The Gift of Experience

Christmas is coming.

I love this season for the magic it brings. Twinkling lights, Rosie Thomas Christmas music, the smell of a fresh turkish fur, chilly weather, decorations, & the spirit of intention; that's what I see in the still small anticipatory moments. I fear however, like every month, the time ushers past me too quickly and I'm caught up in the navigation of daily life with the added holiday agenda.

Already I am dreaming of Christmas morning and seeing the faces of some of those I love opening up presents. I have spent possibly too much time considering just what to wrap up for them before purchasing. Then there's the worry that my children will MISS the reason of the season: Jesus. That I will miss JESUS in the season!

Yesterday, in an epic toy explosion we call KK, we had the chance to examine every single toy we own strewn out around the living room. Wide eyed, my husband and I stared at each other: this is NOT what we want!

I shared, "Sweetie, I really WANT to ask people NOT to get our children toys for Christmas," and he acquiesced.

Now before you think I'm a horrible mother trying to strip the magic of Santa's delivery or rob grandparents of their ability to love long distance, it's NOT that I want to rob my children, it's quite the opposite, I want to GIVE to my children. I am not against the idea of gifting (after all, it's MY very own love language. I LOVE gift giving). What I want though for my children is the gift of experience.

I know, Skylanders are an experience (a technologically odd one but an experience none the less), blocks expand the mind, remote helicopters are fun (for dad), & nerf guns are fabulous but they all lose their magic. Each toy that was so highly coveted soon becomes a thing of the past and only remembered if in generations to come they are resurrected again, like Ninja Turtles or Strawberry Shortcake. What takes longer to dissipate, what builds bonds, what grows relationships is the gift of experience.

From my childhood, what I cherish most now is the gift my grandma gave of The Candy Cane Tree. Before she arrived at our house, she'd hang a barren tree with dozens of candy canes. All three of us would line up at the end of the street and at the word GO would race down and strip the tree of it's new peppermint leaves and see who won the "who got the most!" contest. I remember all of the clothes we would get and between cousins our eyes would meet and silently say, "I can't wait to return this with you on our after-Christmas shopping trip!" I LOVE the annual gift my Aunt and Uncle gave us of family bowling WITH team shirts. And of course, there is always the gift of Christmas Dinner at the castle. Gifts of love, time, & laughter that just STICK in my heart like cinnamon roll frosting on my fingers.

I don't want my children to relive my experience and the magic it brought me. I want them to have their own. I want them to be sown into with opportunity: college support, swimming lessons, a chance to go to the movie theater, an art class, a pottery painting hour, a date for a shake at Sonic, a trip to Dutch Brothers for a hot chocolate. Some of these experiences are less than $5 and give the gift of living life outside of our own financial ability to provide or sustain.

The humbling part is that I realize in writing this that my wish to dictate what is given to my children is selfish. I want to orchestrate the love that is sent to them, given to them, doted upon them to fit within my parenting dreams.

In this moment, I stare at the sea of legos, the ninja turtle figurines, and the endless supply of hot wheels and wonder, is this not relational experience too between brothers? Perhaps I am off base. The heart of this rant, however, is my acknowledgement that time is invaluable and what an amazing opportunity to gift others in our lives with small gifts to encourage relationship. At the very epicenter of my heart is the desire to spend less time frustrated at the chaos of cleaning & more time GIVING LIFE to my family in the art of making memories.

{Looking for ideas on how to give non-toy gifts?? Check out this post!}

Recovering from Recovery

We have come through to the other side of Kheler's post surgical recovery! 

We made it! 

It wasn't like we expected, yet we didn't actually know what to expect.

It was hard. 

You know how doctors give you those "there's a 10% chance x, y, & z could happen" statistics and you think, "Well, THOSE are great odds!"? 

Well, they ARE good odds, but we weren't the 90%, we were the 10%. 

I circled my emotional drain multiple times a day. 

Each morning I started my day on my 1/8' of the bed with the verbal proclamation, "I can't do this!" and I meant it. It wasn't a hypothetical statement, it was one I believed in my core. 

It turns out, we have a VERY strong willed, determined, and stubborn son. All three years of him convinced us that he will become a doesn't-take-dookie Navy Seal Commander. That kid had my husband and I, two people on the same team, convinced the other was an under cover spy working for the enemy. 

We had a son who had become a popsciletarian, anti-beverage, and could be a poster child for DARE...he WOULD NOT take the drugs! I mean, bravo to him, I hope it stays that way, but in this particular season, we were practically {no, we actually were} pinning him down, blowing air up his nostrils to get him to open his mouth long enough to super-soak his throat with hydrocodone only to watch him volcanically erupt it back in our direction. Did you get winded by the ridiculous length of that sentence? It was worse in real life.

In all of it's empty, ugly, exhausting, heart breaking misery though, there was life being planted for us. 

The only comparison I have now for what we went through and now being on the other side is that it was like depression. When you are depressed, truly, dark hole, desolate depressed, you can't even fathom what a smile feels like or remember what happiness FEELS like. People TELL you you will feel it again, but the numbness has spread too deep. 

This was like that. I KNEW it was temporary, but I COULD NOT see the light. I could NOT get on my knees and pray...I could only beg. My prayers became like tick marks on a prison wall, "Just make it stop. Make.It.Stop!" I KNEW there was an ending, but I didn't see how we were going to feel normal again. And in ALL of that, I felt greedy for taking up air space with God. 

Who was I to be praying for a fever, a bleeding throat, a child who was fighting me to get better when there are others with so much more persistent pain? 

I found myself void of the reality that this inconsequential moment in my life MATTERED to Him.

But that's where He worked. 

He climbed in the holes others were keeping Him FOR me. 

He lived in my neighbor who lovingly shared her empathy and was my guide through this. He used her as the echo reminding me, "You're not alone!"

He breathed through my best friend who sat on the other end of the phone letting me be angry and telling me, "I'm sorry," which was exactly what I needed...just to vent.

He lifted me up through my girl friends as we tri-talked via group chat in facebook. When I went silent, they said, "Get real with us!"

He hugged me & spread His covering over me through the servants heart of a friend who put together a meal train, made treat and present deliveries and showed up at the ER the second time Kheler had to go in.

He stared me in the face each time I opened my door and found a balloon, stuffed animal, gift, flowers or a note from a complete stranger wishing us well.

My friend Carin wrote the most beautiful blog & included a bit about our walk through this recovery. She wrote, "I felt like walking behind her that week with a sign pointing at her that read 'BE NICE! She hasn't slept in a week and her baby boy is really really sick. Buy her a coffee.'" And it made me CLING to the reality that we are LOVED, we are PROVIDED for, we MATTER. It makes me want to LOVE out harder, more compassionately, more sacrificially, more intentionally than ever.

It was dark. It is light again. We each have our seasons where we need someone behind us with a sign. Who are you holding the sign for right now? Who do you need to hold a sign for? Are you the one who needs the sign? 

Know this, the sun always shines again.

50 Shades Past Exhausted

The days have all run in together making me lose track of time, thoughts, and even peace.

I have been watching my son slowly (SO slowly) try to heal from a seemingly minor, "everyone does it" surgery and I am weary. Even with hoards of love, prayer, and concern cast forth upon us, I am weary. 

It was the other night that I found myself battling it out with Jesus. 

50 shades past exhausted, I held my son in newly changed sheets sans bile, as he breathed deeply drifting into rest.

"Jesus, I KNOW you can heal. I KNOW you DO heal. But I can't ask you to heal this because I feel selfish. There are families dealing with cancer, death, terminal illness, and I am desperate after four long days; four long days that I know have an imminent end. HOW is this ok? HOW are children being sick ok?"

I grappled in perhaps the most real I have ever let myself get with Jesus. I was angry & it seemed trite. I was too tired to scoot my chair back and excuse myself from the table with Him. 

I processed this with two of my girl friends. One of them so astutely asked, "Have you 'heard' anything placed into your heart from Him during these days?" And I had. I had been reminded in love, "Don't put human limits on me" but I shuffled past that dealt card and kept on moaning. Angry that I couldn't take my son's pain for him, doubting my motherly instinct to proceed with the surgery, fearing that my son would be traumatized by this. I couldn't lay my thoughts down and turn the battle off. I couldn't rest in the truth in my delirium. 

My husband is my best friend and teammate and here we are, at opposite ends of our son, pinning him down, forcing another syringe ever so gently against his grinding teeth and fitful body thrashing, forgetting to speak to each other in love. Sheer desperation for this to be OVER we find it easier to grumble, grunt, and toss out the "I wish you had's". 

In ALL of this, I have been just crushed inside that parents deal with this over much more severe illnesses and I felt the weight of their heavy shoulders bearing down on my lungs squeezing all of my remaining breath from my soul.  My body & bed have been paired magnets disabling my ability to move. 

"Jesus, I don't understand this world and it's hurts. I KNOW you took on all sin so I could have everlasting life. I KNOW you understand human pain, hunger, thirst, need for you were once here, too. I love you, even when I am angry and fighting you with my toddler fists demanding answers. I KNOW you love me, you love my son more than I do. I KNOW. And I'm so sorry I find myself so ungracious right now. Please help me. Protect my marriage, my sons, my self from the battlefield of my own heart and mind in this moment of earthly aching. Amen."

Tricks of the Save

Ok so saving money tricks is one of my favorite topics! I talk a lot about it lately with other women and of course with my husband as we have now celebrated the accomplishment of 8 years of HARD and focused work!

8 years ago, my husband & I took financial counseling at Saddleback in Orange County when we were first married. We started our marriage with over a combined $80k in debt from from both college & business loans that we were locked in to but that we wanted to be free of to achieve our goals. 

Our family goals included 

1. Buying a home

2. Traveling

3. When we had kids, that I could be a stay at home mom

In the early years, my husband made about $15 and hour and I made $13. We were living on the pennies left over from car payments, student loan payments, and business credit card debt. In our first apartment, we had all hand-me-down furniture that included a lovely set of christmas colored chairs & an ornate glass dining table. We didn't have a couch or living room furniture aside from a television that didn't even have cable and an ikea coffee table. But in it's own right, it was the magic of starting off.

So, we pursued change!

Between the financial tools that Saddleback gave us together & the classes Christan took with the Dave Ramsey plan, we kicked out all debt about four years ago. That makes it sound easy, but it wasn't. It included

PAYING a car dealership to take back one of our cars, carpooling, doubling up credit card payments, doubling up student loan payments, knocking out debt one debt at a time until 1 year ago we were entirely debt free. It included other sacrifices like not having cable {which we still don't have}.

If we HADN'T done this, two years ago when we BOTH lost our jobs we would have lost our home. As it was, we had no car payments and no pending debt we owed on. We had an emergency savings account we had poured into at Dave Ramsey's teaching and it "paid" for one of the hardest years of our life where we DID have to sell our home and move out of state to find work. However, today, after just celebrating a year of employment we have accomplished remaining DEBT FREE, buying a new home, and owning two new cars. It's HUGE for us. 

How do we do it now?

-We are on a cash only system. With each pay period I pull out our cash for things like Groceries, Gas, Clothes, Dates, Babysitting & Gifts. I have all of our cash organized in a coupon filer. When the cash is gone, we don't spend. 

-We have an amazing budgeting tool we were gifted from Saddleback that we use to help us figure out where the money goes and how much we have for the necessities as well as the fun. 

-We have a spreadsheet that shows which bills fall into which pay period so I know exactly what goes out and when it goes out by week. 

Other Savings Tricks

Every morning I do 3 things:

1. Load coupons to my Freddy's card. The coupons I load to my grocery shopping rewards card are automatically deducted at check out + they let me print my coupon/shopping list to help.

2. Check couponpro 

​3. Check groupon & living social for family activities & restaurant deals  (the reality is we WILL use them at some point and we LOVE adventure so we budget for it and pre-plan for it. My motto is without a plan both time and money are wasted)

I also....

1. Do a lot of online shopping in order to save! I use ebates to shop because they give me quarterly cash back kick backs for just linking my shopping through them & retailmenot to always check from promo codes before I check out.

2. Use my YELP app wherever I go! There are often check in incentives like a free drink, 10% off, etc.

3. Use Target's Cartwheel App + the Shopkick app when I'm at Target because I save a lot

4. I always plan ahead - if something is one sale and I know we use it, I buy it {clothes, gift cards through Freddys, cleaning supplies}. I keep a back stock so nothing is ever an urgent purchase.

5. I recycle. We often have soda cans and water bottles in stock so as we drink I save them and I take them to Costco or the local grocery store to recycle. It's worth the couple dollars I get back from that for me me to put towards my groceries.

6. I Christmas shop & Birthday shop all year long. I keep the gifts in my closet so it spreads out the financial "burden" of gifting {which I love to give gifts}

In the end

Saving is a way of life for me. 

I value it & it IS my job. 

My husband has asked me to track how much I save and when I save so we can truly understand the income I currently make with the hard work that goes into PLANNING, RESEARCH, & SAVING.

I am tremendously GRATEFUL that we have taken the lessons we learned early on seriously. There were times we felt desolate and utterly discouraged as we looked at other people and what they had. What we have experienced in the last year as a result of YEARS working to better our financial situation, however, is irreplaceable. I don't see what we don't have. I see what we DO.
We live on one income, I am home with my kids, we LIVE life & I LOVE that! It's worth all my time learning and saving.

What are some of your tricks??

Heat, Heat, Go Away

I spent another evening, night, and now this morning deep in thought.

I've been chastising my self for how I was made; that I was made to love cool, calm climates & detest the heat.

I get that this must sound ridiculous, but I feel this ache in me today that I quite seriously wilt in personality & capability to function when the temperature is above 80.

My best friend loves when it's 75 degrees at a minimum.

I LOVE when it's 65 degrees at a maximum.

We have always made jokes about it.

Yes, I am a California girl

BUT

I'm a California Coast girl which means that 75 is often breezy but mostly, the weather is cool, calm, and collected 365 days a year.

When we moved to Oregon, I worshiped the rain.

I was vocal about my love of the grey skies and surprised to find that "the overwhelming amount of rain" was really all hype because it's not that bad.... for ME.

Last night we went to family camp at church.

It's not a spend-the-night camp, but just an evening to interact and be intentional with the kids.

For weeks I have been anticipating this event.

Not like, "oh yay I'm so excited!" but like, "oh my gosh! I just don't know if I can DO this!"

It's ok if you're rolling your eyes

I read that and I think, "Duh-RAMA!"

But here's the thing,

I know my self.

Ever since I was young, the heat evaporates who I am.

And last night, I felt truly ashamed by that truth.

Internally I was telling myself how ridiculous I was & I walked away feeling like the worst mom, wife, and church member.  No one said anything to make me feel that way! I just DID.

I found myself wanting to apologize for who I was that evening and explain, God just didn't make me for heat.

But is that real?

Did God not make me for the heat?

I don't know if I buy that.

I just know that the Allegra you get if we're in a coffee shop is ME and who I am if we're outside and I'm sweating is like meeting three-year old me (at BEST).

So if God made us uniquely with gifts or passions for varying things like communicating, art, hiking, gardening, writing, or public speaking, could He also make us uniquely made for climates that bring out the best or worst in our human spirits?

I'm feeling silly for feeling crummy about who I am today....

"DRAMA!"

;-)

high dives and puddle jumps

This is one of those posts where I feel like it could rub people the wrong way. One that puts my heart out there to potentially be cracked, but I feel it churning and when that happens, it has to come out with all of it's truth & good intention.

My son is turning three.

It's the age old tale for me of making sure everyone is included, no one is left out, and most of all my children only know love.

The tale is a twisted one with bumps and bruises from falls {high dives and puddle jumps} but it all comes down to divorce.

My parents couldn't be more opposite people, both amazing in their own right of being, but oil and vinegar always separate even IF you shake them up for a bit.

I remember when my first son was coming into the world - I worried not only about my in laws but my two sets of parents. Managing expectations and taking personal responsibility for the emotion management of others is something I can't seem to grow out of. I wear it like the five extra pounds I want to shed but can't quite commit to working off. So the burden sits there, like a noose.

Six years of grandchildren's' birthdays later, I still become achingly aware of the crevice of pain that IS my family. Not my husband's or my children's', but my past that always comes knocking. While I have learned to navigate through it, there is still a five year old girl in me who never gets used to watching her mommy & daddy hate each other.

Most of my life, I've lived near with or near my mom.

31 years of it actually.

For one year, I've lived near my dad.

Growing our friendship, sharing the ins and outs of the little things vs. one week a year relational saturation.

Now my mom is the visitor, the the home field belongs to my dad.

I am the field manager.

I am acutely aware of the precautions that need to be established, the traffic signs that need to be put up to avoid any encounter pre-game.

This year, there isn't a pre-game...no party, no birth for anyone to be forced to co-mingle at the center of the field for; there's just a one sided coin toss:

mom wins one week.

see you in a bit, dad.

The pink elephant in the room LOOMS there.

We all pretend fifteen miles away is one thousand, that every day grandparent roles haven't switched, and a state line doesn't divide us.

I am five on the inside, thirty-two on the outside.

I am a mom who desperately wants my children to be protected from the bad relationships that DO exist in their extended family.

I am the mom who struggles to answer their questions: 

"Who's your mommy & who's your Daddy, mommy?"

I am the daughter who probably won't ever reconcile the pain it causes me but I will continually unload the burden on Jesus to show me how to love like a grown woman, not a hurt child.

My son is turning three.

Separate celebrations will happen because it's best for everyone involved;

But wouldn't it be amazing IF we could all lay the burden down and BE love for that little boy in one place, at one time, all together?

It would.

Managing Summer

 I feel like Summer just SNUCK up on me & I can't quite wrap my head around all my hopes, dreams, plans & goals.

Last night I just had to sit down, write it out, and get it on paper.

My personal reality is I have an etsy store that I want & need to succeed. I'm also a mom of a 2.5 year old & 6 year old with night & day personalities {one extrovert who wants all day attention & one introvert who wants quiet time}. Of course then there's also my short resume that includes home accountant, maid, entertainment manager, personal shopper & saver, behavior & character development manager, wife, friend, short order chef, & self.

To wrap my head around all of this succeeding, I had to lay it out not for a strict sense of following a timeline, but to have some structure and order to our every day routine.

At the heart of our family mantra is COLLECT MOMENTS & MAKE MEMORIES so my husband and I really love to live actively with our kids. It includes taking pictures and things as simple as a picnic at the park or last minute pizza dinner at a playground. We love adventure, newness & exploring. I figured with limited brain space for the months ahead, I should do some advance thinking & made a short list for us on those, "I can't think of what to do" moments

So, I'm starting my 1st official Summer Morning following the schedule.

The kids are playing with the legos with PBS Kids on & I'm managing my 2 hour morning work allotment with some instagram marketing, some blogging, & some order processing. 

It's really easy for me to get overwhelmed.

My brain is often a firing ground for chaotic thoughts of lists ranging from the dreams to the do's.

I am HOPING some of this can start to feel natural as I have the grateful gift of being with my boys every day this summer!