He Calls Me Mommy

For as long as I can remember I have wanted to be a mommy. Oh, I had little girl dreams of being other things like a secretary, teacher or even the President (who wouldn't want to be in charge and run the country?), but I never lost the overwhelming desire to have babies. I will never forget the morning that I held that little white stick with the pink line which indicated that my dreams were going to come true. The home pregnancy test had said to take it first thing in the morning so I woke up REALLY early because I couldn't wait another second to find out. I remember Patrick stumbling into the bathroom to see why I was up, and there he found me with my white stick. It wasn't exactly how I had pictured telling him that he was going to be a father, but oh well, I couldn't contain my excitement. He acted pleased and then made his way back to bed. I followed him and crawled under the covers, but there was no way I could sleep. We were going to have a BABY. I was beyond thrilled.

After enduring extreme morning sickness, 9 months of pregnancy, and 40 hours of labor I'll never forget the moment I heard, "It's a boy!" When they placed that precious bundle in my arms I couldn't believe the amazing love that filled my heart. I was a Mommy! We had a child. It was truly incredible.

We gave him a name that Patrick had chosen before we even met. He loved the stories of Jim Elliot and Nate Saint, missionaries to Ecuador in the 1950s who gave their lives for Christ and motivated many to go into missions through their example. We named our precious first born son Nathanael Elliot and prayed that he would live up to his name and serve the Lord with his life.

It's hard to believe that was 9 years ago. Our precious boy has grown so quickly. He became a big brother before he was two years old and has always had a friend in his little sister. Our quiet little obedient boy grew up to demonstrate that he has a very stubborn determined side. He's a good kid though. He's helpful and polite. He's probably the quietest of the three (though none of them are really quiet), but if you get him going on one of his favorite topics, watch out. He can talk your ear off. He loves technology and can do things on the computer that amaze me. He's all about time and his watch keeps us all in line. He is definitely a mix of Brazilian and American culture. He'd be happy to eat beans and rice everyday, but heaven forbid something doesn't start at the hour it was scheduled. :) He knows a lot about the Bible and our hearts were full to overflowing this year when he accepted Christ as his personal Savior. I'm so thankful that God has placed this amazing boy in our home and lives. What a privilege I have to be his mother.

Happy Birthday to the special boy that gave me the name Mommy!

Holding On Tightly

Ever find yourself on a roller coaster with your eyes tightly shut, your knuckles white from gripping the safety bar, and your lips silently moving because you are praying for the ride to just come to an end and that you are still alive when it does? I really liked roller coasters when I was younger, but ever since I became a mom something changed. I don't know if realizing my kids would be motherless if something happened to me made me lose the desire to be suspended upside down high in the air or maybe some hormonal change (we can always blame things on hormones), but something has totally changed for me. I really don't want to go on roller coasters anymore. The last couple of ones that I did ride I did literally pray that God would just keep me alive and let the ride be over quickly. Those were the longest 45 seconds of my life. :)

I feel like I'm on one of those roller coasters right now. Only this time my feet are firmly planted on the ground, and my eyes are wide open. It's the roller coaster of life; to be more specific my life, and if I had to really narrow it down it would be the homeschooling aspect of my life. We hit the ground running after our vacation, jumping right back into school. I wanted to get a good schedule underway and be well into school before the other activities of our lives started piling up. It hasn't been the easiest transition back into the whole school routine, for sure. I won't go into details to protect the innocent (maybe "innocent" isn't the best word choice). Just suffice to say that this teacher is a sinner and the students are little sinners, and that has become quite obvious in the past few days.

I love to read good child training books. Recently I felt led to pick up one of my all time favorites, Don't Make Me Count to Three by Ginger Plowman and do a re-read. This is one of those "recommend to every parent, read again" type books. I think I'm reading it for the third or fourth time, and as always I'm convicted of my responsibility to try to get to root/heart issues with my kids instead of just correcting erring behavior. It's amazing to me how I can find myself nodding along and getting that euphoric sense of a peaceful home as I read in the quiet of an early morning or the peacefulness of a late night. I'm all pumped up to be the best mom I can be. I'm armed and ready to talk kindly and sweetly to the precious gifts God has given me, teaching them the correct way to treat each other and honor us as their parents. I can even envision the funny conversations and cute interactions as we go through the day. I might even get excited enough to plan something fun to eat or do together in our journey toward obedience. THEN the precious little sinners wake up. Before I can even come down from my euphoria the complaining and demanding begins. At first I'm usually able to breathe and answer with a calm, sweet voice. It doesn't take long before my dreams of peace are shattered when no one is happy with each other, no one wants to obey anything, and my name is yelled loudly and continuously: "Mooooooooommmmmm. . . . ." The breaking point usually comes when I'm dealing with one child and trying my best to do it Biblically, and the other two start into something that requires my attention. At this point I feel like I'm being pulled in a hundred directions, and I want to throw up my hands and say, "okay, Ginger Plowman, you come and show me how it's done." :) I'm so tired. It's only 30 minutes into the day, and we haven't even begun the tough part. . .

Enter homeschooling. I was homeschooled and have desired to homeschool my children for as long as I can remember. I even homeschooled other children before I had my own which was great practice. It's just a wee bit different when they are YOUR kids that you are with 24/7 and responsible for not only their food, shelter, and spiritual training but also their education. That's a whole lot to do in one day. I don't want to go into the pros and cons of homeschooling and why we do what we do (thank you Veggie Tales for that line). That's not what this is about. Suffice to say that at this time in our lives homeschooling is our best option. I really do like it. I love teaching. I love my kids. What could be a better combination than being able to teach them (maybe if someone else cooked, cleaned and did the laundry)? Yet, the past couple of weeks I've found homeschooling really tough. We're fighting some HUGE battles, and the school days are dragging on for hours. By the time we close the books I'm too tired to do anything else (even read my good ol' child training books). I know that this isn't the way it should be. I'm praying that it's just a testing ground for all of us. I'm really praying that we are doing the right thing as we trudge our way through and try to teach diligence, perseverance, respect, and obedience. I'm holding on to the safety bar of this roller coaster ride and praying that's it's over soon. Weeping endures for a night, but joy comes in the morning, right? Maybe we can check out the carousel or get some cotton candy when this roller coaster comes to an end.

Summer Vacation

Summer Vacation. For me those words conjure up mental images of green grass, blue sky, golden sun, shorts, flip-flops, watermelon, lemonade, cook-outs, lightning bugs, picnics, pools, sprinklers, and kids having fun enjoying their freedom from school. I’ve lived south of the Equator for 4 years now and have adjusted to the idea of summer being in December. What I haven’t adjusted to is that summer break here isn’t the same as my mental pictures.

I looked so forward to finishing school in December. I’m pretty sure that homeschool moms just like teachers are more excited about breaks than the kids. Finally some time to do a few things I would like to do and maybe get a couple more hours of sleep. So we worked hard and finally closed our school books a couple of weeks into December. I don’t know what I thought would happen but what did happen was not it.

First we had the whole Christmas fiasco with our delayed trip. It suddenly dawned on me that while we were waiting around to leave on our Christmas trip we were living our summer vacation. There was no golden sun, no blue skies, no running around outside enjoying the freedom from school. What we did have was rain, rain, RAIN. It rained every single day and rained hard. When it wasn’t pouring the air was heavy and muggy. We soon discovered leaks all over our house. Every time the rain started we ran around from room to room looking for where water might be coming in. It was very difficult to dry clothes (since we don’t have a dryer), and laundry became a huge chore. We spent so much time opening and closing windows. With no air conditioning a house can get pretty hot all closed up against a summer storm. Then things start molding, and we were constantly on the hunt for where it is creeping up in the house.

I kept thinking that this was so not the way I had thought our summer vacation would be. This is our first summer in this city so I learned that rain is a part of life here during this time of year (guess we should really look into buying a clothes dryer). Yet, we had an over abundance of rain that resulted in a national disaster in both our state of São Paulo and the neighboring state of Rio. People lost their lives, their homes, everything, and I quickly learned that rain day in and day out can get a bit depressing after a while.

Just when it looked like summer vacation would be spent in the rain things completely changed. Our car was finally out of the shop, and we could finally take our longed awaited trip to Brasilia to be with Patrick’s parents and celebrate Christmas (who cared that it was January 14th). It was just what we all needed, and it turned out to be everything my summer vacationing mind was dreaming.

We spent two glorious weeks in the beautiful city of Brasilia. I really like Brasilia. It’s GREEN! There are tons of trees, plants and grass. The sky seems so big and wide. It’s blue, blue, blue with big puffy white clouds. Patrick’s parents have a lovely home that invites you to sit awhile and RELAX, and that is precisely what we did.

We slept in every morning and my mother-in-law always had a yummy breakfast ready when we decided to make our appearance. Then the kids would play outside while I helped Deloris fix lunch. I loved being her sous chef, and that lady can COOK. We ate some amazing meals.

Patrick’s parents rest after lunch, and I loved me some rest time. My kids are finally old enough to play quietly, read books, play Gameboys, or watch a DVD which left me time to myself. I chose to read. Deloris has a great “library,” and I’d been looking forward to reading her books all year. I actually read 8 books while we were there. Loved it!

I quickly learned to wait until late afternoon to let the kids get in the pool. By then the sun had warmed the water, and we didn’t have to go through the chore of putting on sunscreen. The kids swam almost every day and swam for a couple of hours. They loved it! Once again, they were old enough to play on their own and have fun without needing to be held or helped. Elena actually learned to swim while we were there and surprised us by swimming the length of the pool by herself one day

After baths we’d eat dinner, and the kids were ready for bed by nine-ish. Gotta love how swimming wears them out. That gave me plenty of time to do some more reading before my eyes closed, and closed they did. I wanted to read and stay awake, but I hardly ever made it past 11:30. That’s early for me, but I was wiped out. It was the best, most restful sleep, too. Ahhh, it was so nice.

We also found time to celebrate Christmas, bake cakes, pick fruit from their fruit trees, go shopping, attend an art class, take a trip to the zoo, have manicures and pedicures (the girls), and of course do some ministry.

Patrick preached at his Dad’s church every service we were there. We always love returning to the church (where we first worked when we came to Brazil) and visiting with those precious people.

So it was a great trip. We had a wonderful time. I think we appreciated it more after waiting and experiencing the struggles of a wet, wet summer. God knew that this poor missionary lady needed just a little break, and He sure gave me a marvelous one.