3600 Square Feet of Space

but this is where they want to play...

I suppose if we ever need to downsize it won't be a problem for them.

Saying GoodBye to First Grade

I don't know where to begin...there are so many things I want to share!  I want to say thank you, thank you so much, for all of the encouraging, kind, you-can-relate-to-my-disaster comments.  You do not know what that did for me.  It does help to know that not everyone out there has the pristine home that some are able to maintain.

If you haven't already, you should check out the solidarity displayed by my blog friends Mindee and The Lumberjack's Wife (Taylor)!  Plus, they are very funny ladies whom you should go visit anyway!

And to give an update...there are no laundry mountains on my coffee table (and I'm not cheating by putting them on our bed, either!), and my dishes are already done for the night.  The schoolroom floor is still completely visible, and the entryway tables are not cluttered with junk.  It helps that school is out!  No papers are coming home every day.  And I have to tell you that Mike is the one who put the laundry away.  He's sweet.

Now I would like to fill you in on what has been going on around here for the last week, besides Clean Sweep-Dallas Edition.

Last week was the final countdown for school and there were multiple activities that we went to or participated in.  Where to start?!

The end of the school year brought the end of stitching.  I was very excited about turning in my stitching basket, handing out the squares that the students have been working on so that they could take them home (parents are responsible for having them made into a quilt), and giving the teachers their quilts.  If you remember a while back (if you've read for a little while) I hinted that I was working on something.  That something was stitching squares for Christian's teacher and her assistant.  I had a great time doing this...and once I was finished I took the squares to a quilter in town who made them into beautiful keepsake quilts.

These next pictures are for my mom...I know she wants to see the squares a bit closer.  Anyone else feel free to look, too.

The squares were designed mainly based on unit studies or special events the class participated in.  (The Texas square has a white top line, forming the lower northeastern side of the state...you can't really see it, but it's there, along with a star, just like the Texas flag, but in the shape of the state.)

I had so much fun stitching these squares.  I also realized how tricky it can be...dealing with twisted thread, or even stitching my corner into the back (twice in the exact same place!  I almost gave up at that point for the night that particular evening).

I was pleased with how the quilts turned out...the detail in the quilting is wonderful!  It was a special moment to pass these along to Mrs. C. and Mrs. F. from their first grade class.

I like surprising people.

They liked the quilts, too!

The week included other events as well...there is always Field Day.  Don't we all love Field Day?  I'm not sure that's the right word, but I think the kids had fun.

If nothing else we got to laugh at with our children for a while, as we sweated off a couple of pounds.

There was also an end-of-the-year pool party that a family in Christian's class hosted for all of us.

That was fun, too.  The kids jumped right in the water, they ate a little, and they also honored their teachers with special gifts.

One teacher received a tree for her balcony.  The other teacher received a certificate for a tree to be planted in her yard.  They loved this!

Christian's first grade was amazing.  The school year was so wonderful...he learned so much, and did so much.  They had experiences that, as seven-year-olds, they can't fully appreciate yet, but their parents do.  I am sad to say good bye to Mrs. C. and Mrs. F.  They are two very special women, and they run an amazing classroom.  I think Christian will remember this year and the people he was with every day for a long time.  A handful of them are staying at the same school next year, but many are moving on to another place.  That is life.  But for this year...they were such great friends.

 Ahh!  I'm going to cry!

Saying good bye to first grade wasn't all, though.

This same week we had back-to-back ball games.

Michaela got a hit!  Very exciting!

Eliana did what she does best...any guesses?

To finish out the week, Christian also had two birthday parties to attend!  It was a crazy seven days.  But we had the weekend to recover, and now we are well on our way to adjusting to a summertime schedule.  I'm hoping that translates into all three of my children sleeping until 9am every morning. 

That may be wishful thinking on my part.  But, we'll be at Grandma's soon, so I'll just send them to her in the mornings!  I know she'll love it!

You guys (I feel like I should say,"Y'all".  Should I?  I grew up in Richmond, Virginia, but then I lived in New Jersey for almost six years...sometimes my speech pattern has an identity crisis.  And every now and then I actually sound like I'm from Boston.  Strange.  And random, no?), thank you for stopping by here.  It's a meandering kind of path (see the above parenthetical statement, if you need evidence of this fact)...but I'm so glad that you would choose to walk a ways with us.  It means more than you can know.  It is greatly appreciated and not taken lightly!  It helps me recharge for the journey that lies ahead with each new day.

Some Faces, Mostly Feet

 Oh, how I love pictures of feet!  I do!  I love pictures of my babies' feet.  I love pictures of their feet now.  I love pictures of my own feet.

Pictures of feet can tell a story.

This week at I Heart Faces is a non-competition week, and they are focusing on feet (you probably could have guessed that).  Fun!  They are also raising awareness for an organization that does some good for others' feet.  Soles 4 Souls is a charity that collects shoes and gives them away to those who need them.  They do this in countries all over the world, with the help of both companies and individuals who donate shoes.  They are helping to make many someones' stories a little better.

Tucked knees,

Peeping toes.

Big shoes to fill,

But toes will grow.

Toes in water

Get all pruney;

Toes on land

Sometimes get spoony.

Toes and feet

Have things to do-

Sometimes bare,

Sometimes with shoes.

Wrapped up toes

Don't have much fun.

Needles and toes

Don't get along!

(Take it from me;

I'll skip the pic,

But if you're curious

Give a click.)

But once they heal

They like the sand.

They show off tricks

Like handstands.

(Well, maybe that

Is the hands' little trick,

But it's my poem

So the words will stick.)

An auntie's toes

Play hide and seek.

Toes chase balls

Around the beach.

Toes are good for a lot of things,

Useful digits on our feet.

Take pictures of the ones around you;

It will be a treasure sweet.

Head on over to I Heart Faces for some more wonderful pictures of feet!

As Real as It Gets, Part Two

(Part One can be found here)

Monday morning came, following a dreadful weekend full of anxiety on my part, as well as feelings of guilt and failure.  I felt guilty that Mike stayed home in order to clean up so that it wasn't as bad as it really was when they arrived.  I felt guilty for letting the house get to this point.  I felt like such a failure that I was this person who could not take care of her home, or be a good example to the kids as a homemaker.  

I headed up the sidewalk with Christian to get him to school; we were late.  At the end of our block is a street that runs beside the church, and I could see my friend D. at the corner.  She waved cheerfully when we got closer, and I went to her window and told her that I'd be right back, but Mike was at home.  My other friend J. was behind her, and just as cheerful to be on her way to de-wreck my house.  I dropped Christian off and made it back, but I was willing them to have changed their minds the whole way home.

I walked in the door and there they were, waiting with buckets, mops, brooms, gloves, and cleaner.  They had even taken their shoes off, according to our house rule.  These ladies looked at me and said,"What do you want us to do?  Where do we start?"

I wanted to say,"Nothing!  You can go!"  But...that probably would have been rude, and Mike had spent all that time cleaning up so that it wasn't so, so bad.  And it was obvious they weren't leaving.  I still wasn't sure what to say.  What do you say?!  What do you say to women that you know, who know your house is a mess and have come to pick it up for you?  

I felt a little awkward.

So, they just picked their respective areas and jobs and got busy.  J. had the Swiffer (not the vacuum, but the dry cloth only) going to town under all the furniture.  D. had the vacuum on in no time, hose and wand out, getting in the corners and up to the ceiling.  And the extra friend that they finagled into coming, C., went for the kitchen.  She picked a spot and said,"I am very good at getting rid of clutter!  What's this?  Do you need this?"  Pretty soon, she had most of the mess on the back counter in our kitchen cleaned up, the junk drawer cleaned out, and was working on another drawer that I had never used.

I feel that I need to stop and explain something here.  (By the way, I'm sensing this is going to be a long post, so if you aren't into that, I understand.  Or, if you want to read it in segments, that's cool too.)  There are many areas of our home that have been off-limits.  We rent, and the house is old and hasn't been particularly well-cared for.  Unless we were going to remove drawers, sand, and repaint them, I didn't want to use them.  It's not even that they were that disgusting (in fact, at least one of them had been cleaned by a sweet lady when we first moved in, who was helping us get settled), but in my head, they weren't clean enough, and could never be clean enough.  That's what OCD does...it is irrational, but unshakable.  (Yes, I know there is medication for things like that.  No, I haven't gone that route yet.  Let's just say that is material for another post, hmmm?)  But C. and I lined the drawers with some contact paper and that was that.  She was very matter-of-fact, encouraging, and cheerful.  (Notice a theme with these ladies?)  I left her in the kitchen for a minute to go check on what the other women were getting into.  And also to wring my hands.

After lunch C. had to run, but just as she left, the woman with whom I had eaten on Friday showed up and took C.'s place in the kitchen.  If you remember, this is the lady who is an organizer by trade.  She undid my kitchen, y'all.  She took everything off of the shelves, and out of cabinets and my pantry.  She was an organizing maniac, but the most steady and methodical one you ever saw.  This woman took my kitchen by the shoulders and gave it a good, hard shake.  Maybe even a slap in the face.  She meant business.

The day went on like that.  J. and D. went through picking things up, making me look through piles, throwing things away, consolidating rogue toys, and Swiffering.  They rearranged furniture.  They cleaned some more, and put more stuff in the trash.  And then they did the unthinkable.

These women, these ladies that are my friends...they cleaned my bathrooms.  Has someone you know ever cleaned your toilet?  Do you know what it's like to have a friend on her hands and knees cleaning your bathroom floor?  Have you ever let someone else outside of your family, and not for pay, clean your shower?

If you have never experienced this, let me share with you.  It is humiliating.  It is humbling.  This was an act of service that I did not deserve.  It was born of compassion and love.  It was a living picture of the grace and mercy of God; I received no lecture, I heard not one word of condemnation, I saw not one look of disgust. 

Instead of judging me, they loved me.  They loved me when I felt very unlovable.  And that is the definition of grace; "You see, at just the right time, when we were still powerless, Christ died for the ungodly. Very rarely will anyone die for a righteous man, though for a good man someone might possibly dare to die. But God demonstrates his own love for us in this: While we were still sinners, Christ died for us." Romans 5:6-8

My friends were living out the gospel for me, they were sacrificing on my behalf so that I could reach a place that I couldn't get to on my own.

Three of these women were able to come back on Tuesday, one to work in the kitchen some more, and the others, J. and D., to hang things on the walls, and do some more furniture adjusting.  It was a fun day.  Actually, both days were fun.  There was a lot of laughter in the house, a lot of joking.  There were tears, but there was healing.  Moving forward.  Change.

And it wasn't all that hard in the end.

Now that you have spent an hour reading, I want to show you the fruit of their labors.  I have before and after pictures, and it's kind of funny that I even have the before ones.  I took them in order to show my sister-in-law just how crazy it was around here one night.  The before pictures are of the house at a particularly bad point.  By the time my friends arrived Monday morning, Mike had done a good deal of cleaning up, and I had cleaned up the schoolroom recently so that it didn't look like the picture I'll show anymore.  It's a little hard to show these pictures, and Mike might croak; it's a vulnerable thing to do.  I'm showing you my Very Ugly.  But the contrast is so shocking that I think it's worth sharing.

This is what you saw when you walked in the door.  The stairs are straight ahead, and the bench was always a mess.  What a lovely greeting for our guests!

This table was also in the entry, just to the right of the stairs' beginning.  Theoretically it was going to be really cute, warm and cozy.  A sweet little spot for tossing our keys and for odds-and-ends that we needed as we headed out the door.  The umbrella hanging on the lamp added a great deal to the wonderful ambience this composition created.

We got rid of the bench (to another spot), relocated a table from the living room, and switched out another table to the right of the steps.  They hung things on the wall, too.  (The mirror was my idea!)

From our front door you can also see into the living room.  It was a sight.  Our bookshelves never recovered from a previous arrangement, and were spaced crazily, two on one side, two on the other.  Over the last few months they (the bookshelves, of course) began hoarding toys and bins in the front there.  I especially loved the yellow truck on that one shelf.  And please note the angle of the chair.  Feng shui at its finest, folks.

The ladies absconded with the small table in the entry, and filled in the gap between the bookshelves with it and a plant.  A colorful picture made its way onto the wall, and maybe one day we will frame it, so that it fills up that space better.  (This is a work in progress, you see.)  The most difficult job?  Turning the chair 45º.  I think that took all four of us.

This is the before of the other end of the living room.  Yes, we have a lot of strange things in there, but...it is what it is (and you must say that exactly the way Daisy says it to her daughter in the hospital in the movie The Curious Case of Benjamin Button-that is to say, with the voice of a woman who is 113).  I really don't mind the piano and the drum set. 

They hung the picture on the left, and the clock.  And then we just tidied things up (there was a lot of consolidation...to be taken care of at a later date).  My favorite thing that got done was the fixing of the rug.  J. helped me move the coffee table, and then lay a non-skid pad down under the rug.  Now it hopefully won't creep across the floor until it's in the fireplace!  (Note to self:  Find home for vacuum.)

Moving from the living room, we enter the computer room (or the TV room).  The piles that were running along the wall, beyond the bike, I had taken care of recently in a mad fit of cleaning up.  But this room was a bit off-kilter and uncentered.

Just a few tweaks made a huge difference.  They changed out the map (now in Christian's room) for the picture of a field (another idea of mine!) and put the coffee table back in place.  They also reoriented the rug and turned the bike a little.  The shelves in this room are still a wreck, but that is a job for another day.

The front of the room...

and its new look.

All right, here goes the huge swallowing of pride.  Obviously, there are issues to address other than our own messy areas.  The kids do what they see us do.  Maybe this is an easy excuse, but much of this year I have not had the energy to get them to clean up.  Our family life has been a tad bizarre for a while, to say the least, and I won't go into great detail about that.  We are looking forward to a time, very soon, when we can make some much needed changes as far as our family dynamic goes.  Know that we know how to be (relatively) good parents...and pray that God will grant us the strength needed in order to make the changes we need to make.  That being said, here is the schoolroom at its worst.  Highly conducive to learning, no?  Someone couldn't find Sasquatch in there, much less a pencil.

The ladies moved the table over to the sliding glass doors, and floated the couch in the center of the room.  There is still quite a large space for playing in front of the sofa; the rooms in our house are big.

We moved the shelf from the kitchen into this room, so that I can store bins of whatever on it.  It holds a ton, and even though there is a lot of shelving and cabinetry in this room, I had some big bins that I wanted to store on this shelf.  I had been wanting to do this for a while, but it seemed like such a big job to unload the kitcheny stuff and get it down the hall.  Apparently not when you are my auntie-friend.  (The little blue table was set up with the TV on it the other day to keep Eliana entertained while we were working...it is not going to stay there.)

Now we are moving to the other side of the house.  The dining room.  This lovely piece of work, well, I don't even have words for it.  It was not good for my Flat Surface Syndrome.  The table was the perfect catch-all.  There was stitching paraphernalia.  There were air filters (of course).  There were newspapers.  There were Lego creations.  There was a box of play-dough and cutters.  All of these things were very important to have in the dining room.  Very. 

I have no idea where it all went.  I'm guessing a great deal of it got thrown away.  The Lego creations were moved to a shelf for display.  The stitching stuff is actually back at the school and I never have to look at that basket again.  This is amazing to me.  (The transformation, not that I never have to look at the stitching again.)

My mom's rack is hung!  (That is a crazy sentence, but it's staying.)  It's so cute!  I'll have to do a close-up sometime.  Hey, that Swiffer is hiding behind the small buffet.  I suppose it was thinking it deserved a place in the photo, since it played such an important part in all of the shenanigans that went on around here those two days.

And now we come to the kitchen.  Beyond disaster.  It's a galley kitchen, long and narrow.  Whenever I'm in there I have three monkeys stuffed up in my armpits, standing on my feet, hanging all over me.  They just want to be in there, and with me.  You can see the ugly bookshelf in the back, and the clutter in general.  There was always too much stuff, a lot of it didn't belong in the kitchen, and I hated to think about moving it all.  So I didn't.

But J. did.  I'm telling you, she was like the Tazmanian Devil, but instead of leaving a trail of destruction behind, she left order and cuteness. 

One of my favorite things we have is the sign hanging on the wall below.  I bought the W-A-L-K-E-R tiles in Spain, after Mike and I were engaged, and before we were married.  Years later I bought yellow, white, and blue tile squares and a piece of wood, made up a design, applied grout, and had it framed for Mike for his birthday.  We have never hung it before.  But now, there it is, like a claim stake, brightly pronouncing,"This is our home!"

Above, you can see that we moved the table into the kitchen (which I had wanted to do, but how could I when it was so solidly anchored in the dining room with all that important stuff on it?) so that the kids could have a place to hang out while I was busy cooking (or whatever it is that I do in the kitchen...I wouldn't really call it cooking).  The first night that it was in there, I was at the counter and Christian and Eliana were sitting there coloring.  It was so peaceful, and I didn't have any little people under my arm or up my...well, you get the picture.

Here is one of my cabinets.  I know.  It leaves me speechless as well.  Remember I don't use my kitchen drawers (roaches and all that...some paranoia in my head.  Whatever.) so the stuff that normally lives in a drawer made its home in strange places. 

J. is good at what she does, no?

You haven't seen anything, yet.  Here is my laundry room.  Which is really just the back of my kitchen.  And which is always a mess. 

The after...

When I said she took everything out of my cabinets and pantry, I WAS. NOT. KIDDING.  She put like things together, from light bulbs to tomato products.

In the pantry we now have (from the top down) coffee/teas, soups/canned beans, sugars/syrups/baking, pasta/rice, pasta sauce/canned tomatoes/salsa, drink related items on the floor (in bins).  Facing these shelves is a small rolling cart with cereal, snacks, and large Ziploc bags.

It all has a place. 

There are still some areas that need work.  There are things that Mike and I really need to go through and organize.  But what these women did is just amazing.  I feel like I have a lot of words, but no words are sufficient.  I am so grateful for what they have done, for what they have given to me.  They have brought a light to a dark room; they have cleared thorns from a path; they have pulled a drowning woman from a raging sea.

The truth is that only the Lord can do those things.  He is the light of the world.  He is the Way, the Truth, and the Life.  He is the One who takes the dead and breathes life into them.  Only he can save.  My eternity is due only to him.  But in the here and now, he does those things as well.  He gives water to those who thirst, he heals those who are broken, he redeems the one who is enslaved.  And most of the time he uses regular people to do his work in our lives.  Because of friends, we are able to see our Savior.  Because of people who love us, we are able to know even deeper his great love for us.  Because his love is even more unimaginable than we can know.  It is even more unthinkable than friends who clean our toilets.  It is his beautiful life of love for his father, and for his world; it is his horrible death on a cross; it is his powerful and miraculous resurrection and victory over death and sin.  It's hard enough to grasp what a friend will do for me, how can I grasp this amazing love of God? 

But grasp I must, and cling. 

I have been blessed beyond measure this week.  I pray that I will be an instrument of the Lord's grace one day, that I can minister to another the way these women ministered to me.  And I pray that you may know the love of a friend, as well as the even deeper love of God. 

As Real as It Gets

I'm pretty transparent.  Most people around me know how I'm doing, and this year most people have known that I've not been well.  Like many others, I struggle with depression; add OCD to that, as well as little kids (who just so happen to enjoy things like getting dirty and making messes), and crazy life circumstances, and what you get is one whacked out 2010. 

I'll be honest, there have been some very low moments.  They have been followed by some revolutionary ones, some all right ones, and some very joyful and peaceful moments, too.  Then the low ones return.  I'm sure there are as many facets of depression as there are people who live with it, but mine seems to be cyclical.  Unfortunately, I haven't figured out the cycle!  Obviously, there are factors in life that exacerbate something like depression, and then there are details that become manifestations of it.  At times these things weave an intricate and complicated fiber, and it becomes harder to tell if particular elements are the causes or the effects anymore.

One such example is our house.  For years I have had a terrible time managing our household.  Things like keeping up with the laundry (washing, drying, folding, and putting it away), staying on top of the dishes, basic cleaning (sweeping regularly, upkeep of bathrooms), getting toys put away - all of it eludes me.  I will readily admit that some of the problem comes from poor decision making on my part, as well as laziness in just being a grown-up and doing the things that need to get done, and being a parent and teaching our kids to pick up after themselves.  I would also like to submit that part of the problem is that we have moved three times in the last five years, and not once did we do it well.  It feels like a moving van showed up at our house this last time and threw up inside, without so much as a how-do-you-do or a can-I-help-clean-that-up. 

I would like to interject here and say that my parents were, in fact, very helpful during the last move and offered up a great deal of time, encouragement, and sweat in order to help us accomplish a move around the corner (literally, around the corner...much harder than across the country).  We were just disorderly to begin with, and so the material they were working with was unruly, and required a lot more time than they had.  Virginia called them home too soon.

At any rate, over the last year the condition of our house has certainly had its ups and downs; we've had whirlwind clean-ups for company a couple of times.  Mike is much better than I am these days at charging straight ahead to face the task at hand, and wrangling the delinquent piles and messes into some semblance of order quickly.  But for the most part, I have been unmotivated and complacent about the chaos all around me.  Even though I know that chaos breeds chaos, and I know that just putting one thing away at a time would, over time, get many things put away, I could never take the first step.  And most of the time I just didn't want to.

I say I was complacent, but that might not be the most accurate word.  The truth is, I cared.  I would walk through the house and see the piles of random stuff, the papers that were balancing precariously on the edge of any given table, the toys everywhere, the mountains of laundry, the dishes on the counter, and I would think,"Is this really my house?"  It felt surreal.  I would cry and then sit down at the computer and make my escape.  I hated it and yet I made no changes.

Change is hard.

As I said before, I am an open book.  I shared with people when things were rough, when I felt overwhelmed.  I got a lot of encouragement.  More often than not someone shared a story with me about a time when they felt the same way, or went through a difficult period; people were kind, positive, supportive.  Then a couple of weeks ago I received an email; it was from a mom of one of the girls on Michaela's old soccer team, her first soccer team here.  She said my email address had randomly appeared in her phone, and she thought it would be fun to get together with me and one of the other moms at a bakery for a visit.  And most likely a muffin.  I thought that sounded fun, too, and told her to let me know the details.

A Thursday morning get-together was settled upon.  We met up at a local bakery, and when I arrived they were seated outside, with food as well as a spread of playthings for the other two little girls who were there.  As I went to sit down, two birds swooped down just beside our table and set about frolicking in the bushes to my right.  One of the women raised her eyebrows as she saw me wince and said,"Oh!  Do you want to go inside?  Will you be much more comfortable in there?"

You do know how I feel about birds (and animals in general), right?  Everything in me wanted to yell,"YES!" and run into the building as quickly as possible.  But, they were all set up, there were plates and glasses on the table, and the kids were busy at the table beside us.  I smiled and said,"Let's just call it therapy!"  I tried to put the humor spin on it.

My other friend looked curious at this exchange, and the woman who had asked about going inside, let's call her D., explained a bit about some of my issues (for example, I don't like to sit on outside furniture.); my OCD was now front-and-center.  My second friend, let's call her J., pursued the topic with gusto.  She was curious about the different ways it affected me, and as we talked I shared more about some of my other struggles.  The house came up. 

And then our trips this summer came up, and the fact that I was looking forward to them.

After quite a while of me talking and them listening I jokingly said,"Is this an intervention?!"  I felt like the conversation had been focused on me the entire time.  It had been a good conversation, full of laughing and just honest and meaningful dialogue, but I still felt as though I had hogged all the attention.  My friend brought out her phone and told us about the weird surge of information that had occurred recently, which filled her phone with all the email contacts she had ever had, which led to her getting in touch with the other two of us.  Apparently this get-together was a coincidence.  Providential may be a better word.

J. went back to my summer visits, and came to the conclusion that I could not go away and have a fun and refreshing summer vacation, only to return to a disaster of a house that would immediately drain the joy and goodness of great family visits.  The two of them determined that it was imperative to come to my house and help me tackle the job head on, including cleaning up, ordering, hanging things on walls, and rearranging furniture.  Monday was deemed The Day.  Tuesday was deemed The Second Day.

It was clear that it would be a two day job.

This was a scary thing that I was facing. 

And then.  Then I had lunch with another friend the following afternoon, a woman who is a little older than I am, and who loves on our family more like an aunt than just a peer.  I am a blabbermouth, and I shared with her about my friends and what they were planning.  She was excited about this prospect, and proceeded to offer her own help in organizing and decluttering.  She actually does that kind of thing professionally. 

While all of these women were offering to help, the truth is that I didn't have a choice in the matter.  They were coming whether I wanted them to or not.  And by Sunday, I was in the "not" category.  I felt sick to my stomach, Mike went into high-powered cleaning mode (the cleaning before the clean-up crew arrived), and I begged them in an email not to come.

Not only did they come, they even managed to convince one more friend to join them.

(To be continued...)