Busy

Last Friday, the girls' little recital was great. It was at a small church (where they take voice lessons) and it was a "Valentine's Evening." There were about 13 or 14 selections. Many were performed by members of the church choir. The "audience" was primarily people over 60 (the exceptions being the young students and their families). The women of the church had all baked and brought desserts. The strawberries were the best! The Strawberry Festival starts this week. I love seeing the giant strawberries grown. I like eating the strawberry shortcake even better! I'm hoping to go see the Christian group, "Casting Crowns" next Saturday as they're playing at the festival.

I definitely have a busy week. I'm off to South Carolina to see John and Gwyn and my parents. I'll get a chance to see my big sister, Elaine, too (for a few hours) before I leave Thursday afternoon. I'll drive to the Florida/Georgia border Thursday night (it's about 1/2 way) and then I'll drive home Friday morning. Next Friday night we all get to go see "Wicked!" I can't wait! We've had the sound track since last Christmas, we bought the tickets last February, and we now are finally going to see the play. The hardest part will be remembering our manners and not singing along with the actors. The music is really wonderful. "Defying Gravity" is one of my favorites. It'll be fun to get all dressed up and go to the Performing Arts Center together. We haven't been in quite a while.

Then next Saturday is the Strawberry Festival and then it's back to normal chaos.

The Imp won her school's competition of the Readers' Digest WordPower Challenge. She then took an online test at school, and she finished in the top 100 6th, 7th and 8th graders in Florida so is off to the state competition on March 19. I'm thrilled. The Imp isn't so excited. She looks at it as a place to fail. I look at it as a place for her to shine, no matter how she does at the actual competition. She does not seek the spotlight like her sister does. As a spotlight hound myself, I don't always understand her.

Lent has started. I found it very telling about our society (and how our religious holidays have become so secular) when the Imp came home from the store last Sunday with a box of Peeps. She wanted to eat them before Lent started since she knew she wouldn't during Lent. I don't know, some thing's off-kilter when you buy Easter candy before Lent which is the time to prepare for Easter. The fact that Lent is 7+ weeks long, tells a little something about the commercialization of all things today. People hunger for fulfillment, but few realize that only God can bring that fulfillment. So many will try to fill up on things and activities. Is the current obesity problem a consequence of Americans turning to food to fill them up instead of personal growth and a relationship with God? I just read yesterday that the average American child drinks 65 GALLONS of soda a year. Whoa! That's a lot of soda. As I was exclaiming about this stat, the Imp tells me many of her classmates, including a close friend of hers, have coke for breakfast! Huh? Her friend goes through a drive-thru on the way to school and gets hash browns and coke each morning. Yuk! I feel my arteries clogging and the pounds settling on me just thinking about eating that each day. The Imp, seeing how appalled I was, defended her friend by saying, "They're so busy they don't have time to cook like we do." I didn't argue with her, but thought "Breakfast doesn't require a lot of cooking time...a box of cereal and milk is a lot healthier and cheaper than McD's every morning." I also know that when I was working we did eat out more than we do now, but I still planned a menu each week and we still had most meals at home. But that is one of the reasons I quit teaching, so I could contribute to the well-being of my family by making our lives less hectic. By being at home during the week, I can get grocery shopping done, do laundry, go to my Bible Study during the day and not have to take away from family time to do that. Our evenings and weekends are still full, but they aren't frantic because I view the 3 pm - 9pm time-frame as my prime work time. I'm not too exhausted to help with homework, listen to little daily problems with friends or at school, make dinner. The saying "If momma isn't happy, nobody's happy," has truth to it. I do set the tone of the family. If I'm calm, the family is much calmer than when I'm stressed out. Hubby is wonderful and is a very hands-on dad, but I'm the one who keeps tabs on the emotional well-being of each individual in the house and the family in general. That's my job, and I like it.

I'm obviously an advocate of stay-at-home moms. I stayed at home for 6 years after the Singer was born. When the Singer was 6 and the Imp 2 1/2, financially things started to fall apart for us (including renters moving out in the middle of the night with no notice). We decided that I would go back to work. It was a hard decision because teaching is a very demanding job, and one that is rarely confined to the time in the school building. But when I went to work, it was with the idea of achieving financial stability (not wealth) so I could then be at home once again. When I was working, we did not change our life-style in that my salary was used to cover working expenses (day care, wardrobe expenditures, increase eating out, gas, etc) and the rest of my salary was but towards our debt and our savings. So after 6 years in the classroom, I could easily leave without an impact on our standard of living. We bought our house with the idea of being able to afford it on one salary. Trust me, the sellers wanted us to upgrade and kept telling us we would qualify for a bigger house, with more extras. We kept saying, "No." We knew what we wanted.
I know there are people who have to have both parents working to make it. But I also know many more people who claim that both parents have to work but in reality they have put themselves in that position. Yes, if you buy a 3500 square foot home, you may not ever be able to make it on one salary. But if you bought a modest home, instead of a huge home, you could. I'm sure the Imp's friend's mom would say she can't afford to stop working (she is a teacher's aide at a private school, so her salary is not large). But I wonder how much the family spends because she works (eating out is very expensive). Our ideas about living "comfortably" are really skewed as a society. A roof over your head (clean, not bug-infested, working plumbing, etc), steady food on the table and a few outfits per person. Anything beyond that is luxurious. Kids don't all need their own room, or 12 pairs of shoes, or the newest Playstation console or game, or an ipod, and on and on. We are financially blessed. But when I look around, my kids have much less "stuff" than most other children their age. I don't feel guilty about it. I'm happy. They know stuff won't make them happy, and much of what they have, they've earned. (Both girls have an MP3 player, both paid for over 1/2 of the cost). I don't worry about them losing their MP3 players, because they know I won't buy them a new one, and they know how hard it was to save that kind of money.

On a different topic, although still on how much I think our society has lost focus. A hamburger chain "Checkers" began an add campaign with RapCat. RapCat is a hand puppet of a cat dressed as a rapper (and he raps, too). As part of the campaign, the company made their bags with lines of where to cut holes to make the bag into a rap outfit for your pet cat. The outrage over the "mistreatment" of cats by putting the bag on them has been way out of proportion. If your cat doesn't like it...don't do it! If that's the mistreatment of animals, how is America's Funniest Home Movies still on the air? The treatment of the animals on those clips is much worse than putting a paper bag on your cat (as an outfit). How many people put outfits on their cats and dogs? How often do the cats and dogs not like it? Should we prevent the sale of animal outfits? [Actually, I wouldn't mind, as I think we spend too much on our pets, but that's another story]. What really floored me with this whole story is that it led the 11 o'clock news AHEAD of a murder! Huh? Somehow we've really gotten off track about what's important.

The Spirit is Alive

Last night I had such a wonderful time. It was moving and fulfilling. 130 people (mostly 8th graders --but also the 4 adults from my class) were confirmed in my church. The bishop was there. Whatever his shortcomings (and we all have them) he has been very visible and accessible to the people of his diocese and he is a great homilist. He shared with us a letter he received from a young lady currently serving in Iraq who he had confirmed about 5 years ago. Her letter was poignant and beautiful. I think everyone had tears in their eyes as he read from her letter that he should make sure that people know forgiveness is the key. She had chosen St. Sebastian as her saint's name, and he had asked her about it. She chose him because he is the patron saint of athletes and she's very athletic. Bishop Lynch told her he always remembered that as St. Sebastian pulled the arrows from his body, he forgave each of his aggressors. She wrote of how little forgiveness she has seen in Iraq and that forgiveness is the only way to peace. Like I said, it was very moving.
So my emotions were running high between the story and watching 4 people I've personally watched grow in faith become confirmed. Then the Singer was the cantor and sang so beautifully. The Singer may not be the best singer ever (although I think she is...and yes I'll concede I may be biased), but she is an awesome cantor because she recognizes her role. As cantor she is not to perform, but to lead and encourage others into active worship. And she believes in her heart all that she sings and it shows! As she stood on the altar singing for the Holy Spirit to come I felt her true supplication that the Spirit would touch all of our lives. She is quite the young lady. I am truly blessed to have my parish and my daughter.

Saturday night the Imp took Hubby to the Father-Daughter dance at her school. It was the first time her school had done this, but it was such a hit, I think it won't be the last. Every girl was announced as she arrived and walked down the red carpet through a lattice archway. "Suzie Smith escorted by Joe Smith." There was a professional photographer there who took pictures of the "couples" and donated all the proceeds to the school and there was a dance instructor who taught the Salsa and the Merengue.

I've been busy crocheting lately. I really love the intricate patterns and designs that are so easily created. I love creating. This past week, I've mainly crocheted bookmarks, and it's great to be able to start and finish a project in a day. I actually gave each of my confirmation students a bookmark for their Bibles. I think I made about 10 bookmarks last week. The previous week, I worked on a bookmark that was wayyy too involved for my tastes, but once I started I wasn't quiting. I think it took me 7 or 8 days to complete. It's nice...but I'm not sure I'll make another one. I don't think it looks much different that the other ones, but it definitely is much harder.

The weather is cold. The coldest thus far this winter. I put a turtleneck on this morning for the first time this season. Tonight there's a freeze warning. I don't like the cold but when it's cold and cloudy, I really feel blah. Today is cold and dreary. No sun shining, wind blowing and COLD. Yuk. Fortunately, I'm off to scrapbook so my day isn't a total loss.

The girls have a voice recital tonight. They'll be singing "Sisters" (the song from 'White Christmas') together. I can't wait. I'm sure I'll be tearing up tonight!

Friends

I received this Friendship email today. I receive lots of "cute" things from multiple people on a regular basis. Sometimes I groan when I see that the mail is a Forward, meaning my friend isn't really writing to me, only sharing with me. But amidst all the clutter some real nuggets emerge. I believe this is one of those nuggets.

TWO FRIENDS WERE WALKING THROUGH THE DESERT.

DURING SOME POINT OF THE JOURNEY,THEY HAD AN ARGUMENT;AND ONE FRIEND SLAPPED THE OTHER ONE IN THE FACE.

THE ONE WHO GOT SLAPPED WAS HURT, BUT WITHOUT SAYING ANYTHING,WROTE IN THE
SAND:

TODAY MY BEST FRIEND SLAPPED ME IN THE FACE.

THEY KEPT ON WALKING, UNTIL THEY FOUND AN OASIS, WHERE THEY DECIDED TO TAKE A BATH. THE ONE WHO HAD BEEN SLAPPED GOT STUCK IN THE MIRE AND STARTED DROWNING, BUT THE FRIEND SAVED HIM.

AFTER HE RECOVERED FROM THE NEAR DROWNING, HE WROTE ON A STONE:

TODAY MY BEST FRIEND SAVED MY LIFE ."

THE FRIEND WHO HAD SLAPPED AND SAVED HIS BEST FRIEND ASKED HIM, "AFTER I HURT YOU, YOU WROTE IN THE SAND AND NOW, YOU WRITE ON
A STONE. WHY?"

THE FRIEND REPLIED "WHEN SOMEONE HURTS US WE SHOULD WRITE IT
DOWNIN SAND, WHERE WINDS OF FORGIVENESS CAN ERASE IT AWAY.

BUT,WHEN SOMEONE DOES SOMETHING GOOD FOR US, WE MUST ENGRAVE IT IN STONE WHERE NO WIND CAN EVER ERASE IT."

LEARN TO WRITE YOUR HURTS IN THE SAND AND TO CARVE YOUR BENEFITS IN STONE.

I know I need to work on the idea of writing good things on stone and bad things in the sand, no matter who does them or how they happened. Life is so much more fulfilling when we don't waste time on things we cannot change and don't dwell on hurts, percieved or real.

Valentine's Day Hype

With Valentine's Day just around the corner, we're now being inundated with all kinds of ads telling us that things say "I love you!" Yeah, right. I've always felt uncomfortable about Valentine's Day...if you have to be told to say "I love you," how much does it mean? Fortunately, Hubby shares my views (and he actually is thrilled that his love will not be measured by what he does or doesn't do or buy for Valentine's Day). Would I be hurt if the day weren't acknowledged at all? Probably. I like getting the cards and the gooey words. I don't mind getting a box of candy or a teddy bear to add to my collection. But I definitely do not need a diamond, or a trip or 12 dozen roses or anything else. Hubby tells me he loves me each day...in words and actions (Yes, hearing "I love you" is very important to me). I'd much rather get the day in and day out little declarations of love that to only get them on "special" occasions.
There's a great book about love called the Five Love Languages by Gary Smalley. Gary Smalley actually has written lots of good books about relationships in general and marriage in particular. My primary love language is Words of Affirmation. Tell me "Good job." or "I really appreciate you doing..." and you've charged me up for quite a while. By the same token, if you yell at me or suggest by your words that I'm not doing good enough... I take it to heart and tend to be crushed. Hubby's primary love language is Acts of Service. Many guys have this as their primary love language. They like to DO. So at the beginning of our marriage, I'm drowning him with all these words, and he's busy doing things. I'm hurt because I'm not getting the words I need and he's not responding to my demonstrations of love. He's upset and feels unappreciated because he's not getting the "brownie points" for doing all these things for me. So we had to become bi-lingual. I needed to recognize his little actions (making me coffee, or doing the dishes, or taking out the trash) were great declarations of love and needed to try to do the same for him (fill up his gas tank, move the car seat back after I drove his car, get up first to turn the heat up in the morning). He could understand those things easier than words. Actually, the more proficient you become in each of the languages makes all relationships easier. If you figure out what "speaks" to the other person you can tailor your interactions with them. If they speak Gift Giving then you better have gifts on Valentine's Day (although gift-giving doesn't mean expensive...it's the presentation...Here I have something for you...a flower picked from the yard is a gift). I think Physical Touch is the language that is the hardest to work with. If your primary language is Physical Touch, you really need it. If Physical Touch is not a language you speak at all, someone hugging on you all the time is overwhelming. So you withdraw, and then the other person feels extremely unloved because withdrawing physically is with-holding love. If you can learn the love languages of your children, it's great and helps you figure out how to reach your child easier. (Smalley has a book on Children's Love Languages as well). I know I've blogged about this before but it's so true and impacts my life so much and I was thinking about it again, I had to write more.