It's been a while...

2 of the 3 Boys.  Not teenagers yet - but might be by the time I do my next entry. 

The other boy still acts like a teenager sometimes - does that count?

Well, my hopes of keeping up with this blog were quickly shattered as I came to finally do an entry and I was completely unable to even remember how to log in and begin to blog. After finally achieving that great feat (I won't tell you how long it took), I was feeling a bit better about myself and I noticed a comment on one of my past blogs from my college roomie welcoming me to the blogger world and asking me if she could be a 'follower'. (Love you Kim!) Now, this normally would have made me feel pretty good had I not noticed the date she sent it to me. May. She commented in May. Not this past May...2 Mays ago! May 2011. This, my friends, is NOVEMBER 2012! Just in case you forgot. And so my journey of never ending flawed self-realization continues. Otherwise known as...

Perfectionism. What a funny yet fully loaded word. And by funny, I mean the kind of funny that everyone laughs but is really feeling incredibly sorry for you kind of funny. I am pretty upfront with others about the fact that I am not perfect. None of us are...which makes me feel a bit better about myself. But when perfection collides with failure - now that is dangerous.

When one has the idea of precision in one's head, yet does not perceive to even come close to said perfectness in a part of one's life - failure is perceived as a very real viewpoint. This is propelled into the third realm of interesting by the fact that one never ever thought it was going so perfectly bad in the first place. Now, go ahead and clean off your screen - because boy howdy, that was a lot of 'P's'!

I never saw this more real in my own life as with a situation that happened to me within this past year. It had all the juicy components: betrayed trust, blatant betrayal from perceived friends, the loss of something so important to someone that it sends this person out of control in a fit of failure - only catapulted further by one's perfectionistic self. Oh ya, Days of our Lives has got nothin' on this story! But enough of my bon bon eating, soap opera watching afternoons... the plot awaits!

And by plot, I mean point. Someday, I will be ready to share the plot with you all. But, on my road to healing - I don't think I'm at that stop sign yet. But I will say this. God is BIG. Ok, ok... you're wondering how in the world is this crazy woman throwing God into her perfectionistic, ADHD, failure laden rant you ask? Because that is exactly why He loves us so much. Because we do just that. We fail. We lose hope. We sin. He, my friends, does not. If we were like Him, we wouldn't need Him.

To this I cling. To this, you can cling too.

Now before you go on and feel badly for 'poor Shari' and send me messages asking how you can help me thru this hard time.... please stop (unless you want to offer to bring meals in - I'm always up for that). Please know that much of my writing is laced in humor. I have begun to coin it, "Inspirationomedy". Don't use it - or I will go all trademark on you.  I promise.  For reals on that.  I'm here to offer my struggles, joys and much more to those who will endure it to listen. It's doing life together, blogger style. And to those of you who have read this entire entry and not laughed once - I apologize - just take the 'omedy' out of 'inspiration' if you must. If you need to remove the 'inspiration' too - then you might need to message me and see how you can help. However, if you do that - you will FOR sure be bringing me a meal. Just a warning.

Stay tuned...I will share the plot someday. And, there will be just as many 'P's' in that story. As well as sword fights, damsels in distress and gnomes bounding in to save the day. Yes, gnomes people - I said gnomes. You can now put that 'omedy' back in that you took out earlier. And when I do share (after my therapist tells me I'm ready) God will still be BIG and I will still be a Saint in His eyes, PPPPPPerfectionism and all. So thankful for that.



 

It's Time...

Here I am...you've seen me on facebook - so you know I haven't left the planet. It's been a long while, and I've come to accept that I'm a 'once in a while' blogger. Ok, ok, maybe a 'once every nine months' blogger - but again, I've accepted it. I encourage you to do the same. Let go....just let go.... Control - what a strange thing we all think we have. I absolutely love to disillusion myself with the feeling of having control. Maybe 'love' is the wrong word - 'plaqued for life with this annoying sinful nature' might be a better one. But, anywhooo, it's this fake control that I continue to push against on the journey I'm on, here are just a few examples...

Kids are the ultimate, 'you are not in control' frequency meters.  I am fortunate enough to have the two age groups represented in my house that are the greatest contributors to the 'out of control' category.  A 5th grader and a pre-schooler.  5th Grade...that nasty spot between I'm a little kid and I'm the big kid now.  The countless eye rolls and talk back comments I get in a day could compete on the level of the political debates we've been enduring lately.  In addition to this, homework has now reached above my grade level.  Yes, I have a college degree, but for some reason 5th grade math has been completely deleted from my memory bank.  This makes for interesting evenings at our house.  On the other hand, I have a lippy, don't make me eat that, I think I'm really a 16 year old in a pre-schooler body that also lives here.  Between the two of them, any hopes of control I had have quickly flown out the unopened window in my kitchen that has two days worth of dishes in the sink.  The one flint of a controlled looking situation I do have is that I am still able to help with my pre-schoolers homework; unfortunately because he is really 16, he wants to do it all on his own.

There are so many more things that would make my life easier if only I could control them...people, work, finances, income, past mistakes, future mistakes that need to teach me a lesson, the fact that Sonic happy hour is only from 2-5, when really it should be an all day thing.  The list could go on and on.  I am challenged daily with the notion that forgiveness is the key to letting go of the control.  Forgiving myself, accepting God's forgiveness as well as others. Resting in the fact that things aren't perfect and if they are done differently than I would do them, it doesn't make them wrong.  I could probably have suggested a better way...but again, it doesn't make them wrong.  :)

So, I am thankful.  Thankful that I have the computer and a calculator to make me look like 5th grade math is really my 'speciality'.  Thankful that I have a house to clean, children to love, dogs to pet (only when they look really pathetically at me) and a husband who loves me despite my controlling tendencies - and in fact loves me more because of them.  He says that, I'm not really sure I believe him.  Thankful that I am able to see that controlling myself is really the one thing I can control, and that God hasn't given up on me in my effort to do so.  And mostly thankful for the God that is in control.  Without that security - there would be no reason to be thankful. 

And to those of you who have been involved with me as I was having one of my fits of need to control, I am truly sorry.  If you haven't been, I can't promise that you won't be.  But, I do know that admitting is one of the first steps of solving it - so just be gentle.  One thing that I will respond to is for you to begin singing Janet Jackson's 'Control' to me softly...I'll get the picture.  I will be laughing hysterically, but I will get the picture.  For my fellow 'control freaks' - you know who you are.  No matter how big the problem is for you, God is bigger.  He loves you, and me - controlling nature and all.

Break the Ice...

Well so much for being perfect. On my never successful quest for perfection - I have found two things (actually many more, but for now, we will stick with two) that make me look straight in the mirror and say, "Shari, perfect, you are not." One is this blog. I began it several months ago (seven to be exact, but who's counting?) with one goal in mind - write something daily. Yes, that was seven months ago - the first time I wrote in this blog where I stated my goal and that same month where my goal was despicably missed and has been ever since.



The second, Break the Ice. The pre-school game of skill and precision where NO ONE is able to accomplish the goal of not breaking the ice. First of all, why is the name of the game, "Break the Ice" when the goal of the game is to not break the ice? Aren't those 'game' type people who come up with these silly games setting you and your pre-schooler up for failure from the very beginning? Personally, I just don't need anymore failures in my life and I'm pretty sure Lucas is going to have plenty as well down the road - but since I'm the mother that I am I sat down to play break the ice with Lucas again today. After pulling the millions of ice cube pieces out of the box along with the ice 'frame' that I was never able to get back in the box from the last time we 'played'. We sat down and started.



Now, for those of you not familiar with this game, let me explain. There are a bazillion ice cube prototype thingys (yes, that is the technical term on the directions) and the goal is to build them in the middle of these two blue frames - picture for a moment a skating rink made of ice cubes. Stupid isn't it. Should of known the game would be as well. Then, you put a little bear in the middle of the ice (poor guy) IF you are able to build the ice rink out of the ice cubes in the first place. That is your first goal - to build the rink without the ice falling thru. If you can accomplish this feat, in Lucas' and I's world you have already won the game. Now, if you are one of those 'advanced' game players you would continue to play by trying to chip away the ice cubes. Yes, remove them - after you just spent three hours trying to put the things together - you are now trying to take them apart. One by one with your ice chipper - and to do it in a way that your little red bear does not fall thru the ice.



Now, picture this game, me and my limited knowledge of the word patience and my four year old. As we begin, Lucas already knows that "Break the Ice" is not Mommy's favorite game and I am playing it with him purely out of love and devotion for him (plus a bit of guilt that he just got done watching a movie while I was on facebook). So, he is on guard for any frustration that Mommy might be coming to as she is building the ice.



At one point in the game I was faced with a teaching moment I don't get that often. Lucas allowed me to help him with his 'removal of the ice cube' from the ice rink. Lucas', being the independent child that he is, always wants to do things on his own. This was my chance to show him the patience and precise hand that his dear old mom has and hopefully teach him by example just what to do in a stressful situation just as this. As we went in for the delicate extraction of the chosen piece of plastic ice I could tell he was watching me for my reaction as to what was about to happen. We 'tinked, tinked, tinked' away at the ice and suddenly, kabamm, it was gone.



I don't think I need to go into the full play by play of the other games we attempted. But, to give you a clue it ended with Lucas and I playing basketball with the ice chunks and then cleaning up all the pieces, shoving them halfway back inside the box and the box going into the garage sale pile.



Why do I share this event as part of our family story? Because, I think it highlights a lot of what me as a mom and us as a family sometimes strive for and can never reach - perfection. As God continues to reveal Himself to me (oh, how grateful am I for that) I am learning that perfect is not what He wants from us. He wants us to be broken, frustrated, inpatient and defeated so that we realize that is only in Him that we have victory... and therefore we are perfect in His sight just as we are. (2 Corinthians 12:9-10). We just have to go as far as a beloved Sunday School song to hear, "For I am weak, He is strong".



So, I strive to encourage my boys (even the big one in the house) that Christ's strength is made perfect in our weakness. And although I really wanted to throw "break the ice" thru the window as well as my insufficiency in keeping up with my goals of this blog, I realize that without those things, there would be no need for Jesus.



Now, I just know that when I get to heaven someday - Jesus is going to be sitting in heaven with a "Break the Ice" game and He is going to show me how the Master plays. I'm pretty sure I will enjoy that game.

And, yes, that is Aidan and Lucas in snuggies above and neither of them are afraid to show them off proudly! I'm one proud mama!

Remembering the margins...

Well, third posting attempt and I have writers block already. Each day, I have events that cause me to stop where I am for a moment and say to myself, 'man, that was funny and I need to remember to share that in my blog'. Then the day goes on and no less than a few hours later when I sit down in front of my computer, I have absolutely no recollection of the event that took place. It was so funny and interesting that it caused me to pause earlier in the day, but now, nothing. Maybe it's my age or simply the busyness of life that makes me do that. I've once heard of it called 'living in the margins'. Where life is so busy that the margins in your book of life are full. So full that there is simply no place to put anything else.

I've been known to scrapbook a time or two. As a matter a fact, at one time, I sold the darn stuff just to support my habit. Making the sale of something my occupation for the sake of reaping the rewards of perks or discounts is a trait of mine and I've done more than once. Make-up, clothing, real estate. But that topic is a whole other blog for another day - or therapy session, whichever might come first. I apologize for my exit from my original topic in pursuit of 'something shiny' in the corner -back to the thought at hand. Warning: this may happen quite often in my blogs... hence the therapy session reference.

Scrapbooking. Back to scrapbooking. I was quite diligent with my first son in keeping a record of events that I wanted to mark in my scrapbooks. His first step, his first word (it was Gus, by the way - our beloved german shepherd / basset hound whom we miss dearly), his first haircut, etc. As the years have gone on, I've not been as diligent about recording such information. in all reality, I've not gotten past Aidan age two (he's now 9, for those just joining us) and poor Lucas is just a blip on the map of my scrapbooking dreams. Now, if I am not able to remember what happened to me earlier in the day in order to share it here, how in the world am I going to remember 20 years from now the exact date that Lucas got his first tooth?

So, my epiphany of the day in regards to all this is to leave some space in life. Don't fill up the margins so much that you won't have room for what is really important or what you don't want to forget. I've gotten much better about this in the past few years. I've been introduced to real sabbath. Yes, real sabbath. Not just no working on Sunday - because with my job, I simply can't get out of that one. But real rest with the Savior. It is refreshing, rejuvenating and truly sanity saving. I would have never known what I was missing if I didn't learn it.

I can only hope to continue on my journey and try to find more time for the rest stops in the margins of life. My kids will thank me for it, my husband will love me for it and my relationship with Jesus will make me crave it.

That reminds me of the funny thing that happened today that I so wanted to remember! A friend and I were shopping because she is about to welcome a new baby into her family. Nothing is better than shopping for a new baby! With our game faces on, we were in our super intense shopping mode. We were so incredibly focused on the task at hand that when I looked down at the cart I was pushing was a completely empty. Now, that is a good thing you are thinking, we were only looking not buying. However, the cart I had a few minutes before had both our purses in it plus some treasures that we had picked up along the way. Never mind that I had obviously picked off someone else's cart, probably another hopeless shopper who was also focused in her excursions. Both our purses were in our cart! There we were, lost in the abyss of the massive teenie tiny clothing section where we were searching frantically. Laughing uncontrollably. Luckily, I had my phone with me and my friend's was in her purse. We were able to call her phone and hunt the cart down after several minutes. Talk about forgetfulness! Now, that would have made for a funny post... but guess God wanted me to chat about margins tonight - glad I forgot.

Maybe I should apply for a job at that store...

The aftermath...

Ok, so as you all know; yes all four of you who read my blog yesterday, it was my first shot at blogging. Today is my second. I should have known when I heard the water running for the dogs there was a reason that Lucas was starting a bath for them. After I said goodbye to my first ever blog, I proceeded away from the comfort of my office chair and out into the abyss of my living room. As I walked, I noticed a gritty substance underfoot. As my eyes wandered around the room, there was a faint hue of grayness everywhere. As I looked closer, I saw what it was, pepper. Pepper you say, yes, pepper. The kind that if you put too much on your food it's hot and if you don't put enough on it's blah... pepper.

As I continued to make my way into the bathroom where water was running I noticed the smell of pepper - which meant there was a lot. More than I had originally thought. I got to the bathroom only to find our two beloved white rescue dogs to be of a different color. They looked a bit like my mom did in her younger years as her dark hair was turning a shade of silver. They were covered. Eyes watering. Sneezing. Before my normally 'oh so calm self' began to bubble over in anger I glanced at my three year old. He was beginning to cry. He already knew the trouble he was in. He looked up at me with his huge blue eyes and said, "I fix it mommy". He wanted to fix what he had done, hence the bath. Oh, how often in my life do I feel that same way and want to 'fix it'. At that moment I had a choice. I had a choice to yell and scream like my flesh really wanted to. Or, I had a choice to forgive. Sure, his eyes could have been watering from the massive amounts of pepper that were in the air. But, I chose to believe they were heartfelt tears of regret for the damage he had done.

After we cleaned Lucas up, the dogs up and then myself up we proceeded to sweep the rest of the house. As we both swept (yes, it was hard to let him sweep - he was making bigger mess, but I just couldn't say no) I reflected on the moment. So many times in my life I screw things up and then try to fix it myself. I know all I need to do is allow Jesus to fix it, and yet I still try. Man, I've wasted a lot of minutes doing that. It took a good hour to sweep the rest of the pepper. Then three hours later, I found the salt. I must have not noticed it at first because the color blended in with the dogs fur. I'm sure glad God has forgiven me for all the salt and pepper I've spilled along the way.

And so, as I reflect on my first day of blogging I've learned two very important lessons. #1 - don't get so engrossed in distractions that life gets left behind. #2 - always have a back-up salt and pepper for dinner in the cupboard, just in case.

Blessings,
Shari and Lucas

Something New...

Well, I've been meaning to try this 'blog' thing for quite some time now. I guess with 4 inches of snow outside in the middle of May - today is the day. I ask myself, "why would anyone want to read about our life?" and to that I answer, "they probably won't, but I'll tell our story anyway."

A little about us...I'm Shari. A wife of 12 years, a mom of four - two of those human boy children, Aidan age 9 and Lucas age 3. Two of those small white a fluffy rescue dogs whom we loving call Sam and Sadie. My husband, Aaron is a police detective. Yes, that provides for some interesting stories - unfortunately, I won't be able to share many of them here. I work part time at a local church in the Children's Ministry department. I love kids and the Lord - what a benefit to combine the two and get paid for it!

So, here it goes...my first entry in a long list of entries to record the daily rig-a-ma-row of life. Before I begin, please don't take much of what I say as absolute truth. Most of this is my opinion with my hope to show you a peek into our lives and what God is doing in them. I would love if thru this I was able to make you laugh and reflect on your own lives as well as what God wants to do for and thru each of you!

At 35 years of age (wow, I about gagged on that one) I'm not sure I saw myself where I am - but do any of us? It's amazing how we make big plans for our lives and God somehow brings His will into the picture. He's amazing that way. I somehow can't ask for anymore blessings in my life than He has already given me but that doesn't seem to stop me. Why is that? I have an amazing job, a wonderful loving family and a God that provides to me my every need. And yet, I want more. Maybe it is God's way of preparing us for what He has for us in our next adventure.

Oh... just heard my 3 year old start the water in the tub for the dogs. I better get going, forgot for a moment that I was a mom and my child is here with me. Praying for you that you are able to see God in the small things - like runny noses and piles of laundry. Both of which I will be trying to do myself today.

Shari and the gang.