seems to be working

Since I posted about a gentler approach, I have really tried hard to speak slowly and gently. It seems to be working. This morning though I really see how impatient I really am. Sometimes I just don't know what to do when Ethan reacts so badly to my requests.

Just this morning I have felt very full of anger and impatience. I did something that I've never done before and it so far has really made a difference. I turned to God's word in the moment to help me rather than waiting till I had "free time" to read. I made the boys and myself teas and we sat down with our Bibles and read. I've been learning about not allowing my emotions to rule me rather to allow the truth to rule me and inform my emotions. This morning my emotions were getting the better of me, so I stopped and tried to turn to the truth. God's word is so powerful and it was good to go to His word and read the truth and dwell on the truth.

For me this morning I was reading about Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane. He endured so much pain and anguish because of me and my sin. Reminding myself that Jesus lived here and felt so much and yet remained strong so that I might find forgiveness was an amazing truth to dwell on.

May I teach my boys to find comfort and forgiveness in Christ.

a gentler approach

Yesterday was shocking. Ethan has gotten to a extreme defiant stage arguing with me over the most mundane details. I took a hard line approach with him, and was stern in my correction. Yet, I totally lost my cool with him twice. So very thankful for God's forgiveness for both of us. This morning it was all starting again with scream crying requests from Ethan and me getting very frustrated with his lack of ability to calm down and speak in a somewhat normal tone of voice. Terry suggested to me that maybe I take a gentler approach. Oh, it is so good to do this parenting thing with him. I hadn't even considered that tactic, and I am thankful for the suggestion. I feel much calmer already and I can tell so does Ethan.

The more I think about Terry's suggestion the more I want to really try not just today but in our future to do that. I want to speak to Ethan with the same tone and respect that Terry and I try and speak to one another. And I want Ethan to speak that way to us and to Seth and Naomi. I thought about it recently that I speak to Ethan in such a derogatory sort of way, justifying it that he is a child. Yet, that's not right at all. I want to speak calmly and gently and teach him to respond to calm direction instead of teaching him he doesn't have to obey until my tone becomes like that of a lion, rawr!

All I can do is seek to do this new "method" through prayer and His strength. I'll keep you posted.

thinking of you

hi friend, just to you my dear friend kcj, thinking of you daily and praying for you. keep me posted on baby bump when you get a chance!

books and dreaming

I read a post on another blog about a book pile that never sees the book shelf because they are read so often. What is your book pile like that?

I think the favorites on our shelves at the moment are Jack, it's a Rainy Day by Rebecca Elgar, (Ethan LOVES Jack). Seth loves to look at My First 1001 Words (a Brittish book), They both love brown bear, brown bear what do you see, and We're going on a bear hunt.

I've requested to our library to get The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency for me, and Don't let the pigeon drive the bus for the boys.

If you could spend time learning one new skill, what would it be? For me right now, I'd love to learn how to sew and have some understanding about fabrics etc. And if I could sew, I would make a patchwork quilt I think. One day maybe.

this afternoon

This afternoon was a totally different day. My prayer was answered and I was able to enjoy the boys and thankfully there weren't as many melt downs. Even once Ethan stopped himself just before he threw a fit and decided to share his toy with Seth. I almost couldn't believe it. Now that I reflect on it, why should I be so shocked, God is amazing and gracious.

That is something that Terry and I were talking about tonight, how God is so amazingly gracious. I was asking Terry why we should evangelize, which led to talking about what we deserve in life. We deserve nothing, so every good thing that we have is God's grace to us. When I really dwell on the truth of this, it makes me ashamed that I am so quick to grumble.

I was wondering about evangelizing because I was reading in Ephesians about how God predestined us to be saved to glorify himself. I lost focus of why since it's already set out to be done. Terry reminded me that we are told to spread the good news. This relates in my head to prayer. God is in control of everything and is not dependent on us, YET, we are commanded to pray and that our prayers will be answered. I don't know how it all works but I do know that we are to pray and we are to love others through sharing the news of Christ's death and forgiveness and the truth is that this brings Him glory.

I do desire to know Him better, to live and breathe Him, to make much of Him, so much so that anyone who meets me wants to know what is my source of Joy. Oh, to have that kind of knowledge. I guess this is often what Paul prayed for for the churches that he loved and served. May it be my prayer for others, and may I understand how to live out this desire.

two days in a row

I can't believe it either, two days in a row of posting.

Today has been very frustrating. I gage a day by how well I handle situations more than how Ethan and Seth or Naomi are acting. And I have seriously been misbehaving. Today Ethan has been having serious melt downs over the tiniest things. For example, he was trying to wrap his bear with a blanket so that he could lay the bear down to sleep. When he couldn't get it the way he wanted it, he started SCREAMING. This was the second time he had just started screaming and crying over an incident like this, and then I lost my cool as well. I felt so angry with him as I tried to calm him down. How's that going to work? Me screaming calm down, stop screaming. Children are smarter than that, why should he stop screaming when I am. I ended up having to walk away from him and sit down to calm myself down and then came back to him and said I was sorry for what I had done. By then he had calmed down too and we hugged.

I think what is setting me over the edge is not just Ethan's screaming but Seth just gets into EVERYTHING. Which is fine but it gets a little old when I repeatedly say to Seth, don't touch, stop doing that, Seth STOP! Which then he tests me to see if I mean what I am saying, which means I have to discipline, and often it seems it is happening the most when I am feeding Naomi. AH, the life of having three so young.

The thing that I want to reflect on and change for the afternoon (all three are sleeping right now) is that it's okay. Ethan is 2 and going to have melt downs, Seth is 1 and is going to test boundaries and explore, they are more valuable than getting the house cleaned, or avoiding a mess, so if Ethan is screaming he will stop, and if Seth pulls out all the pens in the drawer I can put them back. Everything is REALLY okay, so why do I need to freak out, we'll get there in the end. Please God, help me to keep this in mind this afternoon!

not that i need to

Okay so I've started ANOTHER blog. This is some kind of addiction i think. My parents have gone now, they left on Monday. The new blog is really for them, I'm going to TRY to post there a few times a week with day to day stories from our lives. I don't know how interesting it will be for anyone other than them, but I'll leave a link to it here.

It was great having them here. Funny in so many ways. This is what I've learned about blogging, I have to do it regularly because I'm terrible at recall and I stink at telling those sort of stories. But I can talk about my current day okay. So I will try and blog here more regularly too. They will probably be short little notes from my days, but a little bit more about me and not as much about the children which is what the other site will be more about.

The first day that my parents were gone was HARD. I had totally gotten use to having them in my day to day life. Everything seemed to remind me of them and I cried a lot for the first two days that they were gone. Not sobbing cried but eyes filled with tears crying. Today was a lot better. I still miss them of course but the pain has eased a lot.

If you've ever seen Good Will Hunting there is a line in there that Robin Williams says about his wife dying and what he misses most about her was the little quirky things that she did. There were things that my parents did that while they were here got on my nerves from time to time, but now that they are gone I actually kind of miss those things about them.

KCJ, you are daily in my thoughts. K is getting so BIG, I love the photos of her, she looks likeshe has a spunky personality...would love to meet in the flesh all three of your girls. I hope you are getting some rest at the end of your pregnancy!