21 Days

I've always heard it takes 21 days to make a habit. Do you find this to be true in your life? In mine, I'm not so sure. Last spring and summer I embarked on a Bible study / weight loss program that was an incredible time in my life. The course was a total of about 80 days, and I enjoyed my Bible study immensely - looking forward to doing it each day, growing spiritually. And yet, as soon as that program was over, I missed a few days of study, and then here I am a year later, completely hit and miss on my quiet times.

 

We talked about habits, including spiritual disciplines, in the youth Bible study last Sunday night, but it really got me to thinking. Am I such an undisciplined person that I can't even create a good habit or discipline after 80+ days? What is wrong with me???

 

On another yet related note, here are some points I jotted down from Sunday's sermon from the end of James:

 

• If we aren't seeking the Lord when times are good, we won't be ready to seek Him in times of crisis.*
• Eventually we begin living for ourselves and we become content with that; we become spiritually complacent.
• The prayer of a righeous man is powerful and effective... I've always read that verse and thought to myself, "Too bad I'm such a shmuck..." and yet... how do I become righteous? By praying when times are good, by being spiritually disciplined and seeking the Lord daily.

 *One of the songs we sang Sunday is "Blessed Be Your Name" by Matt and Beth Redman. The words are especially meaningful to me because they ministered to me greatly during the period of anxiety when we were told Gracie could have Down's Syndrome. They helped me through that tough period of time, and really echoed the points above. Interesting coincidence that it was chosen for part of our worship time today...

 

Blessed be Your Name

Matt and Beth Redman

 

Blessed be Your name in the land that is plentiful;

Where the streams of abundance flow, blessed be Your name.

Blessed be Your name when I’m found in the desert place;

When I walk through the wilderness, blessed be Your name.

 

Every blessing You pour out I’ll turn back to praise;

When the darkness closes in, Lord, still I will say,

Blessed be the name of the Lord, blessed be Your name!

Blessed be the name of the Lord, blessed be Your glorious name!

 

Blessed be Your name, when the sun’s shining down on me;

When the world’s all as it should be, blessed be Your name.

Blessed be Your name, on the road marked with suffering;

When there’s pain in the offering, blessed be Your name.

 

Every blessing You pour out I’ll turn back to praise;

When the darkness closes in, Lord, still I will say,

Blessed be the name of the Lord, blessed be Your name!

Blessed be the name of the Lord, bless be Your glorious name!

 

You give and take away; You give and take away:

My heart will choose to say, Lord, blessed be Your name.

 

 

Delight

Isn't one of the best feelings in the world when a baby smiles at you?

I can have the worst day, be tired and stressed and have a headache, and when my Gracie smiles at me, it just instantly lifts my heart.

Today I watched my grandfather light up when she smiled at him. Recently I was tickled watching my mom interact with her at the mall ~ because she was tickled by Gracie's smile.

It just brings a feeling of... of delight. Maybe it's because at 11 1/2 weeks Gracie only knows how to express herself in two ways: by smiling or by crying. Who in their right mind would prefer the latter? (Especially when that was all we got for the first six weeks or so!)

But last night I got to thinking about Gracie's smile. I thought of my two older kids ~ two of the three greatest kids in the universe ~ and how I often take their smiles for granted. Don't get me wrong ~ there's not much I enjoy more than pleasing my children. I love to spoil them and make them happy. But how many times in the day do I dismiss them because I'm busy or because genuinely I'm not as interested in what they delight in? How many times does Joshua come to me and ask to show me his latest Lego creation, and I say, "Not now, Josh; I'm busy"? How many times do I say the same thing to Christianne when she wants to tell me something that seems to go on and on and on?

The fact is I take my kids for granted. They are wonderful, delightful children. They are smart, creative, funny, and fairly well-behaved. Yet I let myself get caught up with all the things that *I* want to do - important or not - and I don't want to be interrupted. How's that for being selfish?

As a matter of fact, in the few minutes I've sat down to write this, I've been "interrupted" no less than 6 times. At least tonight, for a change, I've stopped what I was doing to hug and love on my kids. After all, aren't they the reason I do what I do? Aren't they the reason we've made the choices we have? And aren't they three of the greatest blessings I've been given?

I don't want to take my kids for granted. I've already seen how fast they grow. They'll be adults before I know it.

I have to quit writing for now. My daughter is putting on a show and I don't want to miss it for the world.

The Week in Review

This week:

• I began If You Knew Her, You Would Say...
• We put nearly 250 miles on our new Honda Pilot in its first week as a Wiggy Wagon.
• I paid only $2.98/gallon for gas at Sam's today.
• We spent a lot of time with friends this week: dinner with the Menteeth, the park with the Cassidys (haven't seen them in about a year!), and scrappin' with Kathy.
• We haven't spent any money eating out this week.
• Pluto is no longer a planet.

What I'm reading / rereading /studying:

• Janet Evanovich's One for the Money (a re-read) 

What I'm listening to:

• Point of Grace, Steady On (in the car)

What I've watched:

• Gene Simmons' Family Jewels
• RockStar: Supernova
• The Wedding Date (DVD, 2 stars)
• March of the Penquins (DVD, 3 stars)

Words:

• dandle ~ I dandle Gracie and, when she's not overtired, she enjoys it.
• phatic ~ We move from guest to guest, exchanging phatic words and welcomes.
• tarantism ~ I am struck with tarantism after a good time at the Craps table.

TGIF

Last night this occurred to me:

I should probably spend more time doing the things I should be doing, rather than just the things I want to do.

(It actually occurred to me in a much more eloquent way, but being that it's been more than 24 hours now, I'm lucky to remember the gist of it, let alone the poetic version.)

That said, I have to admit that today was spent doing (mostly) things I wanted to do. I was able to do a few of my favorite things: scrapbooking, geocaching,

 and eating a homemade version of BJ's Pizookie®. Sort of, anyway ~ I didn't actually get any true scrapbooking done, but I got to sit and sort papers and stickers and chat with my friends*, and we didn't actually find any geocaches, but we got to go take our new Pilot in the dirt and scout a couple locations for some new caches. After dinner I worked on the puzzle for the new cache (our first puzzle cache) and introduced the Wigglets to one of the best desserts ever (bake a giant chocolate chip cookie, and, when it's done, top the still-hot cookie with lots and lots of vanilla bean ice cream and eat it straight from the pan)... mmm...

So, what are the things I should be doing (or should be doing better)? Here are a few I can think of, just off the top of my head:

• Spending regular, quality time with God, in His Word
• Taking better care of myself physically (ie, lay off the Pizookies® and get more exercise)
• Being a better wife and mother
• Doing better at my job (domestic engineering)

That said, I'm really looking forward to school starting again in 11 days. It's been a great and memorable summer and I've enjoyed doing some different things with the Wigglets, but I look forward to the beginning of the school year in the same way other anal people look forward to the first day of the New Year. It's my time to take stock, reorganize, recommit, and plan. I buy new pens. I make resolutions, spreadsheets, charts, and lists. I can't wait for the first day of school.

 

*Yes, friendS. That means, Mom, I count you as one of them.

A Few of My Favorite Things

In (what else?) alphabetical order:

Agatha Christie novels

Books (and Bookcrossing)

Chocolate almond ice cream

Dodgers

Eating

Family

Geocaching

Hume Lake

Internet

Jesus

Kidding around

Logic puzzles

Movies

Numbers

Organizing

Pizookies ®

"Queen Bee"

Rain

Scrapbooking

Third Day

US

Vacations

Words

Youth

Incidentally, I did think of X-words, but nothing that counted as any of my favorite things. Couldn't come up with much for Z.

Gifted

Every good and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with Whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

James 1:17 ESV

I am amazingly blessed. Here are four good and perfect gifts my Father has given me.

 

~ 08/12/06, Salinas, CA

Diving Right In...

Well, not exactly. I've never really been a dive-right-in kind of girl. I've always been the type to test the water first, moving in slowly, as if I have all the time in the world. Robert dives right in. I start with my toes, then step in, moving slowly down the steps until I'm eventually in as far as I want to go - which is, incidentally, rarely complete submersion.

And so it has been with this. I've been toying with the idea of blogging for some time now, always thinking in the back of my mind, "Yes, that would be something I'd like to share with people," but now that Ro has finally hooked me up here, I've sat back for the past few days just testing the waters (originally I typed tasting the waters - teehee).

Nor have I ever been the kind of girl who is comfortable with meeting people for the first time. I'm getting better at it, I think, but I still worry way too much what others will think of me. Yet another reason it's taken me several days to make my first post ~ I want to make just the right impression, you know. Who wants to leave a poor first impression? Some of us care more than others about that. I wish I didn't care quite so much.

And so there it is ~ my first post. It is here only because my ever-wise husband finally told me to "just do it," quit thinking and start writing. So thank you, Ro, for getting me here, for encouraging me, and for loving me.

And to the rest of you who may stumble upon this post: Welcome to my blog.