Love spending time with my family, reading creative blogs and tackling a good project!
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“A virtuous woman teaches her children the ways of her father in heaven. She nurtures her children with the love of Christ, disciplines them with care and wisdom, and trains them in the way they should go.”
“She speaks with wisdom, and faithful instruction is on her tongue.” -Proverbs 31:26
“Start children off on the way they should go,
and even when they are old they will not turn from it.” -Proverbs 22:6
“But Jesus called the children to him and said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these.” -Luke 18:16
Ah, motherhood. A journey deserving of a blog all it’s own, and one of my “job” descriptions that I will never perfect and will always be a student of. Once again God scheduled His timing perfectly…this past week I focused on nurturing my boys and loving them. It was to be all about them. The perfect timing came as it was also the week Cohen had his one year check up which consisted of 5 shots and blood work and Liam had another abscess show up from a recent staff infection along with a bad reaction to his antibiotics. My boys needed me, needed to be comforted and nothing else mattered.
I had planned for this week to be packed full of wonderful educational projects, Bible stories, character building activities and all around greatness (isn’t that how all my weeks have started out?!) But once again God had another plan. Although we did do some fun things, most of our time was spent cuddling together watching movies and just comforting my hurting babies, and that was exactly what a nurturing motherhood looked like for this week.
I’ve started to realize that there is no real way to prepare for your time as a mother. Sure you can Pin all the wonderful and educational activities and bake a fridge full of nutritional food all the while singing Bible songs, but sometimes you’re thrown a curve ball and your new plan as a mommy consists of popsicles and saltine crackers for every meal as you watch the movie Cars for the billionth time. And that is ok.
So, once again my week didn’t go as I had planned, but God taught/reminded me some valuable things…
1) Teaching your children about the love and grace God has for them may be simply by saying “Look at the beautiful day God gave us so we can go to the park,” and singing “Jesus Loves Me” and you scrub the layers of park sand out of every baby chub!
2) No matter how much “valuable” stuff is on your TODO list, when your child asks you to come play blocks, you go play blocks! There will come a day when they will no longer ask you to play and those moments of rocking chair cuddles will be a thing of the sweet past….so forget that mountain of laundry and cherish those moments!
3)Raising my boys to be strong men of character who love God, treat others with compassion and love and stand up for what they believe in is my first priority! Everything else pales in comparison. This also means I need to pray for patience and wisdom in my own life. I also need to lead by example.
I’ve been reading the great and insightful book Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp. It is a great book! I’ve basically highlighted the whole thing! Here are a couple of highlighted parts from this weeks reading….
What a week it has been. God has shown me his sufficiency throughout the hardest parts of this week and I was reminded what was important in my role of motherhood.
Both my sweet boys are napping in their beds, and I think I will join them!
When we moved into our home, our galley kitchen lacked major storage room, so we bought an ugly basic white cupboard to use as our pantry.
**Please forgive my horrible photos….I’ve been lazy and taking photos with my phone
It was supposed to be temporary till we found something more attractive. Well, 5 years later, it’s still in my kitchen, and slightly beat-up. We know that when we do move from this home, it probably won’t make the move with us. So, I thought I would play around with a new crafty project and spice up one of it’s plain sides that faced into the kitchen.
I pulled out my Cricut Frames Cartridge and set to work cutting out different styles of frames onto contact paper. Then I arranged the cut outs onto the cupboard side and then traced around them lightly with pencil. After tracing the frames and then peeling off the contact paper, I chose my paints and set to work
What I wish I had realized before starting this project, was that this the stupid fake wood siding repels paint like no one’s business! So frustrating, but I kept on painting hoping that an added layer of paint would even things out. Even though the cupboard was fighting against my best of intentions to make it pretty, I did find the painting part pretty relaxing! In the two larger frames I did chalkboard paint so we could all leave love notes for each other.
I had finally finished my masterpiece and was pretty happy how it turned out. I didn’t paint the smoothest or straightest lines, but it definitely added color and flair to a once bare wall.
Then as I was making lunch, I hear Liam call out, “No brother! You no touch Mommy’s wall!” I turn around to find Cohen sweetly smiling as he scratches my painted frame off the wall, with not a lot of effort might I add. Like I said before, this cupboard doesn’t like paint.
And I mean it truly does not like paint! I went to write on the chalk board areas and the paint wrote right off! COME ON!!! Lame. Jerad pointed out that I could start over and rough up the wood first so maybe the paint would stick….No thank you! I will gladly re-try this project again, but definitely not on this ridiculous piece of furniture!
Sometimes you just have to get your hands dirty, and having two boys, this happens a lot over here! The other day was so gorgeous and warm (in Feb?!) we decided to play outside and dig in the dirt. Since most of our yard is rock and grass, there isn’t much digging room, but we did manage to make some room in a small abandoned flower bed I haven’t had the desire to plant in as of late.
We dug out some roads for our Hotwheel’s and trucks and lined them with the rocks Liam had carefully selected from around the yard. I even added a little moss for a mini garden, and Liam found a nice round rock that he said was a pond for my garden. Sweet and creative boy.
Cohen got to taste dirt for the first time (all apart of childhood) and then I showed him how to bang rocks together….it’s the little things in life!
Ever since I was little, I have loved creating miniature worlds in my surroundings. Whether it was houses for my barbies, or elaborate villages in the backyard made of rocks and twigs, I was always a happy girl creating small make believe worlds. Pretty sure I was driving the boys crazy with my strong desire to pay attention to detail…Liam really didn’t care if the rocks lining the road matched or if there were tiny flowers scattered through the “garden.” I think Mommy needs a Fairy Garden all her own! Here are few I have seen online….makes me want to create miniature worlds everywhere!
And in case you’d like to make your own lil Fairy Garden, Here is a great tutorial!
The past couple weeks I have received two custom card orders for Papers & Pearls and I absolutely loved doing them! Especially when I’m in a crafty rut, because they provide me with the basis idea for what they want and then I can add my personal touch and sparkle!
I am really happy how they turned out, and even more excited that the wonderful women who ordered them loved them to!
The first was a Valentine’s card! “I Mustache you a question…” Love it.
The second was for a bride’s special day from the women in her family as part of a special tradition! Used an original vintage wedding dress pattern picture and antique buttons and lace.
“Something old, something new. Something borrowed, something blue.”
And last but definitely not least, I made Cohen’s birthday invitations for his Vintage ABC Party!
Love spending time with my family, reading creative blogs and tackling a good project!
