7 Quick Takes Friday

Check in with Jennifer at Conversion Diary to read all the other quick takes there. Or just stay awhile and read... I always do.

 

1. I haven't baked much of anything in the last week but cookies. I only really bake cookies in December and I think I've baked too many. Is 25 dozen really too many cookies? Big Kid says no.

 

2. Check out all the awesome toddler ideas over at Chasing Cheerios! Melissa has been sharing her ideas for fun felt activities for awhile and I know both of my boys would enjoy them. So maybe I should ask Santa for a big pile of felt this year?

 

3. This morning Big Kid jumped into our bed around 6:30. (We prefer he come in our bed rather than wander the house like he's tempted to do) I woke up hearing him whisper to his daddy that he needed to go potty, so Superman helped him take care of that. When they came back Big Kid crawled under the blankets, put his freezing cold toes on my legs and snuggled up to me. He sighed and started to relax as he fell asleep. I put my arm over him and he said, "Mama, I love you so much." And just as I was about to say how much I loved him too, he said, "but your breath really really stinks." Thank you, son.

 

4. Superman has promised me time to marathon sew this weekend! I want to get Reed's quilt top finished by Sunday night so that it can get it to the quilter as soon as possible. It's been sitting around in half-pieced piles all week since last weekend's bit of sewing, and it needs to be finished.  

 

5. I am so behind on Christmas things it's ridiculous. I need to finish the quilt so that I can finish sewing the boy's things for Christmas too! We put our little humbug tree up at Thanksgiving, and we got the stockings hung just a few days ago, but that's as far as we've gotten. Nothing on the door, no extra lights or decorations. And my shopping isn't done either! I still have a sister-in-law to buy for, and we still have gifts to make for the grandparents. Someone please tell me we're not the only ones this far behind!

 

6. There is apparently a leak around one of the sliding glass doors in my studio because I have been freezing my tail off in there this week! I've already been mentally consumed by knitting lately, but now that I spent an entire week shivering I can't stop thinking about this little cardigan. I added it to my favorites list on Ravelry awhile ago, but I just can't get it out of my head! Maybe I'll start it after Christmas...

 

7. I have never been so thankful to work from home as I have been the last few weeks. Superman hurt his back at work two weeks ago and has been home since then, making several trips to physical therapy. Thankfully he's on the mend and might go back to work as early as Tuesday. But if I worked a more traditional job with a more traditional schedule we would not have been able to see so much of each other the last few weeks, and I wouldn't have been available to take him to therapy and help him with his exercises at home. This week was also his finals week for the semester and the unexpected time off certainly helped him prepare for his exams.

Flashback

Ender at 6 months old...




Ender now:

Stewardship

I read Jennifer's post on stewardship yesterday and didn't post here because the post I was working on wasn't relevant after reading her article. Head over there and read for a minute. I'll wait.

 

Seriously.... go read it.

 

I used to scrapbook a lot when my oldest son was born and I read all kinds of scrapbooking magazines. I remember a particular article about a woman who was trying to put together a scrapbook of her mother's life. Her mother had died awhile ago and she wanted to put something together for her own children to have as a keepsake of their grandmother. She was posing a question to the scrapping experts about how to create a keepsake like that when you can only find a handful of pictures of that person. That day I realized that if something happened to me, we had only a few pictures of me with my son. And since then I've given my camera to someone else to take pictures for me. I want to be the one actually in the pictures and being a part of the birthday party, rather than always the one behind the camera.

I've been feeling really stretched lately. Between the regular demands of mothering, working and being a wife, I've been trying to meet many other expectations as well , and I think that's why I've been feeling like there is just so much to do and never enough time to do it all. Jennifer's post has been on my mind since I read it and I've been sorting out in my mind the distinction between my true priorities and the things that I say yes to that threaten my priorities. I've never thought about it that way- that when I say yes to too many things I'm actually stealing from the commitments that are far more important to me, and I can't do that anymore.

 

Superman and I have a tradition of going to lunch together without the kids a few days before the beginning of the new year and sharing our wishes for the new year. One of mine is to learn to say "no" to new commitments if they take away from my priorities, and to have a good plan in place about which things need to go and which ones need to stay. I suppose I'll hang on to Superman and the boys . . .