Make My Heart Sing!

Sounds. Loud sounds (firetrucks, honking horns, screaming kids). Quiet sounds (whispers, birds singing, an empty house). Good sounds (oven timer indicating supper is ready, "Welcome to DQ. May I take your order, please?"). Bad sounds (breaking glass, crying kids) . Sounds you could live without (passing gas, burping). Sounds you can't wait to hear again. That is what this post is about - those sounds that make you smile, make your heart sing. Those sounds you hear throughout the day that cheer you up and change your whole outlook on life - or at least on the day. My favorite sounds (in no particular order)?

1. laughing children - from the giggles of a 6-month old to the belly laughs of a 6-year old, I can't get enough laughter! I will do whatever it takes to elicit the laugher response, over and over again, no matter how foolish or silly it may be because almost nothing compares to the sound of laughter.
2. the loud rumble of Jay's truck as he arrives home - this can elicit 2 separate responses, depending on the type of day I experienced. It may be relief that someone has finally come to rescue me from the chaos or it may be elation that my best friend has come back again. Whatever the case, I always love to hear that old truck rumble down our street and crunch on the gravel as he finally arrives home.
3. the distinct "pop" of a can of Pepsi opening - this is my favorite beverage that I try to consume in moderation due to the fact there is not one iota of anything beneficial in it. In fact, I refer to it as poison, really, really good poison! I rarely have any at my house but I think my in-laws own shares in the company - they stock pile it, literally! So, every once in a while Jay brings home a can for me. And the thrill is immediate. And intensely satisfying!
4. the words "I love you" - there is nothing like hearing a 2-year old tell you she loves you, imitating your exact intonation as she states (or maybe just repeats, but I will take it any way I can!!), "I lu loo!" Well, maybe it falls right in place with hearing all the rest of the kids say it, too! But that first time. Or the first few times. I remember the first time I heard Jay tell me he loved me. More than 10 years ago. I was so unsure of what he felt but so confident of my own feelings. I never have to guess now. "I love you" is a part of our daily lives. And it thrills my heart. Every time!

I am sure there are more but these are some of the sounds that made my heart sing. Has your heart sung today?

The Grace That Gets Me Through

One of the comments I keep hearing throughout my mothering journey is one that could be considered a compliment - but actually tends to bother me more often than not. What comment is that? This one: "You are so amazing!" Or this alternative: "You must be super woman!" Usually I just laugh and say, "No, I am not!" hoping to steer the conversation in a different direction. Unfortunately, it continues with this: "No, really, you are amazing. I mean, look at you. You have 5 kids! How do you do it?". Since when does having 5 kids set the standard for greatness? I know of some women that have not and may never birth children and are far more amazing than I am. Just because I have 5 children does not mean I am great, amazing or super. So, to set the record straight, I am going to show you the reasons why I am NOT an amazing woman!

Reason #1 - I yell at my kids! Does that surprise you? If you know me really well it shouldn't! I am not proud of the fact that yelling happens nor do I like it. As a matter of fact, it bothers me greatly. Do I yell at them every day? No. But the point is I do. Usually when I have called them at least twice and they haven't listened - yelling seems to get their attention. Then I have to apologize for yelling at them. For hurting them in that way. For belittling them in that way. Good mothers shouldn't yell. Amazing mothers don't yell. God's grace is still working on me. Maybe someday, with that same grace, I will say I don't yell at my kids. Anymore.

Reason #2 - I spank my kids when I am angry. I really want to delete that and let you all think I am an amazing mother than never loses her patience. But I do. And it shows. Yes, my kids get spankings for willful disobedience. And sometimes I spank them when I am angry. So angry, in fact, I want to throw a temper-tantrum and stomp my feet! Sometimes I get so MAD!! Now, I don't randomly hit my kids. No, I take them to the bathroom and we have a "talk". And sometimes I am angry when we "talk". And, again, I need to apologize and ask their forgiveness for hurting them like that. I know what should be done - if spankings need to happen, they should never be done when I am angry. I should wait until I have cooled down and can deal with them in a calm manner like the responsible mature parent I am supposed to be. But that doesn't always happen. And I am so sorry for that. And, once again, God's grace pours over me. Someday, with God's grace, I will say I don't spank my kids when I am angry. Anymore.

Reason #3 - I feed my kids macaroni and cheese. A lot. Probably more than is good for them. Amazing mothers should make home cooked meals from scratch. Everyday. In fact, they should spend all day in the kitchen. (The unfortunate part about a blog is that you cannot see when my tongue is firmly planted in my cheek, like it is now!). ☺

Reason #4 - We are always late. For everything. To everywhere. The famous Sunday morning question as we are pulling up to church, "Are we late?". We told them we would let them know when we are on time otherwise they should just assume we are late because we probably are. And as I am unbuckling those late kids, more than likely their faces are still covered with breakfast and I need to do the lick-and-wipe routine! Super mothers would arrive at church on time. With clean kids. Some would say that I obviously think we are more important than church because tardiness shows a lack of caring. Those people haven't been at our house on a Sunday morning. And though it may seem like a little thing to you, it really does bother me that we cannot be on time. Well, rarely on time. It happened once. I think. And we gave ourselves three cheers! Someday, with God's grace, I will say that we are never late. Anymore.

Reason #5 - At times, I would much rather ignore my kids than feed them. Or play with them. Or read to them. Or just spend time with them. Sometimes I wish it were just me. Or that I could go away to work everyday and not spend all that time with them. You don't think I am so amazing anymore, do you? But, I tear myself away from whatever it is I think is so important and feed them anyway. Or play with them. Or read. Or just snuggle. Because I really do love those little people. A whole, whole lot! With God's grace I will put aside my own agenda, my own needs and think of the needs of my children first. Someday I will say I don't ignore my children. Anymore.

Being a mother of 5 is not easy. Being a mother of one or two or three or four or however many you are blessed to have (and, yes, they are a blessing!) is not easy. Having 5 does not necessarily make mothering harder, it's just that more of my shortcomings are revealed. I remember hearing something to this effect when I was pregnant with my eldest - God gives us the children we have, in the exact order, with the exact personality, boy or girl, created exactly as they are to teach us something about God! I must not be getting what God is trying to teach me - I need 5 kids for Him to get His message through!! This life I live is a busy, noisy, crazy adventure full of grace. Grace to live out each day to its fullest potential. Grace to make mistakes and try again. So, when you see me, please don't say I am amazing. I am not amazing. I am not super. I am a sinner saved by grace doing a miserable job showing God's love to the little ones He has entrusted to me. Those little ones I love so much I miss them even when they are not gone. Those little ones who deserve better than an angry, yelling, macaroni-making mother! Thankfully those little ones were created by a God so full of grace and love and forgiveness that He holds that mother in His arms and asks her to forgive herself just as He forgives her. He will walk her through another day with His grace. And she will succeed. If only for this one day. After all, His grace is new every morning.

Family Night Fun!

Sunday rolls around and the excitement builds as we contemplate the adventures that lay ahead! Today, surprisingly, it was warm and sunny with no rain in the forecast (we have had way more rain than we need and not nearly enough sun - summer has been more like winter in BC - cold and wet)! Obviously an outdoor activity was needed. Since we spent a bit of money on bowling last week we decided to go the free route and went park hopping! Winnipeg has many, many parks and many, many play structures that are free for the visiting! We made sure to visit 2 of them! Looking for fun places to take your kids on a limited budget? Most public elementary schools have fantastic play structures in great condition, each one a bit different from the next! My kids are at the age where finding new structures is like finding their very first structure - it is that thrill and excitement all over again! We ended the evening with icecream, most of which was free! Pepe had a free Frosty coupon from playing baseball and the next two had DQ coupons! We bought 2 more icecreams and we were set! A beautiful, fun, free (for the most part),family night!

Little monkeys!

Anything the boys can do, I can do (better?!)

Me and my little people!

Detour, anyone?

Remember in the last post I was explaining my recent shopping trip with all the kids? Well, on that particular trip and most every trip into the big city of Winnipeg, the capital city of Manitoba, I need to cross a particular bridge. This bridge is called the Ste. Adolphe bridge and crosses the mighty Red River that flows throughout southern Manitoba. The town I occupy is located on one side of the river and Winnipeg on the other. As I was going on my shopping adventure, I noticed a large barricade before the bridge indicating that it was closed. Now, you must realize, this is a major bridge which allows access to a major highway for a large number of communities in southern Manitoba. With this bridge closed, the detours are about 10 minutes in either direction. Just a tad inconvenient. However, I went about my shopping experience with a slight delay and thought nothing much of it. Until I got home and checked the net. Turns out the bridge was closed on that same day because one of the main supporting concrete structures for the bridge, measuring 3 meters by 6 meters, shifted by more than a meter. Perhaps a photo will help!

This is a photo from one side of the bridge - doesn't look that bad. Well, okay it looks bad but not super bad. Check out this next one!!

Can you believe what is happening to this bridge?? I am so very VERY thankful that Provincial officials were monitoring the bridge and discovered this "problem" before anyone was hurt! To think I was going to use that bridge ON THAT DAY!! Well, these pix were taken 3 days later and apparently the bridge is still shifting. No one is quite sure what is happening. Some think the Manitoba gumbo clay is sinking thereby causing the pier to move. Some think that with the spring flood we had this year, which brought major ice chunks moving through the river, that the pier was seriously damaged or possibly even cracked or severed below the water level. Maybe even below the clay! Whatever the case, officials are continuously checking it out (9pm on a Sunday evening!) to figure out what is actually happening. Some speculate a new bridge may need to be constructed so this detour may be in place for 1 - 2 years! Many years ago, before this bridge existed, they used a ferry of sorts to shuttle people from one side of the river to the other. Maybe it is time for that again!

Are they ALL yours?

I was feeling a little housebound yesterday plus I wanted to buy some lamps for my livingroom so I decided to pack up the whole gang and go shopping. By myself. To HomeSense (I know, I couldn't have picked a store with more breakable stuff in easy reach of curious hands! But, it is a really fun, dangerous, fun store!). Okay, we stopped at WalMart first just to check their lamp selection (found a beautiful Rand McNally classic style world map on parchment-type paper - just beautiful!). I have never received so many comments pertaining to the amount of children I have. "Are they all YOURS??" was the comment I heard over and over as complete strangers stopped to talk, count the kids, ask the ages, and confirm there were no twins as they stood in awe. (Jay said I should have said that 4 were mine and one was from the "other" woman. Funny, dear. Really funny!) After all, I was by myself, shopping, with 5 kids. Okay, so we don't get out often but really, is it worth all that attention? One woman said I could have my own television show! I might need a few more kids for that plus all I'd really want would be a nice big new house. The show I could do without! Some comments were encouraging. "Good for you!" "Wow, that's great!" Some even asked if I was homeschooling! Do most people that have an above-average sized family homeschool? However, the one comment that bothered me the most was this, "I bet you can't wait for school to start!" Here we go again, ship the kids off so I can do my own thing. My response? "Well, actually, I am homeschooling, and yes, I am excited for school to start but for a completely different reason!" That just got me a semi-disgusted, I-have-no-idea-why-you-would-want-to-do-that look. I just smiled! So, besides being stopped by complete strangers every 7 minutes on average, the event went quite well. The kids were well-behaved, no one broke anything and I found some lamps that bring a bit of sophistication to my we-have-lots-of-kids-living-here-so-nothing-ever-looks-pretty livingroom.

2 lessons learned:

1. The longer we are in a store, the more comfortable the kids become. This translates into a digression of their behaviour. Keep the trip short and sweet so the kids still maintain that deer-in-the-headlights look and fear wandering outside of arm reach. Any longer and trouble looms!

2. Don't give anyone anything to drink for a couple of hours before hand. Have M&Ms on hand. The first prevents trips to the bathroom (a little more complicated with 5!!) and the second ensures good behaviour!

PS: For those wondering how I went shopping with a 6 year-old, 4 year-old, 3 year-old, 2 year-old and 6-month old: baby in a wrap on me, 2 year-old in the front of the cart, 3 year-old in the cart, 4 and 6 year-old walking while complaining their legs were tired and they needed a ride, too! Next time I will steal a Superstore cart!!

My spirit is alive!

Do you ever get the feeling that your spirit becomes more alive, more excited after spending time with certain people? Tonight that is how my spirit feels thanks to the evening we were able to spend with some sweet friends (who actually have 5 children of their own and understand our life just a bit better than most others!!).

First of all, I think I finally have words to express the great desire to homeschool. I homeschooled Pepe last year and I will continue with both boys this year. I don't have to register them for homeschooling until they are 7 so, in the mean time, I have been trying to come up with a philosophy of education. Why do I want to homeschool? Until now, I knew that I didn't like the idea of the kids being away for 8 hours a day under someone else's instruction, influence, control! I thought they were gifts given to me, not the school teacher, no matter how good those teachers are (and in our school division we have some great educators, some of whom are my friends). Some people scoff at the idea of educating my own children - after all, think of all the free time I will have with them gone! Think of how much cleaning, shopping, crafting I can do with no little people to "drag around"! I could read a book, take a bath or a nap, paint my toes, go to the bathroom, all without interruption! But, guess what? I like those little people! And they were given to ME as gifts from the Lord. He says, "Sons are a heritage from the Lord, children a reward from him. Like arrows in the hands of a warrior are sons born in one's youth. Blessed is the man whose quiver is full of them." (Psalm 127:3-5) My children are not a barrier to my happiness, my children are not an inconvenience that I must put up with until I can finally send them away to school so I can do my own thing. My children are a heritage, a blessing, a gift. I need to cherish that gift. To embrace that gift. And for me, that means to teach that gift! Deuteronomy 11:19 is talking about the Lord and his commands when he writes, "Teach them to your children, talking about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up." It says right there I am supposed to teach my children! I need to teach them far more than reading, writing and arithmatic - I need to teach them all about the Lord and all that He has done and all that He is continuing to do. And, guess what? You can teach them to read and learn about the Lord at the same time!! So, I put away my own agenda for a little while. Aren't they worth it? Eventually they will grow up and leave home and I will have all the time in the world to craft, nap or shop. But won't it be that much more rewarding to have that 18 or 20 year-old that is bright, educated and loves the Lord with a passionate faith because their mom took a few years out of her life to teach and embrace those precious gifts He entrusted to her?

Secondly, I was informed, though the concept shouldn't be a new one, that children don't get a baby-sized Holy Spirit - they can have the full power of the Holy Spirit at the age of 3! Do you understand what I am saying? My 3 year-old RJ can have the same power Christ had when he walked the earth because that same power can indwell her through the Holy Spirit!! Isn't that just amazing!!! You don't have to wait until the age of maturity for the Holy Spirit to indwell you. I guess I should have known that but I have never thought about it like that before. Makes perfect sense to me. And, it certainly makes me look at and pray with my children in a completely different light. Can you imagine the things they could do? The children they could be? The children they already are?

Thirdly, God really cares about us, about all the little details of our lives! Tonight Jay picked up Ali and somehow hurt her arm so that she wouldn't use her wrist - she just kept holding it and crying and crying. We tried to get her to move it - she wouldn't. I was already envisioning a trip to the ER - a long night in the waiting room, a 2 year-old crying in pain the whole 45 minute trip - it was not going to be a good ending to a great evening. Her wrist even looked funny. Then all of a sudden she started using it. Just like that. No pain. No more tears. I said, "Okay, who was praying?" The man of the house said he was! And God choose to heal her! Maybe to teach us all that God really does hear our prayers, that God cares about the little things and that God certainly cares about the little ones! After all, Jesus did say, "Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these." (Mark 10:19)

My spirit is alive! Thank you, Lord!

Designs by Chantelle

Yes, I not only sewed this shirt myself, I actually designed it! So, if you don't like it, that is okay. I don't like everything real designers (you know, the ones that get paid the big bucks) make either. But, I like it and am extremely proud of myself.

It is the first time I have:
1. used a serger (rolled hems are now my favorite thing!!)
2. created shirring using elastic thread (the bottom hem is shirred)
3. designed my own article of clothing

Truth be told, I never intended it to be off-the-shoulder but I love it as it is anyway. I will probably add tiny straps just to keep it on better but I can't say enough how proud I am!