Perspective

perspective: mine's moved quickly from gratitude to grumbling. I went from awe at the beauty of the world around me to the anxiety that consumes me during the holidays. Sometimes that anxiety is beyond my control, most often it is something I wallow in. This honesty hurts. I hate the upcoming season. I want to embrace it and enjoy it for my kids but I don't make my heart move past the pain and the stress. The pressure Greg feels at work mounted upon family demands and the financial burden it is, no matter how simplistic I try to keep it sucks the joy right out of the season for me. I try to finish my Christmas shopping before Halloween every year so I don't also have the pressure of dealing with other stressed out shoppers during the actual season but it does make me start facing Christmas plans way too early. At any rate, it is my perspective I need to work on. I am blessed. My family will be warm this Christmas. We will eat.

It was a tough start to the week. Three kids with stomach bugs, a water leak that has us staring at another over $300 water bill this month and the reality that another family needing childcare has not yet appeared has left me maxed out emotionally this week. Then we received news a little boy we love dearly got a life changing diagnosis and another friend entered ICU after months of unanswered questions. The days have been long and draining. I care deeply and feel strongly. I wear my emotions on my sleeve and this week has been hard. BUT.....on the way home from school this morning the sun was out and Awesome God was on the stereo and I realized I do love and serve an awesome God. Things aren't going to go smoothly and people are going to be mean to my kids and test results are going to be bad and life will hurt some days but in the end, no matter what else is going on, I have the option to keep my eyes focused solely on the God who loves me even when I am not loveable. I have the incredible privilege of trusting Him to carry my friend and show me how to love her in tangible ways. I have the knowledge that God provides. The reality is that I have to change my perspective if I want to be joyful this side of Heaven. It's November 1 and if I am going to make it to January 1, I have to choose to love and follow God no matter what life throws at me these next 60 days. After all, I posted on Tuesday night,  "Day is done. Thank God" on Facebook and within hours of waking Wednesday, I wished I could go back. Back to not knowing test results. Back to worrying about water bills and sick kids. Back to a friend on the mend and the normal teen drama that sent one kid to bed in tears. Those were temporary things, things that only mattered in the moment because I didn't have the right perspective.

And because I need to lighten the mood a bit. My son loves his footie pajamas. He has two pair. He has several pair of other pajamas but he only likes his footie ones. Monday night he wanted to wear them but they were in the laundry. He was not happy. Tuesday night they were clean and he eagerly got ready for bed. Wednesday he refused to get dressed because he didn't want his pajamas to go into the laundry.  He wore them all day, even under his Halloween costume and again to bed last night. He fought bath time this morning because I assured him the footie pajamas HAD to go back into the laundry. We have one more pair. Guess who's doing laundry today?

Erin took him Trick or Treating to a few homes in our neighborhood last night dressed as a UPS man. Given they only visited neighbors we know, everyone immediately noted he looked like his Daddy. Everyone started to comment that he looked "cute" but Erin was quick to cut them off and let them know Ty doesn't like the "C" word. Confused expressions were a plenty as people tried to figure that one out. There were several guesses that Erin was trying to prevent the word "crap" from being used but that didn't make sense in context. Erin quickly pointed out that he actually likes the crap word but he will literally cry if he hears someone call him cute....we can't explain it but assume he'll get over it eventually. Perspective. In his mind, being called cute is a bad thing.

I was at the hospital with my friend during Trick or Treat but Kate loved walking with Anne and her kids. It was a chilly night but a good time none the less. I am blessed to have such good friends. Adorable kids are pretty awesome too.