A Bewitchingly Ordinary Life!

I hear that phrase daily from David!  "Mom, stay home right now and let's do little school home!"  David, my more introverted, somewhat of a loner, happy to be just him and around me.   My son, the less adapatable one.  Takes him quite awhile to adjust to many things.  Change is not his friend.  He is a creature of habit, of routine.  All on his own he's like this.  As a general rule, I let my children find their own schedules and adapt to that.  Early on I could tell that David thrived on routine.   He didn't tolerate change to well.  He preferred to be one on one or a small group. Aaron, my outgoing people person, is totally the opposite.  He can't stand being alone, is quite adaptable and goes with the flow when it comes to change.  I found this out early with him! Aaron is totally "public school" material.   I worry less about him in that respect.  But David, oh David.  The desire of m...

I'm watching a show on Netflix about a family who visited El Salvador, the poorest parts, helping families in true poverty. I am reminded of 3 major things. 1.) Even though we [my family and I] struggle, we are still extremely blessed.  Our struggles are no where near their struggles.  One El Salvadorian family on there had 14 children, but 4 have died.  One was 3 weeks old from malnutrition.   2.) I am reminded of my own mission trip with my home church in Ohio to Honduras roughly 13 years ago.  We saw, encountered and felt so many of the same things as this family did while visiting.  It seems like only yesterday that I was there. AND... 3.)  No matter how hard I have denied it these past 13 years, no matter how much I push it to the back of my mind, no matter how much I don't want to acknowledge the deep connection I felt in Honduras and how I did not want to board the plane to come back to "reality", no matter how hard I try, I can...

Call me a geek but there are times that certain movie or TV lines can resonate what I feel, think or believe on a something.  The X-Files, when it was on TV, was one of my all time favorite shows.  I remember one episode where Mulder was frustrated after his many attempts, and many dead ends.  He demanded:  "I want an answer!"  To which the reply was from some obscure character, "There are no answers for you." I hate that!  I hate not having answers to something that I have to assign a reason too.  Especially when it involves my children.  I go over this all the time, talk about a lot, and no matter how many times I do, or how many times someone says "It's not your fault" or "It's the past anyway, no matter what", I still have to re-visit it.  I want an answer! I had a short conversation with the principal of David's school and my place of employement.  David has been having a rough time with the fire drills and just did no...

It's been a long, stressful 3 days for us.  One of those times where you are so tired and so drained that you just want to fall into bed, into oblivion for hours and hours and hours.  Not because work has tired us out, or life has been busy.  Instead I am emotionally drained as I watch David cope with his anxiety and try to pinpoint what else could be going on with him. Thank God I have people at my work, whom I would consider close enough friends to cry in front of [like I did today, and have in the past] to share my concerns, fears and frustrations.  And to know they may not always agree, but they understand a mother's heart. I completely understand the side of the coin where people think it is better to help children learn to face their fears, even if it means some days/weeks/months of "uncomfortability".  I really DO understand that. On the flip side, I am not that parent.  Instead I am the parent who follows my child's cues as another good frien...

There are times when I hear or read comments about how well a friend's child can read, interact, write their name... and deep in my heart I feel a spark of envy and sadness.  Not that I ever wish that child did not do those things, I do think it is wonderful.  And not that I think the parent is bragging just to make themselves look good. I'm envious and sad at times because I know first hand, see it, live it everyday....the struggles that David has.   I remember being in a conference and the speaker mentioned her granddaughter and how at this extremely early age she was using full sentences and "big words", and she could do this, and she could do that by such and such age.   I remember as well, having tears stream down my face because I knew that David did not have a chance to experience such things.  I know the difficulty he faces in trying to communicate sometimes.  I feel his frustration AND become frustrated myself with that difficulty manif...

Beginning a new journey can often mean taking a hard first step.  We realize we are going to take risks, expose our hearts, our dreams, our hopes, our fears, the things that others may find 'sad' about us or maybe even delightful. And I begin this journey with a tough first step.  So many thoughts swirl in my mind, yet where do I begin to lay the groundwork.  I've thought about over the last couple of days as I decided to make a public blog.  Where do I begin to set the train in motion?  And then it hit me just moments ago as I talked with my youngest son.  I realize that I do things "differently" than many people around me.  We're all on a journey but we can be on separate paths.  Nothing wrong with that at all!  And there comes a time in each of our journeys that we  hold strong to what we know, what we believe, what we've learned, what we've unlearned and what we are going to learn!  We become unapologetically ourselves.  ...