My Jobby

It's that time of year again. The time of year I stay up into the wee hours of the morning because it's my only good chunk of time to get things done.

It's Paris Street Market season! This year, I'm doing June, July, Sept, & October. And thinking about applying to a couple other shows but we'll see...

Mark your calendars & save your monies. Word on the street is that this year EVERYONE applied to be a vendor in the market. It was competitive. Especially to get my corner spot - but I did ;-) So it should be a very good year at the market.
Wish me luck. Luck that I don't go insane from lack of sleep...

For the Weary

I first heard this song on Grey's Anatomy. Then Bea recommended it for my Mother's Day mix CD, and so I bought it on iTunes.

I just want to share this song, and the lyrics, first because it is beautiful. And also because it's about my God. And I find this comforting when I'm in a funk. While it's not Scripture, her words do a decidedly excellent job of describing God's love. It reminds me I'm beloved, and sometimes we need reminding of that...

Play the video below to listen, and read the lyrics below that while you do:



I Will Show You Love by Kendall Payne

"I will show you love like you’ve never loved before
I will go the distance and back for more if you just say the word

You will come alive again and call the trying times your friend
The pain that you have suffered through will never get the best of you
You will hope in something real that won’t depend on how you feel
When you call my name then I will answer, answer

I am on your side though the wind and waves beat against your faith
You were on my mind when the world was made
Trust in me my child, Trust in me my child

Walk out on the water where you have no control
So scared to death of failure you sacrifice your soul, please let that go

You have climbed an uphill road, You have worn a heavy load
You have cried through endless nights and nearly given up the fight
Watched your dreams like falling stars the heartaches made you who you are
Now looking back you see that I have always been there

I am on your side though the wind and waves beat against your faith
You were on my mind when the world was made
Trust in me my child, Trust in me my child

Where you gonna hide? Where you gonna hide from Me?
Where you gonna go? Where you gonna go that I can’t see?

I have heard you cry and it breaks my heart for I love you so
I would never lie, this is not the end there is still a hope"

I am on your side though the wind and waves beat against your faith
You were on my mind when the world was made
Trust in me my child, Trust in me my child

© 2010 Kendall Payne

First Chore

Recently Justin & I sat down with Eisley and had a little talk.

"It's time you start putting in some effort around here young lady," said Justin. "How about you start contributing to the household chores?"

"I think your father is right, missy! We've been way too lenient on you lately, and you're old enough now that you can chip in around here and do some chores."

To which Eisley said, "Awwwww man! Do I have to?"

To which WE said, "Yes!"

And so we assigned Eisley her first household chore. Her first duty that is all her own.

I will say, she takes it quite seriously.


Behold Eisley's first chore for the household. Walking the dog.

Okay, really, she loves it. It's not really a chore. In fact, we get yelled at if she doesn't get to do it. Surprisingly, she and Bella walk quite well together. We've let her walk Bella several times now without incident.

And yes, we always hold hands when crossing the street.

What NOT to do in life...

{Dear Eisley}

I want to tell you about a few mistakes I've made in life. As your older & wiser mother, I want to share this with you so that you do not make some of the same mistakes I have made. Hopefully I can save you some grief in life. I want to list some, lest I forget!

So, my dear daughter, don't do the following:

1. Fart in front of your pastor and blame it on another kid. He knows.

2. Seek fun with your friends by driving up to shopping carts in parking lots and pushing them with your car, working up speed, and then brake and watch the cart soar across the lot. Hitting another car with the speeding cart is inevitable. I know this from experience. {Note: Especially don't do it just weeks after getting your first driver's license. And ESPECIALLY don't do this when there's a beautifully restored classic Ford Mustang in the lot.}

3. Stir the pot for fun. Even though it often is amusing, it's also mean.

4. Dress the pets up in your nicest dresses and parade them through your parents bedroom when they're still asleep on a Saturday morning. Believe me, they'll think it's a lot funnier if you do it after they wake up and have had some coffee.

5. Cut up your mom's sewing projects in attempt to make even better sewing projects. She won't be impressed.

6. Go to college and: take multiple prescriptions known to cause weight gain, wear only lounge clothes and never your sized jeans so you don't realize when they don't fit anymore, not work out in rebellion for the last 4 years of forced high school gym class, not have a full-length mirror, and let yourself splurge at the college dining hall one too many times (to be fair, the salad bar WAS disgusting). Trust me -- recipe. for. disaster. It's okay to gain a little weight in college but if you do all of the above you're soooo asking for it.

7. Let friendships dissolve just because you want to prove a point {even when you're right ;-) }

8. Not save at least some of your money.

9. Get credit cards. They're the devil. Seriously, watch this if you don't believe me.

10. Stop learning a musical instrument once you've started. You'll regret it...

11. Set booby traps for Santa.

12. Go too far with your sense of humor. Your 2nd grade teacher might not find it as amusing as you do when, say, you draw a "Kick Me" sign on Martin Luther's back when studying the Reformation. {Post edit for clarity: I'm talking about Martin Luther the theologian. NOT the civil rights activist.}

13. Climb up cliffs without adult supervision. Especially when staying with grandma. Thank God she didn't have a heart attack that day.

14. Run from a horse when it charges you.

15. Try and reason with your philosophy professor in college. Especially if he looks just like Snape. That should have been my first clue not to contradict him.

16. When sledding, and your dad is at the bottom of the hill watching you come down and you *think* he's saying, "Steer towards the tree! Steer towards the tree!"... he's probably not.

And that's all I can think of right now. We all make mistakes, but if I can save you from a few of the ones I've made then I've done my job.

Love,
{MOM}

Editing My Life

Sometimes I'm guilty of being a certain type of mommy blogger. I only want to post the best pictures. I skip over the ones with messy undone hair, clutter and messes in my house, my chins, my husband's bald spot, anything that's not "ideal".
A lot of homemaker/mommy bloggers are criticized for this. In part because other's see it and compare your seemingly charmed life to their real one - the one in which they know messes and stress exist. Most of the time, what you're seeing folks, is the edited version of my life. The parts I'm proud of. Even when I post about "the bad" it's not really that bad... not in comparison to the real bad.
Soon here, I'll have to do a "this is my REAL life" post. I'll show the mess & unflattering pictures of myself & my family. But soon enough I'll have wrinkles and gray hair...
So can you blame me? These are the moments I want to remember. These are the shots I want to look back on, when I'm old and fading. When Eisley is grown up and beginning to realize the hard truths of the world, the veil of childhood being lifted from her eyes. I want to remember the best. The half-truth.

I know that at any second of the day, life can change drastically for the worse. So I'm savoring these happy moments. I caught myself writing a "I love my life" post the other day and thought, "You can't post this..." and now it's part of my collection of posts I'm too embarrassed to post.

But why not? In my current state, I'm mostly happy these days. My life is far from perfect, but I choose to focus on the best of it.

Maybe it's a survival thing? Or a coping thing?

We all do it differently but this is how I chose to:

"Here's the best... let's not think about the bad."

Not today at least...

Ecclesiastes 7:

¹⁴ When times are good, be happy;
but when times are bad, consider:
God has made the one
as well as the other.
Therefore, a man cannot discover
anything about his future.

My Community

I've joined BlogFrog.

You should see a widget to the left
of this linking to "My Community".

Hope you can join the discussions!
There are a lot of great blog communities and I've
been having so much fun over there I decided to join
in and start my own.

Cheers,
Heather

{Easter 2010}

Here are some of my favorite pictures from our Easter this year.
Eisley is still confused by the idea of an Easter bunny & basket.
But she enjoyed it nonetheless.
When The Cousins got here, we held an Easter egg hunt in the yard. {LOVE their girls dresses this year.}
Kids get a little wild-eyed when it comes to Easter chocolate.
Indiana Sophie:
The Cousins, I tell you what, were SO good to "Baby Eisley" during the hunt, and helped her find some eggs of her own.

Wait for me!


And later we had a really delicious dinner and enjoyed the lovely weather.
More Easter pics are over at my sister's blog.

The True Meaning of Easter

My kindergarten teacher told this story about me for years, maybe she still tells it from time to time? The last time I heard it again was as a teenager, when the praise group I was in did chapel at her school one day.

It was the first day of kindergarten at my Lutheran elementary school in Denver, and we were having a lesson on our recently purchased school supplies. "Mrs. K" {sometimes we called her Mrs. CareBear} would ask,

"What do we use to write with?"

"A pencil." Some student would answer.

"What do we use to measure things?"

"A ruler." And so on.

At some point she asked,

"What do we use when we make a mistake?"

I raised my hand. I knew this one! She called on me so I answered matter-of-factly:

"Jesus."

Of course she meant an eraser, but my 5 year-old brain was on something better, the bigger picture. Children can have the sweetest outlook on God & Christ, so much more faithful and earnest than adults at times. They can really teach us a thing or two...

My friend, Melissa, posted this on Facebook yesterday and it really warmed my heart:

"Was at an Easter play tonight...heard one little boy yell at the Roman soldiers during the crucifixion scene...and then yell for Jesus to come and hold him at the resurrection scene. Love children!!"

Isn't that sweet?

Tomorrow I will be too busy to post, but we will be celebrating Easter.

It is the day Jesus became our eraser.
For our mistakes.