Hopeful Homemaker

Joy, week 8

February 26, 2012 jennifer JOY in 2012

Tonight’s picture of my daughter peering through the “O” in Joy is a good representation of the week. It’s in the middle of the word, and I feel like I’m in the middle of a lot of things right now. Let’s be honest, the middle is usually the messiest, least pretty stage in most endeavors, and my middle feels a little ugly right now. So I’m somewhere in between the J and the Y in this mission of mine to seek and find greater joy in my daily life. There have been joyful moments and terribly discouraging moments, but a conversation with my parents tonight combined with a few other thoughts and conversations throughout the week made me decide that for now I’m going to focus on the happy parts of being in the middle. Happy things like that sweet little girl’s face above.

I’ve mentioned before that I’m reading a book about creativity. It’s slow going because it sits in my purse and I only read it when I’m waiting in the car for some reason and there isn’t some other crisis to take care of. This week I read a chapter that I particularly liked. The chapter is about how to get good ideas, how to unearth them and grab them. I realize that right now, in my efforts to live more joyfully, I’m doing some scratching for ideas. I’m looking for little things I can change, small adjustments I can make, to feel better about what I’m doing even when it’s crazy. Because let me tell you, my life sure feels crazy, and if I were to really get going and describe some of it for you, you’d agree with me that it sure sounds crazy. There is just SO much going on in our home and SO much of it depends on me. That isn’t going to change anytime soon, so I’m scratching for ideas to make this stage more fun and rewarding for myself, in healthy ways. And when you’re in the middle you usually have some things that are working and some things that aren’t working yet and some things you have yet to implement and some things that need tweaking. And that pretty much sums up my life.

So I let myself spend a few minutes most days at the sewing machine. I enjoy feeling like I get something permanent done, something I can SEE. The bottom line is that my life is going to be crazy for a long time. This “middle” I’m talking about isn’t an overnight experience. The middle of “joy” might be short but the middle in my life reads more like the middle of “supercalifragilisticexpealidocous.” It’s going to take some time. I need to enjoy the process. Therefore, fifteen minutes of sewing is a good investment.

My house needs help. You might think I’m exaggerating but I’m not. It really needs some help and I’m hoping to provide that help this week. I think I’m starting to get over my cold, and if that’s true then there’s reason to believe I might be able to do it. If I can keep the schedule under control, that is. There is this very fine line between serving your children and leaving their messes for them to clean up, between teaching responsibility and work and keeping things looking nice enough for mom to be satisfied. These balances are fairly simple to maintain when we’re not as busy, but when we’re running crazy it’s much more difficult. We’re really busy.

We had more Parent/Teacher conferences this week and they went well. Thank goodness! We had lots of friends over to play. My seven year old went to her first piano lesson and really liked it (I knew she would, but it did take an ice cream cone to convince her to try). I went to a great Church activity with my daughter. We had lacrosse practices, soccer practices, futsal games, birthday parties, snowboarding, choir practices and so forth. My two year old hasn’t slept well and I’ve had some tender moments in the night when I gathered her into my arms as she cried, “Mommy I want you!” Every time she says that I remind myself how lucky I am to hear it. My four year old said some incredibly cute things to me. She’s really into pinkie promises right now for some reason. She asks me to pinkie promise her things that are important to her, and it’s quite cute. Last night she was watching a movie and a character in the story didn’t do something they had committed to do. She said to me, “They should have pinkie promised.” So cute.

It sounds silly to say that my children got their homework done, but really it’s huge. With six children all having homework daily, and all their different reading levels and materials, it takes me at least a couple of hours to get it taken care of. Sometimes it takes me much longer, like on Thursday night when I was up until 1:30 a.m. with my son, who had to be at school before 6:45 a.m. Friday morning. But it got done, and sometimes that is victory enough for an entire week.

My planning needs work. I missed my weekly planning this morning because I had to get my son up for a service opportunity and never managed to work it in later in the day.

I’m doing really well in my goal to talk to my friends more often. I am so grateful for the blessing of holy scripture to read and study from. I am incredibly grateful for prayer. The thing I’ve learned about prayer is that rarely does an answered prayer give me LESS to do. Most of the time my work load increases. Lately I feel tired and worn out, but it’s a happy tired in some ways because I know that I’m doing the things I should be doing. It’s a happy tired because I’m seeking God’s help with my priorities. I’m not doing them perfectly but I’m getting better and that is all I can control.

So I’m off to try again tomorrow, to remember to pause in the middle of things and remind myself that this is it, that now is the time to find something to be happy about.

Life is good!
Jennifer

Pudgy Little Hands

February 25, 2012 jennifer Musings on Life and Beauty

I love the way little ones cup their chubby hands together to hold a snack. Her little hands and sweet eyelashes melted my heart.

Most of the time she is wild. She takes rubber bands out of her hair and rubs food in it. She undresses and puts on terrible combinations of outfits, usually with the shirt inside out and backwards and the pants from someone else’s drawers. She is forever climbing on top of kitchen counters, bathroom counters, tables. She turns water on in sinks and walks away. She can open doors now, getting into nail polish, big sister’s candy, makeup, soap, markers, you name it. She learned how to open the front door and will quietly follow family members outside. Earlier this week I ran outside to catch someone with a message before they drove away. When I turned around to walk back inside she was running down the driveway toward me, barefoot on the ice. Did I mention she won’t keep her shoes on? Honestly, she often looks like an orphan.

Yet she loves showers, baths, getting her diaper changed, washing her hands. Pretty much she loves water. If it is in a container somewhere she will pour it out. If I don’t clear the table fast enough she dumps every glass of water into one container, no matter how small the container of her choice may be, usually ending in a huge puddle on the table and floor, with her sitting in the middle of it.

She is wild, and yet there is a side of her that is all mine. She wants to be with her family and is wary of strangers. She’s afraid of the trash truck when it drives down our street. She nicknamed herself Puddles and I love it. Sometimes she calls me Mommy puddles. She is afraid of going to sleep alone in her room. She sings and hums to herself. She LOVES to color: on walls, on tables, on my counters and cabinets, on homework that belongs to the big kids, in my books, anywhere.

She wakes up happy and as the school mornings go on and the attention remains focused on the older children, she gets increasingly irritable and when they all leave at last, she needs me all to herself for a while before she’s herself again. She loves to read books. She’ll let me read it once and then she takes the book and says, “Now I am going read it to YOU.” She marches around the house yelling “Fe, Fi, Fo, Fum! I smell blood of an English MAN!” and then she laughs and yells and dances in a circle. She sings “I am a child God!” at the top of her lungs. She eats like a horse. She LOVES babies in all forms: dolls, books, and of course, the real thing.

She’s been avoiding her Dad lately, as if to punish him for being gone so much. This week he spent a lot of time with her to reconnect. She ended up riding around on his shoulders yelling at everyone, “Get out of my house!” We all looked at her and laughed, and then she threw back her head and laughed too. She loves to pretend to be a monster, but when she’s feeling sensitive she tells me “I am a baby girl monster.” She growls with the best of them and gets out the tickle monster gloves to chase us all around the house. She is amazing.

But when all is said and done she is my little girl who loves to be snuggled and tickled and hugged. There is still a part of her that is my baby and these pictures captured that part. She is not what I expected; she is so much more. And I can’t help but wonder what kind of adventure we’ll have watching her grow up.

For now, I’ll give her goldfish crackers and smile at her pudgy little hands.

I love you, Puddles!

Love, Mommy

One comment 8 kids, baby

Heart Shaped English Toffee

February 24, 2012 jennifer Desserts

It’s becoming a tradition for me to make a batch of English toffee for my husband every Valentine’s Day. He loves English toffee, but I don’t make it very often so it’s a thoughtful gift. This year I wanted to try something other than broken shards of toffee in a bag or tin, so I sprayed some non-stick spray in some heart shaped metal pans and poured the hot toffee in them.

I then sprinkled the hot toffee with chocolate chips, let them melt a little, then spread the chocolate and pressed chopped pistachios into the cooling chocolate. I worried that the toffee might be difficult to release from the pans, but they came out very easily and none of them broke.

I don’t think my husband cares what shape the toffee comes in, but I enjoyed trying something new. Sometimes the best treats are common things in a new shape.

If you’re wondering, this is the toffee recipe I use:

English Toffee Ingredients:
2 cups butter 2 cups sugar 1/4 tsp. salt 2 cups semisweet chocolate chips 1 cup finely chopped nuts (I used pistachios) In a large heavy bottomed saucepan, combine butter, sugar and salt. Cook over medium heat, stirring until the butter is melted. Allow to come to a boil, and cook until mixture becomes a dark amber color and the temperature has reached 285 degrees F. (My recipe says to stir occasionally, but I’ve found that if I don’t stir pretty frequently the bottom sometimes burns.)

Line baking pan with aluminum foil or spray with non-stick spray.

When toffee reaches proper temperature, pour onto prepared pan. Sprinkle chocolate chips over the top and let set a minute or two to soften. Spread chocolate into thin even layer. Sprinkle nuts over chocolate and press in slightly.

Place toffee in refrigerator, if desired, to speed setting. Break into pieces and store in an airtight container.

Enjoy!

Hopeful Homemaker