The Saturday 7

1. We did it! We finished school for the year! We started in the middle of August, didn't take a million snow days, and don't have to comply with the state's "180" days or whatever it is. (Yay for Michigan's non-existent homeschool laws!) But we made it through all 34 weeks of our curriculum, and packed in a whole bunch of knowledge. As you all know quite well by now, it was not always smooth sailing. Actually, it was probably more stormy than smooth as a rule, but we powered through and stuck with what we felt was best for our kids. And I know I'll never regret these days spent with my kids - even if they drive me crazy 85% of the time, homeschooling with a toddler is madness, and I regularly questioned my sanity. 🤣 It's years I'll never get back with them (as all the sappy, sentimental Mother's Day stuff is reminding me this weekend), and I'm glad to have had them.

That is a tattoo on Lena's leg, not a bruise. Haha

2. I finally finished my non-fiction selection for April. 🤦 I've been reading a lot by Rachel Jankovic recently, and this is another of hers that came highly recommended.

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Here's a snippet of my Goodreads review:

In a Christian culture that is becoming increasingly hedonistic, she's a breath of fresh air - calling Christians, especially Christian women - to stop buying into "feel-good" theology. What is sometimes a harsh message - the call to die to self daily - is written with grace, humor, reality, and good old fashioned common sense.

3. I also follow her on facebook, and she posted something this week that I've been thinking a lot about:

🌟When it comes to the Bible, many Christians have forgotten how to simply read. We read newspapers, online articles, magazines, Instagram posts, blogs, recipes, novels, etc etc LIKE NORMAL READERS. And yet we feel that we haven’t “really read” the Bible unless we have journaled, checked commentaries, studied the Greek, listened to a sermon series, etc. 🌟That is how we have started to believe that reading the Bible is an undertaking too big to fit in our lives and schedules. We can’t block out several hours. We aren’t feeling smart or focused right now. (We are seldom feeling smart and focused!) 🌟We think we aren’t getting any value out of the text if we aren’t bringing ALL of our resources to it. But guess what?! God’s Word brings the value to His Word, not our brains. We don’t bestow on our reading the importance of it. 🌟Simply reading is not the only way to approach Scripture, but it seems to be the most forgotten one, and the most needed one. Nothing shows submission to the Word quite like just showing up to let IT work on YOU instead of you coming in full steam to try to work on it. 🌟 Nothing shows submission to the Word quite like just showing up to let IT work on YOU instead of you coming in full steam to try to work on it. 🌟

I've been a Christian most of my life, and tried multiple "plans" and "routines" to get me reading the Bible more regularly, but none of them are sustainable long-term. In the past few months, I've finally just started reading through the New Testament. No commentaries or journaling or digging into the cultural ramifications. Of course there's a place for that, but at least for me, it's not best for the every day nourishment I need. I love how Rachel reminds us that "God's Word brings the value to His Word, not our brains" and that we need "to let IT work on YOU instead of you coming in full steam to try to work on it." It's actually really freeing!

4. Are you ready for the exciting Bathroom Update? (Like The Weekend Update with Tina Fey and Seth Meyers, but way less fun and/or exciting.) This week, Justin's wonderful dad framed in the bathroom and laundry room! Then John and Justin finished the plumbing and put in the tub! It's actually starting to look like a room! (It's also really hard to photograph, so bear with me.)

Now we're just waiting on the electrical before we can finish it all up!

5. Justin and I refer to our plumber friend as "John" when we're talking to each other, so that's what our kids call him. One day I told them they should really call him "Mr. [Lastname]" because he's an adult. Apparently we're bad parents because they were totally flummoxed. Lol. Lena said, "But we call Kelly Kelly and Missy Missy and all your other friends by their first name." That got me to wondering if it's a generational thing that's not as important as it used to be. When I was a kid, I wouldn't dream of calling an adult (other than my parents' very close friends) by their first name. But now, I only make my kids use "Mr." or "Mrs." if the adult is well older than me, or a teacher. Similarly, my kids don't call mine or Justin's siblings "Aunt" or "Uncle." Is that becoming the new norm as well? Or is it just because I was 8 when my first nephew was born and never expected him to call me "Aunt Sadie," so the trend continued in our family? What do you do in your family?

6. Today is Lucy's 9th birthday! I know, I'm not old enough to have a 9 year old. Trust me. I agree. Haha. But alas, I do, and as usual we celebrate birthdays big time around here. Yesterday at 3 we dropped Lena and Levi off at Niki's until Justin could pick them up after work, then headed out for girls' weekend!

Lucy had some birthday money to blow, so we went to Thrifty Outlet, Once Upon a Child, and Five Below. I told her we could go anywhere she wanted for dinner, and she chose KFC. Lol.

Then we headed to our ultimate destination: a hotel! We checked in and immediately got into our swimsuits and headed to the pool. Well, Lucy went in the pool. I dipped one toe in and decided that was not happening. She swam, while I sat in the hot tub reading my book. Glorious!! (Except for when a 50 year old man came in all by himself, dropped his pants, and climbed into the hot tub with me sans swimsuit. #awkward!)

When we were sufficiently water-logged, we headed back to the room for what Lucy didn't know was the real reason for this hotel getaway:

Ugh.

I was super nervous, and did not want to have this conversation with her, but it's time for me to get my head out of the sand and be the one to tell her before she hears it somewhere else. She's also built very differently than I was at that age, and I'm worried puberty may be a reality sooner for her than it was for me (#14 #latebloomer). "The talk" actually went really well. Inwardly, I was cringing at saying the very technical terms and describing things very graphically, but outwardly I think I did a good job of acting natural. Lol. I was relieved that Lucy said she had never heard of sex and didn't have any idea what it was. And she wasn't completely horrified. Whew! But she also didn't have questions or engage in conversation at all. Haha. So hopefully she understood the basics. I intend for it to be an ongoing conversation - not just a one time talk that we never address again.

Once we got that business out of the way, we moved on to more fun: eating junk food in bed while watching the Disney channel and reading.

I am desperately trying (and hopelessly failing) to hide my double chin in this extremely unflattering angle. Lol.

Gummy pizza. What could be better?!

We stayed up until midnight, so we could officially ring in her birthday.

Midnight was not a hardship for either of us. #nightowls

This morning, we had breakfast at the hotel:

And enjoyed one last dip in the pool:

We did a little more shopping after checking out, had lunch at Logan's, then headed home. Sweet Lena set up all these decorations for Lucy's birthday: