Monkey Boys! And other stuff...

Matthew is napping, and Arthur is having Quiet Time in his room (which isn't as quiet as it really ought to be yet, but oh well! He's playing with his cars on the bed), so I might have to stop this at any time if Matthew wakes (or Arthur does something that means I have to go up and remind him to be quiet/not come out of his room, etc).

I just wanted to update on the doctor's appt on Tuesday (thanks for asking, Jenn!). Arthur was very concerned about the tick in the jar, which was definitely as dead as a dodo by the day of the appointment! He looked so worried as he peered in at it, and shook his head as he said to me, "It doesn't look very well... It doesn't look very well at all." He insisted we took it to the doctor's to see if she could make it better, bless his heart!! I personally looked on that dead tick with grim satisfaction, hating it for biting my precious boy! *sigh* He has a much more generous heart than I do. I hope I can parent him well enough so that he continues to have that wonderful trait into adulthood.

Anyway. We took the tick to the doctor and she examined his leg where it had bitten him. She praised me for getting the whole tick out and not leaving the head behind :) I told her I looked online for how to do it before I attempted it. She is writing to the paediatricians at the hospital to inform them about Arthur's case, and to ask them if they want to routinely screen his blood for Lyme Disease, but she says they probably won't. They tend to wait for symptoms to develop first, before screening and treating. If they DO want to test his blood (NOT a thrilling prospect in itself!), they will contact me directly at home.

Otherwise, we wait. She assured me that he was in the best possible "camp" - first of all I knew he had been bitten by a tick, and then I got the whole tick out within 24 hours, and now we know exactly what we're looking for and the timeframe to expect it, so he's got everything in his favour. She said most of the complicated cases were where people don't even know they had a tick bite, or the tick had been in for days/weeks (!!!), or symptoms had been going for a long time before Lyme Disease was even suspected. The earlier you start on antibiotics when it starts, the better, and if Arthur gets it, he will start instantly that I spot a symptom.

The timeframe for symptoms to start is anywhere between 3 and 32 days after the bite - quite a wide range. After 32 days (RINGED on my calender - I can't believe I have to wait till the end of September! It feels like forever away!) I can completely relax. We are on day 5 today, and he's fine so far. I am watching for fever, pain in the joints, general unwellness, or rashes of any type, anywhere on the body. I also have to check the site of the tick bite every day. If he develops Lyme Disease, the area will "react". There is no reaction there at the moment, so it will be obvious if it changes. The doctor said that it will start to look good after say 20-25 days if the bite area has not reacted yet. But I can't relax till the end of September.

I sooooooo hope he doesn't get it! I have the prayer chain at church praying about it. The doctor said only a tiny percentage of ticks at the park carry Lyme Disease, but I know my stuff, having researched aplenty online, and I KNOW that 30% of ticks there carry it. That doesn't seem so tiny to me. Anyway. I pray that he doesn't get it.

The doctor did have to tell him that the tick was dead though! ;) I don't think he understood the concept, but he seemed perfectly accepting of the fact that she couldn't do anything for it! We had to take it home again, and I have to keep it until the 32 days are over.

So that is the update on that!

I have a ton of stuff I could write, but I have had to go up to Arthur what feels like a BILLION times since I started this entry - he is being ultra sulky and whiney about Quiet Time today. This is part of a general sulky and whiney trend over the last couple of months that we are most definitely working on at the moment! I am attempting to nip it in the bud, but not having the best encouragements of success at the moment. BUT, I do not intend to go, "Ohhh, he's only two..." and wait for him to outgrow it, no siree!

Matthew wakes. We'll see what I can get done on the rest of this entry later.

Okay, back asleep for a little longer, and Arthur is playing sweetly with his cars, from what I hear through the door (""Are you thirsty?" said the car.... "Yes!" said Arthur!" - aww! Arthur narrates EVERYTHING these days, it's ever so sweet! He does have a drink and snack in there, by the way!).

We are almost back to square one on the move/job front. I still feel like we are called to where Neil is working, or certainly somewhere in the county, but hmmm. Neil's job turns out to SUCK. He has 3 months probation. I think he is just over 1 month into it. He has found out that he's the third in a row in his position - the last two did not finish their probation, but quit before that point! Neil is already thinking to do the same, if only he can find a new job, urrrgh.

The difference this time is that we are really really much closer to God on the whole deal. For nearly 2 weeks now, we have been putting the kids to bed earlier - usually by 7.30pm (what bliss!), which means a huge feat on my part to feed, bathe and change them ready for bed by the time Neil gets home, with dinner ready for Neil when he walks in too. But I'm starting to feel sooooooooo much better in the pregnancy department (nearly 17 weeks now, already!!) and that helps a lot. I'm managing it!! They are most often ready for bed, or just requiring their night nappies and teeth cleaned before bed when Neil walks in. He spends a little time with each of them and helps me get them ready, then I take Matthew up (Neil spends more time with Arthur, playing cars and reading with him) and breastfeed him in bed. Then I put him in the cot (WIDE awake, sometimes even not too pleased about going to bed!) and LEAVE THE ROOM!!! Yeah!!! I finally managed to get it to the point where I put him down and leave him to fall asleep. Oh my gosh, it has only taken me FOURTEEN MONTHS, and I'm so relieved! It has been a very slow, gradual process from around the time I found out I was pregnant. In the end, I'm glad it was gradual. It was more gentle for Mathie that way.

He takes a while to go to sleep usually, and if he cries and sounds persistant, we go in, pick him up, rock/walk him for a moment and then put him down in the cot and leave the room again. That's all we ever do, and sometimes there are a fair few trips upstairs to do that, but other times he gets the message pretty fast and goes to sleep. He usually falls asleep all mashed up into the top corner of his cot, the funny boy! So we go up once he's been quiet for a while and move him down the cot all limp and fast asleep :)

Arthur gets a Bible story (or 10!) with Neil while I settle Matthew. And then I go in and breastfeed him in his bed. I pray over him (aloud - he nods while he's nursing to all the points in my prayer that he agrees with, which makes me chuckle for some reason!) while he's breastfeeding, and then he's usually out like a light before I even take him off the breast. Now that he isn't napping anymore, he goes to sleep very quickly at bedtime. If I DO get the chance before he conks out, I take him off the breast and pat his back for a moment before going downstairs, but it's rare that he is still awake by the time I go down. That's okay. I know from a few occasions that if he happens to still be all wide awake at that point, I CAN tell him Mummy and Daddy are going downstairs to have our grown-up evening time, and he must stay in his bed and try to go to sleep (or wait for sleep to come), and be quiet as a mouse. If he comes out or makes a ton of noise, he will be disciplined.

We have finally got a grip on discipline (watch me say, "Waaaah, it's not working!!" a few months down the line, haha!), and they seem to really get it at the moment. Well, Matthew less so, but he's so little still.

Anyway, so bedtime is working better! And then we come downstairs, and often it's like SEVEN THIRTY!!! Unfathomable, over the last nearly-three years!! It's so nice. We then spend 30 minutes chatting about our day(s) - each getting plenty of chance to talk and get stuff of our chests and share difficult stuff with each other. Then we spend as much of the next 30 minutes as we need to praying about the stuff we just discussed. It's SO GREAT!!! We are both feeling so much closer to God because of it, and it's starting to feel second nature to bring every issue in our family life before God as it crops up. It's feeling normal to pray together daily for our children, and to persistantly bring up the subject of Neil's work/our move with God. He isn't showing us anything about it yet, but we'll pray and seek him on it daily anyway. I know he'll speak to us about it.

So that is that. It's much more brief than I wanted it to be (I have such a lot of smaller detail/thoughts and feelings about the subject that I would normally really want to share here), but I haven't got the time. I need to get Arthur from his quiet time as it has been over an hour now and he's sounding restless up there!

I just wanted to post a few photos of something from yesterday. Matthew is climbing like crazy these days - more than Arthur ever did, and I thought HE was bad! I can't stop him scaling things he really mustn't go near, but we can't lose or rearrange any more furniture in our small house! Anyway. I had to go to the loo, so I told the boys I was going up to the toilet for a wee. Almost as soon as I got up there I could hear Arthur calling to Matthew and then shouting up to me, "I can't stop him!!" so I came back down and Matthew was trying to climb onto the merchant's chest (huge chest of little drawers that we have) from the sofa arm, which is cluttered on top with paperwork and boxes of tissues, and a box of more solid bits and pieces in the middle at the back where the boys can't reach, even from the sofa arm! I got him down and disciplined him, and then went back upstairs. He did the same thing again before I got the loo (Arthur called again to let me know), and that time I explained to the boys that if they didn't let me go to the loo, we were in danger of running out of time to go to the swings (there had already been like a dozen interruptions to me getting washed and dressed before going for a wee, and the time was getting on). Obviously, Matthew is too little to understand that, but Arthur got the message.

I finished in the toilet and was washing my hands when I thought how nice and quiet it was, and got suspicious! So I called down, "What's going on down there?!" and Arthur yelled back, "NO!" - always reliable evidence of something fairly monkeyish going on! So I called, "But what are you doing, Arthur?" and he said, "NO! I'm not doing anything!" Hmmm! So, drying my hands as fast as I could, I called, "What's Matthew doing?" and Arthur called, "He'd not doing anything either!" Uh-oh!

I ran downstairs to discover that without really noticing it, I have suddenly got TWO monkey toddler boys who get into mischief! Two of them! Yikes! Matthew had evidently climbed up onto the merchant's chest, rummaged in the box of bits, found a family bag of chocolate Minstrels (which I had forgotten about MONTHS ago!) and emptied it over the sofa, floor and toy boxes! He and Arthur were hoovering them up! Matthew had already chewed and spat several onto the sofa and the floor (urgh!), so keen was he to get the next tempting looking chocolate into his mouth!

Monkey boys! I told them off first, and then cleaned up. I was putting things in the bin in the kitchen when Arthur came to the gate in the kitchen doorway and said to me, "Mummyyy? Mashew did say "Would you like to share some chocolate?", and I did say yes!" :)

Here are the photos, after the goop was cleaned off the floor/sofa:

My camera was being annoying and taking lots of blurry photos. Right after these photos, Matthew started doing his usual thing where he chases Arthur around the floor, sort of hanging onto the back of Arthur's nappy as Arthur tries to crawl away! He eventually wrestles him to the ground. Arthur is very good-natured about this! Matthew is such a different personality, he's so boisterous and assertive! Arthur is both too, but SO much less than Matthew. They're blurry, but here's a little sequence of "action" photos of the above!

Okay, the monkey boys are now downstairs with me, and getting restless, so I must stop for now and think of something fun to do for the rest of the afternoon. My brain is so blank on that kind of thing lately! Yesterday we went to some swings that we hadn't been to before, and the boys were both SO taken with a child's pushchair and baby doll! The first thing Matthew did was grab it by the crotch and carry it around with him!! Not sure what to make of that! ;) Arthur was SO sweet with it. He put it in the pushchair and insisted on pushing it everywhere. He didn't want Matthew to "help" at all. It was a baby that had a crying noise when it was in a dark area, and he looked so concerned when it started crying after he pushed it into the little house! Eventually he figured he could turn the pushchair towards the open door and it wouldn't cry any more. I saw him pat its tummy, bend at the waist to talk gently to it, and then kiss it sooooo gently on the face before leaving it there! Bless! I absolutely MUST get them a couple of dolls and a child's pushchair. I have been meaning to for at least a year, so I really must get around to it.

Okay, MUST go! Will update when I can again, hopefully soon!

First trip to the beach! And a tick. Urgh.

I love the fact that we live very near to one of London's Royal Parks. It's vast, and largely untamed, and beautiful, and full of birds and animals. It even has wild deer!

I have just realised that I also hate the fact that we live very near to one of London's Royal Parks full of wild deer with ticks that carry Lyme Disease - one of which was found embedded in Arthur's upper thigh this morning. Ugh. Neil took the boys for their usual walk in the park yesterday, and I can't BELIEVE we didn't notice the tick before bed last night. But anyway, there it was this morning, plain as day. Neil had to go out to buy some antiseptic wipes as we didn't have any antiseptic in the house (yet another annoyance - WHY, with two toddlers in the house, are we not more prepared for first-aid-ish type incidents?!). And we consulted the internet and tweezed the tick out, and rubbed antiseptic on the spot where it had been. Thirty percent of ticks at this park carry Lyme Disease, and I feel really quite anxious about it. There is no way to know if the tick that bit Arthur carried it or not, until a few weeks go by and we see if he develops symptoms. I am taking him to the doctor tomorrow (it's Bank Holiday Monday today - as it would be whenever we might have a good reason to go to the doctor *sigh*), and we have kept the tick (alive and kicking, by the way) in a container as per the suggestions of the sites I read online.

Please God do not let my little boy contract Lyme Disease. Some of the stories online are REALLY scary. There's even a small risk of fatality. Oh my gosh. I also do NOT want him basically experiencing M.E. I know how much that totally sucks. The good thing is, if he DOES get it, the earlier it is diagnosed, the better, because he would go on antibiotics I think, and that is better if started earlier. I am just praying and praying that he doesn't get it. Please God!

Anyway. Onto a different subject.

On Saturday we all went to Littlehampton beach for the afternoon, with our church! It was so nice! The boys have NEVER been to the seaside before, so it was extra special. I am NOT a beach person. I think you either are or you aren't. Give me mountains, lakes, or basically anything GREEN, any day. But beaches do not thrill me at all. Sand gets everywhere, wind blows yet more sand everywhere, you get too hot, and step on things that hurt your feet. And there's not much to do. But I don't hate them. I did have a nice time! Especially since the little ones had a great time too. I took a ton of photos of them experiencing the sea for the first time - they paddled with their clothes on, since we have no swim wear for them. They got pretty wet up to their nappies, but we just changed them the moment we got back up the beach to our blanket. We brought lots of dry clothes and nappy changes with us for such a purpose! We also had lunch on the beach - we packed a picnic, which was NO FUN with all the sand and wind and no-place-to-put-my-sandwich-while-I-brush-sand-off-a-small-boy's-for-the-millionth-time.

But the boys both loved the sand and seaweed underfoot, and they loved paddling, and building sandcastles (especially Arthur, with the sandcastles!). Matthew walked CRAZY distances and didn't want to stop for anything. He just walks as far as anyone else these days. He rarely crawls any more. I got some video footage of him having a little steppy-step around the blanket/pushchair, just feeling the sand and dried seaweed beneath his feet, but Neil has taken the boys out and they have the video camera with them, so I can't upload it at the moment.

But here are the photos (there are lots, be warned!):

They had such a great time! And didn't burn - yay! We kept their hats on and plastered them in factor 50 kiddie sun-cream. We wore the same ourselves, and we were the only people at church who weren't SCARY shades of red and purple the next day at church! I can't fathom why people don't have any sense in the sun. Maybe things are improving on that front in general here, but there are still a LOT of really daft people out there getting burnt.

It was 1.5 hours on the way there and again on the way back, which we haven't really managed successfully in the past with the kids, but it went fine in the end, despite a few nerves over it! There was NO traffic, to our surprise! Matthew fell asleep the instant we set off, having been deprived of his morning nap, and slept literally all but the last 10 minutes of the journey! Arthur kept asking when we would be there, and eventually, about halfway through the journey, I said that it would take us quite a while to get there yet, and suggested that he could have a little sleep while he waited, if he liked. To my amazement, he said, "Oh, okay." and went straight to sleep!!!!! Soooo not like Arthur! Of course, he wasn't as tired as he needed to be at bedtime as a result, but it was good that he napped anyway. He slept most of the remaining 45 minutes of the journey.

On the way home it was okay, except that Matthew cried and cried for some of it. At the beach, when we were changing his nappy, the excellent light (and the fact that I was making faces to make him giggle) allowed me to see that he has just cut two new teeth! He has a new top molar (his first one!) on the right - the same one that Arthur got first. That has a tiny white corner through, so I reckon it came through within the previous 48 hours. I had noticed the "eroded" dent in his gum a couple of days before, so I knew it was coming. But I was also surprised to find a bottom incisor as well! He only had his bottom two middle teeth (six in total, with four at the top in the middle), but he has just got the one next to those on the right. It is coming in quite a way behind the others - I hope that is okay and that they'll straighten out! It looked even newer than the molar - maybe only within the previous 24 hours. So the poor little boy was just chewing on his hand and crying his heart out on the way home. We had to stop and give him some Calpol (thank goodness I had a sachet in my bag!). He seems otherwise unsually fine with the teething though. I'm quite surprised he's been as little bothered by it as he has. Maybe he'll get worse as the rest of the molar pushes through? Or maybe he got lucky this time? He usually teethes worse than this, and I expected worse with the molars. Anyway, it's been MONTHS since he got any teeth, so I'm glad to see some coming in again at last! He now has 8 teeth! I think the top molar on the other side won't be far behind. I can feel a real pokey bump in the gum over it.

I think I will save this in Word and wait till I can get the little clip of Matthew walking at the beach uploaded. I really want to post it here, and it will be kind of out of place if I don't post it with the entry all about the beach and the photos. I will try to do that later, and then just paste this entry in and post it. I'm going to rest up now, while the boys are still out. They are at Kew Gardens this afternoon! We are avoiding the park for a while, yeurgh!

Back! It's 9.30pm now and I have finally uploaded the video to YouTube. It's 3 minutes long - my longest video yet, I think! YouTube seem to be annoyingly slow these days, so I hope it doesn't take just TOO LONG to load for viewing. Anyway, here it is! Matthew was walking around, feeling the sand and dried seaweed (which he especially found interesting!) underneath his feet. He seemed kind of wobbly when he was doing that, but he was just stopping to feel the sensation I think. When he wants to walk to get somewhere, he goes pretty fast now. He also tried to eat stones from the beach a lot! Hence me trying to get him not to rather a lot in the first part of the video!

I WISH I could remember something funny that Arthur said to finish the entry, but it has all fallen out of my head suddenly! I have also started to upload (to my computer, not YouTube yet) 5 other video clips of the boys recently. Some were a good few weeks ago now, but I also have a little clip that Neil took today at Kew Gardens. Anyway, I need to post those soon! Hopefully not allll at once, otherwise it will just be too many videos at once! And take ages to load, or something.

Anyway, I'll try to update again soon!

Getting closer to God, and a ton of boy-related updatey stuff!

Yay, I'm so excited to be back again just 3 days later!!! Gasp! ;)

Thank you SO much for all the messages after my last entry. You were all so encouraging and said such nice things! And gave good advice too. Thank you!! Every single message really helped me a lot.

I feel quite a lot better about things now, which is great! I have spent more time with God, but mostly just making sure I am focused on him throughout the day, etc. I pray when I get up so that my day gets off to the right start - just as I'm getting up out of bed, not a long thing. And I snatch prayer times throughout the day. If I'm at the kitchen sink refilling a little boy's sippy cup of water, I pray then, just while the water is running. It's enough time to ask for help with my flagging energy, or for inspiration for activities over the next hour, or for guidance over discipline, etc.

The day before yesterday there was a time for about 10 minutes when Matthew was asleep for his afternoon nap, and Arthur was well settled in his room for Big Boy Quiet Time (oh, I ought to write about that in a minute! I talked about it in my pregnancy diary but not here, I don't think). I couldn't decide what to do for my short time with the little ones occupied elsewhere, and in the end I just craved reading the Bible, so I went up and sat on the bed next to Matthew's cot, and read my Bible! It was so nice! Then after I read a bit, I prayed about the stuff I read. It was a short time, but it felt like soooo much more than just a few quick minutes. So that kind of thing is encouraging me!

I talked with Neil about the way I have been feeling (re. God) and he had already mentioned about the Christian book on discipline we're reading, and how it suggests that as parents we need to live by example, as in, our faith in God. We haven't been doing that for a long while. And we both feel it's really important that we do. We want it to be completely normal and usual for the kids to see prayer and heartfelt worship in their own home, and also for us to talk about God with the love we have for him a lot. There's more we want to do on that kind of theme in the long run, but for now we have decided to have a family prayer time in the morning before Neil goes to work. Right now, it's literally a quick prayer for a matter of seconds. But we have talked with Arthur about it, and he knows it's Family Prayer Time. We make sure the boys are both sitting with us so we can pray, and then Neil and I (or one of us) will pray out loud, but not like we have been praying with Arthur at bedtime about bad dreams and such - in those instances we have been praying using very simple language and keeping the prayers quick and childlike, so he can relate to them I guess. In Family Prayer Time, Neil and I pray like we would with other adults, or each other. We want the children to see us doing what we do, and being embraced into that.

We might start having a song that we sing before praying. I usually fall out of bed just minutes before Family Prayer Time, as Neil goes to work shortly afterwards (and he gets up with the boys - he has to get up then anyway to get ready for work - so I can cram as much precious sleep as possible for the day ahead!). I think I will sometimes find it hard to really get into the right frame of mind to pray when I'm totally bleary and sleepy. I know that for me, worship wakes my soul up, no matter the circumstance, so I asked if we could have some worship time before we pray in the mornings. I have had Christian music playing during the day sometimes, especially if I feel my energy is really on the floor, or I am getting exasperated with the kids or something. I put it on and sometimes I sing to it, and other times it just helps to have it in the background. It helps me to focus on God more. The boys don't mind it and it means the TV is off more (YAY!!!). I have some children's Christian CDs too - one or two are really funny and bouncy and Arthur loves "Lovely Jubbly" (Doug Horley), which he calls "The Poo Song" (!!) as it has a line about how God made birds that poo on your shoe, hehe! He laughs till he cries at that line, every time :)

Anyway, so it is going better!

I am praying over the boys every night before bed, and that is HUGELY powerful for me. It was quite by accident, the night of my last entry. I thought I would just check on Arthur to see if he was too hot in bed (he wasn't), and he was just soooooo beautiful, lying there so fast asleep. I lay next to him for ages and ages and just watched him sleeping. My mindset is so changed towards my children when I watch them sleeping. They may have driven me half out of my tree during the day, and I may have been relieved to see them go to sleep at bedtime, but once they are asleep, everything melts away as I watch them and I only feel this huge surge of love and an almost animalistic urge to protect them and do what's best for them. That is a good place to be, when it comes to praying for them, and about raising them right. So after I watched him sleep for a long time, I began to pray. I prayed for a long time, and he didn't stir at all.

I prayed about me, how I am doing as his mummy, and for guidance over lots of different things. I prayed for Arthur - loooads of things specifically. I laid my hands on his sweet body and asked God to bless him. I asked forgiveness for things I was doing wrong - not as God would have me do. I felt so close to God and so close to Arthur, all at once. I prayed in tongues and praised God for my sweet little boy. It was a lovely time!! Then I went to Matthew's room and prayed for him too. I didn't pray for nearly as long, and I couldn't get right in there with him because of the fact that he was waaaay down in his cot (mattress on the lowest setting now) with all those high BARS all around. *sigh* Some aspects of cots really don't sit too well with me. I'm happy that he sleeps in a cot, but it doesn't feel natural to be so cut off from him by bars! Anyway, but I prayed for my tiny boy too. I was at least able to lay my hand on his back, but he was more stirry than Arthur was! Then I lay down in bed to go to sleep and put my hand on my new little bumpy bit, and prayed for my little beany person!

There's so much responsibility with having children. The more children you have, the more children you are responsible for (obviously! But it sort of hit me anyway). So it's WONDERFUL that God is right there to help and guide and take the burden of everything. Not that children ARE a burden. I mean, there is a lot on the shoulders of a parent with several small children. God can take the weight of that and help me as I raise them. I'm so so glad and grateful.

Last night, Neil and I were praying together for a bit - we are praying together more about stuff, yay!!! Just quickly when we get time, but still. I'm so excited about that! Anyway, a few weeks ago, a lady from church and her teenage daughter came to help me get the boys' lunch for them and play with them for an hour or so. They did our food shopping for us beforehand and brought it with them. They gave me the receipt from the shopping so that we could pay them back when we had cash to do so (I didn't have any in the house at the time). This was when I was on bedrest briefly with my big scary bleed at 11 weeks. Anyway, I am SO ashamed that 2 weeks went by and still we had not repaid them! How awful is that. We had spoken to them at church and they had said we could just put a cheque in the post if that was easier (we NEVER seem to have cash on us!). So the week went by and still I didn't remember to put that cheque in the post. Finally last night (Friday), we decided one of us would drive round to their house with a cheque and be done with it! We should have done that AGES ago, but never mind. It's worse because that family are short for money at the moment, urgh. I feel sooooo bad.

Anyway. Last night after the boys were in bed, we were getting the chequebook out and talking about what to say in the thank-you card, etc, and both of us said how we felt we wanted to give them more back than we owed them. So we stopped what we were doing and prayed about it, and asked God if we should give them a gift in his name, and if so, how much? Neil wanted us to pray because he said *I* might hear something from God about it. Tsk! He never really hears guidance from God when he prays and is generally quite negative about it. It bugs me. It's like he closes off to hearing God's voice before he even gives him a chance, with his attitude. But anyway! Sometimes I DO hear God's voice on things, when we pray and wait on God. So we prayed, and waited. The grocery bill was £33.47 and my head was thinking that maybe we could give them £50 or even £100. I waited for God to confirm one of those figures. Within seconds, I started to feel that God would have them receive TENFOLD what they paid! My ungenerous mind (sigh) started to think, no no, I will wait a bit longer and see if God comes up with something less expensive! We can't afford anything like that anyway. We had a message on the phone from the guy at church who we need DIY help from, to get our house ready to sell. He has time to help us, and is thinking of us paying him £100 a day plus expenses, and though we can't POSSIBLY sell the house without some work done first, we can't think how we can afford his help! That was literally 20 or 30 minutes before we were praying about this, so my mind was all fresh about not being able to afford stuff!

Anyway, I waited and waited, and allll that was in my head was the word "ten-fold" over and over and over, giving me no rest at all! Eventually I looked at Neil and asked him if he felt God had spoken to him. He wouldn't say, because he wanted to hear from me first. I would not give in, so in the end he said he felt we should be giving more than we'd first thought. I said I had been unable to shake the word, "ten-fold" and he was SO excited and said that the very first thing that came to mind when we were praying was the word "ten-fold", but he instantly dismissed it because he felt it was too much and I wouldn't agree!!! So, we JOYFULLY wrote a cheque for £334.70 and I drove round to give these lovely people the cheque and a card. I explained that we had been praying and that we felt God would want to bless them with this money. I can't DESCRIBE the joy I felt!!! They accepted it happily and also encouraged us over having been obedient to God's calling :) Which was so nice! They did say for a moment, "But, you can't afford to give us this much!" and I just said, "I know! Isn't it GREAT?!" and we all laughed, hehe! I ALWAYS know it's God when we give a large sum of money away as a direct result of God asking us to do so (and specifying the amount), because of the incredible joy and abandonment that comes with it. There is literally nothing else like it. It's exhilarating to know that we don't have that money in the bank! Not from a "dangerous thrill" perspective, but because it's such a FREEDOM to think that God knows full well what is in our bank account, and the fact that we're obedient when he asks us to give more than we have is just so exciting. We have never had an occasion where we give financially like this and DON'T get seriously blessed financially in return. Ever. I don't know my Bible well enough (which I SO want to change), but doesn't it say about when you give, God brings it back to you in a greater amount than you gave out? Or something? Anyway. We have always received more than we gave - usually exactly what we need for something urgent at the time. When we moved house last time, years ago, we had recently given money like this and there was an unexpected problem at the very last minute with our purchase of this house that we're living in. We needed THOUSANDS of pounds. We literally sat on the bed to pray about it, and the phone rang when we had finished! It was my dad, offering us basically the exact number of thousands of pounds that we needed. My parents had just felt that they wanted to give us that money as it might help us to have it (not knowing about our sudden need). He even said, "I hope you haven't been praying!" - he is NOT a Christian and it hugely annoyed him that we'd just prayed for that money and HE was chosen to bless us with it, haha! ;)

Anyway. I'm SO excited that God chose us to bless this family, and SO excited that we just put ourselves in a sticky situation financially in God's name! I wrote it all out here because I have such complete faith that God will now bless us abundantly. You just watch my God bless us!!! ;) He is so faithful.

Driving out that evening also gave me some alone time in the dark in my car, and I took a worship CD with me (my much-scratched and battered Michael W. Smith "Worship" CD). Some of the tracks wouldn't play because it has been kind of scratched, but I had some lovely time with the tracks that would play! I remembered what some of you guys said in my comments about getting away even for a short time (like that walk last year or sometime) to be OUT and pray. I can really connect to God quickly if I am on my own, out of my house, especially somewhere vaguely private, like walking in a park or in my car. I had forgotten about it! Thank you for reminding me! That's just the kind of thing I need to do. I would have done it today but I have had a bad headache. I will definitely try to do that more often, maybe every weekend when Neil is home to watch the boys? Or some evenings if I feel the need, maybe.

So I feel way better about things! I have also been searching the internet like CRAZY for stuff like Bible studies that are specifically for women, or mothers, etc. I want to read my Bible, but at the moment I particularly want to get stuck into verses and passages that will guide and encourage me over things that I'm going through right now. I'm also generally looking for Christian sites that have good advice about parenting in general and discipline, etc.

Thanks Jennifer for suggesting the Duggar family website! I have heard of them - they had just had their 14th child when I was pregnant with Arthur (or had just had him?) so I have vaguely kept up with their news since then, with interest. I think everything they stand for is GREAT, personally! :) I know they get a lot of flack, but I love what they're doing. Anyway, I went to their site after I read your message, and followed links there to some really useful places. In particular, Titus 2.com which has some reeeeally helpful articles written by these parents of 8 kids (under the Dad's/Mom's corners section, if anyone is interested!). There are so many to read in the archives, and I have already had lots of help from them over things like anger with the kids and my attitude. There's SO MUCH MORE! I am able to treat these as the precious Bible studies that I've been looking for, because they are based on Bible verses and I can get my Bible out and read the verses and then really think about what they mean as I read the article. Sooooo helpful! I'm so excited to have found it! They are a homeschooling family (as are the Duggars) so that is of great interest to me as well!

So, overall, yay! :)

It's getting late now (waffled more than expected, as usual!), so I will try to post some more pictures and then go to bed. Oh, I forgot to say - Arthur has stopped having naps. I think it has been 3 weeks now since he has napped. He has taken the odd nap (maybe 2 or 3 times) in that time, but it has NEVER been worth it - he has always been up till 9.30 or 10pm being kind of difficult, even with a 30 minute snooze in the afternoon. With no nap, he's out like a light as early as we can put him to bed! He is often asleep before Matthew, whose afternoon nap is finishing juuust a little bit too late for him to be ready for sleep again at bedtime. He can't seem to manage with just one nap yet, so I'm not sure what to do about that. But Arthur will be asleep for 7.30pm if we can get him in bed for then. He breastfeeds right before sleep, and sometimes falls asleep within a minute or two on the breast. Other times, I take him off and pat his back for a moment and he's out. The idea was never that he'd depend on us to fall asleep, but he's going to sleep so fast that we don't really have time to leave the room before he's out, at the moment! He sleeps right through and wakes between 6am and 6.30, usually. If we haven't been able to get him to bed till after 8pm (which is the norm at the moment since Neil isn't home from work till after 7pm), he sleeps till almost 7 the next morning. I wish we could consistently get him to bed so he can fall asleep before 7.30. I think even 7pm would be great for him. But with Neil commuting and getting home late, that is very hard to achieve. The boys need to see their daddy, and at the moment I need some help to get them ready for bed. Although, I can now bath them and get them dressed for bed by myself :) I discovered it the other week when I just DID it and found that I could! Also, Neil worked late last night and didn't get home till 8pm. So I got the boys ready for bed after the three of us ate dinner (Neil's was ready and waiting for him too!), and put Matthew to bed, intending to take Arthur up right afterwards, when Neil got home as I was just finishing putting Matthew down. Matthew wasn't asleep yet so Neil went to say hello/night-night, and then he read to Arthur before Arthur went to sleep. But I almost did it all by myself! It's getting easier. I am just learning that I need to be seriously organised. And accept being busy in the home as a Godly calling - a JOYFUL one at that ("Then [the older women] can train the younger women to love their husbands and children, to be self-controlled and pure, to be busy at home, to be kind, and to be subject to their husbands, so that no one will malign the word of God." Titus 2:4-5), instead of a hardship, which I think my attitude has become lately. I love this verse!! It's so helpful to me. I can't wait to read more wonderful stuff like this in the Bible!! :) I can see I SERIOUSLY need help with the bit about being self-controlled and pure. Seriously. And the rest of that verse, too, but right now I am going to focus on becoming self-controlled. It's a fruit of the Spirit, and so I need God's help with that. I have very little self-control these days so I think I will be a tough nut to crack! But I am willing and eager, and God is good and faithful, so that's alright :)

Instead of naps, the very first day he properly refused to nap, I told him that if he was big enough to stop having naps, then he was big enough to start having Big Boy Quiet Time! I made a big deal of it and he seemed excited to hear more about it, so I told him that big boys got to play quietly in their rooms all by themselves for a while, instead of naps! I told him he could take any toys he liked, so long as they were quiet toys. He was really eager! So we started from there.

At first he was happy playing with cars on the bed, but after a few days the novelty started wearing off a bit, and he came out of the room more and more, and made noise and jumped about sometimes too. At that point I was concerned about how to enforce it - I DO want to enforce it. I like the way the large families I read about online have a set quiet time in their day (or two, sometimes) - and their well-disciplined children sometimes have 2 hours of quiet play in their rooms! That's better than naps for me! I will know the kids will be occupied and if I can get it properly sorted, they will know that they have to stay put and play quietly for a good while. That is more freeing than when they're asleep and I have no idea how long they'll sleep for. I'm always "on call" at any given second, for when they wake up. I will feel more relaxed knowing that the kids are occupied in Quiet Time for a good while, so I can get things done, or have my own quiet time. But I didn't know how on earth to enforce it, or get it going properly. One afternoon I left Arthur upstairs having Quiet Time, and was praying on the way downstairs that God would help me find some help on the subject. I set up the laptop straight away and searched online for answers but didn't really find what I was looking for. Then I thought I would just check a few diaries and blogs that I normally read, and one of them was Sarah's. The VERY latest entry right at the top was dated August 1st 2007 - that very day! It was entitled, 'Sanity Spelled "Roomtime"' and contained basically everything I needed to know! Thank you God! So, the next day I made changes to Arthur's Big Boy Quiet Time. I let him choose a snack, and he had his drink and snack all by himself in the bedroom, which he was very pleased about! I bought him a couple of special toys that were ONLY for Big Boy Quiet Time. They are a roap-map floor mat, which he can drive his cars around, and a big car transporter that he can drive his cars onto (he LOVES car transporters at the moment). He is not allowed to have those downstairs, or play with them outside of Quiet Time. They are special toys that Matthew can't play with because they are Arthur's for Big Boy Quiet Time. Also, I closed the bedroom door on him. He didn't like this on the first day, but I basically gave him no choice. I explained that I didn't want the noise of his games to wake Matthew, and if the door was closed, Mummy would not need to come upstairs and keep reminding him to be quiet so often. He protested, but I was firm, and on Day 2 he didn't mind at all. He has been happily playing in there with the door closed since then.

I am firm about the rules. There is no loud talking or shouting, and no jumping or climbing. He does not come out of the bedroom until I come to get him. Mummy will tell him when Big Boy Quiet Time is finished, it's not something Arthur decides. And he has to try to remember to be very very quiet. If he breaks any of the rules I go straight up and remind him not to do those things. If he breaks the rules more than once then I warn him that he'll be disciplined the next time, and then I follow through with that if necessary. He rarely needs disciplining over Quiet Time rules. He generally has lots of fun playing and will stay for up to an hour. An hour was my target, and right now it's my minimum. I don't push him to take more than an hour right now though. Once or twice I have gone to fetch him after an hour and he has said, "But I haven't finished! I'm still playing my car game!" So he stays for another 10 minutes or so. He has to pack up all his cars before he can come downstairs, and he has to do it by himself as part of the Quiet Time. I am intending that starting out strict will pay off! I want no trouble with Quiet Times! I want to start as I mean it to go on. When Matthew gets older, he will have Quiet Time too, but in his own room. I like Sarah's thoughts on the value of learning independent play, and getting space of their own, especially when there are other little ones in the house. For Arthur it has started to mean less frustration (a little, anyway!) over Matthew messing up his lines of cars and things during the day. I simply remind him that when Matthew has his nap, he gets to have Big Boy Quiet Time, and play all sorts of wonderful games with his cars (his absolute favourite thing right now) where Matthew IS NOT ALLOWED to interfere, because it's Arthur's special time by himself. He looks forward to it sometimes for that reason, and he shares the cars much more nicely with Matthew after he has finished his Quiet Time - in fact, when Matthew wakes from his nap, if Arthur is still in Quiet Time, he calls me and asks if Matthew can come in and play cars with him on the bed! Which I always allow, and they have loads of fun. It always ends up with the cars being put away after a short while, and the boys jumping and jumping and jumping on the bed! Arthur calls out breathlessly, "I love jumping! It's my favourite thing to jump with Mashew on the bed!" :) Matthew jumps in the middle of the mattress with no support, but his "jumps" aren't big ones yet. His heels leave the bed, but he stays firmly rooted to the balls of his feet till he overbalances. He sticks his cute little bottom out for added effect as he bounces! He loves to fall onto his bottom and I say, "Boi-oi-oi-oiiiing!!" and he laughs and laughs at the silly sound :) Then they like to play "follow" or "walking follow" as Arthur now calls it, since Matthew likes to mostly walk, from one bedroom to the other. And then somebody usually poos and we all go downstairs for the usual nappy changes and meal preparations! :) I do love my life! It is hard work but I do love it.

Sometimes Arthur DOES get tired in the late afternoon, particularly if he's had a busy active morning or early afternoon. Often in the late afternoon, I am preparing dinner (yay, I'm able to do a bit more COOKING again now that my morning sickness is easing off!), and he will watch CBeebies on the telly for a while. Matthew sometimes watches, but mostly plays on the floor with toys and things, and walks around carrying things (his latest thing - the heavier the item, the better, apparently!). A couple of weeks ago, when he had been a week without naps, I came in to check on the boys and found Arthur in front of the telly like this:

Complete with drool (he's so like his father...)!

I woke him up after I smiled at him being so cute for a while (!) but it still affected his bedtime later.

They were both getting such LONG hair at that point, and really needed haircuts! Neil finally took them to the barbers to have their hair cut, and it seemed so short when it was done! Arthur's wasn't as short as last time, because I asked him to make sure they didn't cut it as short! But Matthew's was shorter than the last time. He looked so much more like a little boy than a baby to me when he came home! Waaah! :( But they both look nice and neat now :) Here's a picture of them playing with cars and shoe boxes (garages!) on the sofa together, after their hair appts:

And here are a couple of rather samey photos of Matthew just about a week ago (pretty much the most recent photos I've taken of him):

Oh, another GREAT thing about me starting to feel better, is that I am able to get back to doing fun crafts and stuff with Arthur when Matthew has his morning naps! Poor Arthur has been sooooo bored lately, and keeps saying, "I want to do something SPECIAL!" Lately we've made weather collages, and pictures of flowers, and tissue paper flowers. Arthur always comes up with what we'll make. He usually randomly says, "IIIII know! Shall we make a daisy?!" like it's the MOST exciting idea he ever had! :) So we make a daisy! I have lots of craft supplies to hand so it's usually straight-forward to make what he wants to make. One morning we baked chocolate fairy cakes! He loved that. And another morning we were watching CBeebies and some children were making hats, so I asked Arthur if he would like to make a crown, and he was excited about that. So we switched the TV off and made a crown together! He wanted to make a GREEN crown, and I got him bits of all sorts to stick onto it, and fixed it the right size for his head. He was sooooo proud and beaming as he wore it after it was finished!

He kept saying, "I think Daddy's going to EVER like this! I think Daddy weew be EVER pleased!" Bless his heart! And he said Matthew would EVER like it when he woke up, too :) Daddy DID like it, so much that he took another photo when he got home that evening, with Arthur's helper in it too!...

I think that's all the photos for now. I just wanted to post a couple of random things Arthur has said recently. The other day the boys were eating lunch, and they had Arthur's chocolate fairy cakes for pudding! Arthur had some crumbs of his cake on the table, and he put his drink down on them. When he realised there were crumbs on the underneath of his drink, he lifted it up and started to lick the underside of the cup. He said to me, "Mummy, I'm licking my cup!" and I was trying to clean Matthew up so I just replied absent-mindedly, "Ohh, that's good..." and he immediately did a sort of exasperated sigh, and then said, "Don't encouwage me!" hehe!

Also, the other day I was in the kitchen and I heard a very audible FART from the living room as the boys were playing with cars together. There was a brief pause, and then Arthur said, "Mashew! Was that your bottom?!" and Matthew did such a cheeky giggle in response, so Arthur joined in! Funny boys :) It has to be said, Matthew is HIGHLY impressed with himself when he farts audibly. *sigh* I don't know quite how he has learned this! He always tries soooo hard to do it again and again, after he's finished giggling from the first one. He goes quite red in the face with the effort! They're not even anywhere near eight years old yet! I can't fathom what I'll have to deal with when they are 7 and 8! It's SO nice that they make each other giggle already though :)

I'm trying to get the boys on video more lately. We ran out of tape for a while, and then while we've been ill or I've been bleeding, we just seem to have been really slack on both taking photos and getting video footage of the boys. I really need to get some good footage of Matthew walking because otherwise I'll miss a WHOLE stage of his development! He walks everywhere, and doesn't crawl much at all any more. He also walks well outside in shoes, and walks quite long distances on bumpy grass and stuff without difficulty. I can't wait till I can go for walks with my little boys, holding one of their sweet little hands in each of mine! I don't think it will be long now before I can.

Okay, I don't think there's anything else for now, and this entry is SO long! I'm so glad to have had the chance to finish all the updatey stuff that I wanted to write last time. And I'll try to come back again soon. My morning sickness is definitely on the way out, so my chance for diary updates will improve now! I need to write a pregnancy one tomorrow though. I can't believe I am 15 weeks already! I have a scan on Monday which I'll update about on the day at the pregnancy diary, too.

The wife/mother/child-of-God thing. And photos!

I can't believe it has been almost a MONTH since my last entry here! That HAS to be a record for this diary, urgh. I have been writing a lot at my pregnancy diary and several times it has ended up that a LOT of what I would normally write here has been written there instead, along with a ton of pregnancy-related stuff. Everything overlaps at the moment. My pregnancy is affecting everything, so everything comes under a pregnancy heading!

I have been having heavy bleeding and the usual morning sickness and exhaustion, so the combination of all that means that NO area of my life (or the poor boys' lives!) is unaffected by it all. I am 14 weeks pregnant now, still bleeding, but after 3 scans (a fourth next week too), everything with the baby is just fine. I am just being annoying and bleeeeding a lot! Tsk. I hope everything stays fine. But anyway. That is a brief update for the sake of this diary. I will continue to update about it all in my pregnancy one. This diary DOES tend to get neglected every time I'm pregnant, especially when I feel gross. I can only seem to maintain one diary at a time! But I always want to write here. I just never get time/energy.

Now I will try to catch up a little bit! I don't think I will necessarily attempt to do one of my usual "catch-up" entries, because it's such a huge task and I don't want to be throughly exhausted by it and put off writing here again! But I'll generally try to post some older photos before new ones (maybe....) and remember news from a few weeks ago as well as very recent stuff. Otherwise I was hoping to just ramble about stuff on my mind, and things the little ones are doing. But I will try to keep the rambles short! Otherwise I'll be here all night! ;)

Okay!

Yesterday, August 14th, was my 8th wedding anniversary! We spent the first hour of it (midnight till 1am on the night of the 13th) arguing and bickering. *sigh* It's a long story and not something I want to get into. It's not even much of a story! We are both soooooo tired and stretched to the very end of our stretchiness (!!), and basically near burn-out I think. I don't know if that's really fair to say - we do okay some of the time. But when I step back and see how we're doing.... We're just both permanently exhausted, never able to achieve any of the goals we set out to achieve (even tiny ones) each day, snappy and irrational easily ALL the time, and just, I don't know. Burnt out, I guess. I am just EXHAUSTED with this pregnancy. The bleeding and nausea do not help! Neil is now out for long days at his new job and I'm barely holding it together with the kids. I can't fathom why I'm coping SO badly with life right now. I'm not depressed at all, or anything like that, but I just feel completely out of control of the MAIN things that, as a woman and a wife and a mother, I need to have some grip on. My house is depressing to be in, it's that awful and cluttered and unhygenic (you know the times in the past where I've moaned about how the state of the house is just SO BAD? Well, now double that. It's never been so bad as now :( ). My kids are bored and climbing the walls because I can't take them out much at all and even indoors there are some days (well, quite a lot of days, some weeks) where I can't seem to do much with them at all IN the house. They both seem to be getting kind of out of hand with their behaviour. Arthur won't listen to me, goes out of his way to do naughty (yes, naughty) things, especially when I'm on the phone to someone (no, I don't have long phone calls while they are up and about), or when someone comes to visit us, and is getting really attitudey and stroppy in general. He also has times when he's completely precious, respectful, and obedient. But the balance is definitely tipping, and when it is tipped, I seem to have zero control over his behaviour. I know he's bored, and likely after my attention, but I can't always give it to him, and I most definitely can't continue to tolerate some of the behaviour he's exhibiting at the moment. I WISH we'd got a firm grip on discipline from the start! I just feel like we're so wishy-washy and loose and inconsistent, or something. Like we really don't have a clue what we're doing. We don't have confidence in our method, and we are not firm enough. Or we're OVER firm, and then the opposite the next day. Our own moods affect the way we discipline the kids WAY too much, and that is just not acceptable. It's a HUGE issue for us right now, and we're reading and researching. We are about to have a big discussion, when Neil has finished reading a book that I read and made him read! He reads it on the train on his commute to work.

Anyway. Matthew's behaviour (yes, I know he's only 14 months - FOURTEEN months already, waaah!!) is also difficult to handle at the moment. The particular issues with Matthew are that he basically bashes the house and his brother up on a constant basis. Nothing (nothing) will deter him from doing this, no matter what I do, at the moment. I can't ignore it because he is literally breaking the TV (which now receives only half the channels it used to!), and it's not fair to Arthur to allow him to smack him around like he does. He isn't acting frustrated or malicious towards Arthur, in fact he ADORES him. He just has a thing for whacking things as hard as he can, or bashing toys into them, including people. Which absolutely CANNOT be tolerated, 14-months-old or not. Yes, we smack him. No, it's not working. We are just RUBBISH at disciplining children. *sigh* I really feel like a failure at this part of parenting, but I know there must be a way. And I'm starting to feel desperate, because I am not sure how a mother manages a houseful of very small children when there is just no effective discipline in place. It will just be chaos. And I can't bear chaos. Right now, I'm not bearing the chaos that is the can't-function-in-it-at-all messy house and the boys' behaviour. I am losing my temper with them BIG time sometimes, and that is not what I'm like. I am also feeling overwhelmed and unhappy in my home. I feel like any tiny thing will make me snap, all the time. I know I am hugely hormonal right now, but I also know that's NOT what it's mostly about. I need control over my household, and over my children. I know it's not popular to think of a parent having CONTROL over their children. But I'm not out to be popular, and that is what I need with my kids in order to function better for them as their mother.

Urgh. It's a LONG long subject right now. I could fill a whoooole over-long entry on it, and pretty much get nowhere doing it. I am a little anxious about drawing negative comments like I ALWAYS do regarding discipline choices. This is not a time I need criticism on anything to do with my parenting skills! I know I'm not doing a good job. I will probably be unpopular for this (but as I said, I am not out to BE popular), but we're pretty much decided that we'll go back to the Bible for how we raise and discipline our children. We feel we want to be firmer in our discipline.

I can't believe how much of a complete 180 I have done on SO many parenting topics since my first baby was born! I was so stubborn and even "superior" and proud over the choices I had made with parenting and things, when we started out. Some of those things are literally the complete opposite of what we are now choosing to pursue! But I feel like I have grown a lot. I have become a LOT more open-minded, and am perfectly accepting of other people's choices (which, if I'm honest, I WASN'T at the start - how awful of me! Thank goodness God changed my heart!), even though I'm getting more determined about my own.

Many of the choices we're making now, we're doing for the good of our family as a whole, rather than one specific member of it. We need to, if life is going to go smoothly (ish!) when there are lots of us! We need to already. But even more so, the more little people there are.

Anyway.

So, yesterday was our wedding anniversary. We argued the night before over silly trivial stuff (car seats, I think!) and then went to bed. Everything was as normal the next morning and we remembered our wedding anniversary and that. Then, while Neil was at work later in the morning, a van drove up and a man delivered flowers for me!!! Neil must have ordered them days before. I felt SO bad about arguing then. More so than before, that is! I already felt bad. But I must have seemed like someone he couldn't believe he had ordered FLOWERS for, while we were arguing. And I had no idea. Anyway, they are BEAUTIFUL! Neil tends to get me flowers that are as similar as possible to my bridal bouquet :)

The boys were thrilled with the flowers! They kept wanting to touch them and did lots of gasping and gazing! I let Arthur have a closer look when I put Matthew down for his nap:

I DO have such a sweet husband :) We both perfectly accept that life is a bit stressful right now, and we are stretched thin in all directions. But it can be hard at the moment. Donya, I DO appreciate your advice and sweet words! But there's no WAY I am giving Neil any sort of keep-things-sweet parsnips (parsnips is my code word, if there are any new readers out there! I don't want google finding me talking about se*x!). Because, a) oh my gosh, why does anyone ever engage in this activity?! My hormones always make me feel this way about parsnips. ;) And b) time and energy are simply not conducive, on both sides. Also, and this should have come first as it's most important, c) I am bleeding. The doctor didn't say one way or the other, but I'm pretty certain parsnips would be 100% forbidden right now. There's now way I would have any sort of parsnips while I'm bleeding and pregnant. And I guess, d) Neil is really not the pestering type, when it comes to parsnips. I don't think he's a typical man in that sense! ;) Before my first big bleed at 11 weeks, I actually SUGGESTED it (I mean, that is exceptional for me when pregnant and morning sick!) but he said he was tired and not in the mood. Genuinely tired out and stressed. We both are a lot lately. So, I don't think there are major issues there. The situation means no parsnips, and we're both okay with that. I'm honestly not missing a THING! ;)

Anyway. Enough about that!

I feel a lot that I am not being a very good mummy or wife at the moment. I am also feeling a HUGE pull towards God at the moment. Not the healthy kind, you know where your whole body and soul just yeeeaaaarrrns to worship God and you can't seem to get enough! The desperate type where I just NEEEEED God more than I can even comprehend, but I can't find him enough. I mean, he's there, I totally know it. I feel his presence, and I have complete faith that he's my provider and my safe refuge, and my strong tower. He's everything I need. And boy do I need God! But I am just longing to plunge deep into God's presence. I feel like a pot plant that's got SO dry that watering it will do no good, little sprinklings with the watering can won't fix it, and a deluge with the tap will pretty much soak it but run right through. My mum used to soak her dry pot plants in a bucket of water in the sink - just plunge them in and leave them to soak for an hour. They would perk right up, and then respond great to normal waterings. THAT exactly what I need right now, spiritually speaking. I want to cry with how much something inside me aches for it, whenever I think about it. And I can't seem to "get" it. I turn to my Bible and get "sprinklings". I pray and get "watered". I sing worship songs at church and feel just a tiny bit refreshed for a while. But it all passes almost immediately and I KNOW that it's not touching the dry-to-the-core issue. I know what I need, but suddenly I don't know how to find God in that way any more. I ask him to come to me but then I can't find time to wait on him. How do you find the time for some desperately needed soaking in God when your every waking moment is consumed with tiny people?! There has to be a way, other people must do it. Why can't I?

I think I need to reconnect with God. I need to have silence and hours of it probably. I need space to pray and let the Holy Spirit lead me, and I need space to cry and sing and let myself be refreshed by God. I need quiet and space and time to listen to God and hear his voice. I can't fathom how I can possibly ever do that again! I mean, in the next decade or whenever! Let alone this week. I really need God. I really need God. I know he has made me to be someone who can manage my life and my children, and cope wonderfully and give all the members of my family EVERYTHING they need from me. But I also know I can NOT do it in my own strength. More than ever I am realising that I can only do these things through Christ who strengthens me. And lately I have not been turning to him and allowing him to strengthen me. Thus, I have not been doing my best for my husband or my children. I feel like I'm failing them, though I know I'm not. I feel helpless and hopeless and disappointed in myself, and sad for Neil and the boys. But strengthened by God and clothed in him daily, that can turn around in a DAY, I know it. I'm NOT a failure. I'm just not being a wife or parent in partnership with God, and that's why I'm not managing to cope or meet the needs of my family. I don't know how to instantly "tap in" and draw on God's strength! I need him so very much.

We are getting a cleaner. We ARE getting a cleaner!!! Yesterday I told Neil that striving to keep our house clean and fix the clutter together is way beyond our ability at the moment, and the thing where we keep on trying anyway (and not remotely getting anywhere) is putting a strain on our marriage, affecting how we are with our kids, and becoming a mental health issue for me. I know all that sounds extreme, but I have really been thinking about it and it IS accurate. It will become way more apparent if it goes on much longer. Really. It's the same issue as when Matthew was newly born. The house got away from me (was it ever anywhere else?!) and I was hanging on by the skin of my teeth, with the transition from one to two kiddies. I know that in hindsight, my hormones were not right and everything very suddenly became peachy a couple of weeks before my first period, so I KNOW it was hormonal. But the main thing that I felt would make things feel SO much less unbearable and even make life easier and happier for me (and thus the children), would have been to get someone to clean the house so it wasn't a stress factor for us to try and do it when we had nothing left to give. And NO stress of living in a dump all the time with the two little ones. I think that would have made the biggest difference, seriously. And I feel the same way now. It's been a huge battle to convince Neil to hire a cleaner. He has this thing where he thinks we should be able to do it ourselves. He doesn't expect me to do it right now at ALL, but he puts it on himself when he can't actually DO it! And then we're back to square one, except that since he's made himself the designated house-cleaning-person, all the stuff that I can't manage with in the day (like the kitchen being too awful to even find space to make sandwiches for the boys at lunch time, let alone sit them at the table to eat!) then I just become overwhelmed and it makes my day so much harder to deal with, and I end up building resentment towards NEIL for leaving the mess for me to not-be-able-to-manage-with in the day. Which is TOTALLY wrong! So, a cleaner, please. Finally I think he gets it. I put it pretty bluntly last night, I suppose. He said he would get a cleaner to clean the kitchen and bathroom, but on the condition that they don't TOUCH the clutter all over the house (wha??!). He says HE needs to fix that, and then once it's all sorted and put away properly, a cleaner can maintain it. He said it's not up for discussion. *sigh* But yay, a cleaner! I hope we can afford one.

I need to post some photos, otherwise I will just rant and waffle this WHOLE entry away and not catch up on pictures of my little sweetie pies!

Here is Matthew, about a month ago, on the phone :) Not really talking on the phone - he likes to pretend! He's not always so great at having the earpiece in the right place, hehe!

Here's a not-too-well-lit photo of the Boo-Bean at 13 months - I think it was when Arthur had the tummy bug, so Matthew had got better pretty quickly! He is always smiling like this. He just beeeams all the time, the sweetie :)

Here's Arthur being poorly with his tummy bug (the day after), poor lovey lamb:

Better again in this next photo though! :) Rough-and-tumble on the sofa with Matthew! This is a favourite game of both the boys. Matthew is the dominant character in these games in general, despite being such a peanut compared with Arthur! See his arm (the navy sleeve) locked over Arthur?! He's nearly always the one doing the wrestling. Arthur just laughs and laughs and loves it, till someone gets a bit toooo rough and then that's the end of the game. They initiate this kind of game allll the time:

And urrrrrgh, wouldn't you know it?! Photobucket has gone down for maintenance!!!! How frustrating! I have a ton more photos to post. Oh well. Perhaps it is a GOOD thing. It's 10.30pm and goodness knows how late I might have been up yet if I had continued this entry on and on for a while longer! Also, now I can eat Ben & Jerry's (Fossil Fuel, yum!), and - OH! Now is the time to spend time with God! I need to go to bed before long, but I can praaaaay!!! And maybe read my Bible a bit too. I will do it right now!

If anyone has wisdom (because I have NONE!), please do pass it on to me, about how to fit in time with God in this kind of situation. Maybe I'm getting on the right track already? I don't know. But if you have some good tips, I am longing to hear them.

I will definitely try to update again soon, because I need to post more photos, and also because this entry hasn't been such a huge task after all! So I'm more motivated to come back and write again :) Thanks, Photobucket! I think that maintenance time was just what I needed! Though I'm pretty sure I have God to thank for it too :)