Tonight we had a dinner auction for the high school. The kids spent the evening with Grandma and Papa and watched a Cardinals game after supper. When we’re here the kids listen to the games on the radio, so seeing them play on TV is always a treat for them. The boys are staying overnight but the big kids are back now.

People keep asking us where our son is going to college. The answer is we don’t know. He doesn’t really know what he wants to do after school. I’ve told him off and on for several years that I think he would make a great teacher and coach. He used to say he wanted to play baseball for the Cardinals. I never knew what to say when he said that.

There was a baby at the table next to us tonight at the auction. Whenever I see a baby I often mentally guess at the baby’s age. In the first year I can usually tell what age a baby is by looking at them. They were passing her around between the parents and another couple. I thought about asking if I could hold her but decided not to.

I hate when I say things here and then later when I think of it I’m like, “No, that wasn’t it.” What bothered me last night and what had kind of gotten my internal feathers all ruffled was when four different people asked me during the baseball game what we were having for supper. I actually like when they ask me this. Number one, because when this particular stereotype fulfills itself I think it is so funny. Two, it’s just an honest question about an honest need and I don’t mind that.

But I didn’t have a good answer. And so four times I had to confess my failure to have planned out any meals for the week. I didn’t know what the plan was. I didn’t know what we were having. I haven’t made it to the store this week so I didn’t even have something I could scrounge together for a decent enough meal (one of my specialties), or at least one that would fit my mental standards regarding a meal you would serve to others. We were going to have to stop by the store on the way home.

Which we did. One of the boys came in and carried the basket while we filled it with a few thigs to make spaghetti and meatballs. When we came home I told them that absolutely no one was to be getting on the computers, besides the big kids. They were to practice their piano, something we recently started again. I have feelings about the piano things but I’m not going to go into that right now. I made the spaghetti and heated up the meatballs and sauce. We saved Dad a plate.

It made me happy to come out of the kitchen and see all of the boys eating their food in the living room. That is when I said, “Boys, I’m feeling a little stressed”. “Again?”, one of them said, and the younger ones laughed because it’s one of our jokes. Sometimes it’s “Sorry, boys, I’m just a little emotional at the moment” if for some reason they see me sad and shedding a few tears. “Again?”, they say, and then we laugh about it again. Everyone was happy and enjoyed having food.

I have a rather lengthy take-home final plus three papers to write over the next several weeks. Two of them shouldn’t be too hard. The one I’m more neutral about is the 15-20 page research paper about something we found interesting over the course of our Stone-Campbell Movement class. We’re supposed to have a “compelling thesis” that makes an argument. This is the kind of stuff I feel I should know already but don’t, and don’t really have a good reason other than that I was busy.

Or just doing what I needed to do to get by. The teacher was wondrously kind to not insist on the original Chicago Manual style but is allowing us to use the APA format that we’ve been using for all of the other papers. This is what I’ve liked about basically all of the teachers we’ve had in this program, they don’t expect you to be this brainiac or the highest caliber academic prodigy–it kind of surprised me. We’re all just regular people. There’s so much freedom, and I dare say, love in that.

It really is like we’re these groupies traveling around from town to town following these athletes while they play their sports. I really do enjoy it but it just kind of baffles me that we do this as parents. They always said that to be a good parent you’re not supposed to live a child-centered life where the family revolves around the child or children. Instead, it is supposed to be the parents who set the family agenda and culture, with the children being the ones who are along for the ride.

But like most everything else, there’s the theory that sounds good, and then there’s real life. I’ve always thought that if there was a sure and certain way that gets a baby to sleep through the night, then every mom on earth would know this valuable information. But kids are different, and what works for one very well might not at all work for another. I feel like most of the time our babies were pretty good sleepers. There was only one who I remember having any trouble with, but barely.

The boy I mentioned yesterday is out for the rest of the season. I didn’t want to make that call at first, but I had thought it a possibility. He fractured his hip and is to be off it for six weeks after which they can maybe start therapy. We have this GameChanger app on our phone that allows coaches and athletes to communicate in a massive group chat. I was looking on it this morning to see if anyone had updates on how he was doing. He’d put a message around 1AM letting the coach know.

I was feeling somewhat stressed this evening once we got home. Dad had to leave the game early for an important board of education meeting. He’s been the pastoral advisor for the high school Board of Ed for probably going on five years. It was a no brainer as far as deciding whether or not it was something he should do. As an alumni of the school it is something that’s important to him. They’ve had a lot to navigate with the needing to figure out what to do about the building situation.

They’re supposed to be tearing down the old school toward the end of the summer. It’s sad because it really is a beautiful campus, and because the new parts of the school were only five or so years old as they had just added on and finished a building project. They’re also looking for several teachers and a full-time principal. But I was feeling stressed just thinking about the fullness of these days. I asked the boys if they could help me by straightening up the main upstairs rooms.

Between homework, school, and sports, the big kids aren’t really available to help around the house as much and it definitely makes a difference. I was reading this Instagram post of a mom with 8 or 9 kids who has ages spread from teens to newborn. She was talking about how she was having to adjust to not having the expectation be that her big kids are just going to be her personal helpers all of the time, especially as they’re getting older. I could definitely get that.

But in the meantime it just means we’re in another one of those seasons where there’s more than I can keep up with and there’s a lot of adjusting to being okay with okay. It’s seems like one of the entire points of motherhood was to learn that we can’t do everything perfectly or even anything perfectly. I think the sooner we get over this the happier we are, but it’s an ongoing thing to have to keep getting over. This wasn’t even about me being perfect, I was just saying things I guess.

After the track meet the boys played on the baseball field for a while. We brought along a picnic supper to eat, so the grown-ups sat on a bench and ate their sandwiches as spectators. The track kids were eating right across the street at one of the local town restaurants, which is a school tradition following the conference meet.

Out of four smaller area schools, the boys team placed first which they’ve done for several years in a row. The girls team placed a close second this year. One of the runners hurt his hip during the hurdles and couldn’t finish the race. He grabbed his hip and laid down in the grass. After wondering for a moment what we should do if anything, there were soon several of us who went out to him.

His dad plus two senior boys helped to carry him out of the track area. They got him to where he was leaning on a railing and off his hurt leg. His parents went to get his clothes and backpack as well as their cars to take him to the nearby urgent care. Another dad helped his dad get him from the railing to the car. They left for Chatham.

On Good Friday afternoon we took the taps out of the trees. It was a beautiful spring day that we used for catching up on little odd jobs. We used different trees this year–I can’t remember if I said that. Instead of the bottom of the big hill closer to the creek we stayed mostly up by the camping area. There are three bigger ones up here that we also tried last year that have really good yields.

We had our family pancake meal a couple of weeks ago. We didn’t end up boiling all the sap this year, just enough to make some syrup to use. We really do need to get the taps in sooner, like toward the end of January where the trees can run for the next six weeks. Neither of us had capacity to give much time to the process but I feel like each time we still come away having learned.

I took a good half hour nap this afternoon and it still feels like I could fall right back asleep. We have class tonight with a speaker coming to talk about substance abuse and working in an outpatient rehab facility. This has probably been my least favorite class so far, plus the topic just isn’t fun. Addictions seem to be some of the worst conditions to have ever afflicted the human race.

The grass takes on a deep green this time of year. It’s been mowed at least once now and it always smells so nice those first few days after. There is a lot of grass to mow out here and each year it seems to vary on whose job this is. It’s never just up to one person to mow it. Josh does some, the kids do some, there’s often a different volunteer each year who is around to help out with it.

After church we spent the day at my in-laws house. Before my father-in-law’s cancer diagnosis, he had just gotten all of his land arrangements finalized with his farm land. They don’t own a ton, but it is enough for him to make a living farming it himself without needing a partner or a job on the side to supplement. They’d planned to build a house on the farm. They’ve met with an architect and have plans to start on the house this spring.

The remainder of the day has been for resting at home. Uncle Glenn is next door staying in a camp room for the night. He lives in Northern Illinois now and drives a truck for a living. Uncle Mark and Aunt Cyndy were at lunch today too, along with their two daughters Christina and Clara. Josh told me later this evening that he was glad we got married and had a family. I told him I was too.

“But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep.”
~1 Corinthians 15:20~

It’s been a busier couple of days doing Holy Week things. Thursday the boys and I went Easter clothes shopping. Grandma keeps them stocked up on church clothes, church shoes, tennis shoes, school shorts, uniforms, coats, and most of their clothes. But most years I try to take them shopping for new shirts. They each picked out two and I picked out a couple for my older son.

This morning we had the Matins service. Dad had to preach so he left a little early. The baseball team had an away game in Decatur, so my son left earlier this morning to ride there with Grandma. I was scheduled to help stuff Easter eggs after the service, so my daughter and I helped with that while Dad took the boys and made it over after church for the rest of the baseball game.

My daughter and I stopped by a consignment shop to look for dresses. She was looking for one to wear to prom. She tried a few on but none were quite right, which it’s harder to find dresses in a store like that. We then went to Wal-Mart for more clothing items which took a while for us both to try on. She found what she needed and I found a couple of shirts I could wear for the spring.

Next we went to County Market to get the rest of the items for the breakfast casseroles and salads. They didn’t have strawberries, to my confusion and surprise, so I called Dad to see if there were any stores where he was at that looked like they would have strawberries there (I really didn’t want to go back to Wal-Mart). He said there was a Schnucks and he could pick some up there.

The Easter Vigil was later this evening. In the past it’s started at 7 but tonight it started at 8. Dad had to read, bring the wood, and start the fire. Before that I’d made soup for anyone who was hungry. The kids cleaned the kitchen and helped me with food things. It’s becoming a tradition to worship softly through Easter morning services. I stay in the kitchen where there are works for me there.

I decided just to go ahead and use my SkyView app for starting to learn the constellations. It’s super easy. All you have to do is go to the app store and type in SkyView. It’s the free one so it’s actually SkyView Lite. The field journal I have has been on my nightstand for months and is a beautiful book. Other than looking through it a few times, I haven’t gotten to it with everything else.

Maybe at some point I might still try to learn them the other way, like when you’re logging your field hours and drawing the pictures. But I wasn’t learning them at all by not doing anything, so I decided to start with Orion and work around from there. Certain constellations are only visible certain times of the year. They say winter is when he’s most visible in the Northern Hemisphere.

The next one is Taurus which is to the upper right of Orion. The app is nice too because it shows you a drawing-like picture of what the constellation is supposed to be, in this case, a bull. I’m trying to be able to just look up and find him, like on clear night when we happen to be getting home after dark. Gemini is an easier one to Orion’s upper left. Leo I can find because his body is a trapezoid.

“I think that might be an oldest child thing.”
~Mom~

The kids had a track meet this evening. They had one yesterday evening as well, which is an unusual thing to have two in a row. The coach added the one yesterday with the likely possibility that tonight’s meet would end up being cancelled due to weather. It didn’t end up raining, so the track meet was on. The temps were actually comfortably warm. There was just this constant gust of flatland, country, midwestern wind.

Most of the time being a mom of teens has been positive, but every so often I have conflicts with my older two kids. It happened tonight, where my mom feelings were hurt. I know I have my own issues that are mine to deal with and not things to project onto other people. My “love” is tainted in many ways, and yet even still I can find it hurtful, even lonely, when my heart so often goes unseen. Why don’t these ones who I love so much, who I would surely do almost anything for, why can’t they see me? Why do I feel such alienation?

I think likely first and foremost it’s a matter of maturity. With me being the adult, I’m supposed to be the one who possesses this quality in greater measure. The Bible says not to be wise in your own eyes, but sometimes I do wonder things like, “Why doesn’t anyone appreciate my wisdom?” I remember asking my mom one time regarding a conflict with one of my siblings, “But when is my wisdom going to count for something?”

“Nobody can be interesting all the time, sustain high energy all the time, or fully invest himself or herself all the time. Never travel with anyone who expects you to be interesting, lively, and emotionally invested all the time. Real life doesn’t work that way. Neither does prayer.”
~Ronald Rolheiser, Domestic Monastery~

I am aware that when I write here I occasionally reveal what are glaring errors in my thinking. For example, after I wrote that one post about being upset that’d spent so much time of my spring break reading articles and threads about an article I’d read on the internet, I realized something. First, I had also just listed the various ways my family had spent some of their spring break, which all included doing things that they enjoy.

My husband enjoys doing special things for his kids. My son enjoys the Cardinals and watching their games. My boys enjoy playing Minecraft and learning tips from other players. My daughter, who loves animals, enjoys spending time with her cousins as well as meeting my sister’s new pets. There is nothing wrong with any of these activities and it makes total sense, that being the people they are, that this is what they were doing.

In that way, it also makes sense that I was spending my spring break, a time when one would normally experience a suspended time from certain duties, spending more time engaged in something like reading. In this case, my thing was reading about about a topic I am interested in and spending time also reading what other people have to say about it. Reading about what interests me is something that I as a person like to do.

“Why are you saying this? You’re just trying to justify the various ways you waste your time.” Actually, no. Two different things can be true at one time. There can be activities that a person enjoys and likes to do, such as reading or writing, and there can also be misuse or poor use of those activities. I don’t feel as though I am saying that right. What I mean is, I can be okay with spending time reading, and also be frustrated about it.

But back to the time thing, it seems to be a theme that’s come up a couple of times. There are a lot of things I currently feel frustrated with as far as my time goes. There are a lot of things I want to work on and do, things that take time, and time that takes me being able to better organize myself and choose the ways I want to spend it. This season of life is pushing me to grow in this area and it’s been good to do so. I actually like being organized.

Not that that’s a word people would use to describe me, by any means. I’m just saying that I’m willing to learn and keep trying, to keep growing in the ways God would have me to grow. Another thing I realized is that I misquoted Paul. I said he called himself a Pharisee of Pharisees but what he said, at least in the passage I was thinking of, was that he was a Hebrew of Hebrews. Maybe silly to mention but I also felt it worth doing so.

(The above would be a form of cognitive-behavioral therapy, or CBT)