Learning Life Lessons with Your Child: Be Kind!

(Disclaimer to this post: The activities described in this post are currently being tested. We are 12 hours into the test. I may have to retract my position after a longer period of testing!)

For some time, we have had trouble with Claire's sassy mouth. It seems like every word that comes from her mouth is bathed in either ingratitude, complaint or sass. After a long morning yesterday, I finally took my woes to my personal MomSquad (the ladies in my office that have been there and done that and don't judge me for my mothering missteps). I asked, "What in the world can I do to help Claire be more grateful and kind with her words."

The first brave friend gently told me, from her own experience of course and not out of judgment toward me (!), that first, we, as moms, have to look at how our words are coming across to our children.

My history (and Bill's too) is that neither one of us are yellers. So, mentally, I put my "Good Job" sticker by that checkpoint and moved down the list. Perhaps sometimes I'm a little nagging and hurrying in my words and gritting my teeth to Claire (but then again, I'm just trying to get us to work, school, church, social activities on time. Okay, so I put my "Try Harder Next Time" sticker by that checklist item. Do I complain? Oh no, I do complain. Most of the time. I feel like I'm wearing many hats and I complain because none of those hats are worn with excellence. And then my words lash out to the ones I love the most at home.

So the verdict was that I had some work to do on my own mouth.

As I got Claire buckled into the car after pre-school and started driving home, I started a conversation with her.

Me: "Claire, God has talked to me today and He told me that I haven't been speaking very kind words to you. Will you forgive me?"

Claire: "That's okay Mommy" (notice that she didn't forgive me...she pointed this out later that evening when I was recounting the story to Bill!)

Me: "Claire, I am going to try really hard to be kind to you with my words. But I need your help. If you can be kind to me with your words, I think it will remind me to be kind to you. Can we do that together."

Claire: "Yes, we can be kind one to another" (Good job Ms. Patty...that verse was her Sunday School verse this past week).

I continued to re-iterate the point down the road and felt like we were making some progress. First test came when we drove by Toys-R-Us and I told her "not tonight". Test begins. Her mouth opened and she started to whine and complain, and then something miraculous happened. She caught herself and said, "I'm not being very kind." Bingo Sister. You got it. You understand.

Now, before I slap the "Terrific Job, Mom" sticker on this test, I need to tell you that later that night as she threw a tantrum over something very mild (in my opinion), and after I reminded her that she wasn't being kind with her words, she let me know that she "didn't feel like being kind" and that she was mad, and sad and angry (thanks pre-school for teaching her to put words to her feelings)! But I will give both her and I a B+ for our effort and will continue to repeat the lesson.

I learned a valuable lesson in parenting yesterday. It's not always about correcting and guiding my child, but sometimes I have to pray for direction and help her learn what I am learning. Wish us luck tonight!

Happy New Year!

I know it's not January 1! However, I feel like it's the beginning of a new year for me. This weekend, I went to Boston (well, actually Lowell, MA which is about 30 miles outside of Boston) and coordinated my final Living Proof Live event for 2010. My first event of 2011 is in April. That means I have 6 months before another event. I do have a couple of more travel conferences in the next month, but the intensity of coordinating an event is behind me for 2010.

So, I made a list tonight of things I want to be intentional about doing and getting into a strong habit of doing for the next 6 months. As friends, you can help keep me accountable. Here's my top 6 projects for the next 6 months:

1. Plan the best birthday party a 4 yr. old could ever have! That includes finishing my sewing project for Claire's November 1st birthday. (I can't wait to post pictures).
2. Return to weekly attendance of our Wednesday night church activities
3. Exercise. To be specific, I would like to start running again and dabble in either yoga or pilates.
4. Start shopping for Christmas! Well, and actually catch up on 2010 neglected birthday presents (Sorry Gran and Owen, it's coming).
5. Take control over my nutrition due to being off of Remicade. Which includes more cooking and attempting new recipes. STOP eating Mexican!!!
6. Clean, clean, clean! Oh, this may be my favorite. I can't wait to have a sparkling home again! Most likely, just in time to decorate for Christmas and get it all dirty again!

What are your fall/winter goals? I am so good at making goals in January. But I think October is as good of a time for goal-setting as any month.

I Believe

When I was a senior in high school, I was given an English assignment to write a first-person perspective paper on my summer. That summer, our family had celebrated the marriage of my one and only, older sister. As you can imagine, and I experienced first-hand 11 years when I got married, it was an all-consuming summer of wedding details. I was quite the baby of the family and acted the role 100% that entire summer. I wanted nothing to do with the wedding, the showers, the festivities (until the day of the wedding when all of these handsome college guys showed up that were friends of my sister and brother-in-law). When I wrote that paper 2 months later, I aired all of my griefs toward that wedding. And guess what? The teacher posted THOSE papers on the bulletin board for parent-teacher night. My mother was appalled. She still shakes her head about it to this day!

Where am I going? I feel like this post may be too honest, one that I might be appalled at later due to my lack of faith; however, more importantly, I pray that it will minister to someone walking a similar road - now or in the future.

I have written a little along the way on this blog about being diagnosed with Crohn's disease about 18 months ago. The journey has been nearly a 3 year journey as symptoms were there, but we couldn't put our finger on the diagnosis 100%. For the past 15 months, I have been on a high-powered drug to offset the symptoms; however, it doesn't get to the root of the cause of this disease. So once I go off this very expensive and heavy-laden-with-side-effects drug, the symptoms will most likely come back. It has been a journey for our family as we have prayed and wrestled with whether to be on the medicine. In the 15 months I have been on the medicine, I have felt better; however, the thoughts and fears always are looming that this chronic disease will be with me forever and effect my quality of life. I have cried out to the Lord for healing realizing that healing could either be COMPLETE healing from the disease from the Lord or it could be healing through on-going use of medicine or many alternatives in between.

I have struggled off and on in my faith that God would truly heal all my disease.

I have also written about our new business venture. It has been such a joy to watch my husband take ownership over this, the leadership/communication/inter-personal skills he has developed in such a short time. It is my greatest delight to see people pleased with what he does. Greater more, my delight at seeing him pleased at what he does. It has also been hard. I haven't always been the supportive wife and partner that I have been called to be. I have mentioned in previous posts that Bill is a man of great faith. He doesn't doubt that God will do what He says He will do (thanks Beth Moore and "Believing God"). Bill absolutely, 100% believes that the Lord led us into this season of being owners of a construction/excavating company and that He will not abandon us. Many nights as we sit down for supper, Bill will look at me and say, "He gave us our manna today. Just enough."

I have struggled off and on in my faith that God would truly be our portion.

Claire, in the past 4-5 months, has been given us FITS. I am not ashamed to admit that she has a stronger personality that both her mother and her father. I have never wanted to squelch the personality that God has created in her. That personality amuses me many days and I am assured that God is raising up a mighty leader that won't take no for an answer. But that personality also has me finding great joy in tenderizing meat with a meat tenderizer or has me beating a wiffle ball bat against our bedroom floor (I'm not kidding about that one)! Bill and I, many times, have looked at each other and thrown our hands up admitting we have no idea how to parent this gift from God. I am happy to report that this tide has shifted in the past 3 weeks. Prior to those three weeks, I thought all three of us were going to lose our minds and join the circus. Have you ever read the children's book "You Are My I Love You"? It is a sweet book that talks about the extremes of parent and child. One page reads, "I am your parent, you are my child. I am your calm, you are my wild." That is our story!

I have struggled off and on in my faith that God would truly calm my little 'raging sea'.

And being completely honest here, of lately, I have struggled to understand how any of the above matters and how God could care about these little inconveniences in MY life. As I have walked the journey with a best friend who has a 2 1/2 year old son who has been fighting brain cancer for the past year, walking with women day in and day out in my women's ministry position who deal with infertility, terminal illness, bankruptcy, failed marriages, addictions and on and on.

I have struggled, more so than not, in my faith that God holds my every moment, that He holds MY world in His hands and cares for me as much as these others.

And then, out of the blue, I listened to a song that I am sure our event worship leader, Travis Cottrell, has sung many times at our events. When I heard it, I about ran off of the road trying to find paper to scribble the lyrics down because it was my thoughts...word for word.

You hold my every moment

You calm my raging sea

You walk with me through fire

You heal all my disease

I trust in you, I trust in you

I believe You're my healer

I believe You are all I need

I believe You're my portion

I believe You're more than enough for me

Nothing is impossible for You, Nothing is impossible.

Nothing is impossible for You, You hold my world in Your hands.

(from the song "Healer")

In my heart, I truly believe that God is powerful enough to take care of all of these things. However, I also know that God allows many circumstances into our lives to build our faith in Him. And that is the case for me! I would love to say that as I have walked through some fiery situations, that I gave all glory to God. I, sadly, can't. However, I know that with each trial, my faith gets a tad bit stronger.

Although We See No Wind or Rain

We jokingly say in our family that I am the Chief Financial Officer of our family (handle the finances, Type A personality to the point of being OCD) and Bill is the Chief Operations Officer of our family (the hard-working dreamer, takes one day at a time). In our first years of marriage, some of the biggest struggles we had would be from his "dreaming" and my squelching those dreams and giving him a reality-check.

I always knew that Bill dreamed of owning his own company. Since he was in the field of construction and built our first two homes, I always assumed he would be a general contractor one day although his strength and expertise in this field was the heavy-equipment, excavating and digging utilities. As he dreamed of being on his own, I was always more comfortable with the liability being on someone else's shoulders and I was comfortable with both of us working for someone else.

God doesn't always like for us to be in our comfort zones.

Late this past winter, the construction work scarcity finally hit middle TN. For a couple of weeks, Bill was getting fewer and fewer hours from his boss, who owned his small construction company that built higher-end homes. Just as Bill was filling out unemployment papers and applying to Home Depot just to keep a job, the Lord turned a chapter in our lives.

One morning, my devotion was on 2 Kings 3:16-17:

"Then [Elisha] said, "This is what the LORD says: 'Dig ditch after ditch in this stream.' For the LORD says, 'You will not see wind or rain, but the stream will be filled with water, and you will drink - you and your cattle and your animals.' This is easy in the LORD's sight. He will also hand Moab over to you."

The devotion spoke more on spiritual blessings. I hid the truths in my heart that morning. Memorizing the verse as best as I could and promising myself to expect the unexpected in my spiritual life that day.

As I was driving to work, Bill called me. Just that morning, his boss had approached him about purchasing the excavating equipment (a dump truck, dozier, backhoe, skid steer and misc. equipment) and going out on his own.

I know the next few minutes were nothing of what Bill expected. I chuckled in the phone and recited in my mind the verses I had just memorized this morning (dig ditch after ditch [excavating is digging ditches]...you'll neither see the wind nor the rain [this is a very hard economic time...it didn't make sense to go into business for ourselves], but the streams will be filled...this is easy in the sight of the LORD).

Bill was astonished by my reaction and the words that I told him about 2 Kings. He is a man of great faith and believes God will do the impossible, despite a hardening economy, despite the downturn in the housing industry. So Bill had been praying, unbeknownst to me, for some time that God would provide us with an opportunity to start our own excavating business. However, he knew his first prayer would need to be that his wife (that's me!) would be open to the idea!

We were amazed at how both of us, the dreamer and the realist, were both on the same spiritual page. We were going to have to go against conventional wisdom and do this. Everything in our day and times told us purchasing heavy construction equipment and going out on our own was foolish. We had been dreaming of me coming home from work soon, and were in the midst of making some adjustments to our 2 income lifestyle. Adding this equipment debt would not accomplish those goals as soon as we thought, but we both knew that all of our dreams were easy in the sight of the LORD!

It hasn't been a cake-walk these first few months of being a small business owner. The flood hit Nashville and knocked us off the grid for a couple of weeks, but then God provided work in helping people re-build after the flood. I often re-read that devotion. One portion says, "It is not the part of faith to question, but to obey. The ditches were made, and the water came pouring in from some supernatural source."

"Oh, for that faith that can act by faith and not by sight, and expect God to work although we see no wind or rain." --A.B. Simpson

A Fresh Start

Last Sunday afternoon, Bill and I took Claire to meet her new teachers at NCS. I felt a lump in my throat as a read her class name, Pre-K Transition, realizing that if you drop "Pre" and "Transition", our baby will be in Kindergarten. Only 2 short years.

The classrooms looked so fresh, she had a new folder for new projects. New teachers, new (and some old) friends, new procedures...thus I thought it was a great opportunity for me to have some new-ness in my life.

A couple of weeks ago, I started working with a Wellness Coach. Her name is Janis and she is the sister of one of my co-workers. Janis is "coaching" me for free in order to finish some credits, so it was a perfect opportunity for me to jump at such an opportunity. Janis and I had been talking for a couple of weeks about some changes I wanted to make/implement. She never tells me what to do. She just has this uncanny way of drawing it out of me and then asks me how I am going to put that change into place and be successful.

In addition to Claire's new school year and my wellness coaching, Bill and I decided for me to take a break from Remicade. This is the drug that I have been on for 1 year, every 8 weeks for the diagnosis of Crohn's Disease that I received 18 months ago. Remicade had caused some scary side-effects since I have been on it. Nothing horrific, but just enough to scare this non-medicine taking girl! As I walked out of the doctor's office last Tuesday, there was a pep in my step. Although Remicade makes me feel better, I believe that as long as I was on the medicine, I would have a dark cloud over me reminding me that I had this disease.

If all of these changes hasn't been enough, I also started the task of couponing for our family. Yes, I was the cynical one, the critical one that despite hearing my friends testimonies of how much money they were saving, I believed my time was much more valuable than the money I would save at the check-out with coupons. However, it has become necessary, due largely to starting our own company 5 months ago, for me to save wherever I can. At this point in our lives, my time doesn't matter and this is one additional way I can help invest in our future!

All of these changes have sometimes felt overwhelming. Especially as I am sitting up alone late at night on the couponing websites as everyone else in the house sleeps. But, oh, how good it feels when I check-out and gradually increase my check-out savings (my best record is saving 54%). But changes are also empowering. They give you energy when they are accomplished.

What changes have you made or do you need to make in your life? I am still making a list and hope to update you soon!

My Own "Comedy of Errors"

Last Friday, if I can say so myself, I was looking quite summery and "cute" in a new Oxford-style shirt dress that I had picked up at Talbot's in their close-out summer sale. I LOVE, love, love Talbot's, but rarely afford myself the luxury of such nice clothes. But I love the classic, timeless look they continue to present to today's shopper!

Enough about Talbots, this post is about me!

It had been a hard Friday at the office, some intense conversations, hard decisions, and my head was pounding. I don't have headaches often, so for all I know, this could have been a tee-tiny headache in the book of headaches or it could have been a migraine. All I know is that I wanted to close my eyes and throw up!

So, despite looking cute, I head home when quittin' time came and just felt plum bad. I picked up Claire from school and prayed that she would have grace and mercy on me and just be really quiet on the way home. All was good until I made a left turn out of the school parking lot.

She wanted to go right today!

And the screaming started. And the crying. And the heartbreaking wailing of me not turning right.

I begged her, "Claire, Mommy has a really, REALLY bad headache. Please quit crying. Please quit yelling at me. I am about to throw up."

My pleas did not work. So against all parenting advise, I started pleading...with a bribe.

"Claire, you know that grocery store on the road that me and you are usually scared to pull into. I'll pull into it today and get you WHATEVER you want if you will stop crying!"

The store in conversation is named Eddie's Market and it's the type of market that probably has really nice people working in it (found out that was so later) but just looks a little too sketchy from the outside.

We went and Claire was excited to pick out a Orange Sherbert Push-Up and a Grape Crush. I got a Heath Bar (because that makes headaches go away...didn't you know that )!

We went to pay and the young lady behind the counter was so sweet to Claire. I even heard myself saying that we might have to come back since she was so nice.

So Claire and I headed out the door. As I exited the door, being held by a man without a shirt on and another shady looking fella, my white high-heeled sandal hung in the door mat.

And down I went.

Yes, in my new, cute blue dress. (I tried my best to keep my dignity in tact).

The nice, but still shady-looking, gentleman, handed me my shoe and asked me if I was okay. Claire gathered up my wallet, drink and candybar and then asked me why I fell down!!!!

We got in the vehicle with my pride shattered (swearing never again to go to Eddie's) and head throbbing. As we pull onto the interstate, Claire was silent and I thought "I can make it home!"

Claire starts slowly, softly, but ever growing panic in her voice, yelling "Mommy!"

As I looked back at her, I realized instead of "pushing up" the Push-Up, she pulled the stick out! So there she was holding the cardboard cylinder and the stick with the ice cream on her lap. So I quickly handed over driving to my knees, grabbed all three items and re-assembled the push up (please recall with me...as I didn't recall in the moment...that not too many years ago I took a drive off the road and broke my back due to trying to do something similar for my precious little girl...how many times does one girl need to break her back to remember that).

So, Push-Up was re-assembled and I look down to see many plops of sherbert on my new, cute, blue dress.

As we head on down the interstate, Claire asks for her Grape Crush. Without thinking about the tumble I just took on the side-walk, I opened the Crush...only for it to spew all over...you got it, my cute, new, blue dress.

So, you may ask, how is the dress! I'm not sure. It's dry clean only and I haven't had time to get to the dry cleaners.

July is Quickly Coming to an End

I can hardly believe that July is coming to an end. I longed for vacation for so long and now that it is over, it feels like the summer is over! I have had such a quiet summer with traveling for work and I know that August-November will be the price I will pay for being home so much (I calculated that I will be away from home 30 days from the first of August to the first of November).

About vacation...we had a fabulous time. I had two goals when I left for vacation: make memories for Claire (we did) and decompress from work and some other things that were sitting heavy on my emotional shoulders (check!) and spend some significant quality time with God. I was able to do all of this and came back so spiritually and emotionally refreshed.

I have to show you a picture (bad as it may be) of Claire in her "bikino". She was so cute in it.

And one of her and her number 1 man building a "Sand Truck"

And one of her in MY favorite bathing suit!

The "little fish" learned how to swim on vacation. She had the full attention of grandparents, aunt, uncle and 2 cousins! It was just a great week!

As soon as we got back on Sunday afternoon, our church's VBS started Sunday night. So we were off and running. It felt, by the end of the week, that all of the benefits of vacation were out the door; however, as life has slowed back down this week, I feel myself loosening up and reaping the benefits of vacation.

I'll, hopefully, tell you more, later, about what's been going on in The Cato House lately.