Whew! I’m actually here! I have been wanting to come and write for quite awhile now, but I just don’t seem to have the time most days. I guess that’s good, for if I have too much time to site and write, then other things are not getting done. But still, 18 days for not writing is not something I’m happy about.
Anyways, back to the things I want to write about. This year, in all 22 days of it, is so far a good year. I don’t look at 2008 as all that good of a year. Yes, it was good in that I got a son out of it. But that’s about all. His birth was not a good one, I couldn’t get out of a brain fog for along time because of it and Maacah’s school suffered for it greatly, Adam and I went trough a serious soul searching time about where God wants us and where He doesn’t (that’s not quite over with either), we had a short, extremely not restful “vacation” to Idaho….It’s not that I haven’t made my blunders and bad mistakes already this year, because I have. But, for the most part, the choices I’ve been making really have been good. Such as:
* We are doing school regularly now. I realize that that statement might leave you saying “huh?” because, of course I’d be doing school regularly. Well, not really. I was last year, in Maacah’s first half of 1st grade. Then Nathaniel was born and everything went out the window. I just could not get myself back into the swing of things. It seems like I was in a fog until about mid July. I tried getting back into the habit of school and our schedule, but I couldn’t. So, somewhere around May, I gave up and school “ended”. Come last August, I got serious again and we got back on a schedule. Maacah still had the second half of 1st grade to finish up and Grace started 1st grade. But even then, things weren’t great and they weren’t consistent. After the first month or so, school wasn’t getting done every day and their math was even less. I was greatly discouraged, knowing all was my own doing. About the end of November, Adam and I had a good talk and he told me point blank that I need to make school a priority in our daily schedule. By not doing so, I am doing great harm to our children. Not only in the school aspect of it, but also in not teaching them, and showing them, the importance of having a schedule and being disciplined enough to stick with it. So I made myself become disciplined and we having been doing school for about 2 months now consistently every day (well, there have been a few “off” days, but nothing like it was!). Math is getting done everyday we have school and I can really see a big difference in their math skills(duh!). It feels very good to make the choice to be disciplined in this area that I’m not naturally strong in. I’m making the right choice for my children and for myself.
* I have been getting up early (6:15am) each morning since January 14 to exercise with “walk away the pounds“. Now this is truly a break through for me. I am totally not a morning person. But I’ve made the commitment to myself, to my family and to my mother that now is the time to change the way I have been eating and the lack of exercise that I haven’t been doing. I am so thankful to the Lord for this, because I know that this determination and the will power that I have been having is from Him and not from myself. I have been getting up each morning this week (Saturday’s I’m not getting up early, but I am doing the walking. And Sunday’s are my day’s off for the walking and for the eating.) and calling my mother. She’s been doing it with me and that is really helping. This morning was the first morning that I was really tempted to roll over and forget about my alarm. But knowing that my mother was counting on my to call her and get her up,… that made me get up and get things going. My body was really sore this morning, but I walked to 2 miles anyway. Less than half way through, I was ready to quit! But because she was on the phone with me, doing her video, she talked me through it and I am so glade that I finished it! My muscles are still a bit sore (I did a 2 mile walk Tuesday morning, then a 3 mile walk Tuesday afternoon. My body is still suffering from it!), but I’m still thinking of doing the 3 mile this afternoon. I’m really on a roll here and I want to take advantage of it to the fullest extent that I can (on this side of killing myself, that is!). It occurred to me the other day that if I lose 5 lbs. a month, it will take me app. 18 months to lose all that I want to lose. And you know what, I can do that. I have ready lost 7 pounds, so I’m 2 ahead for this month. This fat of mine has been given it’s eviction notice. Good bye and good riddance!
* I have already stated that I’m not a morning person. I’m even less of a person who handles money well. We have a monthly budget, as most people do. Over the years, I have proven that I’m inadequate at keeping within the budget. So, at some point, Adam took over doing the shopping. But I still had the check book, and later the check card, which tempted me to go to the store and buy things that we didn’t need, but wanted. So we still were never under, or even right on, budget. It was still my fault. Recently, with the Spirit’s prompting I think, I “turned over” my check card willingly to Adam. Now I have no means of going to the store and buying something. And I can already tell that this is a good thing for me. I don’t have the temptation to make the wrong choices. It was painfully obvious that I couldn’t resist the temptation, even when it came to getting everyone bundled up, into the car and over to the store for things that were not necessary. I still have the credit card for emergencies, but that is not a temptation to use, so I think things will be much better because of this. And it needed to be me doing something, instead of Adam demanding something.
Okay, so I guess I’ve made up all the words I could have been writing since the 4th in this post! Sorry about the book, but I warned you that I have had much to say. I can’t promise when I’ll be back to write, but it’s safe to say that I’m very well and things look bright.