7 Sacred Pauses

I'm pretty sure I've posted this photo/prayer before. It resonates so well with how I feel, well, most of the time.  Our prayer pastor sent it in her encouragement email yesterday morning, and it really helped me.  I was able to pray for the right words and address a difficult conflict, and praise the Lord have forgiveness, an apology, and resolution!  Hallelujah!

The other night, I was really upset and kept waking up in the night. I didn't want my mind to wander or overanalyze a particular situation, so I tried to think of something that had made me laugh recently.  I am not really a meme person (Annah gets so frustrated with me not understanding them or not finding them funny when she thinks they're hilarious.) But this one, really made me crack up the other day.  It is the Tellytubbies sun from the intro of the show, which usually has a laughing baby in it, but in this case the famous annoyed meme girl's face is in it.  It just hit me as hilarious this week, and strangely enough, helped me relax, laugh, and get back to sleep every time I woke last night and focused on it instead of letting negative thoughts run wild in my brain. Whatever it takes, I guess!

Another thing I am going to try to get back to this week is being mindful of the 7 Sacred Pauses or watches of the day/night.  Years ago, Pastor Todd bought this book for me and I read and really loved it.  (Amazon link on picture)

I need to read it again now.

At one point, I set up Reminders for each of the 7 pauses in my Google Calendar. 

I have reset my reminder list to pop up on my phone and remind me to pause 7 times a day.  Now, obviously, I am not holding my phone at all 7 times of the day to even notice these, but if I hear the reminder chime, I am going to try pausing to do these. Hopefully this will help me memorize what they are so I can continue to do them throughout my life. I think it is a really beautiful way to reflect throughout the day!

These are the 7 pauses:

6am - Awakening  – Focus on God’s goodness.  What needs to awaken in me today? Forgiveness, love for others, productivity, rest?

9am - Blessing – 2 things to meditate on: The Holy Spirit’s presence and the work He has set out for me on this day.  I am seeing even menial tasks as sacred when done for God’s glory.

noon - Illumination – Being a light. Think about ways to serve and give hope to others.

3pm - Wisdom – Perspective on the shortness of life – what will really matter in the end? Themes for this pause are surrender, forgiveness, and wisdom.

6pm - Twilight – Gratitude.  Thanking God as we transition from work to rest.

9pm - Great Silence - A prayer to conclude the day taking time to evaluate what the day has held: strengths, weaknesses, and accomplishments.

midnight (or middle of the night) – Night Watch – prayers offered for those suffering in this world.

Lifted

When I left home this evening, it was sunny and pleasant.  As I drove about 5 miles north, this is what was happening over Colfax!  Yikes!!

I went to the UMChurch to hear a new author speak!

Lindsey Hale grew up in Colfax and went to Ridgeview and has just written a book for women, called Lifted. She spoke about the realities of life, and how she has learned not to make decisions in a F.O.G.--out of Fear, Obligation, or Guilt.  She was very real and refreshing.  I bought her book, and am looking forward to reading it.

It was a lovely evening, and I enjoyed sharing time with my friend Joyce and other ladies in our community.

Voting Day

Sylvia and Caeden read a lot.  Their school gives little rewards to students who read books from the Rebecca Caudill Young Readers' Award list each year, and this year the JH student council has been part of promoting the list.  Today those who have read 3 or more books on the list this school year got to be part of the official voting process for the book that gets the award this year.  

The librarian, student council, and some of the reading teachers made quite an event out of it!  

Reward snacks!

They even had secretive voting "booths!"

Caeden, casting his vote

I'm glad when reading is promoted and encouraged!

First week of school

Whew, it is Sunday evening, and we can now say we made it through the first full week of school. If there are any mommas of babies reading this, and people have told you that you will sleep when they get older, I hate to burst your bubble...That is not always true!  Sometimes you are up all night talking with a teenager, or crying with your spouse, or praying over the lives and relationships of people you love. 

On Tuesday, I had a terrible day emotionally/mentally.  I won't go into details of why, but I was pretty much feeling worthless and (as Anne Shirley would say) "in the depths of despair."  I just stayed stuck in it most of the day, even though I tried to pray and seek the Lord through it....It was really more like "wallowing" in it.  Yuck!

Wednesday, I tried to better my attitude, and Jesus did help me, but I was still pretty touchy. 

I did wear my favorite capris of the summer, and listened to some good music, scripture, and podcasts.  All of those things helped too.

That evening, we had a mandatory meeting at school.  All students had to have a parent present to sign a form so each student could receive their school-issued Chromebook. We are pretty excited that the school has made it possible for every student to have his/her own computer, and they will be using more technology to help the students learn and teachers and students to communicate.

We were all a bit disgusted though, when seemingly the entire community rushed towards the Chromebooks like ravenous animals toward food before the speaker had even finished.  It was pretty rude and appalling.

We hung back, and the kids each got their Chromebooks and we were home in less than an hour, including the drives there and back, listening to the 2 speakers, and waiting in 3 different distribution lines. The kids all got logged in at home and set their background photos--very important.

I set up a charging station on a little 3-shelf cart in the guest room, because they are required to bring them to school with a full charge each day.  Another thing to remember to put in the backpack each morning...

Sylvia came to me after getting ready for bed, needing to talk.  I'm pretty sure I said all the wrong things, and then Jeremy and I were awake most of the night talking and crying and praying, as well as closing windows and making sure a storm didn't rain inside the house.

Thursday evening, I took Annah to marching band practice, and picked her up very frustrated that seemingly everyone in the band didn't care to be there.  Jeremy took Sylvia on a daddy-daughter dinner date to Biaggi's, and they had a good time.  Caeden showed me around his Chromebook, and told me how his teacher last year would let him listen to the Star Wars: The Force Awakens soundtrack on YouTube while he worked on assignments in class.

I made mittens this week!  I also made a matching scarf and hat to go with them.
I hope to sell them as a set.

I'm loving this purple color!

Speaking of loving colors, Caeden is having fun with his colored hair glues and his mohawk!  On Friday, he decided to try the bright pink.  As I globbed it in his hair, I said, "My father would have a conniption fit if he knew I was sending my son to school with a fluorescent pink mohawk!"  Please, Dad, don't disown your grandson (or daughter)! It's still the same heart in there, regardless of the haircut or color!  

Annah came home from school on Friday upset about a friendship and wanting to talk.  I'm thankful I can be home when the kids get home from school and need to process interactions and relationships and emotions from the day.  I don't always know what to say, but I'm glad I can offer hugs and pray over them.  I think parenting teens is definitely more difficult mentally and emotionally than the physically exhausting years of parenting little ones.  (Another reason to be thankful we had babies when we were pretty young!)

The girls both have quite a bit of homework this weekend, and somehow Caeden has made it through the first week of school with very little homework and very little struggle.  

 I started Saturday morning lessons up again yesterday.  Jeremy spent the morning chatting with Annah, then met some friends for golf.  I played piano for a small wedding at church in the afternoon.  Sylvia and I watched Anne of Green Gables, and she enjoyed it much more than the book.  

This morning, we had a family meeting [sermon] at church.  

It was beautiful to see our church family gathered around the altars.  We really do have to depend on Jesus in this life.  

We didn't realize there was no youth band rehearsal today, so the 5 of us got to have lunch together at Steak'n'Shake.  Jeremy even splurged for shakes for all of us.  The kids were shocked how big they were!  

Sylvia and Caeden went with us to Annah's violin lesson, and Caeden sat in the pavilion to read one of his new Star Wars books he got from the Bookmobile yesterday.  Sylvia picked a book from the Little Free Library.

When we got home in the evening, we settled on watching Ramona and Beezus, which turned out to be a pretty cute and sweet family movie.  I'm thankful for all the times we have together as a family--whether they are emotionally draining, full of elation, or just relaxing and hanging out together.  It's all good stuff when we can get the right perspective.

"But you are to cling to the LORD your God, as you have done to this day." - Joshua 23:8

Blessing of the Backpacks

Caeden had a dentist appointment at 8:15 this morning to have his chipped front tooth filled.  I think it took about 20 minutes, and he says it feels just like it did before he chipped it now!

This afternoon, Caeden had an hour guitar lesson.  Then we had 3 hours to fill.  We ate at Panda Express, then went to Barnes and Noble to sit and read.  I like to read about stories of hope that happened during WWII, and we recently watched Unbroken, so I picked up this book and read a few chapters.  I'm going to reserve it from the Bookmobile next time so I can finish it.

I found some really good stuff in here,
especially liked the rest of the paragraph from "My self-esteem" on...

We stayed in town so we could go to church for the Blessing of the Backpacks service. Unfortunately, it's rare that we're able to get to Thursday night prayer service, but since we haven't started school yet (and I had a leadership team meeting after) we made it happen tonight.

Pastor Todd encouraged us that Jesus goes to school with us!


From the Day You Saved My Soul

Writing out our "Child of God" name tags...

We rotated to stations in groups.

At the first station Caeden's and my group visited, 

students/teachers marked their schools on a map of our county.  

See, our 3 little pins way out east of town?  

We prayed for each school in our group by name.

At the second station, we wrote our worries about school on an antacid tablet.

Then we gave our worries to Jesus in prayer and dropped the tablets in water and watched them dissolve.

At the third station, Kristy told us about Nazarene schools/universities, and school-age children of missionaries around the world, and we prayed for them.

To close the service, we all gathered around the students and teachers (with their backpacks) at the altar, and prayed over them.

We are ready to go back to school with Jesus in our hearts!

Weekdays

Happy Monday! My lungs are still messed up, so I went to my doctor on Monday and had a breathing treament and a chest x-ray.  He says he can't hear anything in my lungs and the X-ray was all clear. He gave me a different kind of inhaler, and told me to try an anti-reflux med. 

 Annah got her first college info packet in the mail on Monday!  (Illinois Wesleyan)  

How did we get here already?!

 

 Somehow, junior high kids get left out of being honored during their 3 years of in-between-ness.  I noticed this on the school website today, and saw that Sylvia is at the top of the 7th grade class. 

Pouting about something...(I forget what)...

I started reading Jen Hatmaker's book "For the Love" this week. So much good stuff in there...