This really is just my outlet blog...:)

Things are going great on the family front. All of the boys are growing well and are healthy and thriving. I realized that this blog is used more of a place to vent safely (making sure that my facebook link button is always checked no...).

I'm realizing more and more that I'm just not a people person. I'm an introvert and that's how God created me to be and that is okay.

Unfortunately, God also has a wicked sense of humor because I'm in ministry with Jr. High students. Can we say I have to put on my extrovert hat twice a week. It's exhausting.

Since I'm an introvert, and not a very patient person, I find that I get annoyed by others super easily.

For example: Other parents. They tend to make me bite my tongue and grit my teeth behind my fake smile. I have to keep reminding myself that these people are people I will probably be seeing for many years, but it just makes me die a little inside when I look at that.

Nathaniel started kindergarten a few weeks ago. It was an exciting time, ish. One of those milestones where you are forced to bring the camera and pose with the book bag and the lunch box. Smiles and tears all around (he got a little overwhelmed with the excitement...). So, we walked Nathaniel into his class, got him settled into his seat, took a few pictures and then left. I could feel the eyes of the other parents on me as Sam and I walked out. I thought that was odd...but whatever, I had work to do and so did Sam. I ran upstairs to the office to turn in some paperwork and buy some scrip and then walked back downstairs to head to my office (have I mentioned I love working where my kids go to school! Such a blessing!). I peeked at Nathaniel's classroom and every single parent was still in there, huddled in the back watching the teacher and their students. Yikes! I felt like the worst parent in the world for letting my kid experience kindergarten without hovering over his shoulder.

The next day at drop off, parents were bombarding the teacher with questions. Isn't there an unspoken (and sometimes, even spoken) rule about not bothering the teacher during drop off? It's not like she can talk to you indepth, she has 16 little kindergarteners to keep track of! One parent in particular was just being ridiculous. Here is what she was saying.

"My little girl tripped on the playground yesterday and hurt herself. Then the teacher told her that her shoes were too big. Her shoes are NOT too big. She is a toe walker. That means, she walks on her toes." You know, because the kindergarten teacher can't figure out what "toe walker" means...ugh.

Then there is the group of parents who stand around and talk about every move their kid makes throughout the day. I just can't handle it. I'm sure Johnny is a rocket scientist, but right now he's eating his boogers so...yeah. (Speaking as a mom of two little boys who regularly eat their boogers).

I need to get over myself. I need to reach out and get to know these moms, especially since Nathaniel is in class and becoming friends with their kids and will possibly be invited to play. I just wish I could learn how to small talk or something. One lady immediately started telling me about her menstruation cycles and her irregularity and how she got pregnant with her fifth child. YIKES! Am I crazy, or is that tmi?

Sigh. Plodding on. I have lunch duty in an hour with a lady who doesn't get sarcasm or joking. So, when I jokingly said two weeks ago that we could put poisoned bait on the playground to keep the dogs from pooping on it, she told all of the other parents that one of the moms wanted to put poison on the playground where the kids play. *sigh* I'm going to keep my head down today and focus on opening juice boxes. :)

Successful VBAC!

As I type this I'm balancing my laptop on my boppy pillow and cuddling a super snuggly baby on my shoulder listening to happy little grunts and taking every other minute to smell his sweet baby smell and kiss his soft little bald head.

How to turn a teenager off to what you have to say.

We had a special speaker come to our church last night and share with the adults how to share Jesus with Muslims. We brought the high school students and the Junior High students in because we thought they might benefit from it, being that they were younger and in more diverse areas with school.

My students were respectful and quiet and listened attentively. They are usually like that with guest speakers, saving up the disrespect for the regular leaders (I'm so thrilled). Occasionally one of the students would have a question and would whisper to one another, or there would be an interesting comment made by the speaker which needed a shocked response (like when he talked about Muhammed telling his wife that it was written in the Qu'ran that she was to offer her breast milk to any visitor who was over, that just screams for grossed out reaction!).

I didn't notice anything amiss while I was sitting with a group of Junior High students and after it was over we left and went back to the high school room for worship and Root Beer floats. :)

However, when I went back to the kitchen area to grab some spoons an older lady who had travelled with the guy who spoke took me aside and said, "Don't worry, I gave your students some great evil eyes for you because they were talking so much." I had no nice words that could come out, so I simply moved on past her and thanked the speaker for sharing and told him it was interesting. A guy from our church quickly pointed out to the guy that I knew Hebrew and Greek (which is kind of awkward) and the lady was like, "Oh, you're a linguist? That's so great!" I said, "No, I'm a youth pastor, I just got a seminary education."

My reaction to the lady was frustration. First of all, my students were NOT being rude at all. I spoke with the high school pastor afterwards and he said that she completely turned him off of the speaker and the kids as well because she kept shushing them (without reason) and actually went and chewed out two of our girls who weren't even doing anything. The kids immediately tuned out to what the guy was saying because they realized that they weren't welcome there.

I told the students that I wasn't happy with her. I jokingly said, "It's not her job to tell you to stop being juvenile delinquents, it's my job. That's why I'm paid!" Really, if she had a problem with something, the correct thing would have been to approach the high school pastor or myself, not to attack my kids.

*sigh*

And, the presentation was good, but there was a lot of fear mongering going on with a video of how the Muslim nation is taking over the world. Which meant that at work this morning the older people were saying things like, "I bet you are super grateful to your husband now, for protecting us against them, huh?" and "What did you think of that food? You better get used to it for when they all take over!"

Ummmmm... (smacks forehead in frustration). Apparently, the old people weren't listening either. We aren't out to change a culture, we are out to change lives and hearts and bring people to Christ. It's like I was telling my students yesterday when they couldn't understand why the guy (who was from Sudan) was still wearing the traditional clothes of Sudan. I told them that it was what he was comfortable wearing because that was his culture. I told them that if they moved to Sudan when they were older it was highly unlikely that they would stop wearing jeans and t-shirts. They got that.

That's why I like junior high and high school students. They aren't close minded and they actually listen.

Stupid adults. :)

And the hits just keep on coming!

I got to get back to Iowa for Christmas with my family. It was a good visit, but it went super fast and had lots of drama.

1. My brother's best friend's dad passed away on the day after Christmas so my brother flew out to attend the funeral. All four of my mom's kids haven't been in the same room since my mom's wedding 6.5 years ago. It would have been a nice visit except for my brother being himself. 

    a. Anytime anyone said anything he had to top it with a "that's nothing, I..." and finish with some exaggerated story.

    b. Anytime anyone mentioned the upcoming baby (mine) he would laugh at me and make a disparaging remark about how glad he was he was done having kids and how dumb we were (you know, for planning to have more kids and making sure we are financially stable? I don't know, but it was irritating).

    c. He got really drunk on New Year's Eve and kept making up excuses for not coming around the family.

2. My sister and brother got into a really bad car accident and totaled my mom's only car (the one she had literally just paid 960.00 to fix. It had been out of the shop for an hour when my sister got in the accident. It's a miracle that no one was hurt because they rolled the car three times and ended up upside down in the ditch.

3. Apparently last night after my family flew back to California my sister (who is 17, by the way) told my mom that she was pregnant.

It's number three that is just killing me. My older brother got his girlfriend pregnant when he was 20 years old and she was barely 18 and my mom had my older brother when she was 19. Our whole lives we've been told to go to college and not have sex before marriage. My mom also has a strict rule about not allowing my sister to be alone with her boyfriend when no one else is home, except her dad (who is not married to my mom) lets my sister do whatever she wants in that area and her boyfriends parents are the same way so it was kind of a futile rule. Not that some teens aren't going to have sex anyways, but really making it difficult for them to do that is kind of the goal here. So, instead of graduating and going off to college, I have no idea what my sister is going to do. She was talking about going on the mission field, but apparently that's out too. She doesn't have a job, doesn't have a car (they live 8 miles from the nearest town with a hospital and grocery store) and doesn't have a plan. I don't know how far along she is, but I don't know if she told the emergency room technician that she was pregnant before they did x-rays on her (I'm really hoping she told them so they could cover her abdomen...). I would offer to adopt the baby, but we're going to have our third in May and I'm assuming my sister is due in August or late July and I don't think I can do a newborn with a four month old...

GAH! I can't believe she would get herself in this situation!!

Why my brother and I don't get along.

My grandfather had a heart attack this morning and is currently in the ICU and is being transferred to another (bigger) hospital. He has congestive heart failure and his enzymes are high (which is what happens when major damage is done to the heart). 

My grandparents live in Indiana in the same town as one of my favorite Aunts (their fourth child) and so she has spent all day running around from the hospital, to my grandmother, to her own house to take care of her teenage daughter and the dogs. It's a lot for her to handle (especially since she lost her own husband 3 years ago and is doing this solo). My Uncle drove up to be with my grandmother, so that helped out some, but it's still stressful, so we've been getting our updates via facebook and text messaging.

My mom wasn't able to call either my older brother or me because she got the news as she was dashing out the door to go to work and do the whole "get the other kids to school and practice" thing. I understood that and so have been contacting my Aunt via facebook messages and texts and haven't called or anything because she has enough on her plate. She even told us that she was going to only give information to her siblings and let them tell their kids. Which is totally understandable because she has so much on her plate and she doesn't need to call everyone.

Enter my brother. Mr. "Gloom and doom". Mr. "If I don't know the information I make it up". Ugh.

I called him this morning to let him know that Grandpa was in the hospital and that I would keep him updated as I knew more. But, that wasn't good enough for him. He called me this evening and basically said, "Not to be crass, but he's not going to make it. He's old and not healthy." Then he proceeded to say how he was going to go to the funeral, but only to support the family because he doesn't like my grandfather much because "The man never calls me". Then he trash talked everyone else in the family saying that no one bothered to call him and it was obvious that he wasn't important to anyone since no one bothered to call. He then said, "Tim didn't even call my cell phone, he called the house phone. Why would he do that?" (Tim is our step dad).

I tried explaining that, 1. Our Aunt had enough to do without calling every single person in the family. 2. There wasn't really enough information to tell people, and since we aren't immediate family and we live so far away there isn't anything that we can do. 3. Our mom doesn't have a cell phone and is super busy and will call us when she is able. and 4. I called him, so it wasn't like no one called.

My Aunt posted on facebook tonight that my grandfather's enzymes were high. I wasn't sure if that was good or bad, so I googled heart attack and enzymes to find out (it's not good for those who are wondering). My brother has the audacity to post on his facebook page, "Can someone who knows anything about health stuff answer some questions for me. No one is telling me anything and the internet isn't helping." My Aunt ripped into him about how she was telling him everything she knew and that she had told him that she would keep him updated (this, after communicating clearly that she was exhausted and wasn't doing anymore tonight, and was drawing her limits with her immediate family). Then she told him that the internet wouldn't know how grandpa was doing because the doctor's aren't clear on how much damage was done to the heart and that all depends on what type of treatment they decide to do.

I love my Aunt. My brother...needs to get over himself and learn how to think of others. He even said, "When I fly out for the funeral I'm not staying with the family, I'm staying with Uncle Rob (my dad's brother, the one I blogged about two entries ago). I don't want to put people out." I'm sorry, but the way my mom's side of the family works is that when someone dies, we all cram into one or two houses, sleeping on mattresses and couches and floors and we mourn together. We clean the house of the person who was the most immediate family member. We laugh and we cry together. We make fun of one another and tell funny stories of the deceased. We cook meals together and love one another and act like a family. My brother thinks that the attention needs to be on himself and because it won't be on him, he's going to stay far away and "only go out of respect to mom". 

I'm sorry, but if you want to respect someone, then you take part in the family traditions. 

Sigh.

Man, my family is SO STINKING DYSFUNCTIONAL!!!! Apparently, these are the things God is having me deal with in this season of my life. *sigh*