their math packets, which didn’t make Seth too happy, but both older children started working on them anyway… slowly. As I helped them, I accidentally turned my back on Ian for approximately 3 seconds as he managed to disassemble a metal exhibit and throw it at a little girl. This is the one moment in which I would have understood if one of the perfect homeschool moms was angry. I apologized. She smiled (sort of) and moved her child to a safer area. I rebuilt the exhibit.

By this time, it was almost time to go. We all jumped into the elevator with the janitor who seems to me to just be a precious elderly woman whom I have never seen anyone else speaking to. I talked to her on the trip down. She seemed surprised and genuinely pleased. I was pleased, too, because no one else would talk to me, either.

When we reached the lab classroom, all of the children (including Caleb) were gone. I was not too happy about this. The other moms looked down their noses at me like I was irresponsible for not being there when the doors opened. I have never had an experience there where they have released the children without parents. In a slight panic I began calling Caleb (probably a little louder than most people would have liked). Seth, Grace, and Ian were begging to go into a quick walk through exhibit, so I told them to go ahead (as long as they stayed with Ian) and that I would meet them at the end (hopefully with Caleb). Caleb materialized quickly and told me he’d been looking “everywhere” for me. We pushed the stroller to the end of the exhibit I’d sent Seth, Grace, and Ian into, but after waiting for what seemed like forever it became apparent that maybe they weren’t in there, after all. We began walking toward the start of the exhibit when the mom of the very wet, fell into the bubbles, toddler exclaimed, “Is that your son?” I said, “yes,” before I even saw Ian, because I knew it would be him. He was too scared to go through the exhibit now and was blocking the entrance. I attempted to collect him, as Caleb begged to do a quick run through. I agreed, and as I worked to get Ian down and away from the entrance, Caleb got a little over excited and sort of plowed through a couple of kids who were waiting in line. I don’t think he meant to, but there stood guardian mom, again, and she got all over Caleb. This was almost my breaking point. However, instead of saying what I really wanted to say, I looked only at Caleb and said something to the effect of, “You must wait your turn behind the other children who were here first.” I really said it like that… with a sickeningly sweet voice. Caleb looked at me like I’d totally lost it, but he quickly got behind the other kids, which was what confirmed it for me that he wasn’t trying to be pushy… he was just excited. But… oh… we still hadn’t retrieved Ian! At this point, several of the other mother’s children and friends decided that they, also, were too scared to go through the exhibit… Well… what do you know… and they ran over Caleb on their way down the ladder. Caleb and I just stood there looking bewildered, but without such a crowd he was able to climb up and I was able to yank Ian down.

Ian, Miah, and I waited at the end of the tunnel for Seth, Grace, and Caleb. Eventually, Caleb and Seth came through (it took a long time). Then we waited some more (remember, this place is getting ready to close), but Grace never showed up. I sent Seth to the entrance to call to her. After quite a while, she came out. Except now Seth was missing. I sent Grace to the entrance to call to him and told her to come right back. Seth came out… No Grace. So now I’m getting flustered (and thinking this is kind of like a bad episode of The Three Stooges). I sent Seth, again, to call for Grace and told him not to go back through. I mentioned to the other mom that maybe there was a full moon tonight. She told me she didn’t think so, because it was just a sliver last night. I knew that, because I’d actually taken note of the moon last night. I admitted that we had no excuse for today. Grace came out. Seth came back. And we proceeded to wait in line for the elevator.

Eventually, all of the other people waiting in line gave up and took the stairs. We pushed the button again and the door opened.

I think some of my “normal” friends would have laughed with us. But it’s OK. We survived even without friends today.

We drove through Chick-Fil-A for more chicken and fries. We drove an hour and a half home. Phil had Casey’s chicken waiting for me. Seriously… you are not what you eat…

Lisa

How To Split A Pumpkin In Half...

So I had this "great" idea...

We had a few leftover pumpkins from HallowedWorship, and if I can help it I don't like to let perfectly good food go to waste. Although I had never cooked fresh pumpkin before, I decided that it was definitely worth a try. I did not take into consideration how difficult it is to cut a pumpkin in half.

I began with a steak knife (They are good for carving Jack-O-Lanterns after all). When this did not work, I did a quick google search to determine the best way to break these stubborn vegetables! I tried with a chef's knife (that failed). I tried with a screwdriver and hammer (that failed, but slightly less). Finally, as a last ditch effort, Ian and I went outside and threw a pumpkin on the concrete. Much to my delight (and Ian's as well, who said, "Way to go, Mom") it worked. We proceeded to throw all of the pumpkins on the concrete... some of them repeatedly... until they split. I think we made some pretty good sound effects while we did this.

Ian and I had a great time!

We are getting new neighbors... I have joked about this before, but maybe I really am the reason everyone has their houses up for sale on this street...

Pumpkin rage...

It was fun (and it's going to be tasty, too)!

Lisa

Epic Fail, Mom…

Today it occurred to me that no matter how hard I try, I cannot “protect” my kids from everything. It’s funny, because in recent days Phil and I have been talking about how our oldest two children have been quite sheltered, and we are getting to the point in life where they simply need to know about certain things. For instance… although they do know that words exist that are never to be said, I sincerely doubt they could name more than a couple of them… and those they have happened on by pure accident. Ironically, they know more about where babies come from (as in how they get in there and how they get out) then most of their friends. I think that’s kind of funny, since the other kids can string together whole conversations using swear words… I guess it has a lot to do with what you value teaching your children. In a recent interaction, one of the kids’ friends got mad at another one and called him, “gay”. Man, was he ever offended. And Grace was just shocked, saying, “So what… gay means happy!” And she honestly had no idea whatsoever that there were other possible connotations.

At any rate... This post isn’t about words… or sex… or homosexuality. Not really, anyway… although there are some things we are going to have to bring our kids up to speed on before they start getting mixed messages from their friends who think babies magically pop out of their mommies tummies when the stork arrives…

What this post is really about is Halloween… really…

I am not a huge fan of Halloween. To tell you the honest truth, I get creeped out quite easily, myself. And trick-or-treating… I hate it. I used to love it… until I had kids. I went trick-or-treating myself after I was married… twice. I mean, come on… who doesn’t like free candy, but taking my five children door to door to ask strangers for candy… when it’s dark out… and the streets are busy… It just puts my nerves on edge.

Three years ago, we accidentally missed the night for trick-or-treating (not Halloween, go figure), so we raided Wal-Mart and bought tons of discounted candy with our costumed kids. Two years ago, we went trick-or-treating at Sea World. Now that was fun. Last year we planned a Halloween party, combination family worship event. And that was fun, too. This year we’re repeating. I think I’ve almost got my kids “detoxed” from traditional trick-or-treating… and with it, “detoxed’ from ghosts… and goblins… and witches… and monsters (except of course Mike and Sulley).

So yesterday Seth comes home from art class… and I am always thrilled to see what new project he’s created, so I step out into the kitchen to find two renderings of skeletons. Further, I read the note from his teacher explaining that they have been studying Mexico’s “Day of the Dead”… and so I take a moment to decide whether or not I can deal with this and then give the skeletons (which are pretty cool by the way) a place of honor on the refrigerator.

This is followed by our field trip to experience the orchestra, this morning. My understanding was that we would be hearing music from Star Wars (which my kids aren’t really familiar with, but I love), and so we settle into our front row seats only to realize that we are not going to be enjoying Star Wars but rather Harry Potter, The Legend of Sleepy Hollow, ghosts, witches, and even references to demons? Seriously? How the heck did I manage to buy tickets for this one?

In hindsight, maybe I should have marched our little gang out after I realized what was going on. Grace was sunken into her seat, nearly terrified, and Seth was sporting a sour look on his face, matched only by his exclamation, “what a waste of our lives…” Caleb didn’t seem to mind the content too much, but he was bored out of his mind, Ian was running back and forth between me and Grandma, and Miah just clapped at the end of every selection, because she is nearly 7 months old, so when people clap… she claps…

Our dissatisfaction with the program was probably only outdone by the poor little Amish kid sitting behind us…

I left some choice comments on the evaluation form…

When all is said and done, I don’t think this event is really going to have much of an impact on my kids’ lives. But I sure think we could have spent our time more constructively, this morning. And I just keep reminding them that, “Hey… it was really cool when the orchestra played the Star Spangled Banner at the beginning of the concert!” To which Grace replies, “Yeah, Mom… that was the only cool part.”

Live and learn…

Lisa

Drama…

… is not what it used to be.

I can’t remember, for sure, when I first heard the word “drama” used with negative connotations. I think it was probably around 6 years ago…

You wouldn’t think that significantly changing the meaning of the word drama would have any real impact on my life, but it did. Suddenly, when I wanted someone to participate in a role playing type thing, I had to ask them if they wanted to do some acting. It just didn’t sound as good, but if I asked them if they wanted to get involved in drama, they kind of looked at me like I’d grown a second head. Thankfully, Mrs. Darbis (from High School Musical) eventually supplied us with the word, “theater”… and that sounded a little bit better… sort of…

When I was in Jr. High (and… uh… maybe early High School, too…), I remember having “drama”. We didn’t call it that, but it existed. I do specifically remember the words, “drama queen”… so I guess the concept was there. Let’s not have anybody guessing who the drama queen was, OK…

At any rate, kids had drama, even then… back in the stone ages…

It usually had to do with the boyfriend of the month… or the popular kids thinking they were all that (and a bag of chips)… or your best friend stealing your boyfriend of the month… or your best friend becoming one of the popular kids and leaving you behind.

Drama was about who you would dance with when the slow music played and how you would balance your birthday party list so there would be the same number of girls and guys (which there never was). It was about having somebody to sit with on the bus until they were all old enough to drive and you still weren’t. Then it was about begging your dad to drive you to school so your friends wouldn’t see you actually getting off “the cheese”…

As I got older, it became about making a 4.0 the last semester of high school in order to graduate with honors (just barely) and convincing other kids that it wasn’t so incredibly beyond the realm of possibility that someone would choose to get married at 17 without being pregnant (or even ever having had sex).

It was about crying over not being the #1 Bible quizzer… again… or not receiving a scholar’s endorsed diploma because you missed the fine print about having to take a 4th year of science.

That was kind of my experience, anyway.

But the thing about drama is that it’s supposed to be a façade. And drama isn’t a façade anymore.

Now, to be fair, let me explain that this post is coming out of my thoughts about something very serious that happened in my town last night. I was at home with my kids (kind of a rare occurrence for a Friday night), and after they were all asleep I decided to take a quick look at facebook before I turned in for the night, too (kind of a regular occurrence every night). I expected to see my usual fare… cute updates from friends about their kids… baseball news… amusement park news… a couple of posts about what somebody had for dinner… and some teen drama thrown into the mix. For the most part, that’s exactly what I found… except for one post that caught my attention and had something to do with a shooting.

To be completely honest, it took me a couple of seconds to grasp the reality of it. At first I thought it was a new application I needed to block… or a joke… or something. As a photographer, I actually had to think for a moment about whether the post insinuated that pictures were being shot… or guns. Unfortunately, it didn’t take long to come to the conclusion that it was the latter.

I quickly sent a message to one of the teenagers I know who was on and within minutes had information in front of me about 4 teenagers (the news today says 5) who were shot near our bowling alley. I looked at the time and realized it was 10:12… just minutes after Phil should have sent the last teenagers home from the firehouse for the night. I ran upstairs to grab my phone. Upon opening my phone, I kicked myself for not having it on me, because a message had been left at 9:40. It was a staff member from another area youth hang out, calling to inform me of what I already knew. I hung up and called Phil… 10:13. He knew absolutely nothing about this and had, indeed, sent kids out to walk home within fifteen minutes. (Here I will digress for just a minute and say that it seems to me that in the case of a teenage shooting… with shooters at large… it would make sense for law enforcement to contact any places in which teenagers are known to hang out en masse. I understand that it would not be the #1 priority, but it ought to fall somewhere on the list.)

Of course, all of this set Phil into motion, calling the parents of the last kids who had left, getting the building completely shut down, and driving through the streets just to make sure none of “our” kids were still out. Mercifully, it started to rain, so there weren’t too many people on the streets.

As of this morning, the latest news article is listing one teenager in intensive care and all of them in stable condition. I cannot actually confirm the accuracy of this, but it is the best source I currently have.

What has affected me most, though, is the single word that keeps coming up in regard to this incident…

Drama…

As I continued to follow facebook feeds, kid after kid (and these are kids, let’s have no doubt about it) wrote about the drama… the fighting… and I just started to feel sort of numb to it.

I want to get in these kids’ faces and just shake them sometimes, proclaiming, “Drama is not real life!” What these teenagers experienced last night was not drama. What they experienced was real.

Now… I have no doubt that it very well may have started with drama. In fact, it might have started with drama much like I described from a 7th grade perspective. But at some point, this escalated. And I see a lot of that. It doesn’t generally escalate to a shooting, but it does escalate far beyond what teenage drama ever should…

I know kids who thrive on drama. They are not happy unless they are unhappy, and they tend to try to take everyone else with them. In fact, I have watched a few teenagers already “cashing in” on the adrenaline rush that this event is producing. They are going to be the ones who know everyone who was involved and create all the details to fill the gaps. Unfortunately, these kinds of kids almost never actually know what happened. It’s just yet another ploy to draw drama and attention to themselves (another reason why I am carefully selecting which kids’ pages I draw my information from and which ones I engage in conversation about this with).

And with that… if any teenagers are reading this today… let me caution you to be careful where you get your facts. To me, it seems like a very sick thing to try to capitalize on this, but there are kids out there who are going to try to be the heroes in this situation. Somehow, they will inflate the story beyond what it even is and look for a way to use this event to catapult themselves into the inner circle of popularity…

Seriously? Do we really need to inflate this story? I think it’s big enough, don’t you?

Let’s keep those who were involved in our prayers. And if the remote possibility even exists that an event such as this could cause us to re-evaluate the pressures and expectations we put on our teenagers, let’s do that, too. It is not as easy to be a kid today as it was when I was a kid (and that’s really not a million years ago… more like a dozen). I feel like teenagers are forced to grow up too soon now, and consequently they are dealing with issues that no one should have to deal with. As a side not, I also fee that teenagers are staying immature longer, and I think that is directly related, as well, to the inappropriate responsibilities we thrust upon them rather than the appropriate ones we let go. This is a post for another time, however.

For today, let’s be thankful for our families and pray for peace in our community.

Lisa

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga'Hoole...

A Review...

It's kind of funny. It's been a long time since I so desperately wanted to see a movie, and I guess that says something for the power of advertisement. I can't tell you how many films I took in that had a trailer for Legend of the Guardians... (I'll make a guess at 3 or 4). At any rate, every time I saw the trailer, I was just excited about this movie. At least once, Phil leaned over and said something to the effect of, "You know... it's not going to be clean. They're going to put something in it..." I ignored him.

Well... early October kind of got away from me (imagine that), and one afternoon Phil made some comment about us going to see Legend of the Guardians, and I was thrilled when he informed me that based on the review at plugged in (which I frequent but hadn't had time to visit), he "thought" it looked clean. No kidding? We had a date with the owls...

Spoilers Ahead...

So we got to the theater a little late, but it doesn't really matter, because our theater of choice plays something like 17 trillion previews before each movie anyway. Including Phil, Miah (who was sleeping in her baby carrier), and myself, there were five people in the theater. We have a knack for taking in movies when no one else is...

I will say, right off the bat, that this is not a "little kids'" movie. I really get kind of irritated with people who think that anything animated or related to animals is a children's film. This movie goes in our PG-10 pile (which means that Seth can watch it, because he's 10, but he probably won't until Grace is 10... or maybe Grace will get to watch it when she's 9, because when you have a sibling who is just 13 months older than you, you sometimes reap the benefits of their age. Caleb and Ian will not see this one for a long time. Miah tried really hard to sneak peeks at the theater...) There is nothing overtly bloody or anything, but there is some violence (beyond like Jafar turning into a snake violence), and there are also some scary/intense scenes. I would be lying to say otherwise. There is also a moment in which war is described as, "Hell". So you have to be ready to deal with that one however you wish with your kids. I found this to be very contextual and accurate. Everyone may not. That's the "technical" stuff.

Now the plot... Oh, my... the teachable moments were many. Any film that encourages imagination... and dreams... and real heroes... and family... and the concept that you don't always have to see it to believe it... Well, a film like that is just going to get my stamp of approval. I will warn, though, that it's not all warm and fuzzy... particularly when Soren and Kludd (brothers) go their separate ways... one to follow his dream and fight for what is right... the other to follow just what makes sense, eventually to be plunged into evil (although it doesn't appear death... I am just now realizing that this is a long series of books, so obviously we have room for a sequel... or more...)

Ironically, it looks like Legend of the Guardians is based on the first 3 books, and if I had one complaint about the movie it would be that there wasn't as much plot development as I would have liked. It seems to me that maybe... just maybe... they could have focused on just the first book or at the very least, they could have made the movie longer (it was only an hour and a half). I don't know... perhaps this testifies to the fact that I am still able to be entertained by something that was written for 9-12 year olds. I am definitely going to be picking up the books...

My final analysis is that this is a must see for those who like epic tales... but you have to understand that it is not written like Lord of the Rings... or Star Wars... or even Narnia. In a lot of ways, I like that it is an epic tale of good and evil that I can share with my bigger kids, right now (or at least soon). Movies like the Lord of the Rings trilogy are still going to be waiting for a long time around here. I love the movies, myself, but heck... they give me nightmares!

However, I wouldn't shy away from Legend of the Guardians because you don't have kids. It's a good story that was captivating enough that I would watch it again on my own and am definitely looking forward to what happens next.

Lisa

Happy 9th Birthday, Grace!

I am back blogging this post, because due to various computer storage issues, I did not have pictures to post until now...

Grace's 9th birthday was terrific! In fact, she said it was the best birthday ever, so I'm pretty happy about how it went down!

We experimented with homemade pumpkin pancakes for breakfast (I had some, myself, for the first time ever at IHOP earlier in the week), and wow... were they ever good!

It was a busy day in which we couldn't seem to get anything to come together in any reasonable amount of time, but Grace didn't mind, so Phil and I were the only ones who were stressed.

For the first time in MANY years, Grace did not choose Chuck-E-Cheese for her birthday dinner, but rather Golden Corral. Could it possibly be the light at the end of the rat infested cardboard pizza palace tunnel? Nah... we have three children younger than her...

We had a kind of pathetic b-day cake, but again Grace didn't mind, because Daddy served her an enormous piece that got us all laughing... she couldn't finish it all!

There's a story behind that candle...
No... wait... There's a candle behind that candle...
We were all out of 9s, but we managed to find a 6...
hehehe... epic fail! :)

That is one large piece of cake!

No doubt, present time was Grace's favorite. She got all kinds of stuff including hair things, shower gel, candy bars, magnets, books, and CDS. The "big ticket items" were the Lego Family House, Wii Sports Resort, and the New Tinkerbell Movie. By the time she was done opening things I think her head was spinning!

Oh no... She's not excited at all...

So... I feel the need to explain the Dora book...
Grace lost a copy of this book when she was like 4...
She has never forgotten it or stopped asking us to replace it
(even though her interests are far beyond Dora now).
She kind of laughed when she opened it...
I guess she will read it to Miah!

My favorite part of the day, of course, is getting those birthday pictures. And so here she is... my incredible 9 year old princess without whom I cannot imagine my life. I love her so much:


Lisa

The Fine Line We Walk…

Like so many others, this post has probably been a long time in coming… and it could very likely get me into trouble, as many of my opinions are apt to do…

Last week I ran into an interesting situation while working the registration table for Friday Nite Fire. It was not unique, by any means… but interesting, nonetheless…

We had quite a few new students, and one of them struck me as particularly well mannered, interactive, and inquisitive. He spent a reasonably long amount of time chatting with me at registration and stopping back by the table throughout the night. He played a little bit with Miah, who was with me, and seemed to genuinely like babies. And it was not lost on me that he was dressed in girls’ clothing…

At some point during the night, another new student came and told me that she needed to go talk to someone at another popular youth hangout and that she would be back. We have a policy that you cannot re-enter the building after you sign out, so I let her know about this and she seemed rather distraught. She went on to tell me that the other organization had kicked her friend out earlier in the evening because he is gay and that she wanted to talk to someone about it, because it wasn’t right.

And now I had to choose my words very carefully…

I told her that I agreed with her that it is not right to kick someone out just because they are gay. I am nearly certain that this statement would have caused people to stop in their tracks if anyone else had been around. Thankfully, no one was… and here I am sharing this on the world wide web a week later…

I also told her that I still couldn’t let her check out and then back in again, and in the end, she and her friends decided to stay…

All along, I was smart enough to put two and two together and come to the conclusion that the new student I mentioned earlier was the kid who got kicked out…

Well… I didn’t really think a whole lot more about it until after our event was over and I got a phone call… on my cell… from someone at the other youth hangout. How this person got my personal cell number is a bit of a mystery to me, because not that many people have it, but I have got to assume that one of “my kids” (not my biological children, mind you, who were long since sawing logs, but one of my teenage kids) must have made his or her way over there after we closed and decided to make my digits public knowledge… (who knows what else they said)…

At any rate, there was a message on my phone saying that they couldn’t find a teenager who was supposed to be there, and wouldn’t you know it, I immediately recognized the name as yet another one of the new kids we’d had… and he was a foreign exchange student… so I figured I’d probably better call back and make sure we found him!

Once I got in touch with the person who called me, it was quickly discovered that the missing teenager had been found (I’m thinking he was probably missing for less than 10 minutes), and I was going to say, “Have a good night!” and then head on home… but wait… There was something else that they wanted to, “make me aware of”…

I took a deep breath… and I knew what was coming…

They let me know that earlier in the evening they had kicked a “young man” out because he was hitting on other young men. And they gave me his name. And of course, it was my new friend...

And now I had to choose my words very carefully… again…

So I simply said, “Oh… thank you for letting me know…” I mean… seriously… what else was I supposed to say? But I just felt like they didn’t think that was a strong enough reaction…

Now here I feel like I need to stop and say this. Over the years I have kicked guys out for hitting on girls and making them feel uncomfortable… or too comfortable… In the same way, I would not hesitate to kick a guy out for hitting on a guy… or a girl for hitting on a guy… or a girl for hitting on a girl… or whatever, if other kids are being negatively affected by it. Since I was not there at the other establishment, I cannot say, for sure, what happened. He may very well have come in and hit on guys and made them feel uncomfortable and been warned to stop and kept doing it and then been kicked out. If that’s what happened, then fine. But that’s not the behavior I observed from this student once he got to our building.

Basically, I thought this was going to be the end of the story.

Except my cell rang a few minutes ago… and since I didn’t recognize the number, I didn’t pick it up.

But there was a message.

It was from the same person who called me last week, just wanting to make sure that it had been clear to me that when they said the kid was “hitting on” someone, they weren’t talking about him actually hitting another student but engaging in sexual misconduct. Apparently there had been some sort of miscommunication about this? I’m thinking that maybe since we’re not open tonight a bunch of my kids showed up there and said that I thought their policies sucked or something… and by the way, I never did say that…

But… What exactly am I supposed to say?

Am I supposed to be like, “Oh my… thanks for clearing that up, because you know… I’m a moron, and I thought you meant he started a fist fight! We’ll make sure to lock the doors from now on whenever we see him coming”? (Yes, I’m sure that’s what Jesus would have done, right? – Please read the sarcasm here)…

Look… HE’S A KID! I am not… in any way… endorsing homosexuality with this post. But if I start kicking out every kid that comes through our doors who doesn’t fit into my exact mold of what the “perfect” person should be like, there won’t be any kids left! Heck… I won’t be left, either!

And so we walk a very fine line…

It is our responsibility to these kids to show them the love of Christ and to show them what it really looks like to follow Christ. It is our responsibility to teach… but it is not our responsibility to convict (that belongs to Holy Spirit) or to judge (that belongs to God). I often fear that we have no idea where our place is.

Lisa

Kinda Funny How That Works…

Today is an anniversary of sorts…

As I began this post, I thought about how it is the anniversary of the end of something… a sad sort of anniversary… one of those days that you don’t want to celebrate perennially… heck, one of those days that you really don’t want to remember at all… but you do… every year…

Ironically, the subject came up last night at dinner… with the kids, no less… and I found myself grappling for the words to explain so that my almost nine and ten year olds could understand why it is that we can’t just call up old friends and invite ourselves over to play… And it completely sucks to have nothing left to say but, “Well, (insert friend’s name here)’s family just doesn’t like us anymore”. (Not to mention the fact that that friend probably doesn’t even remember you’re alive, even though you have never forgotten.) And then as if that wasn’t hard enough, the answer that sustained these guys for the past five years suddenly wasn’t quite enough anymore, and the follow up came, “Why, Mom?”

I believe in being honest. In fact, I am sometimes so honest that I have been accused of having no tact… at all… I believe that when you’re at fault, you should take the blame. And so I do take the blame… almost every single time there is blame to be taken… because I also believe that it is nearly impossible to have a falling out with someone if you aren’t at least partially to blame in some way, whether by perception or reality. I have often taken the blame in situations, only to put them to rest. I have rarely had someone return and apologize to me… even when they were primarily at fault. I have on several occasions returned and apologized to someone else… even when I was primarily not at fault. And for the most part, I’m OK with that. But in this moment… over my cheese stuffed crust pizza (Oh, Pizza Hut… the irony continues)… looking into the faces of my kids… I decided that I really didn’t think I needed to take the fall for something I didn’t do… even if the general consensus remains that I was the problem…

And so the story began to unfold… the abridged version of course… in which I explained the principles of human nature that cause us to hate people because of who they are not…

I guess my tale was good enough, because when I was finished, Grace had put the anniversary thing together and told me that we should throw a party! I laughed (you know… that sinister, sardonic, sarcastic kind of under your breath chuckle). But now that I’ve had time to sleep on it, I think she might be right…

Because every event that marks the end of something must surely mark the beginning of something else…

And so the book has been a long time in coming…

I highly doubt it will ever be published except for my desire to print a few copies for myself…

But on this day, I will begin to release it one chapter at a time.

If you’re interested in my side of the story, please visit:

www.4yearjourneybook.blogspot.com

And somehow… I now find myself wondering whether I want to yell, “Let it Begin!” like Rhino… from Bolt… or, “It’s a Good Day to Die”… like the same character…

Lisa

And So I Declare “Mulan” PG-13…

Before I begin; let me say that I know there are people out there who have already labeled me a freak… with a capital F… and I’m really OK with that…

Now that that’s out of the way…

You will be hard pressed to find someone who loves Disney more than me (although I do have a good friend who loves Disney as much as I do… thank goodness, or we might drive everyone else crazy)! I love Disney characters… and parks… and jewelry and clothing… and music and movies… pretty much all things Disney…

Over time, we have slowly introduced our children to the Disney Classics and the Disney “Instant Classics” (just gotta love that concept)… And I think it’s pretty safe to say that they love Disney, too…

“Mulan”… one of my longstanding all time Disney favorites… has been sitting in the “view to see if we want to show the kids this” pile for quite some time now. Last night I had the opportunity to go to bed at 10:00 (rare occurrence, let me tell ya), but for a variety of reasons, I wasn’t all that tired. So I popped “Mulan” into my laptop and let it roll while I snuggled my sleepy little princess Miah…

It had probably been at least 7 years since I’d last viewed the film…

Now… the main reason that it has stayed in the “wait until later” pile for so long is that I distinctly remembered “the ancestors” as being a teaching point for older kids. I was actually pretty excited to get this one out and work through to an understanding about ancient Chinese customs and such, including family honor, and it didn’t hurt that the history of the Great Wall was also explored to a certain degree. But I knew, for sure, that Grace would have a difficult time with Mulan and her family praying to dead people, and I needed to remember just how prevalent this theme was. To my disappointment, it was more prevalent than I remembered. Of course, “Mulan” originally came out in 1998, so the first time I saw it, I was already 18. At almost 9, I knew Grace would have a different take on things… Still, the bulk of this theme is concentrated at the beginning of the film, and I felt with careful conversation I could both prepare her for it and explain why it was OK for us to watch this, particularly as a learning experience… (and everyone stops and wonders if Lisa is trying to rationalize this particular movie because she likes it so much… but I don’t think that’s the case)…

With my view clear on that aspect of the film, I thought to myself, “Great… we should be in the clear… ‘Mulan’ movie night, here we come… maybe sometime next week?” …

And then the other “little” issue began to surface, and am I ever glad that I didn’t just say, “Oh… forget the preview,” and sit down with my kids and the remote…

There are a lot of sexual references in “Mulan”… If you’re laughing so hard that tears are streaming down your face, just send me a complaint and stop reading. I’ll understand. But really…

Mushu (dead dragon, remember) runs into Mulan’s chest, and she smacks him… He also tells Mulan that men like it when you smack their butts… and so Mulan does (now, seriously, I do not expect that Grace would start smacking little boys’ butts because of this, but if she did… well… I’d have a heck of a lot of explaining to do…) In addition, we have a bath scene at the beginning of the movie where Mulan is covered well by bubbles and her hair, but would I let my kids watch this in live action? And perhaps the most significant scene is where Mulan is bathing in a lake and several men join her (not knowing, of course, that she is a woman) for a swim. As Mulan escapes behind a bath towel and her horse, she says something to the effect of, “I never want to see a naked man again,” at which point a whole heard of naked men run by and Mulan’s eyes pop out of her head. Of course, we don’t see anything… but come on… we know what she saw…

So today, our family had lunch at the park. This was my first opportunity to tell Phil what I thought about the movie, and I simply said, “They can’t watch ‘Mulan’.” Phil looked highly surprised, which I found funny, because I consider him to be even more selective about what they’re viewing than I am (he may disagree about this). He asked, “Not even Seth and Grace,” to which I answered, “No,” and began to relay to him the things I just wrote here. And as we chuckled about all of the “bad” parts of the movie, he asked, “So… 13?” And I laughed harder… and so did he… as we declared this “G” rated movie a “PG-13” at our house…

Maybe we’re crazy… I’m pretty sure the birthday party attendant on Saturday must have thought so when she announced that we were going to play hot potato and listen to Miley Cyrus music and Grace and her best friend exclaimed, “Who’s Miley Cyrus?” (Followed by another party guest revealing that Miley is Hannah Montana and Grace and her friend being just as unimpressed as they were with Miley…)

We’re not trying to keep our kids in a bubble… hard as it may seem to comprehend that based on what I just wrote… But is there anything wrong with letting them be kids?

Seth (10) and Grace (8) have friends with cell phones… facebook accounts… and keys to the house. And I am so pleased that they still play with matchbox cars and My Little Ponies (well… let me clarify… Seth does not play with My Little Ponies… just Grace). I am completely ready to let them grow up when it’s time, but I do not want them to be jaded about everything “fun” in exchange for anything and everything they shouldn’t be involved in. There is a time for everything… and at 10 and 8, it’s still time to be a kid!

So bring on the go karts… and the video games… and the bowling parties… We will continue to build with Legos… and listen to Adventures in Odyssey… and laugh at old Herbie Movies and Jetsons reruns until they figure out that Mom isn’t really that cool… and then we’ll deal with the “coming of age” that comes with growing up… and hope that by the time Mushu instructs Grace on what men want, she’ll have a better concept of how ridiculously funny his lines are…

Lisa

I'm Really Getting Frustrated...

... with school.

No one in their right mind has this many credit hours and no degree...

And I'm starting to get cocky, which is never a good thing...

I honestly thought this was going to get better with the transfer I made this fall to a "real" school, but it's not... not really anyway... And the problem is now that if I even had the audacity to transfer again, I'm not really willing to do it, because I need to finish a program in order to hang the all powerful piece of paper up by my desk so that Ian can tear it out of it's frame and fingerpaint it...

Seriously... is this even worth it? Don't answer that. It's rhetorical...

L.

Seth Turns Double Digits...

Wow... oh, Wow... oh, Wow...

Where did it go?

This morning...

We had homemade chocolate, chocolate chip, buttermilk waffles...

And we took pictures at the park...

This afternoon...

We had McDs...

And Seth opened his presents that seem to get smaller, yet more expensive, every year...

And we had cupcakes and ice cream (mint moose tracks for the kids... uh... yuck...)

On Saturday...

We'll head out to America's Incredible Pizza Company for a party...

And tonight...

I go to bed with a "baby" in double digits...

I love you Seth Matthew!

Pictures Follow:

Lisa

May We Never Forget…

This morning, I woke up…

Much like other mornings, although since it is Saturday, I didn’t wake up to an alarm, but rather to a 3 year old crawling into bed with me…

I rolled out of that bed minutes later… banished Ian to the hallway so I could go to the bathroom… looked out the window and lamented that it is raining (I never lament the rain… actually, I love it… but I am supposed to do an outdoor portrait shoot this evening)… headed down the stairs… turned on the Wii… jumped on the balance board (well… not literally… you are not supposed to jump on the balance board)… and began my workout…

I thought about what we should have for breakfast… the birthday party we are going to later… and the rain (again) that I heard pounding on my windows and roof. I thought about Phil and the teens he took to a quiz this morning… and the schoolwork that I need to get done late this evening…

And then I thought (almost as an after note), “What is today’s date, anyway?”

And it was September 11th . And then I remembered…

I remembered waking up to make a bottle for Seth… walking into the “office” to get what I thought would be an update on the Tigers from Phil… plane image on the computer… tower burning… TV turning on… second plane crashing… second tower burning… phones ringing… no one reaching Dad, flying Detroit to Chicago… baby bouncing in the doorway with Cheerios all day long…

Fast forward to today again… I checked facebook…

And my friends are doing much what I did when I woke up. They are posting wedding pictures… heading out for soccer games… and football games… and first haircuts… celebrating births… and lazy Saturdays…

It’s ironic, but when the events of September 11th first happened, I thought we would never stop talking about it… and thinking about it… and for some time, that was true… Although the references come far less frequently now; I have had several occasions this past year when I have thought of September 11th sort of “out of context”. These thoughts certainly come every time I walk past the picture collage of our honeymoon… hung in our living room… with me on the ferry and the twin towers making up the backdrop…

I have done my best to explain September 11th to my children (only one who was even born at the time), and I think they “get it”… sort of… The conversations usually end with Seth saying, “Isn’t that the time I bounced all day long in the doorway with Cheerios?” and Grace saying, “Yeah… I was still in Mommy’s tummy!”

I realize as I look at my beautiful Miah (as she finishes up her breakfast), that she is probably going to understand the gravity of September 11th about as well as I understand Pearl Harbor. To her… it will be a history lesson. To those of us who lived it, it has changed life forever…

But Americans are resilient! I am starkly reminded of this as I go over the list of things we’re thinking about today! Terrorism has not robbed us of our celebrations… of our freedoms… of our fun… of our families… of our lives! And for that I am proud on this dreary Saturday morning!

But may we never forget…

And with that, I give a heartfelt thank you to all of our rescuers… fireman and women… paramedics… police officers… some who gave their lives in the September 11th rescue efforts… some who have given their lives at other times in the line of duty… and all who risk everything for our safety…

And I offer a heartfelt thanks to all of our service men and women who have risked their lives and often made the ultimate sacrifice to secure our freedom!

May we never forget…

Lisa