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Well, it simply has been forever since I posted. This has been a VERY busy summer for me and I am looking forward to the school year where my days are routine based and somewhat predictable...somewhat. I will give an update on my husband's job search but first, some exciting news! Several weeks ago, I had an infection and went on an antibiotic and SUPPRISE...baby #4 is on the way in only 81/2 months! That's right, I am just barely pregnant! Oh, did I mention that I am in my little sister's wedding on October 6th! I have a tendency to "blossom" quickly (hips spread, breasts grow, belly rounds) I am hoping that God will be kind enough to prolong all of that until October 7th, the day after the wedding. I guess I will be eating a lot of salad and drinking a lot of water between now and then in hopes of warding the pregnancy figure so that I can fit into the already-altered dress! I AM NOT one of "those women" who never look pregnant until they turn around and you see the cute little basket ball belly. No no no, that's not me! Although I have friends who are lucky enough to have one of those adorablely cute pregnant bodies, I resemble a walking mac truck! My husband is sweet enough to tell me that I overreact, but I know the truth! Next...THE UPDATE! Jeff applied for a job at the local carpenters union in Lexington. We are praying that he gets contacted quickly. Our goal was for me to be home permanently by November 16th. With #4 on the way we have got to get some bills paid down quickly and do some light remodeling to the homestead. Please pray for us...at this point we are between a rock and a hard place. I cannot work because we can't continue to afford child care, yet my husband cannot pay the bills by himself on what he is making now. He needs a better paying job, and he is so talented and such a perfectionist that anyone who hired him would have a wonderful and loyal employee. We are praying for a door to open up...and soon. Sometimes I quickly forget that "in my time" is not necessarily " in God's time". Usually, it is me who is WAY off...but I only see that after the fact. |
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My oldest two kids, Summer (7yr) and JD (4yr) are visiting their dad in Nashville, Tennessee until July 6th. So, I only have Baby Colton (7mo) to hang out with. I haven't blogged much this week because there hasn't been much to say, my house has been fairly quiet and I get REALLY sad when Summer and JD are gone. Summertime use to be such a joyful time for me, but for the past three summers I've just gotten so down. I know that they have a super-great time while they are with him, and I try not to let them know how much I miss them - because nothing would break my heart more than if I knew they were home sick and wanted to come home. This is the first year that I've had Baby Colton to entertain me while my big kids are away. I know that I'm not nearly as much fun to play with as Summer and JD, but I'll guess I'll have to do until they get home. I will say it is really nice to have Baby Colton around to keep me busy, also...me and Jeff are BIG cuddle-ers, and Colton loves to cuddle too, just like his brother and sister do. You know, Colton was a "surprise", and I was thinking last night that maybe God knew that Jeff and I needed someone else around to keep us from missing the big kids so much. His Will update: The job I talked about previously that my husband had applied for was a No-Go. It was the same $, more traveling, and third shift. However, even that was in God's plan. Jeff has not had a formal job interview in...years, so this was great practice for him. Just as that decision came to a close, literally, hours later another opportunity came up. So, we called a friend and asked some important questions. This gentleman has been with this company for 20 years and had all good things to say. It sounds promising because Jeff has all of the qualifications that are needed for this job, but I want to do a lot of praying this weekend and see what God moves us to do. Waiting patiently, Gina DeBruler |
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Last week was a trying week for me! There are times when, as parents, we should allow our children freedom to move and grow and make there own (good) decisions, and then there are times when, they are not making good decisions. During those times we have to pull back the reins and put on our mean-mommy faces until everyone on the ship shapes up. Fortunately, I have pretty great kids and it only takes a few days to get them back on the straight and narrow. Very often I have to remind my children that I expect them to do what they are asked the FIRST time that I ask...not the seventh time! Last week, it seemed that my kids would only obey after they had been asked several times and then, only after I was yelling would they take me seriously. So, it is time to buckle down on them, but most importantly, myself! Some time ago, I read about "First Response Obedience". It works wonderfully when you do it correct and consistently. Here it is...
I'm tellin' ya, this works if you are consistent. Do this everyday for a couple of weeks and you will see your kids obeying QUICKLY. You are empowering them as well. They start to learn that their help is needed, when they don't do what needs to be done and what they SAID they would do, there are consequences. They can choose to follow through with their word and make things run smoothly, or backout on what they said they would do and suffer the consequences? After my refresher course I started applying this yesterday. Immediate results! Now like I said, for the most part, I have agreeable kids. Your results may not be immediate, but keep at it. Good Luck, and keep praying!
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Baby Colton smiled at me this morning before he even opened his little eyes. I was standing over his crib coaxing him to wake, and with his eyes still closed he flashed me a big gummy grin. He knew it was his mommy just by hearing my voice, and that made him so happy that he was smiling before his little eyes even popped open! He made my day, I have been in a great mood ever since! There are few things that warm my heart more than morning smiles from my babies. Note that I said "babies", I don't get morning smiles from my oldest two anymore, they used to smile at me...when they were babies. Now I only get morning growls from them. Which made me think about the very last time Summer and JD gave me a morning smile. What day was it, how old were they? If I had known it was going to be their last morning smile, I would have enjoyed it a few moments longer. Speaking of morning growls - Summer, who is 7 and wise beyond her years, decided sometime last year that she no longer liked pizza or poptarts! What American-raised child of a working mother does not like pizza and poptarts? Is she nuts! They are staples of my family's diet (I say that shamefully). When I asked her what brought her to this decision, she very thoughtfully said, "When we have a bad morning and are running late, you always say, 'Grab a poptart and get in the car!' And when we are late getting home and you are too tire to cook you always order pizza for us. So, poptarts mean bad mornings and pizza means bad nights." Being a working mother has destroyed what should be a childhood pleasure for my children! I look forward to being a stay-at-home mom. Maybe I'll catch a few more morning smiles from my kids, and maybe Summer can eat poptarts even when we are having a great mornings. HIS WILL update: This past weekend, my Mary Kay consultant and I got on the subject of our husbands' jobs. Somewhere in the conversation she suggested that I get my hubby's resume to her and it was very likely that her husband could get Jeff a better paying job. This was step one in my plan and Jeff didn't even have to go job hunting! Isn't it wonderful when God just drops opportunities at our feet! I really hope that this works out, this could be what we have been praying for! As I am reading over my blog, checking for spelling mistakes (which I am sure that I missed something - my eyes often deceive me), I would like to point out how horribly embarrassed I am about my spelling yesterday! My fingers get ahead of me sometimes, and I was very nervous about posting. Where is the spell check/grammer check button? |
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Well, this is a whole new experience for me! I am a newbie to blogging, but I was an English major in college so it won't take me long to get comfortable. I really feel like quite a foreigner on this site because I am not a homeschooling mom, nor am I a stay-at-home mom. I work outside the home 40+ hours a week, as the Leann Rhimes song goes,"somethin's gotta give." I hope that this blog will be of interest to some, if not I'm going to write anyway, it'll be neat for my kids to read so they can understand this process that I am beginning. I'm from a long line of working women...one of my great-grandmothers worked, as did one of my grandmothers, my mother, all of my aunts, both of my sisters, and I have been working since the age of 16. My mom was a single parent raising three daughters, and ,thankfully, she instilled workhorse work ethic in all of us. Her parents raised her and her four brothers that way...my family believes in giving each other a leg up, but after that everyone has to make their own way, no lazy moochers in this family! When I started having kids it was no different. I was fortunate enough to stay home with my daughter, Summer, for the first year. My husband (at the time) was injured on the job and so back to work I went. When our son, J.D., was born three years later, I stayed home for 5 months, then God sent me back to work. I know that sounds funny but that is exactly what happened! I was quite content staying home when one day my old boss called and asked if I wanted my job back. Within minutes, I went from being completely content at home to begging my husband to support my decision to return to work. I felt CRAZY, what was happening to me? My conscious mind could NOT understand the change that had happened in my heart. Seven weeks later my church-going, breadwinning husband left me for someone else. Soon after, I found out that they were expecting a child together. So now you understand why I say, "God sent me back to work." In His great wisdom He knew that I was about to be in a pickle! With my third child (Baby Colton), my now-husband, Jeff, and I could only afford to survive on one income for 6 weeks. That was one of the top 3 "Worst Days of My Life"! Baby Colton, just 6 weeks old, got dropped off at the sitter, and off I went to work a full 40 hour week. But now I feel another tugging at my heart. Picture this: You are driving around trying to find your destination with a self-drawn map, and becoming more lost and confused with each passing minute. You stop at a mom-and-pop gas station to double check your map and get turned in the right direction. The attendant, who is also a local, chuckles at your map and says, "Close, but no cigar. Scratch this, and follow MY directions." WHAT? But this is a self-drawn map! I checked it on MapQuest, it has to be correct! So that's where I am. God threw my self-drawn map away and has given me His map, it is the only one that I have to go by now. God is calling me home...I don't mean "home" as in the up yonder. I mean home as in where I park my car, where I plant my garden, where I cuddle with my kids, where my kitchen table is. Home, with the handprints on the walls, where the much-under-loved dog, ShelbyLou, resides. Home, where my husband and I hangout together. You know....Home! So what choice do I have? If that is where He wants me then there has to be a way to get there, right? He will provide a way.
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