What I've been up too...

VBS prep 24/7.  But with the help of some wonderful volunteers, some amazing friends, and a lot of prayer and hard work it all came together and our first day was a hit so far.  Hopefully the rest of the week will go just as smoothly because all of this really took a toll on me.  But I'm on the mend too thanks to a hubby and SIL who let me rest after work.

Our Registration Table

The Preschool Entrance

The Entrance to Snack room (still a bit in progress)

There is lots more.  Stuff from VBS (including our big set) and lots of fun stuff, reviews and giveaways but some pictures is all I can manage tonight.  For those of you who helped along the way by cheering me on, or helping out. THANK YOU!

Now that I'm through the first day I am reminded how much all this work is worth it.  Not only do I love VBS, but the kids to do.  And that is the most important part!

4 weeks

Well, I've been pretty down on myself weight wise.  I'm eating lots of fruits, but also lots of yummy grilled meats and ice cream lately.  The gym, well, that is non existent these days.  It is all work and family.  The family stuff is great, just busy and filled with new furnaces and family gatherings and the occasional summer cold (of course).  And work is in full throttle right now.

Still these feel some what like excuses but they are also the truth right now.  Realistically I've never been good about maintaining a healthy lifestyle during stressful times.  (I'm not very good at it in non-stressful times too but that's easier to work on).

But, today I need to highlight a victory.  Any victory.

And I realized today that it has been exactly 4 weeks since I gave up diet coke and all soda.  Since that time I have not had ONE DROP of soda.  Not at picnics, or at work, or during stressful times.  Not for breakfast, lunch or dinner.  Not with alcohol.  Not. One. Drop.

And it wasn't easy.

Sure, I've had some more coffee than normal. (learning I like iced coffee with non-fat milk and just a bit of sweetener).  I've had a metric ton of unsweetened ice tea (my caffeine source right now it seems).  I've had some sparkling water, some juice, some more milk and LOTS more water.

The cravings are lessening and are more situational than bodily right now.  I want a diet coke because I'm stressed or tired or miss the taste more than I physically crave one.  My appetite seems smaller and has moved somewhat away from the really bad for you foods.  Burgers and fries just don't taste as good as they used too.  Salads taste awesome.

I can still struggle with drinking enough, particularly if I forget my water bottle at home each day, but I am a lot more hydrated each day.  I am also having LOTs less caffeine, usually just one dose - a coffee or tea - a day.

As for the scale, I haven't been on it, but really that doesn't matter in terms of this diet coke battle.  I think it was important to do regardless of whether it helps me lose weight or not.

I won't lie, sometimes I think giving it up is just plain silly.  As vices go it seems like such a mild one.  And yet, it was something that was controlling my life.  I spent lots of money on it and it really gave me no benefits.

So 4 weeks and counting.  I think I need to get myself a little something to honor my one month mark, (technically 2 days from now), but I'm feeling poor and haven't found something awesome yet.  But my eyes are open for something fabulous.  (I'm open to suggestions).

I do miss diet coke and soda, but overall I'm so pleased to have made it this far.

The Man-child realization

I took a bit of time away from VBS prep this weekend to go up to our church camp with our kids (4th-12th graders).  It was fun to be goofy and do all those fun church camp things.  I get to work with such great kids.  It was fun and great to get away from the chaos of VBS prep work but while I was up at camp I came to a startling realization.

Little goat will almost certainly be taller than me some day.

Yes, I know, this should be obvious but it wasn't something I'd really stopped to take in.  And it is more than just the height.  It is that some day my son, my little baby, will become this Man-Child like some of the kids at camp this weekend.

Someday little goat will be another one of the smelly, boisterous, tall, man-child boys of those middle school and high school years.  And I'm really not sure how I feel about it.  On the one hand, I can hardly take in the speed at which baby goat has become little goat already.  It is exciting but a little scary watching him change and grow. 

But on the other hand, I know that he can be a wonderful man-child.  I hope to help him grow into a kind, gentle, respectful man-child. 

Still, the thought of the future blows my mind.

It goes so fast... baby goat, toddler goat, boy goat, man-child goat.  I'm afraid to blink.  I don't want to miss a thing.

Wordless Wednesday: How does he sleep like this?

Seriously, his butt is like 6 inches off the mattress.  It is like sleeping toddler downward-facing dog!

Enough

Vacation Bible School is coming.  It starts two weeks from today and about this time every year I start getting a little panicky.  I love VBS.  It is a great week and I really enjoy it... once I get there.  During the week of VBS I am gregarious and energetic and excited.  I can troubleshoot and be flexible at the drop of the hat.

Two weeks before, well, let's just say I'm as likely to begin laughing hysterically as I am to burst into tears.

I fluctuate wildly between over confidence and a complete lack of confidence in my event planning skills.  I have confidence because I have put VBS's together 6 times before.  I do know what I am doing and I have the skills to make it work.  I lack confidence because there are just so many components and no matter how many lists I keep I still burst awake at 3am and wonder if X is on my list and if I've taken it into account.  Add to all of this the fact that this is my last event that will complete my first year at my new job.  This time next year I'll have seen how VBS operates at new church but right now I am using the word of others and my own imagination to piece it together.  So even though I know the VBS beast I'm tracking it through completely new territory.

And sometimes I am not certain that I am enough.

I can feel that way a lot, VBS just brings it out.  I can feel like I just am not enough.  I don't have enough time, or enough skills, or enough organization.  I don't have enough volunteers, or patience, or artistic ability.  And even though I know it isn't all me that needs to have all of those skills and abilities, I feel the pressure of being the one organizing and in charge of it all.  SO even when I love what I get to do, sometimes I feel, I am just not enough.

Enough.

But when I take a deep breath I realize that I am wrong.  I am enough.  You know why?

¹ You have searched me, LORD,
   and you know me.
² You know when I sit and when I rise;
   you perceive my thoughts from afar.
³ You discern my going out and my lying down;
   you are familiar with all my ways.
⁴ Before a word is on my tongue
   you, LORD, know it completely.
⁵ You hem me in behind and before,
   and you lay your hand upon me.
⁶ Such knowledge is too wonderful for me,
   too lofty for me to attain.  ⁷ Where can I go from your Spirit?
   Where can I flee from your presence?
⁸ If I go up to the heavens, you are there;
   if I make my bed in the depths, you are there.
⁹ If I rise on the wings of the dawn,
   if I settle on the far side of the sea,
¹⁰ even there your hand will guide me,
   your right hand will hold me fast.
¹¹ If I say, “Surely the darkness will hide me
   and the light become night around me,”
¹² even the darkness will not be dark to you;
   the night will shine like the day,
   for darkness is as light to you.
 ¹³ For you created my inmost being;
   you knit me together in my mother’s womb.
¹⁴ I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;
   your works are wonderful,
   I know that full well.
¹⁵ My frame was not hidden from you
   when I was made in the secret place,
   when I was woven together in the depths of the earth.
¹⁶ Your eyes saw my unformed body;
   all the days ordained for me were written in your book
   before one of them came to be.
¹⁷ How precious to me are your thoughts,^[a] God!
   How vast is the sum of them!
¹⁸ Were I to count them,
   they would outnumber the grains of sand—
   when I awake, I am still with you.

~ Psalm 139:1-18

Coincidentally, this is also the psalm that is the main theme for our VBS this year.  I have often thought of this psalm and related it to children.  I think of it when I pray for children, and my friend's pregnancy.  It gives me confidence to trust that difficult pregnancies can work out, like my friend Sara's pregnancy currently.

But I seldom think of it for myself, but when I do I realize that there is no way I couldn't be enough.  I am called to my ministry and deep down even in my most stressful days I love what I do.  I love working with kids and parents and making all sorts of creative decisions daily.  Even when it is hard I love it and I am good at it.

Of course I am.  God made me for stuff such as this.  He knows me and sees my challenges and successes.  He knows how to raise me up to levels that I have yet to see.  Which isn't to say I won't ever fail, but it is to say that I won't FOREVER fail.  I am fearfully and wonderfully made, and so is each of the 150 kids and 60 volunteers who will come to church in two weeks.

I owe it to them to give it my all.  God expects no less, but God also knows that I am up for the challenge.

And I am.

I am enough.

20 Questions

Hey, did you see my new layout?  I'll be fiddling with it for a while but I finally have a lovely new banner and stuff to go with my new domain name!  Now if I could only think of the perfect tagline....

Anyway, let's play twenty questions today.  Inquiring geeks want to know and all that jazz.  You know the drill you can answer as many or as few as you want in the comments.  Then come back and learn from the wisdom of your fellow bloglanders.

20 Questions:

1.  What is your favorite (quick) and healthy breakfast?
2.  What is your favorite healthy lunch?
3.  What is your favorite family dinner?
4.  What is your favorite healthy snack?
5.  When can you start feeding raw carrots (and crunchy harder to chew veggies) to toddlers?
6.  What other easy (don't need to cook them) veggies do your kids eat?
7.  Have you ever left Target without buying something that wasn't on your list?
8.  Any tips and tricks for week-long travel (flying) with a toddler?
9.  Personal DVD players - a plus with toddlers flying or just more technology?
10. How often do you vacuum?
11. Do you have a favorite workout DVD?
12. I need a new purse.  What do you look for in a purse?
13. What is one thing you do as a family to save some money?
14. What is your shopping philosophy: Do you buy cheaper items more often, or quality more expensive items that last?
15. What should I do with my hair? (see pictures below for current lack-of-style)
16. What is your favorite game to play? (board, card, or sport-type games acceptable)
17. Would you ever want to be on a game show on TV?  If so, which ones?
18. Are you going to go see the final Harry Potter movie?
19. What did you want to be when you grew up?
20. What made you smile today?

As always thanks for sharing your wisdom and helping me get to know you better.  Also I hope you like the new look.

Wordless Wednesday: Mama Goat and her kid

Special thanks to Melissa for taking these awesome pictures.

So it got worse..

Remember yesterday how I hoped that today would be better.  Yeah, not so much.

I got Little Goat's cold.

BUT Little Goat is much better and was able to go to daycare today.

Little Goat still needs an antibiotic and nebs.

BUT for the first time in forever he didn't need an additional steroid for a cold.  And since it has been almost exactly a year since all our asthma testing things are definitely improving as he ages.

Remember our furnace that the blower died?  Yeah the whole thing is dead - like carbon monoxcide emitting dead (if it were on which it isn't).

BUT it isn't January and 20 below out.

Still we have no A/C for at least a week and it is likely to be hot this week.

BUT we have fans and access to pools.  Also see about RE: Not January.

Furnaces are expensive to replace.

BUT we have time to shop around and knew we'd need one in the next few years so at least we aren't totally unprepared.  (Just mostly unprepared!)

It is annoying but at the same time I can't help but be a bit grateful for what we have.  A year\ago, the thought of having a house seemed impossible.  I was on the verge of my position be cut and forced to walk away from my job and we'd just spent an expensive week in Children's figuring out his asthma stuff.

Now we have a house, I have an new amazing job, and Little Goat is so much healthier.

So yeah, not a great few days, but in the grand scheme of things I can handle it.

Of course if you see ads on the blog in the next few days please click on them...Mama needs a new furnace. 

(That seems like the blogger equivalent of passing the hat right? LOL)

(Seriously though, don't worry, we'll make it through.)

Happy 4th of July

Well our plans changed today as both boys of mine were sick.  So we scratched the family BBQ and I didn't get to meet the newest cousin.  Bummer.  Also while our AC was working our furnace blower died, so we are AC-less on a warm day with a feverish toddler.  Also there are bugs in my house - I've discovered some earwigs.  Eeeew.  Eeew.  Eeeew.  Add a bad night of sleep thanks to said toddler, an urgent care run (ear infection and respiratory crap) and a plethora of mosquito bites and I'm not feeling my best either

So you can imagine this was NOT how I planned to spend the 4th this year.  Thankfully I had a great weekend before this point so there were plenty of fun things this weekend (Jason Mraz concert, neighborhood party, bbq with the extended Goat family, etc). 

It is funny, we have expectations about how we think holidays should go.  Or at least I know I do and I get frustrated when reality requires I adapt my expectations.  But often my expectations are not really what a holiday is about.  Take the 4th for example.  It is our nation's birthday.  We celebrate our liberty and our freedom.  And what that really means is that I can complain on my blog and its ok.  And I can own a HOUSE and have all the drama that goes with it.  And I can have a family and have freedom to be with them on the holiday, even if it is quarantined at home.

And I could say publicly that I think the MN government has behaved very childishly in the last weeks with the government shutdown and that's ok.

And I can light my own sparkler and celebrate with some ribs on the porch of my house with my hubby after the toddler finally fell asleep.  And you know what, I didn't need a full fireworks display, or a parade, or a band concert, or a family picnic.  In the end, I had who I needed with me already.

Happy 4th of July!  (I do hope tomorrow might be a little better though!)