The Saturday 7

1. I haven't been able to sit through the service at church much recently thanks to sick kids and nursery duty. But I was finally able to hear the whole message on Sunday. God knew I would need it for the rest of my week. We're learning about Israel's first kings, and this week was about Saul's jealousy of David. Pastor Chris emphasized that jealousy and envy can fester and become bitterness. As was Saul's case, it can literally lead to madness and open the door for demonic oppression. But it also just makes you an unhappy, un-likeable person. I've always struggled with jealousy, and this week was hard. I heard of a few friends getting amazing jobs, making lots of money. And then I saw some people from my past that are very successful and beautiful. It'd be one thing if I could tell myself these people are all greedy and mean-spirited and selfish, but they're not. They're all sweet and kind and deserving. I've been constantly reminding myself to be content and praying incessantly that God would give me contentment and patience for his timing.

2. Justin's been playing soccer in a summer league with some of his college friends. The games are far away, usually late at night, and usually smokin' hot, so we never go. But this Tuesday, the game was at 6:15 and the weather was gorgeous, so the whole family made the trek to go watch Daddy. Not surprisingly, all the other wives and kids had the same idea. So I got to see a lot of the soccer families. I was never very close with them while we were in college, but they're great people and it's fun to see where they are and how many kids they all have now. It was actually really sweet to see how we went from young, in-love college kids to families. There were numerous shouts of "Daddy!" while we sat on the sidelines watching our husbands play together like they did 10 years ago. Lucy's the oldest of the group because Justin and I were the first to get married, and subsequently the first to have kids (although we also had kids earlier in our marriage than most of them because we're rednecks and they're city people). Of course all of the wives are skinny and beautiful and dressed so cute for a soccer game. But again, I'm working on not being jealous . . .

3. Our fun activities for the week were library/McDonald's playdate with friends, park playdate, and "fashion day." When Levi went down for his nap, us girls all took turns giving each other makeovers. We did make-up and hair and chose each other's outfits. It was quite the endeavor.

This is a terrible picture of me, but the look has to be recorded for all to see. Haha.

4. One day this week, I decided to be a good mom and bake with the girls. They usually love helping me in the kitchen, and we were making homemade cinnamon rolls. They're big fans of canned cinnamon rolls, so I thought they'd be thrilled. But they started fighting over who would put in which ingredient before we even got started, and they each helped for about 3 minutes before giving up and going to play with Legos. (#cookingwithkids) I ended up making them almost all by myself. Which wasn't all that bad. Haha. And they were amaaaaaazing. If it wasn't so time consuming, I'd make them all the time and weigh 500 lbs. 

I did a bad job of stirring the powdered sugar into the frosting, hence the white lumps. They still tasted divine. 

5. I scaled back the reading this week and only read two books: The Mistress of Tall Acre and Honor's Reward (the conclusion of the series that I read last week). I have a stack of books still to read, including a couple I'm supposed to review, but I just got an email this morning alerting me that season 7 of Hawaii 5-0 is on Netflix, so I'm not going to be getting much reading (or anything) done for a while.

6. I'm finally with the times and listened to a few podcasts this week. After seeing it mentioned from a couple different friends in the space of a few days, I decided to try out At Home with Sally with Sally Clarkson. It was ok. Her co-host, Kristen Kill, has the most annoying stereotypical "retreat speaker" voice. She's overly enthusiastic about everything. But I actually liked what she had to say most of the time. Then I discovered the Risen Motherhood podcast, and I like that one even better. I've been listening in the afternoon while the girls do screen time and I clean the kitchen/start dinner. But during the first Risen Motherhood podcast that I listened to, I had to pause it and go find a notebook to start jotting notes down in. It was about how to incorporate the gospel in discipline - a subject that I value but can't fully comprehend. They had such great practical ideas - like identifying your children's disobedience as sin, reminding them that God put rules and standards in place for a purpose and breaking those rules distances them from God. They stressed empathizing with kids that we as parents sin too and struggle to obey. But then ultimately showing them the gospel of redemption and restoration that is available because of Christ's death on the cross. It sounds like a lot of theological jargon written out like this, but they made it so easy and relatable. I need to listen to the whole episode again so I can start trying to use it with my kids. 

7. Pictures!

We were eating lunch one day and Lena randomly declared, "Family selfie time!" Haha. 

Reading her book at the soccer game. Girl after my own heart.

We finally got some dirt to fill in the pit left by our pool. The kids love climbing it.

Blurry snuggle pic.

Bonfire! One with Levi smiling.

One with Lena smiling. None with Lucy smiling.

She loves being his little mommy. She's actually really helpful most of the time.