RESPECT

Okay, so I am back to my marriage study notes. Tuesday night we talked about respecting our husbands. This marriage study is showing me how truly different men and women and are more specifically how different me and my husband are. It is no wonder that we are all messed up at time. There are a few points that were made that I think are worth sharing.

Here is one example of how I say we are completely different: "A wife needs love like she needs air to breath." "A man needs respect like he needs air to breath." When we first started talking about these two statements I kind of thought it was silly and that really wasn't true. But then it all kind of made sense to me. Think about when you are in an argument with your husband. At some point in the argument what do YOU end up saying to him? Something to the effect of "Well, you don't act like you love me." Right? You need love right? I do! I don't know if I have ever heard my husband say "You don't respect me" but when I think back to some of our arguments, that is essentially the bottom line.

There was a diagram in our workbook that is a circle with words written all around it, so show how behaviors can feed off each other. There is a healthy circle and an unhealthy circle. I am sure you can figure out which one is which:

Without love she reacts without respect.
Without respect he reacts without love.

Her respect motivates his love.
His love motivates her respect.

Is there really much to comment on that? It's a fantastic reminder of how we feed off each other and it is really easy to get trap in a circle. Hopefully we get trapped in the healthy circle and not the unhealthy one!

Melody (the woman who wrote this study) gave a great every day example of how to respect your husband. So, your husband is changing the baby's diaper and when he is done you see your kid walking down the hallway with the diaper halfway falling off. A disrespectful response would be something like, "Honey, don't you know how to put on a diaper. Do I have to do everything around here to get it done right.? A respect answer would be, "Jonnie (little kid), we need to march right back in here to daddy so he can fix your diaper. Those things can be so tricky some time."

I know that is silly, but it makes complete sense. Yesterday morning Jayme came down the stairs with mismatched pajamas and I thought to myself, "Alan, your killing me." But I had to change that thought to be grateful that he put the kids to bed last night so I could stay at church to lead a small youth group.

My challenge for you this weekend is to speak all words of respect to your husband. I will have a hard time with this I know, but I think it'll be rewarding for me and hopefully you too!

Teaching your children

So, I have finally gotten a chance to read another chapter in Plan A Mom in a Plan B World.

This chapter really showed the importance of teaching your kids daily about God and His love for us. In our house we sing Bible songs (Bible Book Bop is one of our favs right now) and say our prayers and Jayme asks about God and Jesus some times, but there is not a time to sit down and read a Bible story together and really learn. I think I may change that.

Do you sit down with your kids daily and teach them? If you do, PLEASE share with us what you do with your kids. I would love to know!

High Impact Parent

Okay, so I feel like every single Monday I tell you about our sermon on Sunday. I feel like I am totally cheating, but some of the stuff that was said was so powerful that I have to share it with you.

This week our pastor's dad spoke about being a "high impact player" in parenting. He talk about Joshua from the Bible and how he was a high impact #2 player for 38 years and then when he finally went to the #1 spot, he continued to be a high impact player.

He talked about 2 ways to be a high impact player in parenting.
1. What our families see us do has an affect on them.
2. How we live with our families have an affect on them.

I knew these 2 things before listening to Mr. Thomas speak today, but he really drove the point home.

I wrote some bullet points down in my notes that I want to share with you (and I may go off on a tangent on some of them.)

*Very important what our children see in our lives - AMEN! I need daily reminders of this. When I see a behavior that I don't like from our kids I immediately try to figure out where they learned that behavior. I look at how I act around them and also am observant of how other kids they are around act. I want to make sure my kids see the best in our lives.

*Joshua consistently pursued a relationship with God - I try to do my Bible quite time in the mornings before the kids get up but that never seems to work out. Jayme just seems to get up earlier and earlier each morning. But when she asks me what I am doing I tell her that I am having quite time with God and learning more about Him. She may not really understand that, but one days she will.

*What you do impacts your family - This one scared me a bit because it is so true that e.v.e.r.y s.i.n.g.l.e a.c.t.i.on affects your family good or bad.

*The power of your life is a very influential thing.

*The most influential people in a child's life is mom & dad - no pressure, huh?

*The most critical need for your children is a strong sense of connection - Our children thrive off of emotional connections. I totally see that in my kids. When they can show you how they did sometime and you pay attention to that and tell them how proud you are, they beam like they have a light blub inside of them.

*Interacting is the most important thing in your kids lives - amen & note to self.

I wrote all these bullet points down not to share with you, but as a reminder for me. I want to be the highest impact player parent to my kids and I need daily reminders of how to do that.

Have a great week!

Romans 15:13

May the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.

Have a great weekend!

Love Language

Tuesday night we had our "Bliss or Miss" Bible study. So, here I go again with my 3 pages of notes.

We talked about how you act when you feel loved. We talked about ways to make your husband feel loved. The lady teaching this class made a fantastic point. She said "Your husband knows you loves him, He wants to feel your love."

That took us into talking about the 5 Love Languages. I am sure most of you have heard of that, but if you haven't, check it out and take their online quiz. 5 Love Languages

I think Melody really nailed the hammer on the head when she said that 99% of the time we show our spouse love by doing the things that would make OURSELVES feel loved. So, learning what makes your spouse feel loved will show you how you need to show him love. Alan hasn't taken the test yet, but I am most definitely going to ask him to.

I study this book in a religion course in college and I am going to have to go back and see if I have the results from when I took the test then to compare them to what they are today. I think they have totally changed. So, here are my results:

1. Receiving gifts - This really doesn't surprise me because I LOVE to give gifts. I love to see the excitement on peoples face or to make them feel special by getting a gift they wanted. The biggest thing that made sense to me in the explanation of this love language is that we (people who have this love language) really appreciate the thought that goes into buying or getting the gift. It means that someone took time out of their day to think about what would make us happy.

2. This was a tie between Acts of Service & Words of Affirmation - This really doesn't surprise me either. Just yesterday my cousin comment on facebook "cousin you are SO TALENTED!! I absolutely love your gallery." Melanie - if you are reading this, YOU MADE MY DAY and gave me a little more confidence to keep doing what I am doing!!! Acts of service is something I like to do to. I'll go mow the yard for my husband even though I am highly allergic to grass just so he doesn't have to spend his entire weekend working on the lawn. I don't know if he really cares or not, but that is how I show him my love. (I guess it would help to know if he feels loved that way because if not, it is hard work..haha!)

4. Physical Touch
5. Quality Time

So, those are my love languages. Melody made one other good point that I think needs to be shared. She talked about learning our kids love languages. Obviously my kids can't take the test yet, so I just have to observe what they want throughout the day. I have never really thought about this until Tuesday night, but my kids have a love language too and a "love tank" that needs filled up just the way they want it filled up. Just like I need to speak my husbands love language I really need to speak my kids too. The last thing I want is for them to feel unloved!

In it...not for it

Okay, so this is a continuation of notes I took from the message Susan gave on Sunday. She talked a lot about a very specific phrase that I think really makes sense and wanted to share it with you.

Live IN the moment, not FOR the moment.

Susan made a really good point regarding this statement. It isn't a bad thing to live in the moment. It is kind of like I talked about yesterday and not living for the 'someday' but living for the 'today.' Whether your moment right now is good or bad, living in that moment as best you can is a good thing.

On the other hand, living for the moment is a completely different thing. When you are living FOR the moment you are living for something that will come and go. That moment you are living for will come and it may be a great moment, but it will pass and you will want another moment to live for. That moment will come and again it may be great, but it too will pass and the cycle continues.

The biggest point that she made that I think is that when we are in every moment in our life (especially the bad ones) that there is a bigger picture than just that moment we are in.

Live IN the moment, not FOR the moment.

Someday

Our pastor's wife Susan spoke this weekend at church and gave a great message on "What are you living for?". The whole message was fantastic, but there was one thing that stuck with me and I haven't been able to get it out of my head since I heard it.

Susan talked about the "someday syndrome." 'Someday when I just get more money.' 'Someday when I get a break from the kids.' 'Someday when I get a new car.' Someday when I make friends.'

There are so many 'somedays' that I feel like we could get totally overwhelmed with that. Completely consumed with the 'someday' that we completely miss the 'today.'

I have to confess that I completely suffer from the someday syndrome, ESPECIALLY when it comes to the kids. I believe that my kids are at the age where I don't want to miss a thing because they are growing up way too fast and before I know it they are going to be teenagers, but at the same time I am ready for this stage to pass. Ashlee is already in the "terrible twos." Jayme is learning where her attitude can and can't get her. Having a 3 and almost 2 year old in the house definitely makes from many 'someday' days.

I have been thinking about things with my kids that I put a 'someday' label on and I want to counteract those labels so I can be in 'today' with my kids. So here they are:

Someday Ashlee won't want me to hold her all the time - In a matter of months or just a year Ashlee will not want me to hold her or rock her at all. Enjoy the snuggles now.

Someday Jayme will not want me to look at every single thing she does - Soon enough she will be hiding things from me in her room. Watch her discover her new talents.

Someday the house will be quite and I can think straight for a minute - The house will be quite because the girls won't want to talk to you, only to their friends. Let it be loud.

Someday Alan and I will have the house to ourselves if only for a few hours - In a blink of an eye the girls will be itching to get out of this house and go off to college. Spend as much time as you can with them.

These are all very eye opening to me and make me really realize how much I need to be in 'today' with my kiddos. I really don't want to miss anything. That is one of the main reasons I don't want to go back to work. I don't want to miss the look on their eyes when they discover something new or the excitement they get when I let them get a treat when we are out running errands.

Do you have the "Someday Syndrome?"

Love and Marriage.....

So you know yesterday how I told you I started a marriage Bible study? Well, I am here to share with you today about some of the notes I took the other night in our first night of this study. Some things that made sense to me, that jumped out at me and that I would like to share.

1. You can't control what your husband (or kids or friends or anyone for that matter) does, but you can control what you do. I know that I find myself all the time trying to make Alan do something the way that I want it done or wishing he would do it some other way. I am learning that God made Alan an individual with unique features that will bless the way he does stuff in our marriage.

2. Am I willing to let my husband make mistakes? To let him be the leader God intended him to be, I have to let him lead. And if that means he makes some mistakes, then he makes some mistakes. I make mistakes all the times so it is perfectly okay to let my husband! This was great - If your husband makes a mistake, he knows he did before you tell him. My husband is extremely smart and rarely makes mistakes, so when he does I always want to point it out. That is terrible I know, but I usually make a mistake when I wake up, so it makes me feel good to know he makes mistakes too. Obviously that is not the right approach. (note to self....work on that.)

3. Husbands love when people cheer them on. I (you) can be the perfect cheerleader. This was actually a funny point. The lady teaching the Bible study used this example: You know when you were dating your husband and you would sit outside right next to his truck while he worked on it and would tell him how awesome he was working on his truck. HAHAHA! I wondered if she knew us when we were dating. After 7 years of marriage and 2 kids, I don't have the time to sit outside and watch him work on his truck, but maybe that is what we both need. Just to be around each other. In each others presence and me to be there to see and be proud of his mechanical skills.

4. A woman needs to admire her husband for what he already is, not for what he could become if he lived up to her standards. I think I will be reading this statement for a very long time. I didn't marry my husband because I thought he would become something great. I married him because I thought he was great.

This Bible study is a 'gut check' for me as a wife. I hope I can take it.

Wow God Wednesday

I don't know how many times I can say this, but I am amazed at God's impeccable timing. There are so many things that are falling into place that I couldn't have ever predicted would happen and there are things that are not happening that I was certain would happen. It just goes to show that God knows better than anyone!!!! In my bad moments I just have to continue to remember that!

How has God wowed you this week?

ps - We just started a Bible study at church on marriage and yesterday was the overview of the class and I took 4 pages of notes...totally excited for this and to share with you what God has taught me!

Random Encouragement

This morning when I woke up and read through my note book, nothing jumped out at me to write about. I take that back, a lot of things jumped out at me, but they were just sentences that I wrote down as I was taking notes from something. I thought I would just share a bunch of those sentences with you and maybe one of them or all of them will be the encouragement you need today!

When you give God all you have, that is all that He needs.

When sin enters the human equation, guilt enters the human emotion.

We can curse or bless our relationships by what we speak about them.

God sees your oppression, your pain and He hears your cries.

Trust God for the process He has for your life.

Repentance is when you allow God to change you. With the power of God you CAN change.

True communication occurs when the actual message you are trying to send is accurately received.

God wants to give me the power to be slow to anger, have a good filter in my ears, and heal my broken heart.

Forgiveness is NOT: easy, normal, forgetting, apologizing or optional.

Out of an overflow of what God is doing on your life, you are able to bless others.

Passionate love take that which we love and lay it down at the feet of something we love more.

The battle for your mind is a battle for your life.

Pray for your own wisdom and your childrens acceptance of that wisdom.

Control

Sorry for the lack of post. I had ever intention of writing last week, but I have learned that if I am out of town, blogging just isn't going to happen. But, I am back in the swing of things and will continue to write to you until our next trip out of town!!!

I read another chapter out of Plan A Mom in a Plan B World. This chapter was called "Being overly controlling or Trusting God with my child." I have to say that I didn't think I would take too many notes. And I also didn't think I would relate much. Boy was I wrong. I want to share with you a few things that stuck out to me.

The story of the Bible in this chapter is about Sarai not being able to bear a child and taking matters into her own hands. You can read Genesis 16 to get the whole story, but basically Sarai took control and didn't trust God's plan and things didn't turn out so great.

There were 8 dangers of being controlling in this chapter and two of them really stuck out to me.

1. Not trusting God - I am smart enough to know that God has my best interest in mind. There is no doubt about that. I want to trust God with everything and I try my hardest, but I have to say that sometimes I just want to do it my way because it seems like it will be the easier way. Instead what I need to be doing is trusting God to lead me in the direction that He wants me to go and trust that He will get me through any situation He puts me in.

2. Fear - I am scared that if I do something any other way than the way that is worked out in my head it will be a disaster! Or a different way will be harder, less efficient and have a completely different result than what I want...even if it is a better result.

I feel that many times in my life I control situation for my fear of the unknown. To know there is a plan, execute that plan, and see the results is very comforting to me. When there is an unexpected Plan B I go into "make things happen" mode (characteristics of a controller) and try to control the situation instead of letting it happen, and making the most of the situation.

Dear God, Please help me let go of my controlling behaviors. Let me trust you even with the smallest things. If dinner is running 30 minutes late, let me see the good in it, trust that my kids will not have complete meltdowns and all will be okay. Please HELP ME to give everything to you and to NOT lean on my own understanding, but to lean on you.