Budgeting Time

 Something that my husband said today was so profound I have to share it with all of you.  He said, "We have been budgeting our finances and are making some much needed changes in that area of our lives but what about budgeting our time?".  Wow.  This statement rocks my world.  We are a family of 5, soon to be 7.  (adoption)  We really need to be careful we spend time doing the right things.  If you know anything about me you know that I homeschool my girls.  If you've ever been to my house you'll know that it's a huge part of what we do here.  When you walk in the front door, there is the schoolroom.  The biggest room in the house.  I LOVE it!  But even though we've made the decision to homeschool (which causes me to be with them all day) am I budgeting my time like I should?  I don't purposely budget my time so that I am not just teaching them but actually spending great quality time with them.  I teach them and lead them but do I take time to listen to their hopes and dreams and their view points on different situations.  If I did I could probably learn a lot from them.

I feel like we are such a FAMILY oriented family.  We homeschool and most of the stuff we do outside of the home is as a family, but our time is still not BUDGETED EFFICIENTLY.  I want to share with you some of the things that we want to purposely start to pursue from now on in our lives...  (These are just some of the things that we are going to do, please don't feel like you have to copy the list exactly in your family.  Find out what works for your family, the idea is to just live purposely and budget your time so that the most important things in life aren't left out.)

1.  More praise and worship.  Worship is so much more than just the songs we sing but right now that is what I'm talking about. We want to worship more as a family.  Whenever your 7 year old is complaining that we don't worship and pray as a family enough then you know that maybe it is lacking a little in your life.

2.  Playing games as a family.  Board games, PlayStation games, card games, Hide and Seek, etc.  Not super spirtitual but something that is necessary in our house because it shows our girls that we value them and that we want to be around them.

3.  More quality time with the love of my life.  Less movies at night after the kids go to bed.  Okay, so most of the time the kids go to bed and that's relax time so on goes a movie or TV show and off goes my brain.  This is okay, but I know that Micah and I could get to know each other better if this wasn't what happened every night.  It's good sometimes, not always.

4.  Discipline differently and explain things.  Take time to explain to my girls what they did wrong and relate it to something they'll need to know that information for outside of our house.  I don't know how many times I just want my girls to be obedient so I tell them to do something and they ask why and I say because this is just how it is.  When I am more patient and gentle with them and I teach them and show them scripturally why they need to remember this specific thing, it sticks and they'll hopefully want to do it for life, instead of JUST to please Mama while they live here.  Also instead of just putting them in timeout, actually giving them a creative consequence that fits what they've done.  Again this takes more time to do but if I know that I won't budge when I'm teaching my girls these life lessons then I know I'll have time for it.

5.  Get relax time.  This is one that I've implemented for our family (those of us that don't go out of the house to a job) since we started homeschooling.  Every day that we are not out and about (doing homeschool activities or the like) we have an hour or more of quiet time a day.  Everyone goes to a room and is quiet and reading.  Natalie (5 years old) reads, Samara (7 years old) has to read 1 chapter in her assigned book during this time and Alyssa (9 years old) has to read 2.  After they do that they can continue to read, sleep, do a craft (loom loops, cross stitch, crochet, etc.), or just sit and stare at the wall, as long as they do it quietly.  For me this is time to pray, read the Word, read a good book, do a Bible study, sleep, stare off into space, write a blog, etc.  This time is not a time to get my to do list done or the chores.  It's time for me to get some rest as well.  I have had so much success with this time that it has been unreal.

One of the things that I find so crucial in our lives is to not compare ourselves to other families.  Ask God to show you what will work for your family.  Take advice from people and if it works great and if not that's okay too.  Every family is different.  I tried comparing my mothering skills to a friend of mine but she is task oriented and go, go, go all the time.  I am not!  I am scatter brained, somewhat task oriented, but I love to sit in silence for a little while every day, I don't like to be go, go, go all of the time.  So I took some advice from another friend of mine and that's when number 5 on my list started happening and I've found that when I do this I am much more happy and I'm able to tackle the day with new vigor after my rest.  Also, knowing that rest time is coming motivates me to get done what needs to get done before rest time.

I didn't mean to type so much!  Oh well, I can now look back on this later and see if I'm meeting some of the goals I have laid out for myself.  Happy BUDGETING!!!

Who God is

I am doing a Bible study right now called Lord, I Want To Know You by Kay Arthur.  I love Kay Arthur's teachings because she goes into depth and makes me think so much about whatever it is I'm studying.  She is amazing.  I love the way the Lord speaks through her.

At lifegroup last night (a group of friends from church come over and we discuss the sermon from the week) we were talking about changing our attitudes, I know I need an attitude adjustment a lot!  I have been learning a lot as I've been studying the Bible and reading this book, and talking to my friends about God.  I have learned that I don't just need to know what God does, but who He is.  God doesn't just love me… HE IS LOVE!  God doesn't just forgive me… HE IS FORGIVENESS!  God doesn't just give me hope… HE IS HOPE!  God doesn't just give me the way the truth and the life… HE IS THE WAY, THE TRUTH, AND THE LIFE!  How encouraging that is to know.  That God doesn't just DO, He IS!  So whatever it is that He does He can also do through us because He lives in us and IS that characteristic.  WOW!!!  I needed to hear that from the Lord and I'll bet someone out there needs to hear it too. 

Until next time--

PEACE

Today is the Day!

Right after I wrote the last post I knew I would have to sit down and write another one on what I've been up to lately.  I have been... Wait for it... Doing inventor on food.  And the crowd goes wild!!!  Not really.  I have been researching a little bit about how to save money on shopping for food, and how to use what you buy instead of throwing it in the trash.

As I'm typing this my youngest daughter (of 5; 3 here, 2 in Haiti) came up to me and looked like this:

That is a plastic bag full of used Kleenex that she used during her rest time.  All three of the girls are feeling the awesomeness of the changing weather.

Well, I have been doing a lot of planning lately and am going to start a system that I think might work.  It's planned out but I can change it as I need or want to.

I will share what I'm doing with my inventory hopefully in the next couple of days but right now I want to share what I am making for dinner and the stuff I'm baking with bread.  (What!?  Did someone say bread!?)  I LOVE bread so here it goes.

I decided to make 2 batches of bread dough today.  Yep, 2 batches.  Why did I not just double the recipe, you ask?  Because, that's why.  There wasn't really a reason.  I just did it that way.  It would've been much easier if I would've just doubled it but I wanted to do things the hard way.

I don't come up with many things on my own.  I look at blogs, pinterest, facebook even sometimes, I google it, but rarely are things my own in inventions.  I got the recipe I'm about to share from http://heavenlyhomemakers.com/  and I use it all the time.  I like this recipe because it doesn't call for extra wheat gluten.  A lot of the other recipes I have found have that added extra ingredient.  But this one does not call for it.  So here's the recipe.

Honey Whole Wheat Bread             by:  Heavenly Homemakers    Makes:  2 loaves         Time:  3 hours

6 cups whole wheat flour, divided (If you are grinding your own wheat then about 4 cups wheat berries equals 6 cups.   I usually grind more than that though and store it in the refrigerator so that I can make other things when I need it quickly or when the girls are sleeping, the grinder is pretty loud!)

1 ¾ cups warm water, divided                       1 tsp salt

1/3 cup honey                                                 3 Tbsp melted butter

1 pkg (1 Tbsp) yeast

  

1. Mix 3 cups of whole wheat flour with 1 ½ cups of warm water in a large glass bowl (I use my Bosch bowl). Allow this to sit for about 30 minutes. This will break down the gluten and help the bread to rise better. (To be honest, most of the time I don't do this. I should! But I don't. I do let it sit for a little while but not the full 30 minutes. Someone try it and comment on my blog and tell me what the difference is.)


2. Meanwhile, in a small bowl mix together ¼ cup water, yeast and honey. Allow this to sit for about 10 minutes or until the yeast is activated and mixture becomes bubbly.

3. Add salt, melted butter and yeast mixture to the flour and water mixture. Gradually add the remaining three cups of flour and stir well.

4. Knead the dough for 5-10 minutes.

5. Cover the bowl with a cloth and allow the dough to rise for one hour, or until it has doubled in size.

6. Pull the dough out of the bowl onto the counter. Knead for just a minute or two until the air bubbles are gone.

7. Cut the dough in half with a large sharp knife

8. Shape each section of dough into a loaf and place them each in a buttered bread pan.

9. Cover and allow 45-1 hour to rise again.

10. Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes, or until the bread sounds hollow when you thump the top of it.

11. Allow the bread to cool for 10 minutes, and then remove it to finish cooling on a wire rack.

    

Here are my loaves of bread almost ready to go in the oven.

I also made these.  I told you before that I made two batches.  With some of the dough I took pieces and rolled cheddar cheese and 2 lil smokies (the generic kind) in them.  I put them in a muffin tin, only because all my other pans were being used.  It seemed to work out well.  These will be excellent for lunch tomorrow.  I haven't tried them yet so I don't know if they turned out awesome, good, or just okay.  I may post about that sometime too. 

I wanted to remind myself I did them in a muffin tin, that's why this picture is here.

And out of this double batch--or 2 batches--I made rolls for dinner tonight as well.  WE LOVE ROLLS!  Well, we love bread!  Did I already say that?

    Along with this today I also made a roasted chicken.  So excited for that!  I don't know who I need to give credit to for this recipe, it was one of those cards in the mail, but I LOVE it!

Herb-Roasted Chicken                Time:  1 hour 40 minutes      

2 Tbsp butter                                             2 cups chicken broth

1 tsp dried sage                                        6 oz new potatoes, parboiled

1 clove garlic, crushed                              3 bell peppers, deseeded and cut into quarters

1/8 tsp black pepper                                 2 medium zucchini, cut into chunks

1 whole chicken (3 lb 5 oz)                       1 red onion, sliced

1 tsp dried rosemary                                1 Tbsp olive oil

1 onion, peeled                                         flat-leaf parsley springs, to garnish

1. Preheat oven to 375F. In a small bowl, combine butter, sage, garlic, and pepper. Carefully loosen the skin from the chicken breast, being careful not to tear it.

2. Spread half of the herb mixture under the skin; rub the rest on top. Sprinkle with rosemary. Place onion in chicken cavity and tie legs together with kitchen string.

3. Place the chicken on a rack in a roasting pan and pour broth into pan. Cover pan with foil and roast for 1 hour.

4. Uncover chicken and roast until juices run clear when meat is pierced, about 40 minutes longer. Transfer to a serving dish. Let stand 15 minutes before serving.

5. Meanwhile, place the parboiled new potatoes, peppers, zucchini and onion slices on a separate baking tray. Drizzle with the oil and then roast for 35-40 minutes until cooked and crisp around the edges. Arrange around the chicken, along with the parsley, to serve.

         I wouldn't have ever thought to put seasoning UNDER the skin.  We don't eat the skin at our     house.  None of us like the texture of the skin, so it makes sense to do it this way.

          Here is a picture of the chicken and vegetables.  I parboiled my potatoes a little too much.  But       they are sure to be good anyways.

The chicken, half carved.

The gravy.  Just the broth I ued for roasting the chicken and 2 Tbsp flour.

The potatoes, purple onions, and red bell pepper.  Next time I will use more peppers but this time, this is what we had.

So most people would say that this is what goes in the trash.  I used to say the same thing until recently.  I now know, after blog hopping, how to make and can or freeze chicken broth.  I LOVE cans!  I would either freeze this in a can or can it in a can.  Maybe someday I will post something about that. 

  Today has been a productive day.  I hope and pray that I will have more days like this.  Now if I can just get a handle on how to do this every day!...  someday...  as for right now, I am going to continue to try.

    Today is the day He has made, I WILL rejoice and be glad in it!

Hills

When I used to run cross country there was a hill at one of our meets in Reno.  Everyone hated tis hill because it was HARD-crazy HARD!  It was a windy hill and it was pretty steep.  The downhill portion of this hill was what everyone liked.  You could really pick up speed on the decline.

I must've been foolish-crazy even because I actually liked going up the hill.  Maybe the reason I liked doing this was because I was just different than everyone else.  I've never been like everyone else.  Another reason I think I liked doing the uphill was because that's where my legs and character were built.  It wasn't just about getting to the top, it was about the strength gained from pushing through, from not giving up.

Maybe I didn't pick up as much speed as I thought on the downhill.  I mean, I'm sure I picked up some, maybe even a lot of speed, but because my legs were so tired and rubbery--maybe that's why I felt like I was soaring down the hill.

People go through so much in life. Some of it is just being dealt a bad hand.  Some of it is that we give away good cards and trade them or even steal bad ones.  We do this by making bad decisions or doing something that we thought felt good at the time but ended up being not so good for us.  No matter what the reason is for our hard times-it still sucks.  There is retribution for those things but the consequences, most of the time, remain.

In life's uphill climbs, whether we are climbing because of a consequence, a bad hand, or just life, it's the attitude, and a teachable spirit that makes the biggest difference.  In every situation we shouldn't question "why is this happening to me?" or "why isn't life fair?" it's more about "what can I learn from this situation?"  I need to remember that with every step I take.

The Thankless Job...

I have been thinking lately about what moms say (and even I've said many times up until maybe 3 or 4 days ago).  "Being a mom is a thankless job".  I understand what is meant by this statement but I think I am a little off when I say this.  We, as moms, don't get the kind of thanks that we would like to get from people, our spouses, or our children, but more important we get the approval, and I believe as I've been feeling the last couple of days, we get thanks from God!  WOW!!!  Isn't that amazing!  The only approval that I want is from the Lord!  I don't want anybody else's approval more than His. 

He has entrusted me with 5 special, precious, unique girls!  He has great plans for them and for myself; part of that is to rear these girls to the fullness that GOD has for them... not the fullness I have for them!  I praise the Lord for this because on my own I don't have much to offer except a lot of faults, but God has ALL things and He only gives good and perfect gifts to us! 

In my almost 8 years of mothering I've had some kind and encouraging words spoken to me as well as some mean and hateful things spoken to me.  Some things that built me up and some things that tore me down.  When people speak kind and encouraging words to me I try and see them as people sent by God to be a comfort to me especially when my girls seem to have LOST THEIR MINDS!  (If you're a mom you'll know what I'm talking about!)  But when someone comes along and says something that's not so nice or very discouraging with their words, actions, and sometimes even their looks, I have to know and be secure in the way God sees me and not the way that man sees me.

In the Bible it talks about how we, as Christ followers, are aliens in this world.  We should act differently, talk differently, be different.  I believe that this ultimately comes from knowing who we are in Christ and not allowing anybody to persuade us differently.  And in this I know I need to watch my tongue and what I say to others so I'm not one to say hurtful things but be an uplifter instead.

I knew this before but I'm understaning at a greater level that my children are not my own.  They are a gift from God for God!  I need to pray daily... hourly... for wisdom, which He grants (Godly wisdom is far greater than human wisdom) so that my girls will be exactly what God wants them to be, not what I want them to be because I don't necessarily have a full picture of what their greatness is.  I get a picture of their greatness but I'm definitely NOT all-knowing. 

Motherhood is not a thankless job.  If you don't feel appreciated for what you are doing with your children that will effect eternity then I encourage you to examine your heart and ask yourself "who am I looking to for appreciation".  I know I need this advice more than most that's why I believe I've had this on my heart so much lately.  God is the one I would like the appreciation and encouragement from more than any other!  And remember we are just borrowing our children for this life.  They are ultimately God's children not ours!  Thanks for letting me share my heart today.  Go and make great disciples out of your children.

LOVE

So I've been thinking a lot lately about LOVE.  In the Bible one of the greatest commandments, second only to love the Lord thy God, is love your neighbor as thyself.  In this we see the heart of God.  I've been thinking a lot about love lately because I'm trying to figure out if my heart is in harmony with God's heart or if I'm completely out of tune.  We are in the process of adopting two adorable girls from Haiti, which has been a ride!  The love that we have for these two girls is such a different feeling than we've ever had before.  It's not more or less than our biological girls but just a lot different. 

When my husband and I got married I knew it wasn't going to be easy but I didn't think I was going to be able to just FALL out of love with him.  I figured that would just be a feeling I felt FOREVER.  Boy was I wrong.  In the times that I didn't feel like I loved my husband I thought that that's just the way it goes.  It took me a couple years and a couple of Godly people to tell me that's not the way it goes.

The thing it comes down to is that when you don't feel love for someone, even if you have in the past, you still have to CHOOSE to love that person.  God doesn't just want us to love the loveable, or the ones that will give love back, He wants us to love EVERYBODY.  In Matthew 5:43-48 it talks about the idea of loving your enemy!  WHAT!?!  And not only loving them but blessing them, doing good to them, and PRAYING for them!  Wow.  What a different way to look at people right?  So even when people are flat out annoying, or flat out rude, or flat out mean to me... I'm supposed to love them anyway?!?  The answer to that question according to these verses is obvious.  The answer is yes!  This will set us apart from others and people will wonder why we are so loving to people who aren't necessarily accepting of us.  My prayer today is Lord help me to love ALL people. 

LOVE

Today love is on my mind. The very being of God is love! If we are striving to do the will of our father then we must also BE love. Not just show love to people that we like but be love to ALL! The other day I was driving, oh the pleasures of driving, and a lady got on the shoulder of the road to get two cars ahead and tried to cut in front of me. Well, I wasn't going to have any of that so I tailed the person in front of me so that she couldn't get in. She persisted for a while but I was NOT going to budge! I was there first, and besides she needed to be taught that she shouldn't break the law by going on the shoulder of the road to get in the front of the line. (Wasn't she taught anything in Kindergarten about how important it is to stand in line and not get out of line!) I was so convicted that night. I knew that if my kids understood what I had just done they would know that it wasn't very loving. Even though she was in the wrong with what she was doing I still was not right. So I'm awful at quoting the Bible but I know it says this in there, I just don't remember the passage. If you know the passage please leave a comment so I remember. This is also kind of a Kim paraphrase because I don't remember it exactly. It says in the Bible to know what you are supposed to do and not do it that is sin! WOW! Sin isn't just doing bad things, it's knowing that we are supposed to LOVE and being unloving, sometimes on purpose and sometimes without thinking about it because it's been sort of engrained in us. My goal for the rest of this year... and the rest of my life for that matter, is to be loving especially when I know somebody has done the "wrong" thing... like go on the shoulder of the road to cut me off.

By the way, I may get to Skype with my precious princesses tonight! I'm so excited!!! My heart aches for them! Please continue to pray for them and for the adoption process! Pray for my heart! My MOMMY'S Heart. Blessings to ALL!