Regaining Focus

I'll have to admit, for the most part, these last couple of years have been pretty easy. Kids are doing well, no deaths in the family, no health issues. You can probably say we've been on "cruise control". Cruise control is great when you are driving. It allows you to relax a bit, and when you are driving on the highway at night halfway through a 10 hour trip, it's nice to have that little relief. You would think, however, that having one less thing to concentrate on would allow you to focus on other things: other drivers, keeping yourself between the lines, watching out for the police (not that I speed!). I notice it does the opposite for me. I get more tired, I'm not as focused. Often times during a long trip, I'll take the cruise control off just so I'm more aware of everything and feel more in control. It's kind of how our lives are now. When things are going great and we're on "cruise control" you would think I would have more time to spend with the Lord, more things to thank Him for. I don't. I spend less time with Him. I get tricked by the sound of the easy road beneath me that I think I don't need him today, or yesterday, or the day before. Maybe I just think - "things are going great....why bother Him, He has enough to do". I don't know where I ever got that thinking, but it's wrong. He wants a relationship with me, at all times. There is something about going through hard times that drives us to our knees. We are thankful for these times because it brings us back to the One who loves us most. It forces us to focus on Him and what He can do and not on what we can't. I have struggled tremendously this last week with what the future holds and where God wants us to be. I feel the waves coming and fear starts to creap in. Do I brace myself and fight the current, or do I just allow the water to crash over us and pray we float to the top long enough to breathe? Is God going to calm the storm before it cranks up another notch, or is He going to allow this turmoil to continue? What is He trying to show us through this, and is He even hearing our prayers? I don't have the answers yet, but I know the One who does. I will say one thing, as unnerving as these past few months have been, I have had tremendous peace this last week, simply because I have spent more time with Him. I have seen him answer prayer for others, and I have faith that our prayers are going to be answered as well. There is one thing though about watching a massive storm roll, it makes you secure the things that are most valuable to you.

Look at my muscles!!!

The neat thing about my husband spending more time with our family, and also taking better care of himself, is that sometimes those times overlap - like when he works out. It's a "guy" thing in our house now. My 7 year old and 3 year old came running to me after their "work out" with dad the other day, yelling - "look at my muscles!" They are tiny, but they sure are cute!

The Power of Prayer

A dear friend of mine had terrible news this week that no mother should ever have to hear. Her 8 year old son has a brain tumor. Her son is just a grade ahead of our oldest at the same school, she teaches my youngest in Sunday school and we serve on a church ministry team together. News around our church spread fast and the family was overwhelmed by the amount of support they received. This is one of those moments where most of us struggle with what to do. He is not my son, but I have wept and prayed for him as if he was. I felt my heart break for my friend's pain of having to see her oldest child go through this. I wanted to go down to the hospital, to bring them cookies or a book, to take their youngest to the park or go and get their mail or mow their yard. Just do something...anything. Maybe it's just our nature, especially as moms, to feel like if we are doing something, we have control. "If I'm outside with my children, nothing will happen to them". Any one of us who has watched their child fall off the swing knows that is not true. No, we don't have control. God gives us responsibilities, not control. God knows we don't have control. He says so in 1 Timothy 6:15 "God....is the blessed controller of all things, the king over all kings and the master of all masters". So what do we do? We, as Christians, instinctively pray. So we did. My friend's son was scheduled for surgery this morning so a group of about 20 of us moms and all our kids headed to a local park at 10 a.m., the time of his surgery, and we prayed. We prayed for his safety, we prayed for his healing, we prayed for peace and strength and skilled surgeons hands. We prayed through crying and long pauses to gain composure. We prayed specific prayers and we also prayed for God's will to be done. I was so blessed to be a part of it. To watch these women cry out to God on behalf of this family, each in their own unique way of praying was powerful and something I will never forget. I kept thinking that just this time last week my friend was at the beach with her family, playing and enjoying the last few weeks of summer. She couldn't possibly have known this was how much her life was going to change in a week; but God knew. God walks before us and that brings comfort to me. No matter whether you see the storms in your life rolling in, or they pop up out of nowhere and throw you around, God is with you. He has walked before you, is walking with you now, and will walk with you tomorrow. His love and grace never changes, and He doesn't love you any less because He has allowed something tragic to happen to you. (The child's surgery went well and they are pretty sure his tumor is benign. They will know more in the coming days and then he will have another surgery to completely remove the tumor. Thank you God, for your grace and mercy and love.)

What my 7 year old can do that I can't

New neighbors moved in across the street several weeks ago and I have yet to go introduce myself. It's not that I haven't met them, I have, at a neighborhood block party. But to be honest, I should have gone over there earlier. I had every intention of going over there, but my fear and insecurity masked as busyness is what kept me. I hate social situations. It takes all of my energy to socialize with people. I know that is very strange coming from a woman. For example, today I had lunch with dear friends from my bible study. I loved it and loved being with them, but by the time I got home I was talked out. So when my little boy asked me to take him over to the new neighbors to play with their 12 year old, I truly didn't want to. He bugged his daddy yesterday to do it and quite frankly, daddy felt yesterday the same way I do today. We would be happy if we lived on 12 acres with no one around. But we moved into this neighborhood so our children would have friends to play with. DH and I have always been very uncomfortable here. It's not that there is anything wrong with the neighbors, they are great, but we keep to ourselves and thrive on long periods of time alone. This neighborhood is very, very social so we don't make it to many of the parties that are here because, well, there are so many of them. Back to my 7 year old. After seeing that I was not going to walk over to the neighbors house, he conceeded to let me stand on the front porch and watch him walk over. He wasn't going in their house, just asking him to play in our front yard (I'm not that bad a mom!). I stood on the front porch and watched him walk over (something I should have done weeks ago) ring the doorbell and talk to the mom while I waived from afar. "What an idiot I am" was the first thing to come to mind and then "How proud I am of my little boy" was my next thought. My husband and I struggle daily with social situations, and we've taken ourselves way out of our comfort zone on a consistant basis so that our children don't have this anxiety as they get older. As I watched my sweet boy walk across that street, I remembered his earlier years at Sunday school and preschool and vacation bible school crying his eyes out because he couldn't stand to be there. I remembered those days because I spent much of them crying too. I specifically remember driving off the church campus and calling my husband, barely able to talk through the tears because I just left our sweet toddler at the best preschool in Charlotte crying his eyes out. He would always say "babe, it's for the best, it will get better". It did get better. And today, as I stood there on my front porch and watched my son play with his new friend in the front yard, I took a moment to be thankful. Thankful to the God who gave me strength during those early years to keep pressing on. Thankful for a loving husband who wouldn't pull our son out of preschool just because he and his mommy were crying all the time. Thankful for a church and teachers who loved him and held him for as long as he needed to cry, and then would walk down the hall to tell me it was ok for me to leave - he was going to be ok. Thankful for my son. Thankful that at age 7, he already is a stronger person than I am. (I did call the mom by the way. We're going to have lunch.) Sherri

Lessons while running

I've started running. Not something I particularly enjoy doing, but one of my closest friends and I are training for a 5k together, and well, I need to lose a few pounds. There is a trail that runs through our neighborhood and runs behind our house - behind a lot of people's houses actually. I walk some and then run some, it's a whole training program which you can find on my sidebar. I run the same path every time I run, and I have noticed that many of my neighbors are adding on to their houses. Let me just say here that we live in a fairly new neighborhood and most homes are big enough not to need "adding on to". As I was running I kept wondering when is enough "enough"? Are people adding on because they need to, or is it because their neighbor is doing it and they thought "great idea! I think we need that"? I don't judge any of my neighbors, I make this observation for myself and me alone. I remember when we lived in our first starter home. DH and I hardly had any money, but we wanted to invest in a glass front door so we can see the front yard during the day. I remember getting that front door, and how happy it made me, and how nice it looked. It was a temporal, worldy thing, but yet, it made me happy. I also remember my disdain when just about 3 weeks later, my neighbor across the street got one just like it - glass etching and all. Of all the doors to buy, I thought, why the one JUST LIKE OURS. Within a few months, several of our neighbors had glass doors similar to ours. In Dennis Miller's book "Searching for God Knows What" he describes, hypothetically, about an alien landing on our planet and having to report back to it's leader about what humans are like. He goes on describing how the alien reports back that humans are always comparing themselves to others: What they look like, what they are driving, what they are living in. How odd it is to the alien that we are doing this. How great my sin can be in this area. I am part of a neighborhood bible study, and we used to only meet at my house, and then other girls offered their homes up to meet there as well. I love these girls with all of my heart and I have learned so much from them. But I remember going into several of these girls homes and seeing how beautifully decorated they were, and then coming back to my home and going "yuck" or something profound like that. Why do I compare myself, my house, my children, my spouse, my gifts (or lack thereof) to others? God tells us test our own actions and then we can take pride in ourselves without comparing to one another. (Galatians) Paul tells the Corinthians in the 1st book, Chapter 12, that we each have different gifts and God uses each of us with what he has given us. Why isn't that sufficient enough for me? This last year has been very dark for me; so much so that it wasn't until I started seeing the light and it blinded me that I realized how dark I had been. God is teaching me, as always. He has been teaching me through my low, if not non-existent self-esteem, that He loves me. That He created me this way. That I need Him. I have been focusing so hard this last year on my weaknesses and how I need to improve them, that I have lost sight of the great gifts He has given me and how I need to use them to His glory. All because I have compared myself to others. God, may you continue to show me your love so that I may love others, and myself.

All because he was cute....

True story. My mom told me this story yesterday of a lady that works with her whose daughter is 12 and son is 5. She decided to take them to the aquarium in Atlanta over the weekend. They were having a great time at the aquarium when she turned around and saw that her son was missing. She frantically looked for him and then rushed to the security desk where they promptly put the place on lock-down. Everyone was looking for him when, after many minutes passed by, someone found him. He was hiding from his mother behind one of the doors. But wait! The story gets even better.... The mother was exhausted after all of this and decided to take the children back to the hotel room to rest. They took a cab to the hotel and upon entering her room instructed her daughter to keep an eye on her son while she laid down. She asked her daughter not to interrupt her unless it was an emergency. A few minutes passed by and the daughter came to get the mother. Needless to say the mother was angry and said "I asked you to let me rest unless there was an emergency!" The daughter replied "this is an emergency. We have a penguin in our hotel room!" The mother rushed to the other room to find a baby penguin walking around. While the 5 year old was missing he managed to kidnap a baby penguin and bring him home because "he thought he was cute and wanted him". I'm not sure whether the Atlanta aquarium will ever let that woman back in again. If you think your day is bad, it can always be worse! And don't worry, the penguin is safely back at the aquarium. And I'm pretty sure the 5 year old survived as well!

Timing is everything

I made the monumental mistake today that no mom of 7 years should do - I took my children to the grocery store right before nap time. I was determined to get groceries after having nothing in the house from vacation, and my morning got way to busy to do it then. I don't leave the house after 4 p.m. unless I absolutely have to (I've become quite picky about that after quitting work) so that left the hours of 1-3 p.m. Not a good time; not a good time at all. I negotiated with the boys that they could have their Harris Teeter cookie only after they had proved they could behave through the grocery store. So off we went. Unfortunately I had to order my 3 year old's birthday cake on this trip as well. He thought he was getting his cake today to eat. If you've ever been in a HT, you know that the bakery is not even in aisle 1 - it's the aisle before aisle 1. So the tantrum began before we even hit the first aisle. With the help of the nice lady at the bakery (she told my son to be a good boy for mommy and she would start working on his cake right away), I was able to negotiate my way out of the area with little damage to me or my child. Half-way down the cereal aisle we came upon the next round of tantrums.......man how I hate the makers of pop-tarts! I managed to get out of there with no more than a box of s'mores flavored granola bars. Unfortunately for my little one, and me, and every one within 4 aisles of the frozen food section, my little boy managed to pinch his fingers in the cute little toddler sized grocery cart he was pushing. Anyone who hadn't heard his screams before that, definitely heard him now. I held him as he cried and the only thing that would appease him was, you guessed it, his cookie. So much for not rewarding bad behavior. But I think there's an exception to the rule for boo-boos. Sherri This was in the Charlotte Observer today and hit home with me and my picky eaters. http://www.charlotte.com/581/story/199822.html

What a difference vacation makes!

We went on a much needed family vacation for 10 days - first to Vermont and then to Boston. It was like having 2 vacations in one. We rested and played and ate and rested and ate.....and ate. What a great time. My oldest finally lost his first tooth and we went to our first major league game and saw the Boston Red Sox beat the Toronto Blue Jays. What a fantastic time and one I remember all of my life. My DH needed it more than anyone and I am so thankful he got to take the time off. Things move much slower in Vermont than Charlotte. I didn't realize it until I caught myself for the second day in a row asking my husband at dinner...."What is taking so long to get our drinks?"; "What is taking so long with our food?" What a nice change of pace. One of our counselors at church talked to me several months ago about finding rest in the Lord. I always have an agenda in my quiet time - how much to read, prayer list, etc. He suggested I just sit quietly and listen to God. I must admit, it's been hard. I have to pray out loud because my mind wanders too much when I pray to myself; imagine the difficulty in just sitting. Just sitting. Our pastor spoke a few weeks ago about how fast paced we are, always talking on the cell phone, checking emails. Patrick Morley writes in his book "Man in the Mirror" that we are designed to go at a turtles pace and we are thrown onto the race track. (Not exact quote, something like that). That's how I feel most days. I just want the roller coaster to slow down for a bit so I can gain perspective again. That's what vacation did for me. I pray our family carries it with us until the next time. "Come unto me and I will give you rest" Matthew 11:28

The beginning....

My very first post on my very own blog! Yippee!! I was up so late last night and stumbled upon some really great blogs of women just like me who shared the most intimate details of their life. I was inspired by their writings to start my own. So, here it is, the beginning. "Thoughts from the green room" means nothing more than my office is green and, well, that's where I do the most thinking. DH and I were high school sweethearts, dated for almost 6 years before we got married, were married for 7 years before we had our first son then 4 years later had our second (and last) son who is now 3. Yes, we've been together for 20 years and we're only in our late 30's! Through these years we have grown up together and have certainly felt growing pains with that. But the Lord has blessed us so much and I am so thankful we've been together through the great times and the not so great times. He's always been my rock and is an example of what a Christ-like man is. He strives to be that, and I strive to feel worthy to be married to him.