Just a little moment

Today was not the best day I've ever had. Both girls decided to be awake by 6:15 and considering Jade does not know how to exist without constantly talking these days, I definitely started the day in a bad mood.

Even after a 3-hour break (yay for MMO at Liberty Baptist Church!), I still needed a break. I had a babysitter lined up this afternoon for Piper so I could go out for some one-on-one time with Miss Jade, so she and I headed to the playground and for some Rita's. I was doing a really bad job of living in the moment. I was tired. Needed some quiet. Trying to organize our house in my mind. Not focusing on my kid. Which, incidentally, is the whole point of me going out- to focus on Jade with no Piper distractions. So then I felt like a failure. And beat myself up for being a failure.

By the time we got back to the house, I was looking forward to putting the kids in bed for the night. I basically felt like the day could not be salvaged and was praying that we would all wake up miraculously happy tomorrow. And then Chuck was late getting home. Needless to say, I was thrilled to try to pull dinner together with no husband at home and two whiny kids- and, let's face it, a grumpy mom.

And then it's like a switch flipped. I strapped Piper to my back, fully expecting her to arch her back and scream like she normally does (that's a post for another day... a babywearing mama with a baby that hates being worn!), but she didn't. She liked it. Made cute little cooing and gurgling noises. Pulled my hair out. Ok, the pulling my hair out thing wasn't great but the rest was. I put Pandora on the TV and Jade, who normally whines and pulls on my legs or crawls all over the counter putting her finger in whatever I'm cooking, starting dancing all over the living room.

In that moment, I thought "this is fun". In my extremely naive pre-kid brain looking forward to my life as a mom, that's how I envisioned it. Things around here rarely live up to expectations. That's life, and that's fine. But in that moment? Everything was great. God reminded me that, despite all the crud life throws at us sometimes, I have two amazing daughters. And I am so thankful for that.

And for Jade's dance moves. Crawling in a circle being my personal favorite. The next time I go to an event where there's dancing, I'm definitely going to start crawling. It's as good as any other dance move I've got in my arsenal :)

Wait. What?

Friday both of my girls went to mother's morning out, which gave me 3 whole hours to myself. I'm sure there's something else I should have/could have done, but I went to Panera and drank coffee and just relaxed. When I first sat down, I wrote my blog post about God telling me that I'm not supposed to be enough. When I finished that, I picked up "The Resolution for Women" by Priscilla Shirer (have I mentioned how amazing I think she is??) and read the first two chapters. Where she shares that what we have on hand is enough.

"God is able to make every grace overflow to you, so that in every way, always having everything you need, you may excel in every good work." 2 Corinthians 9:8

Pricilla says, "Your God can be trusted to grant you the supply you need to excel at His purposes." She goes on to say that if God has set a task before you, that He has already matched that task with an equivalent-to-overflowing supply of His grace.

As I'm sitting there in Panera reading along, I'm thinking "this is awesome! I have everything I need! I'm enough for my girls!" And then I thought, "wait. what?" I mean, didn't I just write that post about not being enough? Didn't God just comfort me with that truth yesterday? That I'm human and flawed and that I don't have to be capable of everything?

I'll admit that I probably laid my head down on the table in frustration. I felt so encouraged after my walk Thursday. So free after realizing that I wasn't designed to be fulfilling their every need. That I'm not supposed to do everything. And here I was reading that God's given me enough grace to accomplish every task before me. The two seemed contradictory.

So I prayed. I told God that I know that Priscilla Shirer girl is awesome, but she was obviously wrong this time. I told Him that I do *not* have everything I need to accomplish every task before me. And then He, with His everlasting patience, told me I had it all wrong. Again. Priscilla wasn't saying I had everything I need to be perfect. She was saying I had everything I need to fully participate in my life. That although I certainly am not perfect and cannot do everything both girls want me to do, that I can be fully engaged with them. That I don't have to hold back my time or my energy because God will continue to replenish me.

So really, I think it's a balance. After my "freeing" walk, I wasn't planning to go home, throw both kids in their beds and sit on the couch and read because "I can't do everything they need anyways". I was still trying, still striving, still reaching and growing in this thing called motherhood. And God used Priscilla to remind me that no matter how tired I am at the end of the day, God will fill me back up and I can continue to pour myself out to these girls.

God's good like that.

Mother's Morning Out

Today was Jade's first day at Mother's Morning Out. I'll admit that I was nervous. It seems silly, but this is just another sign of how much my baby girl is growing up and it makes me sad! I kept telling Chuck that it was her first day of school and he informed me that "it's not... this is no big deal". Way to make me feel even more crazy, hubs.

I realize that it was just the morning, and that when she actually starts preschool it'll be a much bigger deal, but I still think this was a big deal :)

"I'll sit down, but I won't smile!"

I tried to put her in one of her cute fall outfits, but the pants fell off. This weekend I'm gonna have to get Chuck to get some of her clothes from the attic to see if her pants from last winter fit... I hope her jeans are 9 months and not 6 months, because I know the 6 months will be too small but the 12 month ones wound up around her knees. Anyways, because of this revelation, she wore one of her summer dresses. It's certainly hot enough to wear it, so it wasn't a big deal. But I thought she would've been cute in little jeans!

Stylin'

Our photo shoot before she left consisted of me following her around the house snapping away. She doesn't quite understand the whole "sit still and smile!" thing.

So pretty

When I dropped her off, she was hesitant, but didn't cling too badly and went to the lady that was working. Once they handed her her blanky, she was good to go, so I just left. I've found that the longer I hang around, the more upset she gets so I figured she would be happy as long as I wasn't there.

I included this just because it shows how tan her legs are. 

I will always be jealous of her tan :)

When I picked her up, she was climbing on one of the indoor jungle gym things that they have. They said that she hadn't fussed at all and had a "great little personality". I was so proud! And I was able to go to the commissary and Costco, and I'll admit it was nice to do that by myself. MMO is only every other week, but I think it'll be good for both of us to have that time apart.

She's growing up!