Sweet or Sour

Today has been one of those days that I would love to be able to play over and over and over again.  It wasn’t anything crazy and remarkable, just a day when I look back and I realize how much I love my family and how wonderful they are.  When I started this blog a few years ago, it took on this “recipes for the table and for life” tag line.  Most of the time I share recipes for the table- those seem much easier to come by!   On occasion though, there are things that I realize are great recipes for life and just have to share.

Today has been one of those days.

• I ate breakfast, lunch and dinner with every member of my family.
• I spent 5 hours out with my girls running errands buying stuff not for us (ok, we did pick up some candy as a treat and some contact solution for Dad since were were going by Wal-Mart too—-what errand run is complete without Wal-Mart?!) but everything was really for stuff at church and we didn’t kill each other and I didn’t have to break up any arguments.
• We started our day round-robin reading from the book of Proverbs.  Which is something we have done a few times already this summer.
• We had a great conversation at dinner about what it means to be a team thanks to the imom.com conversation starters.  Then my family indulged me in creating a family cheer.  I have yet to hear them all say it, but they sure do get a laugh out of seeing me do the cheer!
• We ended the night watching a movie together– which we checked out for free from the Media library (free 7-day rentals!).  We watched Cheaper by the Dozen.  I thought it was a remake of an old movie….but I think I was thinking of With Six you get Egg Rolls.  Anyhow, the movie was hilarious and we laughed and then I almost cried at other points. It was great to be together and hear the laughter and see the smiles on each face.

The last time I can remember a day that I wanted to recapture was just over a year ago when our family experienced our first Phillies game.  It was an awesome evening.  The weather was perfect, the seats were great (very high up, but still great), the Phillies won, and we all had a blast.  Then the next day my world crashed—I was told that my job of eleven years no longer needed my skills.  Ouch.  Life is like that, ups and downs…ins and outs…sweet and sour.

The downs, outs and sours help us appreciate the ups, ins and sweets so much more.

Today has been one of the good days and it wasn’t because we were at Disney or some other crazy, fun vacation spot but it has been a good day because of the tried and true ingredients of

• Time
• Togetherness
• Laughter

We took time to start our day with the One who gave us to each other.

We took time to enjoy each other and to talk.

We helped each other out.

We were a family.

Yep, this might just be my favorite recipe yet!

The great thing about this recipe is that it works for the ups and the downs.  Sure we all prefer the ins to the outs but it is family that helps us through it all.

Everyday isn’t like today.  Just last week I was ready to cut holes in the bottom of each child’s door to pass food through and let them come out on Labor Day.  Yep, our summer got off to a bumpy start even with all my planning and wishing.  I mention that so you know that life is not all “Norman Rockwell” around here!

I know that tomorrow is a new day.  I have no idea what the future holds but I know the One who holds the future.

I’m so glad that my family is with me regardless of if it is sweet or sour.

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Crafty Cupid

This is a year of new things for me so why not get all crafty during Valentine’s day as crafty and Becki are usually not found in the same sentence!  Well I didn’t do a TON of crafts but two and then I made lots of Valentine’s day foods for my loves.  The crafts win out this year over the food though.

Let me share what all I did and where I found the ideas:

Craft #1

This Valentine Topiary was very easy to do EXCEPT that my 6 year old burned her finger on the glue gun.  I felt so bad as I had envisioned this activity as a happy time with Mom and daughters sitting around chatting and crafting.  Well, I ended up doing it by myself after H burned her finger and E didn’t ever care to glue the hearts…just eat them.  The styrofoam ball that I purchased was a tad big…but it worked out fine.  I bought a white ball so I didn’t have to mess with covering up the green of the “flower foam” kind of ball.  I found this idea while I was “pinteresting” one day  (that would be actively looking on pinterest one day).  Glue Guns and spatulas was the blog post that has the directions.

Craft #2:

The leftovers

I wish I had remembered to take a picture of all of the hearts in their final form.  Heather and Emily made beautiful crayon hearts and then we (or rather I) sewed them to cardstock with Valentine sayings on them.  These were fun to do, but my fingernails did take a hit with all the scraping of crayon wrappers.  We found that the newer the crayon, the easier the wrapper came off.  My favorite crayons were the ones with the yellows/greens/orange all swirled together.  There are all kinds of pinterest places to find this craft idea but this is the one that I pinned that gave the idea to do this: Crayonhearts

Food idea #1

I found this recipe for 2-ingredient fudge and thought it sounded like something Emily would like to eat.  Then a friend of mine blogged on it and said how easy it really was so I decided to make it for my girls on Valentine’s day.  Since I can’t remember where I originally found the recipe, I will link you to Amy’s blog

Valentine Desserts

 Food Idea #2

The other sweet treat on the platter is a red-velvet cookie.  It is pretty simple to make as you use a boxed mix.  This idea/recipe came from the yummy blog of Two Peas and Their Pod.  Food Idea #3 came from them too.

Food Idea #3

This Chocolate Dutch Baby was very easy to whip up the morning of Valentine’s Day and while it baked I threw some cheese filled smokies on the stove and grabbed the extra four heart-shaped muffins that I made for H’s first grade class (they only needed 18 and I sent 20 so really sending 24 would have been WAY too many…right…so it was a good thing to do–see).  It was a fun breakfast even though neither of my little loves enjoyed the Chocolate Dutch Baby—my handsome fella loved it though

Food Idea #4

This one came from Jen Myers at our Moms4Moms group that meets at Faith Community Church.  This one was the only one that my kids really loved.  It was quite simple.  Get the canned breadsticks from the store.  Stretch each one out about 12 inches and then shape into a heart.  Brush it with raw egg and sprinkle with your favorite topping.  For H we had kosher salt, for E we had cinnamon sugar, Brad and I had Italian seasoning and Parmesan cheese and then there were a few plain ones.  I also made pink homemade applesauce for our dinner—another recipe from Jen.  I’ve made it before and it was a hit then too.

So our day was all about food and I was in the kitchen for most of the day EXCEPT when my handsome fella called home to tell me he was coming home early from work to take me out to lunch!  That was a fun little treat.  We ate at Qdoba and for a kiss in front of the cashier they gave us our second entree free!!

Here are some more pictures from our day:

The traditional Valentine's Day hunt ended with these treats for the girls.

 

Brad and H go through her cards from school.

 

This is where I was most of the day!

 

 

 

 

 

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Life is about Choices

This morning my youngest was complaining that she was cold.  I reminded her that she had a nice warm robe hanging in her closet that might help her.  To which she replied, “But then I would have to leave my orange roll.”  (A favorite “special breakfast…thanks Pillsbury!)

I said “Life is all about choices” and she said “No it isn’t; it is about God.”

I am happy that this would be something she would say to me as we talk about life and why we live it.  I am extremely happy after the day I had yesterday with my two girls.  It is so frustrating to try to do all the “right” things yet not see your kids living a life that reflects all the “right” things.  Yesterday my handsome fella had to step in and talk to the girls about how poorly they were treating me.  I am not looking for accolades of praise for everything I do, but I would just like nice words or no words at all.  It seems that I don’t ever please my girls.  I hear lots of heavy sighs, cries of “I’ll never get….” and “why nots”.

I try hard to say “yes” as much as I can but there are some things I just can’t change.  Like yesterday when one of my girls said that Halloween was on Monday and I said that it was not this monday but the next so a little over a week.  She argued with me and then got angry about it.

It is a calendar.  I don’t write it.  I can’t change it.

Then there was the child that wanted a certain “pattern block”.  I had tried to get some better descriptions from her as I was not aware of anything we owned called a pattern block.  For two days I had been trying to figure this out and finally I thought of something it could be.  So on Friday, while the girls were at school, I went out the storage shed and opened up some of the boxes we packed up this summer when trying to sell our house.  I was thankful to find what I thought were the “pattern blocks” in the fourth box I opened.  I was so proud and put them on the table so she would see them when she got home.

Her response went something like this– Mom, these AREN’T pattern blocks.  Now I will NEVER have pattern blocks.  These AREN’T them.

So tell me….please…what are they.  I’ve been trying for days.

I did say to this child.  It is ok if these are not the right thing.  But could you try to say it nicer.  Something like “Mom, thanks for trying to find my blocks, but this isn’t what I was talking about.”

These are just two examples of the “fun times” we had right after the girls came home yesterday.

Then later in the evening as we were leaving a friend’s house after our small group Bible study (Brad was at work and not with us).  I was standing at the door getting a few more minutes of chatting in and the girls went to the van.  The van was in front of another house’s yard and the door was closed.  But what could I hear from the front door???

Yes, I could hear my two precious girls yelling at each other and screaming.

Ahhhh, it warms a mom’s heart to hear that as you stand talking to a friend.

I used the remote opener to open the door and let them know I was aware of the situation.  After the doors closed it was just seconds before I could hear it going again.  (Sigh)

I got in the van and didn’t scream, but instead I said “Girls I don’t understand it.  You go to church, Bible club, Pioneers, we have devotions as a family….yet I see little evidence of what you are learning.  I see little fruit.  What kind of trees are you?  What kind of fruit are you producing?  If you are applying what you are learning in all these places then I will see love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.  But I’m not seeing it.”

They got still and quiet.

I turned on the van and we drove away.

I used to say when I taught school that I felt like I was hitting my head against the wall—saying the same things over and over but no one was getting it.  I’m at that same place as a Mom.

As a teacher I would reflect and adapt.  So as a Mom I’m trying the same thing.

Life IS about choices.  I need to choose as a Mom to strive to raise daughters who know, love and serve him.  I need to be doing that myself in order to teach them.  I need to make sure that I am adjusting to the culture of my kids in a way that will reach them.  My kids are only with me for a season.

By the way—the “pattern blocks” were eventually found after Dad talked with the child and she came to me and did a much better job of conversing with me about what she meant by “pattern blocks”.  She was willing to answer my questions to help me understand.  We found what she was looking for on the shelf in her room, right by all the things she plays with daily.  And for the child that was cold….still as I type this at 10:30 on Saturday morning she doesn’t have her robe on but instead is curled up on the sofa under a sofa pillow to keep warm.

Ah, I love my family.

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