ephesians

our church has been walking through the book of ephesians and we just finished chapter four. i have loved it and learned so much about myself, mostly, through applying God's teachings. i am excited for the rest of the book and am looking forward to further study when mark driscoll of mars hill church walks through it next year. his church has many more resources than we do and he actually just completed a trip to turkey and ephesus where he studied and preached in the same places paul did! how cool is that? so anyway, i will be following online when all that comes out.

so, my favorite ephesians verse right now (besides the 3.14-21 which is my very fav) is chapter 4.29 - let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear.

i hate earwigs

i had a creepy picture of an earwig on this post and had to take it off because i couldn't stand looking at my blog - that's how much i hate earwigs!

here is a list of places i have found or constantly find earwigs - which is why i hate them. they appear out of nowhere, like they say, "boo! gotcha" then run away as fast as they can. plus they have that terrible looking pincher thing on the back of them so that's just gross. i don't know what purpose they serve and i know we are to take care of God's creatures; but i'm sure they are part of "the curse" for sure.

always in my kitchen - i wash them down the drain if i can - they fight against it though

they ate! yes ate the rubber valves from my breastpump. i no longer leave the small valves out to air dry over night because two pair have been ruined mysteriously and i have had to borrow a new set from a friend who owns the same pump while i wait for the new set i bought to arrive. yes, it looked like a leaf does when little bugs eat on it.

on the bananas - they like the small dark places

in my coffee mug - now i keep the lid closed on everything i can!

in jane's bib - anything in the kitchen is unsafe and i check everything now. my life should not be ruled by creepy bugs

in ben's carseat - multiple times (i always check now) once i arrived at my parents then the earwig crawled out! yikes!!!

in my shirt - yes, it was on the ground over night - but i can't pick everything up off the ground.

on our bedspread - because it falls off in the night and thus, is on the ground!

on jane's changing pad - scary because i didn't know if it was there before or if it was on jane or what

on the ceiling, walls, even smoke detector one night.

in the pack of gum IN my purse - yep, opened it up and HELLO earwig - i hate you

- the list will grow i'm sure, but there you have it.

slept in and feeling tired

you know that feeling when you sleep in too long and instead of feeling rested you are more tired? well, that's me today. i woke up to my alarm at 7 and ben was making a few squeaks in his room but i promptly turned the alarm off and ben fell back asleep too. so 8am rolls around and i can hear ben making little cries for help in his room. he slept for 10 hours! the problem with 8am, i could also hear jane talking in her room. so i jumped up and fed ben then 30min later went down to jane's room to get her up and ready. she also slept through the whole night - 11 hours! so this momma is happy and a bit over-rested. though i haven't showered yet because i slept through that part of the morning; i think it's okay to get my sleep in once in a while - hopefully it doesn't become a habit of mine to over-sleep.

exercise dilemma

i just finished a 30 minute workout with netflix. it was from a series by self magazine and worked my heart and butt for sure. lately (since ben was born) i have been struggling to get back into a workout routine that works for my schedule and motivates me to work hard.

old routine: once jane was older and i wasn't nursing her anymore i could go to gold's gym in the morning and attend a 1 hour aerobic class which usually worked me hard and i was actually in pretty good shape before my pregnancy with ben and even through the 1st and 2nd trimesters too. the nice thing about the gym was the child care. jane could go play and be supervised so i could exercise in peace. she liked the teachers - even got the nickname "super jane" - and didn't fuss too much about me leaving her there. the problem with the gym is the distance. i knew moving to the valley would be further away but the gym took a lot of time out of the day even when we lived on 1050 n so that wasn't much of an issue (though the new truck costs a bit more in gas.) but 3rd trimester came and i just couldn't do the classes anymore so the gym was only helpful in that they watched jane. i tried to take jane on walks but the weather this spring didn't cooperate. i froze my account at the gym until after ben was born and i felt good enough to exercise again.

new "routine": so ben was born and i actually felt good enough, physically, at 4 weeks postpartum to exercise but the thought of loading both kids in the car by myself all between ben's three hour eating schedule overwhelmed me. we started out going on walks in our neighborhood and thanks to our friends i had a few double strollers to use which was wonderful. even loading them both in the stroller with sunscreen and water and such was a big production so i didn't go walking very often and then it got very hot and i am not very happy in hot weather so it was even more reason to stay in. my freeze at the gym ended in july so i tried it out a few times. i think we have been 6 times in 3 weeks which is okay but the price has gone up because of ben so i'm not too excited.

the problem with the gym now: i have a hard time making it on time to a class because of nursing ben (which i often do in the car before or after the gym while jane colors in the front seat with me.) by the time i feed ben and get them to the nursery, put my stuff in a locker, go to the bathroom, i have about 30 min to work out before it's time for jane to eat or ben or whatever. then we are down in town and i feel like i need to do something else to make the trip worth the gas but that costs more money because i usually buy lunch and groceries or some other errand which might take me across town to my parents' house and be even more gas. anyway, long story short, i don't think the gym is worth it right now - especially because i could be using the nice weather outside.

new equipment: pete found a nordic track at a garage sale for 15$ and i could use it while watching tv in the basement. i haven't quite got the hang of it, the rhythm is a bit tricky but it works while the kids are sleeping. also, we bought the trampoline from my parents and i could go jump on that for 30 min and get a pretty good workout while feeling young because i can still do a back tuck - which works all my muscles at once; but i have to do it when jane and ben are sleeping once again because i can't jump with jane on the tramp and that's what she would want to do if we were both outside.

morale of the story: i need some accountability in working out which is why i like going to the gym - even having strangers around seems to make me work harder. i also need a way to work out with my kids or commit to working hard when they are sleeping (which often is not at the same time yet.) i would like to run more but don't have a stroller that works for both kids until ben can sit on his own thus the need for childcare. i'm just not sure if the nursery is worth 70$ a month plus gas! yikes!

your job: i wrote this so some of you who read my blog can ask me how the exercising is going and maybe participate with me. i would love to go walking on the parkway - it's harder work than you think pushing a kid in the stroller and strapping one to my chest. or we could go on a hike (if someone would strap one of my kids to their back or a trail that accommodated the stroller.) so that's the deal - my gym membership is just not working out right now so solo i go for a while.

night time is stressful sometimes

- i'm going to start this post off by saying: "let's just pretend i didn't take two months off from blogging and get right back into it"

the Lord has blessed me with a wonderful, baby boy who sleeps; and for that i am more grateful every night. last night, ben slept 9.5 hours! go little man, go! jane on the other hand.... probably got a total of 10 hours (great for her health) but it was broken up into hour long sections from 2-5 am! i don't know what it is with her, but we just can't seem to fix her sleeping habits. i'm not asking for advice or sympathy, i'm simply recording this so i can have a laugh later. the past week she has been sleeping great. i put her to bed around 8 she usually falls right asleep - after some coaxing and a stuffed animal or two in bed with her - and might wake up at 10 or 11 for a usual, "change my diaper momma!" episode. because i am still awake, it doesn't bother me to change it for her. she also goes back to sleep fine - except for when she doesn't. then it becomes constant requests - and i, rather than listen to her scream for an hour if i don't fulfill them am more apt to give in. she says, "i don't like my bed" so i try to think of ways to make her feel better: "what if eeyore sleeps in your bed to help you sleep?" or "maybe you would like your baby to sleep with you too" which usually works and she falls back to sleep, sometimes for the rest of the night. well sometimes we pull out all the stops like last night....

i fell asleep on the couch, oops, till 2am. just as i was getting ready for bed i heard the monitor making noises and then the requests and whining came. "momma, change my diaper please!" (at least she said please) so i went down and changed it - it was both wet and poopy which is why i don't feel comfortable just letting her scream it out and not go change it. into her bed she went with little fuss - just a song to calm her down (she likes the lullaby song which i realized i don't know all the words and she is learning songs so quickly so i need to find the words soon) anyway, i hurried and went to sleep.

3:30am - "momma, change my diaper" which was again wet but this time she put up more of a fight to getting back in her bed. she asked for a book and a song which we did the shortest book and one song (mary had a little lamb, yes 4 verses) at least i have convinced her that sometimes it helps me to sing songs to myself to fall asleep and maybe she should try to sing to herself or her baby. it is so sweet to hear her singing on the monitor.

4:30am almost exactly an hour later - "momma, change my diaper!!!!" more insistently this time. so by now i am very annoyed and frustrated. pete has realized that i have been getting up more too and tells me to let her cry it out. i thought about it but because i fall right back to sleep when she is quiet rather than when she is screaming (yes we can hear her in our room without the monitor and i don't want her to wake ben) i decided to go down and check. pull up (i ran out of diapers) is dry which i thought it would be - but i pretended to change it because incessant screaming ensues if i don't at least "check it really quick, momma." so i put her back in her bed, this time she wanted to hold a pull up and a wipe in her bed. strange request but whatever, she likes to hold on to the wipe like a blanket and suck her thumb - i blame my mom for this habit when jane naps at their house.

5am - all was quiet and then i hear it - noises and stirring on the monitor. pete said, "just let her be and go to sleep" but then i heard her request.... "momma, there's something in my nose!" yes, you heard right so i went downstairs and she looked so panicked it was sad. the wipe i had given her had been torn into pieces and apparently she thought it would be good to push it up her nostril (yes, we've hit that stage i just didn't think it would be in the middle of the night.) long story (which this already is) - i pulled out the wipe with my finger and she said, "no, it's not all gone" sure enough there was another piece. so i got her out of bed and looked to see if i could get it. she doesn't know how to blow her nose yet so i wasn't sure if having her try to do that was working - she could have been sucking it back in for all i knew. i went and got the tweezers (i was not about to go to the er at 5 in the morning for them to do the same thing. with jane in a headlock, i pulled out the other piece. there was in fact, one more way up there and that's when i started to panic a bit. so i got my reinforcements - pete, and we went to work. headlamp, jane, tweezers and all, we were ready. i held her head and arm while pete worked the tweezers. bam! out. she did very well too - much less screaming than if a stranger had done it.

after that craziness she went right back to bed (sans wipe and pull up or anything that could be put in her nose) without even changing her diaper. sleep at last - then ben started making noises. yikes! not him too. so i let him be and he fell back asleep, thankfully.

that's the end of our night of craziness. i wish it happened less often but it's an every two or every week thing. now you know why i am so thankful for a baby that consistently sleeps because my toddler doesn't.