Spring Reading Thing Update

I finished Black Ice last night. It was good. I really like Linda Hall’s stuff. It is clean & Christian, but not sappy-preachy Christian. It is a murder mystery. I like that Christian authors are writing murder mysteries. I like a good intrigue, something smart and clever, but clean!




In the secular world it is hard to find a good mystery that is not trashy, so I quit trying. You need to read Dark Water first; it is the first in the series, and then read Black Ice. I recommend them. 4 stars!



Here is the link to the original Spring Reading Thing post. I have updated it with lots of reviews. Some, like Black Ice, needed its own post.
Now, I need to go get Coral Moon to finish off my murder mystery kick!

Menu Plan Monday

Here is my menu plan for this week.

We have a really busy week ahead of us. Many end of the year events, plays, co op open house. Also we have several end-of-the-year projects that are littered all over the house, some in the kitchen. I can’t wait till these are turned in, but that is another post. Yikes!

I am trying to plan reasonable things that will actually get cooked. If it requires too much time, we’ll end up eating out!

So, here goes…
Monday – (Evelyn’s play is tonight)
Leftover lasagna and whatever other things are in the fridge

Tuesday – (We’ll be home tonight)
Tip steak on the grill, green beans and tator tots

Wednesday – (We’ll be home tonight)
Enchiladas, corn bread and salad

Thursday – (Co op open house, I have to leave at 4 so it’s…
Whatever you can find night

Friday – (we’ll be home)
Lemon Pepper Chicken on the grill
Rice and salad

Saturday – (We’ll be home)
Grill cheese & tomato soup

Sunday – (Awana Closing Program)
Pizza at the church

Go to Laura's blog and see other meal plans.

The Perfect Mom

Of all the haunting moments of motherhood, few rank with hearing your own words come out of your daughter's mouth. ~Victoria Secunda

God intended motherhood to be a relay race. Each generation would pass the baton on to the next. ~ Mary Pride

I have not posted in a while, my Mom’s been visiting. Her visit has really got me thinking. What kind of Mom will my kids describe me as when they are adults? Will they remember all the good times or only the bad?

Will they remember all the nights I read to them before bed, or the nights I was too tired or too busy.

Will they remember all the kind and uplifting words, all the I Love You’s or the times when I raised my voice in anger?

Will they remember all the things I taught them? Or all the things I didn’t know?

Will they have fond memories of all the things we did together, or only remember the times I went without them?

Will they remember the times I let them make a huge mess, cooking in my kitchen, or only think on the times I said no because I didn’t want the hassle?

Will they remember the times we all played games together, or the times when they had to play by themselves.

Will they remember all the times we curled up on the couch to read a great book, or the times I made them do their math?

Will they remember all the great and deep conversations we had, or only the lectures they occasionally had to endure?

I am a parent, I am a sinner, I am human, I will not be a perfect parent. How will my children choose to remember me when they have left the nest?

I know that no one can be the perfect parent. There is this constant tug between doing what feels right and doing what is right in this fallen world we live in. The more I focus on God the more doing what is right, is easier. But I’ll never get it perfectly right this side of eternity.

Even in homeschool, I feel the tug between idealism, and reality. I want to sit and talk and read and have deep spiritual discussions with my kids, and we do that some, but there is always the tyranny of the urgent. The math MUST get done; we MUST study writing more, the SAT’s are coming! We don’t have time to sit and talk about what my 8 year old wants to be when she grows up, we have phonics to cover, and haven’t even started History yet, and I have to go get Bryce from his Algebra tutor in 30 minutes! You get the point and have probably experienced the same struggle.

I know what I want my home and homeschool to look like, I know the Ideal that is in my head, but somehow reality falls far short of that ideal.

I think having my Mom here reminded me that this is not forever, this time I have to teach and influence my children is only a season, then they are on their own and I can’t go back and do or undo anything. I can’t go back and read Peter Pan to my 30 year olds, or pull them on my lap and ask them what they want to be when they grow up.

It’s kind of like the parable of the talents. God has given me these 4 talents for a time. One day He is going to ask me what I did with them. One day I’ll be held to account.

Some day soon this portion of my job will be done and I desperately want to hear “Well done, good and faithful servant” from my Father, and “You did a good job, Mom, I love you” from my kids.

No pressure or anything!

The above photo...
Enough and Room to Spare
by Frederick Morgan

Go Buy THIS book!

So, I thought it was time to update you on the Spring Reading Thing. I am including a link to the original post here. I have updated it with reviews for some of the books.

However, THIS book needed its own post. I LOVED this book. Really, I love all the books by Kristen Billerbeck. Her books are so far away from my real world, that it is as close as I can come to taking a vacation from my personality, without someone wanting to send my to a shrink. I get to be someone entirely different when I read one of her books. Chick Lit can appear shallow on the outside, but Kristen Billerbeck's books are really are deep, okay, maybe deep is taking it too far, but they have meat, not just fluff. You get to really know & empathize with the characters.

The best thing about this book (and all her books for that matter) is that they are real, (people have issues in her books) and it is clean, but not sappy-unrealistic-clean, but best of all, this book is FUNNY. My kids kept coming into my room to see what was so funny, only to find me reading. I kept laughing out loud! People in the checkout line behind me at Wal-Mart must have thought I had a screw loose! (Yes I read in the line at Wal-Mart, it makes the line move faster, I’m convinced)

So, really, GO BUY THIS BOOK,seriously, I’m not getting any royalties for this advertisement, and I don’t even know Kristen Billerbeck IRL (proven by my referring to her by her full name). So you can trust me on this.

Need a good, clean laugh? Want to read a book and go ahhhhhhhhhh, at the end of it, instead of feeling like you need to go excise your mind of all the bad language (cursing and grammar included)? Then, really, GO BUY THIS BOOK!

Menu Plan Monday

I did okay last week, I did not use all my meals and we did eat out once, but this week I'll do better.

Here is this week's list.

Monday - Sausage and Cabbage (still haven't made this from last week :o( tonight is the night!

Tuesday - Beef Tip Steak on the grill, tator tots and salad

Wednesday - Chicken Breasts, Rice & Greed beans

Thursday - Spaghetti, Garlic bread, and salad

Friday - C.O.R.N. (Clean Out Fridge Night) or pizza

Go Check our Laura's blog for more menu plans

The Wedding

We had a lot of fun at the wedding. It was a beautiful service. It was very honoring to God. One thing they did that I thought was very nice, was take communion together. I think this is very nice for all the obvious reasons. But also, they did it while the soloist was singing. They stayed, kneeled down, facing each other while the singing was going on, but they were done with the communion. From my position, I could see my cousin’s face and she was smiling and she and her husband were whispering to each other. IT was really very sweet. I could tell that she was enjoying her wedding.

I, on the other had was a nervous wreck at my wedding, and can’t remember any of it. I think it was really neat that they got to have a minute during the service, to pause and enjoy their moment!


Here is the photo of me and my girls. They had so much fun at the wedding. I have to say I hope my 8yodd matures A LOT before she gets married She had some really scary suggestions like…

The bride should not wear white that is boring; she should wear purple or blue.

Why does the groom wear black that is depressing, he should wear red. Red is a happy color.

They should have fewer flowers and more balloons.

They should have cupcakes for everyone instead of two cakes they have to cut up, that takes too long.

There should be WAY more dancing and a LOT less talking at the reception.

The one thing she did approve of? The bride wore white, decorated flip flops at the reception under her big billowy skirt. It was really cute. Annika thought that was a great idea.

I am VERY scared of this girls wedding. DH is already trying to bribe them into eloping! Bad, bad, man!


Here is a photo of me and the boys, Gunnar was being a bit silly, but they were dressed up. They looked so nice. They even stayed tucked in for the whole wedding. The reception is another story though. :o)

What hansom men I have. Too bad dh had to run inside and work, he looked pretty good too. I did not get a good photo of him :o(

Too Much Information!

***UPDATE BELOW***

Today I went shopping. I hate shopping. I think I need my own tailor because I don’t fit properly into regular clothes. Big girl clothes are too big. They fit in the shoulders but then are too blousy everywhere else. Large clothes in regular stores are not big enough in the shoulders. I go from shop to shop to find something and end up with another shirt from Wal-mart, that shrinks in the dryer and can’t be worn anymore.

So I need an outfit for this wedding tomorrow. (Okay need is a bit of a stretch, but I’m getting tired of the same 3 dresses!)

Well, after finding a cute pair of denim shorts that don’t give TMI, or go down to my knees, and a nice t shirt that is long enough that I don’t have to worry about showing it all when I bend over; I had already spent my budget and still had no dress. Sigh, story of my life.

My aunt, who is so kindly paying for this new dress (she must be tired of the same 3 dresses too), forbid me to go to Wal-mart or Target. After A LOT of taking off and trying on things in various women’s shops I have decided something. Big girls must really like to show off their, um, assets, up top. I mean really, every dress I tried showed WAY to much up there. I know big girls are…well, bigger. But no one but my dh needs that much information about me. It is like wearing a sign that says, “Tricia’s boobs are here, the rest of her will be along shortly”.

I am not a must-be-to-the-neck person, but have some respect clothing designers! Can’t a girl get a nice dress, feel pretty, and not have to show the world what she’s all about!

So I settled for my standard church uniform; a skirt and top. The top is a sheer pink ¾ sleeve button down with a pink tank under it. The skirt is the typical twirly skirt that goes a little past my knees and even has about ½ inch of eyelet at the hem. It is white with small pink flowers.

I even went back to payless for the cute pink shoes to match. And while I was buying the dress I bought a necklace, bracelet and earrings to match. I thought of buying a nice pink purse to match it all, but I had to draw the line somewhere and my kids were home about to kill each other.

I think I have spent more $ on clothes and shoes this month than I have in the pervious 6 months! I may never shop again. I hate the numbers! The numbers on the clothing label keep going up and the number in my bank account keeps going down!

It is so much more fun to shop for my girls. I could have found two adorable, dresses, sandals,and hair bows for my girls at Wal-mart for the price I spent on my outfit today! Good thing I’m not paying for it.

Sigh, have I mentioned I hate shopping for clothes? Give me a good bookstore any day! I don’t have to try on the books and they don’t come in sizes that make me feel queasy.

I’ll try to snap a photo of my family all decked out in our expensive finery. Rarely are we all cleaned up and looking spiffy at the same time. It will really be a noteworthy event. Hopefully I won’t be to dumbstruck by my clean, good-looking family to snap a photo.

***UPDATE***
Turns out I was too dumbstruck by my beautiful family to snap a photo before we left. But when we came home I took one of me and the boys and me and the girls. Dh got paged while we were at the wedding so we had to leave early and he went straight into the house to work, so he was not there for the picture taking festivities.
So here is a photo of me and my outfit. It is not the nicest photo of me, it was hot and humid outside, but you can see the outfit. It took so long to find, I had to post it!
I'll post the ones of me and the girls tomorrow.

Awards

Wow. I have been nominated as a Thinker! Trust me when I tell you that I have been accused of a lot of things in my life, but being a thinker is not among them.

I am really surprised because I've only being doing this blogging thing since March, and I only started it really, because I was trying to spare my husband from having to listen to all my quirky thoughts. Really it works out better for everyone when I blog instead of talk AT dh. He nods and says mmmmm now and then, but we both know he is not really listening.

When I blog, I can imagine lots of people reading my high thoughts and laughing at my clever wit. Weather this is really happening or not, I'll never know.

So, now an award. People really are reading! Now I feel great responsibility to live up to my new title of "Thinking Blogger". Look out world, the great thoughts and wit of Tricia are about to be unleashed!!! I'm sure I have many more fascinating shoe posts in me! :o)

Seriously though, thank you Halfmoon Happenings for the honor. And, really it is an honor. It is nice to know people are not only reading but enjoying my blog.

Now I must think who I'm going to bestow this great honor on...check back later.

Now, for those of you nominated, here are some rules(don't worry, there aren't very many!):
1. If, and only if, you get tagged, write a post with links to 5 blogs that make you think,
2. Link to this post so that people can easily find the exact origin of the meme,
3. Optional: Proudly display the 'Thinking Blogger Award' with a link to the post that you wrote.

Church Shoes

Today I took my kids, ALL 4 of them, to Wal-mart. The boys needed church shoes. Not for church, they don’t wear church shoes to church anymore because I have experienced spiritual growth in this area and have decided to not care. If they want to look all raggedy in their cargo shorts and flip flops like all the other kids in the youth group, go right ahead, I don’t care anymore. Really, I don’t. Really.

However my cousin is getting married on Saturday and all my family will be there. Apparently I have not experienced as much spiritual growth as I had previously thought, because my boys are NOT wearing their raggedy old cargo shorts and flip flops to the wedding.

I am not worried about my girls; I think we have enough church dresses and pretty little paten lather shoes to dress a gaggle of girls. I am also not worried about my husband because while he hates to dress up and he does not do it often, he had some regional meetings this week that he had to do the whole suit coat and tie thing. He had to go out and buy a new outfit (do men call them outfits?) for the meetings. On a side note my wonderful husband and I are not quite the same size we were last year and sadly the number got bigger not smaller, but that is another post.

So back to the boys. I know they have nice attire to wear. They don’t really mind wearing a nice polo style shirt and khaki pants. What they do mind are the shoes. So off we went to Wal-Mart. My theory was that if we could find shoes we both like, maybe they’ll actually wear them again. I know, how naive, but it sounded good at the time. So there we are in Wal-Mart and my girls, being…well, girls, tried on every shoe in the store in their size and found about ten pair they just had to have. I did stand firm here ladies and gentlemen. NO new shoes for the girls until we go through aaaallllllll the old ones.

While the girls are in shoe heaven, the boys are in…well you get the idea. No shoes in the place were acceptable. After a while my oldest found a pair he said would do. What this means is that he was willing to wear the pair of awful shoes he found to one wedding, if it meant we could STOP shopping and go home. We both knew, no matter what he said, these shoes would never grace his cute little size 11 feet again after their maiden and mandatory voyage to the wedding. At this point, I was willing too. So he bought those and we went to the car.

My wonderful son #2 has wide feet. Really wide feet. So no shoes in all of Wal-Mart were able to accommodate the bricks that are attached to the bottom of his legs. So, as if Wal-Mart with all 4 was not bad enough, we went to Payless. In Payless the lovely salesperson offered to measure his feet. I accepted. Size 8 and ½ . Regular. What? NO way. His feet are wide, I tell her. Hummmm. The thingy must be rigged. So off we go to the size 8 and ½ section. I’ll tell you right here and now ladies and gentleman. His feet are a solid 10. NOT 8 and ½ . So after trying on every “tolerable” shoe in the sizes 8 through 10 we come upon a pair he can live with. O Happy Day!

I go to find my girls who have now tried on every shoe in Payless that is their size and added about 10 more pairs to their must-have list, I say “no, no, no we are not getting anymore shoes, remember?” about 10 times and we get in line. When it is finally our turn, the salesperson asks me if I’m sure I’d not like to get another pair, it is buy one get one half off. Well, NOW you tell me. As my girls (BOTH of them) stare up at me pleadingly, I say NO, because, hay, I’m not about to start world war 3 between my girls, and really I just wanted to go home.

So she gives me the total. $40! Yes, you read that right $40 at Payless. For shoes for a 12yob. Shoes that we all know, no matter how much we try to delude ourselves, he will never wear again. What is a girl to do? I simply CAN’T shop with these kids anymore. I CAN’T do it again tomorrow, and I CAN’T buy my 12yo destructo son shoes costing $40!!

The people behind me are starting to groan. My kids are wishing the ground would open up and swallow them up, as I ask the sales lady, IN THE NICEST VOICE I CAN MUSTER, why these shoes at Payless were so expensive. She gives me a blank stare. How in the world would she know? She is only there from 8 to 1 to pay for her college classes. She has no idea, nor does she care. (All this I am surmising from the blank stare.)

So after more groaning and appalled looks from my children, I bought the shoes. All forty-stinking-dollars of them.

Want to see what $40 will get you at payless? Here you go.

I think you will probably be able to find some, just like this, cheap on Ebay real soon!

Well Drained Mind

I posted today over at The Well Drained Mind about how to refill!

Go check it out...