Weeks 7, 8, 9, and 10--Disposal, Toothpaste, Family, and Earthquakes

Contemplations

It's been a long time since I've written. When I embarked on this adventure, I specifically stated that I would not allow this blog to get in the way of my family or home responsibilities. These past four weeks I've had to push it aside to focus on my priorities. Life has really seemed to speed up in the last month. I can't really think of any one specific reason why. I think it is a combination of things.

The most time-consuming thing right now is continued potty training. April is doing really well. Still having occasional accidents, but is getting better at vocalizing when she has to go. She's peed in the big potty at WinCo and church! Yay! No more hauling the little potty to church every week! (I'll probably take it at least one more week just to be sure.)

Four days ago I added night training to my list of responsibilities. The boys will be four next month and still don't make it through the night. After reading John Rosemond's book in preparation to train April, I decided that once the pull-ups were gone, I wasn't buying any more. The boys are just going to have to learn to stay dry. We used the last pull-up three nights ago. Lukas has stayed dry both nights! Koda has woken up wet both mornings. Hopefully he'll catch on soon. My sister used this method with my niece and it didn't take long. In the meantime, it means I'm washing bedding every day. In the long-run, it will be well worth it, but right now, I'm just tired of doing laundry.

I added a new writing responsibility to my plate in January when I started writing a weekly post for The Frugal Find. This isn't that bad as I can sometimes use Near to Nothing posts and just tweak them a bit. (Sorry, can't figure out why this is centered.)

Another added stress has been the refi we're currently in the middle of. We're hoping to close in the next couple weeks. If all goes through as planned, we'll save a good chunk of money every month and a ton over the life of the loan. But before it can be finalized, we have some things we need to fix around the house. It's all stuff we wanted to do anyway, but it just wasn't high enough on the priority list to make the time for it. Now we have to do it.

Through it all, I've had quite a few times in the past two months when I just wanted to leave the kids to run amok while I crawled under the covers to hide, cry, and sleep. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE being a full-time mommy and wouldn't want it any other way. I'd really cry if I had to go to work outside the house. But lately I've just been so exhausted.

To get through those times, I just keep reminding myself of God's promises of rest in Psalm 127:2 and the glorious future rest in heaven that we read about in Hebrews 4. It truly is only the Lord who can sustain us in troubled times.

Habits in Progress

1. Scripture Saturation: With the craziness of February, I fell quite behind and am still about 10 days behind. Rather than try to catch up, I decided to start March's reading list and go back and pick up February's neglected readings as I have the time. I think this way I will be less discouraged about being behind. I am so far current for March.
2. Toy Pick-Up Time: Going well---need to do a thorough purge of the toys to make it easier and faster.
3. A Hug and a Kiss: Met Robbie at the door almost every day this week!
4. Water: This is becoming such a habit that when I forget, I remember as soon as I start eating my meal.
5. WDTP Scripture Memorization: Proverbs 29:17 "Discipline your son, and he will give you rest; he will give delight to your heart." Due this Thursday.
6. Two More Hugs: Great!! Just gave them each a hug this evening!
7. Disposal Check: Now that they boys are old enough and coordinated enough, I've been having them carry their own dishes to the kitchen after meals. They usually dump them into the sink. But since they can't see what they're doing, this means that the silverware sometimes ends up in the garbage disposal. After running a few spoons through the disposal, I decided I need to make a habit of checking it before running it. Since then, I haven't run any silverware through it.
8. Toothpaste Check: April LOVES to brush her teeth! I often find her at the bathroom sink brushing away. She also loves toothpaste. She discovered that there is often a great supply of toothpaste in the sink after the older kids are done brushing. I have found her scraping the toothpaste out of the sink with her toothbrush and brushing with it. Gross!! So I now regularly check and clean the sink after the older kids are done.
9. Family Time Tuesdays: Sort of as a result of all the recent busyness and craziness, Robbie and I ended up having a huge discussion about how we can make more time for the kids. We decided that Tuesday nights are going to be family time. On Tuesdays, Robbie will not do any school work until after the kids go to bed. I will plan meals that require little or no prep just before dinner time and will wait to clean up the dishes until after the kids are in bed. This last Tuesday was the first time. We all played Legos together and it was so fun! The boys especially liked building things.

This Week's One New Habit

For those of us living in earthquake country, it is very important that we all have emergency supplies on hand: battery-operated radio, drinking water, flashlights, non-perishable food. I used to be real good at making sure we had all these things on hand. But since we moved into our house (almost 3 years ago), I haven't really collected these things again. I've wanted to get this going for some time now, but this week's small quake really gave me motivation.

Buying enough food for six of us for a few days will be really expensive. So to spread out the cost, I plan on buying one or two canned items each time I'm at the grocery store to put away in our earthquake kit. Once I've stocked up as much as we need, I will continue to buy new stuff and use it to replace items that are nearing their expiration date--yes, non-perishables do perish.

So, I hereby resolve to buy at least one extra can of food every time I am at WinCo in order to build up our earthquake emergency kit.