keeping up

Didn't want to leave you hanging. 

Our first time hosting Thanksgiving dinner went well.

The turkey was great, so was the stuffing and gravy.

The only hiccup were the pumpkin pies.

Nate forgot the sugar.

We threw them away and the next day Nate redeemed himself with 3 replacement pies.

They were delicious.

We had a great time with my sister and her kids while they were in town. 

I love the life my kids have with so many cousins and aunts and uncles.

The 14 grandkids range in age from 18years old to 4 years old and everything in between.

Life is busy and good. 

I'm doing my best to keep up with it all.

Keeping up with my cute pack of boy scouts I'm in charge of once a week. 

 

Keeping up with all the Christmas recitals and plays.

My daughters had their vocal recitals.

I love my girls.

Poised, confident, Emmaline. She is 13

I filmed these with my iPhone from the back. Not the best picture but you can hear their pretty voices.

Passionate, lively AnnaKate. She is 11

Taking care of my marriage.

Here we are at 

The Killers

They are an awesome rock band with Brandon Flowers as the lead singer.

Taking care of myself.

That is a big job.

have a laugh

I should post about Thanksgiving but I don't feel like it yet. 

I feel like posting about Sarah.

I'm in the habit of writing things down. I love journaling and have since I was very young, like as soon as I could write.
My kids see me write things down or read things back to them about themselves as babies, or about our family.
Sarah says to me often, when funny or crazy things happen to us,
"mom, write that down"

I have  on my iPhone a little notebook entitled "Funny Sayings" where I write down funny things my kids say.
It's turned into funny things Sarah says. Apparently from the list she is the funniest child I have. 

Now let me warn you, Sarah is very free with her potty words and descriptions.
 Probably because she says them with innocence so I find it cute and don't correct her.
If you are easily offended, don't read on.

I give you
Funny Sayings of Sarah!

"Mom, why did dad marry you?"
Sarah asks in a puzzled voice

Me, answering in an emphatic voice
"Because I'm a good woman"
Sarah "And he thought you were beautiful?"
Me "Yes, I'm a good and beautiful woman"
Sarah "Well, you're getting kindy old on your hands"

(Sarah says kindy instead of kind of)

My friend Karen was over and told Sarah her toes were so cute she was going to eat them.
Sarah said to Gwenyth
"I'm not scared. She's not even hungry"



Sarah was laying on my bed in a happy mood.
She asked me,
"Mom, do you ever see faces in the air?"
For the sake of conversation I said "yes" I wanted to see where she was going with this.
She said
"Me too. I'm going to catch them"
Then she started gently "catching" the faces out of the air as she lay on my bed saying,
"Oh, I caught one! I caught another one! Oh I just caught your grandma! Oh I just caught God!"

I don't know what to say about that one? ;)

One day in passing, Sarah gave me this bit of good advice.
"Jesus doesn't want us to poke our eyes or our skin with scissors, or take pictures of our bums and send them to him on his phone. That doesn't make him happy."

Thank you Sarah. I'm sure you are right.




 I walked into my room to find Sarah laying on my bed in her birthday suit wrapped in a blanket.
It's not unusual to find Sarah under dressed.
She said to me,
"Mom, you are going to be so mad at me"
I said
"I'll try to be understanding"
Sarah "I icked in my underpants. I icked like a baby octopus when it's scared.
Why does a baby octopus ick?"

Me
"I think you mean ink"

I don't remember the context of this conversation. Maybe I had just put her on time out, or finished a very thorough lecture. Anyway, Sarah said....

 "When you get old you're probably going to be nice because you won't have little kids to take care of. That's what grandma's do"
(meaning, that's why grandma's are so nice)

Yesterday after school I was fixing her an after school snack. She said to me with a serious look of concern.
"Mom, today at school it felt like my ears were peeing"

Oh, dear. Excessive ear wax production?

This last one is my favorite. I think the way she says things so earnestly makes it that much more funny and endearing.
If you're not a Mormon I don't know if this will be as funny. It was hilarious to me.
Do you know who Joseph Smith is?
He is a beloved modern day prophet who translated the Book of Mormon and through direct instruction from Jesus Christ and re organized Christ's ancient church.
My husband happens to be a descendant of Joseph Smith's Uncle, John Smith.
This is a source of pride in the family so we have told our kids.
We were at the Joseph Smith Memorial Building in Salt Lake City.
In the Lobby there is a huge marble statue of Joseph Smith.
I asked Sarah if she knew who the statue was of.

She said.
"Our Uncle"
I asked "What is our Uncle's name?"
She said
"Jesus Smith"
 Being there looking at the statue and have her answer  of who our uncle was caught me off guard.
It was a delightful moment as Sarah's mom.
I got a pretty good laugh.
I better clarify our genealogy......



OK
one more.

I was singing loudly as I washed dishes at the kitchen sink.
I finished the song in a glorious crescendo.  ;)

Sarah says to me, while staring at me like she doesn't recognize me.

"Mom, what are you?"

Me. Not quite sure what she means...
"I'm me"
Sarah"Who are you?"
Me "I'm Kristen"
Sarah "No mom, what do you do?"
Me "I'm a mother"
Sarah "No mom, what's you job?"
Me, finally getting it. Thinking of what I wish my side job would be...
"I'm a singer songwriter"
That satisfied her.

I am a singer songwriter in my own little house. Happily writing songs and singing them to myself.
I did get to record the first draft of Silver Compass.
I will post all about that.
Not now but soon. I'm more in a Sarah mood and I'm a girl who goes with the mood.
I hope you had a few laughs.
When my kids crack me up it really makes up for the times they tick me off.
That's why I write it down, so I can focus on the funny and not the crummy

Have a lovely night. See you soon.

Thanksgiving is in 2 days. 

My husband Nathan has volunteered us to make the turkey, stuffing, gravy, pies, and sweet potatoes. 

Hmmmm. I resist being a grown up when it comes to things like this. 

I enjoy being taken care of by my parents and his parents.

 They are still able to and I love it. My mom was thrilled with Nate's offer to do Thanksgiving instead of her doing it. 

That's something I can feel good about. I like helping my mom out. 

I'm about to go to the store and buy the goods. I'm looking around my house through the eyes of "company is coming" and cleaning up piles of stuff. 

I've been trying to eat all the food out of our fridge so we have room for all the left overs. 

I took a nap today with a very full rumbly tummy :/  I take a nap several times a week.

 Maybe more.....Luke's best friend stayed over at our house while his parent were out of town. 

After staying at our house he went to his grandparents. They were struggling to get him to cooperate and do what they thought he should and he yelled at them 

"I want to go back to Kristen's! She let's me do whatever I want. She just lays in bed all day."

Huh.....

I do hide out in my room to read and nap a lot. Especially when I have a houseful of kids.

 If I stay out where I can see them I start bossing them around and ruining all their fun. 

Sometimes I can hardly handle  watching them build another fort and mess up the living room. 

Or watch  my girls try to bake some weird thing without a recipe. 

It's better if I just go read and nap and let them have a fun childhood. 

Back to the Thanksgiving discussion.

This will be our first turkey. I'm a 38 year old American woman and I'm finally making a turkey on Thanksgiving. 

That seems like a milestone. 

I hope it's a tasty milestone. We have 14 members of my family plus my own family of 7 that would like a nice turkey dinner.

I better go to the store.

Next time I want to write about the last couple of songs that I've been working on.

It seems like I never blog about music anymore. 

It seems like I never blog anymore.

Sometimes I can't remember why I blog in the first place?

Either way, next time I'll tell you about the songs I'm working on.

That is one part of being a grown up I do enjoy.

good books

I've always wondered if I'm manic depressive. I experience high highs and low lows. 

I'm married to a man who is very, very consistent and steady. We are a stark contrast from one another.

When I share with him my euphoric experiences he looks at me with a puzzled expression.

Euphoric? He feels like he doesn't experience euphoria, just a consistent state of contentment. 

Steady contentment? Wow. How would that be?

I'm puzzled by his consistent state of mind and he is puzzled by mine. 

I've had some hard days this fall. Many days I haven't been the mother I want to be. I haven't been the person I want to be. I've been trying, as usual, to find ways to maintain some kind of inner peace. 

Cleaning compulsively. Check.

Throwing temper tantrums. Check.

Retreating into myself. Check. 

A few weeks ago I ordered these books off of Amazon.

I felt pulled to them like a magnet. 

They arrived on my porch just in time.

A Course in Miracles

(my BFF Oprah talks about this book often)

I also ordered 

Proof of Heaven by Eben Alexander

I've never heard of the second book but felt a magnetic pull and knew I wanted it. 

These two books have been bringing me some peace and contentment and relief from my lows.

I have had experiences that I consider sacred. 

They have been beautiful and spiritual and miracles in my life. I think these beautiful experiences have given me a knowledge of God's love for all of us.
They have given me a small understanding that things are so much better than they seem.
There is so much more out there. They have given me intense feelings of love and joy but ironically, they have  contributed to my depressed low, lows. 

I feel a home sickness and a deep longing  for the feelings and experiences I've had. 

It's not up to me when these experiences come. 

These feelings are not something I can manufacture on my own. If I could I would stay in a constant state of love, peace and joy. 

Sometimes I feel abandoned by God and angels who have drawn so close to me.

 These feelings are painful. 

The past few days I have been brought back to the knowledge that I have not been abandoned. 

Now is my time on earth in this physical realm learning lessons and allowing for my soul to grow in ways that are only possible here.
It isn't time for me to be in the presence of God and all his loving angels.
That comes later.
Ugh.
How much longer?
I want to get away from the "ugh, how much longer?" feeling.
It's not a pleasant way to go through the day.
I just want some peace. I just want to know I'm loving and living and growing and feel a bit more on the steady contented side of things.
For today, reading these books are keeping my thoughts from the downward spiral.
Thank goodness.

the truth today

Frustrated with my own vanity today. 

Dizzy with  my own complaints and perfectionistic requests.

 I sing John Mayer's song called Gravity like this

Vanity!

 is working against me

Oh Oh and vanity 

Wants to bring me down

Twice as young

 ain't twice as good

and can't sustain like wisdom could

 Wanting more is gonna send me to my knees

I'll never know what makes this woman

 with all the love that her heart can stand

Dream of ways to throw it all away

Vanity

 has taken better women than me

 Now how can that be?

 Just keep me where the light is

Yes, keep me where the light is.

I sing this song to myself often.

Frustrated by how much of my life and energy is spent on cleaning up the same messes over and over and how little of my life is spent on things I love, like writing another song.

Frustrated with my responsibilities. 

Trying to get my girls to do their homework and learn to read.

It's not coming as easy for them as a lazy mother like me would hope.

Just read it. You sound it out perfectly now put the dang sounds together! 

They feel my frustration and run off mad and crying. 

Sarah of course has to throw in

"You're the worst mom ever!!!"

When I'm in a good place mentally this hurled accusation rolls off my back. 

When I'm frustrated with my own stuff and their stuff, it makes me walk off and lock myself in the bathroom for a while.

Today is the last sunny warm day. Tomorrow it is going to snow...

I'm now going to do my best to get my girls to wear some decent clothes to school.

We are going to walk to school in the sunshine and see if that helps.

I sound petty and weak don't I.

Older mothers who are now dealing with the problems of their adult children would smile at my little problems.

Just keeping it real

sometimes it's better not to ask permission

If they would have asked if they could clean out the coop on Sunday in their Sunday dresses I would have said no way! But since they didn't ask and I didn't know till they were well underway, it turned out to be a great way to productively spend a loooong Sunday afternoon. They were happy and getting along and letting me cook dinner. Watch and enjoy :D

embrace what is

It's the little things these days that are bringing me such contentment and happiness.

My desk drawer.

 My collection of pretties from my mother and grandmothers and great grandmothers. 

Look at my great grandmother Abigail's shoes. They are about a size 5. She must have been tiny. 

                 

My great grandmother Eleanor's lamp she brought back from Germany. 

My sweet canary's song and delightful yellow feathers. 

I think I'll always have a canary. 

Looking at picture of my sweet babies.

Holding those beautiful stones polished and shaped like eggs. 

My dog Tabitha. She loves me best. 

She follows me around and her main goal is to be on my lap. 

These simple pleasures has made me think of a my husband's great grandfather's collection of favorite poems he kept in a little note book.

"A rose, fresh cut and placed within a vase

A table cleared, a lamp beside a chair

And books I have loved beside me there.

Oh! I have found such joy!

I wish I might tell every woman who goes seeking

for some elusive, feverish delight,

That very close to home the great joys are

these fundamental things

Old as the race

Yet never, through the ages common place. "

by Grace Noll Crowell

To be honest at times I am that woman seeking for for some elusive, feverish delight. 

I blame it on my big imagination and my childish faith. 

I don't think big imaginations and childish faith are bad, I think they are good 

But

Sometimes I start in on a day dream and I'm half way around the world with people I love from the past and present. 

I wake up from my day dream jolted into the present moment of

 laundry and limitations. 

Resenting what is.

Resisting what is.

I forget that this moment in time is a part of my glorious eternal life.

This moment in time is all that is real and in my grasp.

This moment is where all the power and joy exists.

Embrace what is or you'll suffer.

That's a line from my newest song I wrote 

just for the joy of it.

I've been thinking about what that means.

Embrace what is.

I don't think it means I have to just lay down and submissively accept what is.

I think it means  embracing a situation or circumstance that you may not want but is what is.

 Embrace it fully and you will find your way through it. You will learn from it and progress beyond it until it is behind you and you are embracing a new set of challenges or realities. 

I am trying to embrace the fact that my guitar talent is a mere sprout.

 I'm embracing it by writing songs anyway. 

I'm embracing the fact that I have a lot of messy unorganized closets and right now I can dump all their contents out and organize them. Time consuming yet satisfying work. 

Embrace what is.

I'm embracing the reality that my children need me to do simple things for them but these simple and repetitive  things done consistently by and with me are monumental in there development.

I am ir-replaceable in their lives. 

When I resent and resist what is,

 I suffer.

I've learned this over and over. 

So these days I'm embracing my life in all it's repetition and tedium.

Grocery shopping has never been so fun. (I'm not being sarcastic)

Cheers to another regular Tuesday!