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My living room smells like Dreft. My mind immediately equates the smell of Dreft with babies. Not baby lotion, not baby powder, not any other baby detergent. Dreft. Dreft = babies. I'm going to have a baby in my house very soon. Even stranger, there are little pink things dancing around my dryer. Not little blue things. Little pink things. With ruffles and bows and flowers. Not trucks and trains and airplanes. Not only am I going to have a baby in my house very soon; I'm going to have a girl baby in my house very soon. Now, you may be thinking, "DUH, Jennifer, you've known this for a while," and you'd be right. However, there's something about doing her laundry that's making it much more real than it has felt up to this point. I'm very happy. Don't misunderstand me, but I'm also terrified. 1. We're not ready. Her room is still only primed. We haven't gotten a lot of the stuff we need. My bag isn't packed. Her bag isn't packed, and the house is not baby clean. (Check the ticker in the side bar to see why I'm freaking out about this.) 2. I know almost nothing about little girls. I was not typical by any stretch of the imagination, or at least, I never felt typical. I had all brothers. I went to a mostly male university. I have 3 boys. In fact, I have never had the opportunity to even observe the raising of a Christian daughter in real life. This is scarey to me. I've spent the last 10 years focusing on the mixed up, wrong messages that are being sent to our boys and men (ie "The problem with boys is that they aren't girls.") and trying to figure out how to counteract them, and now I'm remembering all the mixed up, wrong messages that are being sent to our girls and women (ie "Girls should grow up to be large breasted, tiny waisted, centerfolds who think and respond just like men and make lots of money," or "Girls should grow up to hate their feminity and treat men like idiots who are to blame for all the world's ills.") AAACCKKK! Help! Do those of you who are raising princesses of the King have any advice? For now, I'm going to get those fuzzy pink things out of the dryer, fold them, and put them away in her temporary dresser. (Her real one still needs to be painted. Poor hubby!) OK, God, let's get that lamp glowing unto my feet, huh? :) I just wish it showed more than one step at a time. Jennifer |
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So this was the ultimate crazy weekend, and I'm just now recovering. Thursday: OB Appointment, Shopping and remedial cleaning for Saturday Friday: (Woke up at 3 am and couldn't get back to sleep - Uggh) More cleaning, baking, and shopping for things we'd forgotten on Thursday. Saturday: (Woke up at 1:30 and couldn't get back to sleep - Double Uggh) Spent morning finishing party prep. George's birthday party (not quite 30 people in the house). Collapsed for 30 minutes. Proceeded to Halloween party for very nice family in the church. Came home and scrubbed face paint off children and belly (more on that later). Hubby baked cookie cake to take to church for our anniversary there. (Took Benedryl to ensure more than 3 hours of sleep.) Sunday: Decorated cookie cake. Listened to people (aka older men) make jokes about the size of my belly. Worship service including wonderful baptism. Church soup luncheon. Baby shower. Crashed on couch exhausted. We were all supposed to go to the ordination/installation of a now former congregant, but the kids and I were just too pooped and stayed home. (George started crying during worship.) Hubby went to ordination. Hubby came home, scarfed dinner and left to lead youth group. Hubby came home and collapsed on sofa. Monday: (Woke at 2:30am and couldn't get back to sleep.) No school. Mom and kids too tired and table covered with baby shower presents. Wrote approximately 35 thank you notes. Tuesday: Rotary pancake breakfast. No school. Mom still too tired and table still covered in pink gift bags. Wrote 15 thank you notes then stopped. Ran out of cards. Wednesday: Slept most of the night without help of Benedryl. Table mostly clear. Pretended it was Monday and had school. Finished thank you notes (63 total). So, the thank you notes are done. What a wonderfully generous group of people they are! I realize that the stilted style of language may have made me sound ungrateful, but it's more that I'm still reeling from the overall frenetic pace of the weekend. I'll elaborate more on the particular events as the week unfolds. Now for some of that laundry! Jennifer |
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On Tuesday a box arrived from Grandma. The kids, of course, were very excited. I, however, was in the middle of something, so I glanced over the contents and distributed them accordingly: a book of pictures from the old (and far superior to the more recent) traveling King Tut exhibit, a Halloween t-shirt for each boy (and a "Pastor John" t-shirt for hubby), a dot-to-dot for Ringo, a superhero coloring book for George, and what I thought was a robot-type activity book for Paul. The boys scattered with their goodies, and I hardly gave it another thought. Then yesterday, the boys were sitting together making their own Pokemon-esque trading cards. As I listened to what they were saying, I realized that they were making them, not from their imaginations, but from the not-actually-a-robot-activity-book. The names I started hearing were a little disturbing, like "the Death Lion of Chaos". "Uh, boys, I need to see that book." Well, it turns out that it is a book explaining this particular trading card game that seems to be linked to a tv show that I'd never let them watch. It looked like an activity book because there were some activities designed to teach them how to play the card game. Hubby came home in the middle of my investigation, and he agreed that this just wasn't going to fly for 3 very good reasons. 1. It contained very naturalistic spirituality. 2. Bad guys were very bad and were portrayed to be VERY cool while the good guys were whimps. 3. It was all about the battle. There was no greater good being served, no real strategy or imagination used, etc. It was just kill the other guy so you can get his cards. So, we broke the news to the boys. Although we gave them credit for making their own cards instead of begging us to buy the real ones, the cards and the books were going to have to go because they would not help them become the men God wants them to be and would probably hamper them instead. Their faces crumpled, and there was a bit of sniffling. They didn't argue though. I think they were mourning their lost efforts more than the book itself. All was not lost though (and this is the cool part). I suggested that maybe they could come up with their own card game that honored God. Well they jumped all over that idea and immediately started working on a forest world where the animals work together to repel bad guys and help eachother. The first structure they decided on was a church, and the first character was the pastor. They later decided that each character card would have a favorite verse on it, and one of the hills in the forest is going to be called Mt. Holy. Who knows if they'll finish it before they lose interest? Who cares? This is a great opportunity for them to work together and use their imaginations for God's glory. Hallelujah! For the record: I don't think Grandma was trying to corrupt my kids. It's tough to find activity books for 9 year olds, and she doesn't share our convictions or beliefs. Not only would she probably not have anticipated our objections, but she may not have even noticed what the book really was anyway (as I didn't at first). Hubby's gonna have to be the one to break it to her though. |
 I got my very first blog award! Thanks Gidget! According to her, I'm a gorgeous blogger! It's kind of funny, because I'm definitely not feeling gorgeous right now. But then again, God has a sense of humor like that. He didn't wait until I'd lost the baby weight and then some or until I don't have big dark circles under my eyes. Nope, He thinks I'm gorgeous even when I think I look like the Great Pumpkin's ugly cousin! Well the rules for this award are that I have to list 6 things you all probably don't know about me and pick 6 other people to pass it along to. So here goes: 1. I've been eating Fruit Loops like there's no tomorrow. (I don't usually eat junk cereal, but one day I smelled Fruit Loops out of nowhere. I couldn't resist. At least now they have fiber added. 2. When I graduated from high school, everyone thought I was going to end up as some high powered corporate something or other. MANNNN, would they be surprised! (BTW, this is MUCH better!) 3. I've only been a Christian since January 1999. Before that, I believed in God but wasn't sure about that "whole Jesus thing." Before that, I was a "secular humanist" because that's what my Dad called himself, and before that, I said I was a Christian because we had presents at Christmas and ate candy on Easter. Looking back, I see that God had been waiting for me the whole time. 4. I don't have a favorite food, color, song, movie, etc. It all depends on the situation. This is very frustrating to the men in my life who are continually trying to figure me out (insert evil chuckle 5. I get a perverse pleasure from organizing messy spaces, but I'm horrible at maintaining them. I also tend to procrastinate getting in there to do said organizing, but once I'm in there, I'm like a maniac! 6. I haven't seen the ocean in over 9 years, and I miss it intensely! My favorite part is the salty smell. In the interest of full disclosure, I did live in Western Washington for 2 years within that time frame, but that was the Puget Sound and a faint glimpse of the Pacific in the distance. It also didn't smell like salt; it smelled like rotting kelp. In my mind, that just doesn't count. Sorry. Now it's time to name some other gorgeous bloggers. This is tricky because many of the people on my friend list have bid goodbye to the blogiverse for now, or forever. Here's my best shot: 2. Sixfolks 4. Kristenph 5. Melissa (because she was the next mom my random button led me to) 6. And the lovely lady over at Growing Pains because I love the list she posted in August, and it sounds like she's probably not feeling very gorgeous. So there it is. Thanks again! Gorgeous huh? Hmm Jennifer |
I guess He'd know.
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So there I was . . . sitting on the sofa, chatting with my hubby, the kids happily playing upstairs, when I hear my oldest say . . . "I'm the H1N1 Virus! (insert sinister laugh) But don't worry, I'm going to infect someone else." It's amazing what they'll pick up, even when we don't get tv reception! I wonder if his brother was Vaccine Man, the Hypodermic Crusader. Have a swine flu free day! Jennifer |
