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Thursday, January 26, 2012

Digging out

Every winter I get a little down.  Lack of sunshine, too much time inside are both part of the reason, I think.  But this last 2 weeks I have been in a slump.  We have had sickness pass to all of us.  I got it this time too and I normally pass it up.  I have continued to drive car pool and cook meals but that is about it.  Thankfully we are on the mend, still keeping tissues handy and I still have a deeper voice than usual, but I feel more like my self.  Living in a sick house for over a week was only part of my problem.  I have had a lot on my mind..  I am not an outwardly emotional person.  If you know me, you have probably heard me say I have a box in the back of my brain for my issues.  I tend to keep things tucked in there till I have time to deal with them.  Not always a healthy way to go.  I don't think it is all bad.  Sometimes, time gives me time to make sense of some of my thoughts and emotions and can help me hold off and give a situation a reasonable solution instead of a irrational reaction.  But my problem occurs when I try to take care of it all by my self, my "box" becomes overcrowded.  At that point, I can't deal with any of it.  I always wait till I am at a breaking point before I turn to prayer.  I will gladly pray for your 2nd cousin twice removed next door neighbor if you ask me.  I won't question it.  I know prayer does wonderful things.  Something just stops me from praying for my own issues.  I pray for my children and husband daily, but to pray for me....it is always my last resort.  I know that God should be the first stop, but when it comes to my self, He is the last.  Maybe I think I should be able to figure things out on my own?  Sometimes I will say to myself, God gave you a brain, figure this out.  I think at times, I don't feel worthy to bother God with my issues. This is of course crazy.  He created me and thought enough of me to offer his son as a sacrifice so I could be saved.  He wouldn't have done that if I wasn't worthy enough.  I don't think I am alone in this problem.  I think as  women, we are very hard on ourselves.  We try to take on the world.  We take on school committees, church meetings, children,  homework, husbands, friends, our homes and the list goes on and on.  All while putting on a smile and a healthy plate on the table.  We can't let on that we don't have it all figured out.  So we tuck our emotions in our boxes or where ever it is for us and put them  on the bottom of our to do list.  The problem with this, is we check everything else off and eventually our box is so full, and  we are at our breaking point.  My box was in just such a mess this last week.  I was left with no option but to go on my knees and spill all my dirty laundry to God.  But that is just it, it is not dirty laundry to Him.  He already knows  what is going on, his arms were out the whole time waiting on me.  I was just stubborn, like a toddler trying to put their coat on upside down, not giving up, till at last they are so frustrated, they turn to their loving parent who has been waiting to help the whole time. 
What can we do to keep from getting so bogged down.  I think we will always have full plates, we just have to learn to go to our heavenly Father before we are at the end of our rope.  I suppose like a toddler learning to put their own coat on, it takes practice.
But for today, I am feeling better and will be digging myself out.  This time with God's help.

Monday, January 16, 2012

What I learned while being unplugged...sort of

Before I even get into what we learned with no facebook, let me start off with a confession.  I am weak and have very little stick with it.  No, I did not cheat and get on facebook on our week off but as far as the T.V goes, I had caved by Tuesday to letting the kids and us watch 1 show a day.  I could sit here and blame it on them, but I won't.  Though with the first reminder of no T.V. my oldest confessed that he didn't think I would go along with his idea.    We don't have cable or any of the extras like that, just basic T.V.  We do enjoy after homework and chores are done watching T.V together.  I don't think that is a bad thing.  I am not sitting the kids in front of the T.V to get them out of my hair.  It is something we do together.  We have our shows that we like to watch.  With that being said, the few days we made it without T.V were interesting and a good thing.  It forced us to stray from out norm.  To find other things to occupy us.  Our low was when my middle son stormed inside and declared there was nothing to do outside.  He looked at us and said "since I can't watch T.V. , can I at least dig a hole in the garden."  We told him to go for it and for the next 3 days , that is just what he did.  He judged his progress by how far his sister could fit in it.  For the record, he made it to knee deep before the weather changed and snow covered it up.
What I learned, is it is good to change things up sometimes, and a few days without the television won't kill you.  And I learned that sitting down with the kids at night and enjoying a show is not a bad thing. 
Now for the details on our facebook vacation.  I am a very nosey person and enjoy a bit too much seeing what others are doing.  I was good,  though while Lily Rose was getting on her phonics game during her class time she clicked on FB.  But you will be proud to know I promptly x'd out and got her on her site.  I will say that without wasting my time on FB, my laundry is not as backed up.  I will not be signing out of my FB account and it is not all bad in my opinion.  I will be limiting how much time I spend on it.  I am now setting a timer to make sure I get off when I should. It is too easy to loose track of the time without doing that, at least for me.
For now the Buttry family will continue indulging in our tech time but with a closer eye to the clock.  And our next tech vacation we take will probably be contained to a weekend and not an entire week.



What do you all do to unplug?

Friday, January 6, 2012

Little Suprises and being Present in Life



Life is full of surprises, some are very big and life changing but more often than not, they are small, and if your not careful, you might overlook the significance of it.  The picture you see above is one I took of a gift, a surprise gift from a friend.  This lady has been a mentor to me in my Catholic faith, a teacher and guide to our family as we grew and came into the church.  She is a person with a gentleness about her spirit that you can see in the way she lives.  She is not someone who I exchange gifts with, not because I wouldn't, we just haven't done that.  But she found this beautiful handmade figurine at a fair trade sale a while back and said she thought of my family.  She just wanted me to have it.   It is made of soapstone and was handmade in Kenya.  It stands for "family" which is universal.  I think it looks beautiful on my mantle.  I of course said thank you and then she replied not with your welcome but thank you for receiving it.  Coming out of the Christmas season and buying gifts to even out things under the tree; it made me look at gifts in a different way.  It reminded me that giving is a gift by it's self.  See, small surprises. 
Another surprise came this evening when my 13 year old son came to us and asked if starting Saturday morning that we as a family take a break from facebook And get this, the T.V.  This came from, you read right, a 13 yr old boy who by the way, loves his tech time.  I talking, you tell him he has 30 minutes on the computer, he is willing to get grounded for sassing me to get to stay on 31 minutes.  I asked him his reasons for this request, and he said he thought it would be good for us all.  I love FB but you cannot say no when your child makes this kind of request. 
See, surprises are everywhere.  I pray that this coming tech free week and this year, I make it a point to find the surprises that we all receive all the time.  I think  being able to see these surprises is what being present for your life is.  I have heard this term so many times and always struggled with  what it meant to me.  I think this is my definition.
I hope next week to share how our week has gone.  I would be willing to bet I find all kinds of little surprises, and I hope the same for you.

                                                                          

Monday, January 2, 2012

A fresh start - 2012

http://www.incourage.me/2011/12/20-questions-for-reflecting-on-your-2011.html


Here is a link to some thought provoking questions I am asking myself in my journal.  They have them to be asked on New Years Eve but I thought they worked well the first week of the new year to kind of put into perspective the goals and things in our lives.
Do you have goals for the new year?  I looked back on my goals for 2011 and was surprised to see I had completed alot of them.  Some are still being worked on but are a work in progress.  This is a huge motivator for the goals I have set for this year.
We spent New Years Eve hiking. It was beautiful out and I can't think of a better way to spend the day.  It was around 46 degrees that day and the sun was out which made it seem not so cool.  I loved watching my kids find little treasures in the forest.  They see objects in a different light then we do.






I hope each of you has a great 2012 filled with love and blessings and you find a way to pass that on to others as well.