WRAD Memories

Over the past month or so, I've been sort of trying to figure out how to embrace Christmas in a more reflective way- to get beyond the secular to the sacred. I'm not sure it happened. Now that I'm on the other side of Christmas for another year, I find myself reflecting once again on just what exactly is the point of all of it? I did pretty much all the things that I thought would help us reflect on the WHY of Christmas as well as spend time together as a family making memories: baking, advent readings, Christmas concerts/plays, skipping school for snow days, etc. And I wonder, did I even manage to plant a seed in my childrens' subconscious minds about WHY I was having them do any of this stuff? To focus on the WHY (Jesus needing to come and die for our sins) instead of the STUFF. Somehow I can't seem to shake the feeling that somehow we (read- they) STILL missed it. Sort of like the people did when Jesus first came- they were looking for a revolutionary

Okay, I'm just going to say it- Christmas really isn't my favourite time of the year! It probably has a lot to do with the fact that my husband intensely dislikes this time of the year. He doesn't have very fond memories of Christmas from his childhood and so it's really poisoned his attitude. As a result, most years Christmas is merely a blip on the calendar, and then we keep plowing through- basically ignoring the whole thing insofar as we can. Having said that, I decided that this year I wanted to do things differently. To slow down and put some thought into WHY we even do this in the first place. I started by getting an Advent book and candles- so that we'd have a daily reading to do. The story is quite interesting (and very gruesome at times), but as we're working our way through it- I'm realizing it's the right book to help us learn and remember. Then, I decided that we'd scale back the school work (which wasn't too difficult beca

I knew it had been a while since my last post- but I didn't think it had been THAT long. Two months is too long. It's not that there hasn't been anything to say or write about, because there has. I just haven't had the mental energy to do it. Instead I have: - bailed on my 90 days through the Bible (after 120+ days and only getting the Old Testament done) - done 2 x 80+ page digital scrapbooks - completed 3 x 24 page mini albums - started volunteering with my son's cadet squadron - got my first term portfolios together (such as they were) - re-arranged rooms - got rid of the dog - spent an insane amount of hours on the internet collecting digital freebies of whatever kind (scrap-booking/home schooling/eBooks/etc.)- if it's free I've been getting it - started decorating/baking for Christmas - been fighting off a cold for a few weeks now - and somewhere in there, I've tried to keep the house in some measure of cleanliness, kids fed and al

A few days ago I watched a video about distracted moms (by Carol Barnier author of the book "If I'm Diapering a Watermelon, Then Where'd I Leave the Baby?: Help for the Highly Distractible Mom"). I thought to myself, 'yeah, I guess I can get a bit distracted'. Little did I know that probably the next day I would realize just how bad it was. I was trying to explain some math concept to one of the boys and I noticed that his fingernails REALLY needed to be cut. It took EVERY ounce of self control to not interrupt what we were doing and go cut them that very second. I immediately thought back to the video. Yep. I'm a distracted mom. But something in what she said in the video really hit a nerve deep within. At first she thought that she needed to fix this distractability and become the Pinterest perfect home schooling mom. She had charts and list and everything possible to keep herself organized and on task. Only it didn't work because the

I'm finally trying to get my home school reports in to my support teacher and I'm realizing just how much my kids have not been listening to many of the things that I have been telling them to do. It's almost like they are on a quest to see how little they can do/get away with before I get upset with them. However, I think my frustration level with this is probably linked more to my realization that I'M not doing things that I think God has told ME to do (or told me to stop doing but I'm still doing them). So, I'm reaping what I'm sowing- and I hate it. But I've also realized something else- my heart doesn't really want to change things. My head KNOWS I should, but the 'rubber is not meeting the road' at this point. After all, who really doesn't like being selfish and getting their way and doing whatever they want when they want to do it? Forget about serving others, I want to be served! And yet, it grieves me each night when

September was a bit of a blur- which you probably noticed since I really didn't post much of anything during the month. Things and life had me distracted and I couldn't figure out which way was up. My 90 Days Through the Bible is taking longer than I'd hoped- mainly because instead of doing my reading every night I've been doing other things (like creating a Lego scrapbook for the boys. Pointless? Of course! Will they love it and fight over the 1 copy that I ordered? You betcha!). But doing things that I'm not supposed to be doing means that I have to say NO to things that I should be doing. Things that if they don't get done mean that days are really, really rough. Like figuring out a schedule for our school days, or even what we're supposed to be doing for school each day! Thankfully, after meeting with my home support teacher, I have a new plan for the work and I just need to figure out a schedule. And very timely, this post here ( Punching th

I realized that even though I said I was going away camping with the kids, I never actually got around to posting anything about it- or some of the other adventures that we've had this summer. And then I was waiting on some pictures of the dog- so I STILL didn't post this. Well, hopefully it's better late than never, lol! This summer didn't turn out like I'd originally hoped because of the dog, but I think on the whole it wasn't too bad (I can't believe it's over already, though. It went by so fast!). We started our summer holidays a bit early because mentally I was just done. That, and we got our dog- which we eventually named 'Choco'. It's a shortened form of chocolate, which the kids thought was ironic since too much chocolate can kill a dog- but he's varying shades of brown, so I thought it suited him. And after three weeks of having him, he needed a name already. Anyone who knows anything about dogs knows that Airedales are N

Have you ever had one of those days where you just feel like nearly every decision you make seem to be bad ones? Or maybe it seems like it's been weeks... or months... or even years! You think that you have all your logical reasons for or against something, but then after you move in that direction it no longer seems like such a great idea? It's kind of ironic some days that my baptism verse was Is. 30:21 "Whether you turn to the right or to the left, your ears will hear a voice behind you, saying, "This is the way; walk in it."." There are so many days that I either haven't felt like I heard anything or when I thought I heard something, somehow it didn't seem like it was really the right voice that I heard. My first foray into hearing God's voice was while reading the book by Bill Hybels "Too Busy Not to Pray" (I think). From that time on I've tended to live by the idea that as long as it doesn't contradict scriptur

So, I've NEVER taken my kids to Playland. I've always wanted to, but the reality of having more than 1 or 2 kids means that getting into places gets REALLY expensive- REALLY fast. I don't even want to think about how much I paid for us to get into Disneyland (for a day and a half)- and I think Rebekah was even free! Anyway, I managed to discover that on Tuesdays over the summer, a local radio station was doing a promo. Now, not only would we be able to get in and have an all-day ride pass, but we were going to do it for $10 per person! That little deal saved me $100. So, I mentioned it to my sister-in-law and we figured out how we were going to ditch our 3 year olds and went. Okay, first thing to remember for next time (should they do it again next year)- come early. We spent an hour waiting in line to get in. I was SO NOT expecting that. Thankfully the line kept moving and we had snacks to occupy ourselves, but it cut into the time we had available. Second, dou

Back in the spring, my husband bought a canoe from his cousin. After finally getting the roof rack purchased so we could actually take it somewhere and picking up the life jackets from my parents, we managed to get out to the local lake. Swamp would be a better description of said body of water. It used to be a mill site and when they shut it down, they just dumped all their leftovers in the middle of the lake. This means that in addition to a million geese doing their business everywhere, the lake is full of logs. Anyway, the first group went out and was back in a couple of minutes. My friend felt the canoe was too 'tippy'- worse than any other canoe she'd ever been in and didn't want to go out on it anymore. Elijah, Jeremiah & our friend in the inaugural voyage. By this point, Graham was back with the rest of the life jackets that I'd forgotten at home- so he took out the next batch of kids. Jeremiah, Samuel & Graham. Now, I grew up go

Lately I haven't been feeling like I'm getting anywhere with things. I'm dwelling too much on what's NOT working (or getting done, etc.), than I am on what IS working. The laundry piles, the cluttered counters and dirty dishes, the 'still unplanned home school/day schedule', kids who've decided that they don't want to listen or do anything you've told them for the past 10 years! Yadda, yadda, yadda. It's easy to get dragged down into the dumps when you do that. This then becomes a catch-22 where you get so upset that you just want to numb yourself in some way: internet, Facebook, reading, hobbies, eating, drinking, drugs, etc. The list is long of things that we use to fill the hole that's there in our lives. Unfortunately, what they all have in common is that fact that the moment we turn to them instead of to God- they become our idols. As I've been reading through the Old Testament I've been pondering the whole 'heart att

Just when I think things are getting back on track, they seem to fall apart all over again. Mainly it has to do with my 'to-do' list. Honestly, I wish I could clone 10 of me just so I could do all the things that I want to do as well as all the things I HAVE to do. But I'm realizing that really my problem is that I can't seem to say 'NO', and it's just making things worse. Also tied to that is trying to daily do God's agenda instead of mine. Can I let you in on a little secret? I've sucked at doing that lately. Thankfully, God's mercies are new every morning (Lam. 3:22-23), so I can hit the restart button and try again tomorrow. On the upside, I am trying to be more present with my kids and in everything that we're doing each day. Hormones have subsided (which I'm discovering make me really crazy), I'm hardly yelling at all and I'm slowly trying some new techniques with the kids in order to change some behaviours tha

It's hard to believe that the summer break is almost done. As I was thinking about getting ready for the new school year, I actually had a fleeting thought that I wished I could send the kids back to public school, just so I could get caught up on all the half-finished projects laying around the house and NOT have to get ready to teach them. Honestly, I had been counting down the years till my youngest entered full-time school so I could do just that- finish all my stuff and clean-up/organize my house. Then I think of James 4:3 where it says, 'you do not get because you ask with wrong motives'.  Ah yes, God. Homeschooling it is, then. Die to self, take up His cross. Repeat. Keeping it real, by the grace of God... Tammy

I always think it's neat when I can see God moving in my life. For me lately, everything I'm reading in my bible (as I attempt to go cover-to-cover in 90 days), all the sermons I'm hearing and the topics from our Friday night bible study group, are all pointing to the same thing. A total, heartfelt obedience to God. Like my blog post  here . This past week, I finally hit that moment of surrender. And was it ever freeing. God gave me such a cool picture to go along with it- but that's just for me and Him for now. But surrender is only the first step- now I need to walk that out. Doing ALL the things He asks me to and NOT doing those things that He says not to. I feel overwhelmed by it all. Where do I start? However, those thoughts are mine, not His. Surrender is listening for the next instruction and then doing it. And then repeating the whole listening/doing thing for the rest of my life. It's laying down my agenda for what I want to do/accompl

Tonight I NEED to write. It's been a LONG summer so far and for no reason really, I felt like the past few days have just about put me over the edge. So I need to write and find the good in this, because if I don't I keep dwelling on the bad. Today started with an interesting dream. In it, I was going to be driving my friend's car- but I realized the back passenger door was open and thought 'I need to close it before I go'. For some reason I didn't- and only discovered that when I got to my destination. I got out to check to see if there was any damage and both the doors on that side were massively scraped up. I felt sick to my stomach over it. There was no way to hide the damage and no way I could pretend it never happened. In some ways, it's a lot like life. You see something that you KNOW you really need to do. Unfortunately, life distracts you and it doesn't get done (or the other way- you don't stop doing things you know you shouldn&

I started a summer project. Oh yes, not like bringing home a puppy wasn't enough craziness for the summer- I've gone and added something else. I set a goal for myself- read through my bible in 90 days. At first I hummed and hawed about doing it. Would I really retain anything to make it worthwhile? Shouldn't I do a slow methodical study to get as much as possible out of it? Blah, blah, blah... Then I figured, anything that gets me at least reading my bible on a regular basis (whatever the outcome) would be a GOOD thing. So I started out with great enthusiasm and even got a day ahead of myself. Now, I'm behind (surprise, surprise). REALLY behind. Out of town visitors and a week of camping will do that, but I'm working on getting caught up again. Until then, I want to share a little nugget that I got from Ex. 36:2. "Then Moses summoned Bezalel and Oholiab and every skilled person to whom the Lord had given ability and who was willing to come and

Leaving the hubby home and going camping with the kids and my parents for the week. Hopefully I can do a post or two while I'm gone, but if not- you'll now know why it's been quite around here. Relatively speaking anyway- things have NOT been dull. Or quite. Anyway, I should try and get packed since we leave in the morning. Keeping it real, by the grace of God... Tammy

Finally, the last semester. I really can't believe that we've FINISHED four years already!?!?! Where has the time gone? Anyway, while the year may have started out well, I mentally bailed out near the end of May. I. was. just. done! After talking with Jeremiah's speech therapist I understood why- our brains do best on a regular cycle of learning and rest (a maximum of 3 months learning and then time off to assimilate and process the information learned). Unfortunately the January - June model of schooling doesn't work into that properly and so she seemed to think it completely normal for my brain to have shut down then (based on how long it had been since the spring break). She actually advocated for year round schooling (three months on/one month off). I'm seriously considering it. Well, for final term. This spring was a bit odd for us, since my husband actually ended up being off for six weeks due to hernia surgery. Geocaching with daddy- his first