Another Mother's Day - Another Reality Check

And this begins year two of my blogging; I began one year ago this week. And it is also another Mother's Day weekend in which I get my once a year HUGE reality check, I am not "mom" to the majority of kids. I was reminded of that last night and this afternoon. Not that I needed to be reminded, but they felt that I did.

This is my first Mother's Day as the mother of four adopted children. TJ is still too little to understand it all, so I'm "mom" to him right now and I'm soaking as much of that in as possible so that during the dry times, I'll still be quenched.

Mark did the typical haul the kids out the store to buy mom a present routine day. One refused to go, which was no surprise. It's a good thing that my skin is pretty thick. I've also learned to be creative; we're having friends over tomorrow evening so that our kids can play, the dads can hang and us moms can go out by ourselves. We're going to celebrate our roles as moms and our friendship!

As I read through my last Mother's Day blog, I was reminded (thanks Carrie!) that God did not invent Mother's Day. All He asked of me is that I raise up my children in His ways. He didn't say that it would be easy all the time or fun. Just that they were a blessing (which mine are!) from Him. I cherish my four blessings and I look forward to spending some time with my mother tomorrow, showing her how much I appreciate all that she did for me and continues to do for me, as well as celebrating with great friends.

I hope that everyone has a great Mother's Day! I am blessed!

Thankful for the little things

I've had the most, not sure how to describe, week. I continue to feel out of sorts, but just keep praying and plugging away. At the end of the week, Satan is still irritating me, but I feel confident that God is protecting me with every step that I take. So, in the quietness of this evening, I say a prayer of thanksgiving for everything that I am thankful for this past week.

I am thankful for:

1. My heavenly Father (I've felt His presense greatly this week!)
2. My loving husband
3. My wonderful (yet annoying) children
4. That I got to see Clara on Wednesday (our staff meeting was cancelled PTL!) and give her a hug and let her know how much she means to us and how much we will miss her loving husband Tom
5. That I appear to have mastered my new washer and dryer
6. That my new washer and dryer lessened the amount of laundry this week (or my family didn't dirty as much as they normally do, I'll take it, whatever the reason is!)
7. That TJ was only nasty sick for a few hours on Friday
8. That Mark was only down for the count sick for 24 hours
9. Vanessa had a good week at school
10. Suzy had a good week at school
11. Jessica is communicating her hopes and dreams to us
12. TJ began escalating at the restaurant today when he got something taken away from him and managed to descalate in record time (less than 60 seconds) without having to go outside. We were amazed and can't wait to report this to his behavior therapist
13. We held a somewhat successful family meeting this evening to redistribute the chores
14. I have amazing friends who pray for me and check in from time to time to remind me that they are praying for me and to see what I need
15. Melissa B. who faithfully picks up my produce co-op basket the 1st and 3rd Saturdays of each month for me
16. That my first week of my Business Statistics class was fairly easy, thanks to Mark going over some of the terminology with me, thinking I will be calling 1-800-ASK-NATE when it starts getting hard (it's been over 24 years since my college algebra class, which is a prerequisite for this class).
17. I got a new medical insurance card and it had Tyler J Eley on it!
18. The cooler weather!

I could go on for at least another 30 things, but you get the idea. Although this week has not been the greatest of weeks, I have SO MUCH to be THANKFUL FOR! God is Good! and I continue to PRESS ON! (thanks Pastor Gregg for that constant reminder!)