Friends and Famil

Today I am grateful for friends and family. Without them I wouldn't be where I am today. I figured this would be a good time to get wedding pictures from last month posted because it contains a random sampling of the people in this world that have changed my life and brightened it in often unexpected ways.

There are so many other people I wish I could put up here, but I was horrible getting my phone out and taking pictures. I'll steal some off of Facebook soon and post them later.

Today was the Primary Program at church. The two big kids did very well. The songs were pretty, the message was great. Peter had an epic meltdown the last ten minutes of the program, so I missed the last songs and speakers. Then I walked him to nursery and walked out to my car, got in, and spent a while having a good cry.

I've not been letting myself fall apart (not that I do that often), but things have been so beyond stressful. I've not been sleeping, I've not been eating (I keep forgetting), and with the crazy stress and missing I've been feeling lately, in combination with the fatigue and lack of adequate fuel, I just had enough trying to get Peter to stop screaming. So I allowed myself a moment to crack, away from other people and my kids. After I'd settled down enough I grabbed a couple of tissues, put on a smile, and got back to work. And I felt much better, too. :)

I talked to almost everyone I needed to at church today, and I lead choir practice without too many mishaps. In fact, the choir sounds great! It was the first time we'd run Joy to the World and I would let them perform it next week because it sounded that good! Not so for "Once in Royal David's City", but it was a cold run after not having reviewed it for weeks, and just so I could hear the accompaniment for the first time. I have no doubts that it will be sounding amazing before long, too. I'm really looking forward to this Christmas program, I feel like it will be a good one. And if it doesn't touch a single other person's heart, it has touched mine so I am satisfied.

After dinner tonight I gathered the kids around me and we had an impromptu family council. I told them that we really needed three things in our family at the moment: routine, schedule, and cooperation. We defined those things, identified what is part of our routine, and then the kids created a schedule (with some input regarding specific times from me). Then we talked about the importance of cooperation in accomplishing our tasks and sticking to our schedule. I asked if they would be willing to make an extra effort at cooperating and sticking to the schedule. David was enthusiastic in his response, Andi was not. Peter was picking his nose the entire time, so I'm pretty sure he'll be eating glue while we work at a schedule. But after some discussion I think we are all on the same page, and I think having so much input from the kids in the creation of our routine and schedule will help them stay focused. I can always hope, right?

That done the only thing that remained in my day was to get the littles to bed before David and I sat down for a little while just the two of us and a couple of cups of herbal tea. He's getting to be so big, and I can hardly believe it but he's growing up from little boy to young man. He takes his school work very seriously, even if he doesn't like it, and he loves to tell me about what he's been working on, reading, and learning. He just learned the real story of Santa Claus, and thus the tooth fairy and Easter bunny... He's excited to be in on the surprise for the little kids. It wasn't the reaction I was expecting, but there we have it. ... Why did I have to blink?

41 days until Jonathan gets home.