Notes

I am not sure what I have accomplished this week that I had on my list. Maybe I should just make some new lists. The biggest thing I guess is Isabels quilt. I have worked a lot on it, but it is not done yet.


I have so many crafty things I want to make, but I just don't have either the time or sometimes just not the resources to do it. Still I should redo the list and post it here with links. That should be a task I should be able to finish by next Tuesday, right?


My family and I are going home to Norway for a visit and I think I am almost ready for the trip. All I need to do now is pack. I should probably make a list for that too. I am so nervous for traveling with a baby again, some lists for things I might need in my hand luggage would be good.


I want to plant some flowers in my planterboxes before I leave, that way they are nice a big when I get home. Need to make some lists for what I need for that then. I also need to get started on the yardwork for the homeowner association, lots to do there.


I definitely need to make a list of things I want to do around the house.


So for next Tuesday I have to have at least 3 lists made and maybe something finished. If I can get there I can get anything done ;)

BTW

Linking up to New Nostalgias Anti-Procrastination Tuesday, Steady Moms 30 minute challenge

and Supah Mommys Post it Note Tuesday.

Start to end 29 minutes.

Who am I?

Who am I?

Hi, I'm Marianne and I am a stay at home mom.

Hi, I'm Marianne and I am a teacher, I just don't work as one right now.

Hi, I'm Marianne and I am Jesses wife.

Hi, I'm Marianne and I am...

Get it?

When you become a stay at home mom it can sometimes be difficult to know who you are anymore.

Our identities is usually connected with our profession, our hobbies, accomplishments, what others needs us to be and our experiences.

As a stay at home mom I found it difficult answering the question of "What do you do?" when meeting someone new at a party. What do I do?

I think the best answers I have found is "I'm a need meeter" and "I'm in human resources management."

A few weeks ago I ordered some new business cards for myself and on them it says

Marianne ...

Mom of Isabel and Sofie ....

Maker of baby sleeping bags and other crafts made by sewing, knitting, or crocheting.

Is that who I am?

I don't know really who I am yet, but it is one of my newest projects to try to find out who I am now and maybe even find out who I want to be.

No matter what, I do know that I am unique; I am an imperfect, fallible human being in process; and I am loved because God loves us unconditionally.

Do you know who you are?

The idea to this post came from reading the first chapter of "What Every Mom Needs", by Elisa Morgan and Carol Kuykendall.

At my house

Such a busy day today. I have barely spent any time at my house today. Since my oldest was out of school today we decided to go on a road trip to a wildlife park.

Northwest Trek Wildlife Park is located in Eatonville, Washington. They have over 200 animals roaming over 725 acre. There is a naturalist guided tram tour throughout 435 acre of free-roaming area where you can be lucky to spot elk, mountain goats, bighorn sheep, bison, woodland caribou, blacktail deer, beavers, ducks, geese, swans and the ever so elusive moose. They also have a walking tour where you can see black bears, brown bears, gray wolfs, red foxes, coyote, wolverine porcupine, skunk, badger, fisher, beaver, river otter, raccoon, bobcat, cougar, lynx, three kinds of owls and two kinds of eagles.

Isabel and I took the tram tour and got to see all the animals except for the beavers and the moose. It was so much fun to just be me and her together. She is so attentive and such a follower of rules, well at least as long as they are not my rules and I guess it is more fun to follow the rules when she actually is good at it and I keep breaking them. (Hm, I am sorry dear naturalist if I did talk to much behind you.)

My mom and Sofie took a long walk and got to see all the other animals. (Isabel and I did too except that we mostly just ran past them looking for my mom and Sofie.) They were having a really good time shopping in the gift store too. We met up in the cafe and had lunch before we drove back home again. I must say for the 4 hours I spent driving I got 3 hours at the park, but it was so worth it.

At home again I had someone waiting for me. Which is where we get to the small thing of today.

The fall and early winter of 2008 while I was in my first trimester of my last pregnancy I got very sick with hyperemesis. My very good friend and neighbor who was pregnant in her third trimester at the time with a very active toddler running around stepped up and helped me every day by taking Isabel to preschool several days a week and also picking her up three hours later. She would also go to the store for me or to the mall to get me anything I would like to eat or drink. She also took me out at times and brought me food. She was such a big help for me and I felt so bad all the time for asking for help.

Why is it that I always feel like I have to pay back to someone who helps me, but I never expect anything in return if I help someone else? I am not going to attempt to answer that question tonight though.

Anyway back to today. My friend lost her grandmother this week and early this morning she and her husband and two kids left to join the family for the funeral. Yesterday I had promised her that I would take her dog to the kennel where he will stay till she gets back. He had to be there by 6 PM, it was 5.15 PM when I got home. I cannot and will not take him in my car (he poops under stress and I cannot deal with that in my car, though I have no problem with my own dog throwing up in my car under stress). So I and the dog ran. We made it. He is now in the kennel and maybe not so happy, but I am and my neighbor is.

It felt good helping her and while she is gone I will be taking care of her cat. I just hope they had a safe trip and I pray for her and her family during this time of sadness.

I can't wait to go to bed tonight. I am so tired. At least there will not be any barking tonight. I will get some sleep. Maybe even some uninterrupted sleep. That would be nice.

Thank you to all of you from Home Sanctuarys Company Girl Coffee, I can't wait to come by, but it will have to wait till tomorrow because I am falling asleep right now. Good night all.

Shoes for use.

When I learned about this party my first thought was that I don't have any shoes worth showing. Then I figured that I could just show of the shoes for use I have downstairs in my "mudroom". (I have a few more upstairs in my closet, but those will be for another time when we talk about shoes not for use :) )

My slippers for the early morning, late evening cold floors. A Christmas gift from the girls together with a pair of very cute pajama pants.

These are a pair of indoor sandals my mom bought for me about 15 years ago. They are almost like new still and trust me they have been used a lot.

I love these flats. My mom bought them for me last time she visited me in the summer of 2008. So far they have been washed three times and they are still going strong. I use them year round and did I tell you that I just love them?

My new love affair. I found these on clearance for only $20. They are so comfy and is almost taking over for my flats and is definitely taking over for my Dansko.

Another pair that my mom has bought for me and these she actually brought with her from Norway to me when she came to visit me now. I don't know what I would have done without these. They are comfy, waterproof (except if you jump in the puddle) and they are so cool.

Yes my mom rock at buying shoes.

My old work shoes. I used to work in retail. Walking at least 1200o steps in 4 hours and these saved my feet and sanity on more than one occasion. Now they are just waiting for me to start running again. (Not sure if I ever did run before, but I would like to start at some point).

My Dansko. Well used. Good quality, but not so good for my feet anymore. Still having a hard time letting go.

My newest gift from my mom. Canadian waterproof boots. They got a higher heel than what I normally wear and they got stretch on the side and actually fit around my calf. I have never been able to fit into a hight boot ever before. My favorite with tights and a tunic.

Another buy I am not to sure about. To much stuff going on, but they are water proof, which is a good thing in the Pacific North West. Still they are warm and my daughter likes them.

That is all folks. I recently had to throw out my pirate rain boots otherwise I would have shown them too. Now I am planning an outing with one of my friends to go to the store, get coffee and a pair of rain boots each, all without kids in tow. Lets just hope it happens before we get the next big rain fall and I feel like jumping in puddles again.

Thank you Beth @ The Stories from A to Z for hosting this party.

Fleece dresses for the girls

There are so many talented women out in the blogosphere that make all kind of clothing for their kids and I figured I had to try this too.

I got some fleece at Joann a while ago from the remnants and I was sure it would be enough for a dress for both of them. Using some bigger jumper dresses as templates I set to work.

It wasn't difficult, but it didn't get perfect either. No matter what my girls love their new dresses.

As you can see Isabel got a gray dress with a pocket made of the fleece that was left over after I made Sofies dress.

Such a serious little sister and such a goofy grinning big sister.

Btw I made the curtains in the back, they are two stories high. No kidding...

Notes

Linking up to

30 Minute Blog Challenge with Steady Mom and

Post it Note Tuesdays with SupahMommy.

Mottos

Grøtfjord, Norway (One of my favorite places in the world)

"Happiness can be found in the darkest of times, if one can only remember to turn on the light."

- Albus Dumbledore

I was doing some research online, well actually just googling the word Motto, and on Wikipedia I found a list of Mottos. On the list of mottos I found this by Albus Dumbledore. Or can I say that it is by Albus Dumbledore as he is in fact a fiction figure made up by the author J. K. Rowling? That always confuses me.

No matter what I love it. It is just so true. You cannot find happiness unless you remember to try to find it. Sometimes you get so caught up in your unhappiness that there seems to be no end to it. Especially during dark times of struggle.

Even during the darkest of times there is good somewhere, but it isn't always easy to see it. That is where the phrase "remember to turn on the light" hits it right on. Sometimes it can be as little as just remembering your favorite little spot or thing and just get there or that. Sometimes you need a little help of someone who drops by with a little something. Sometimes it is your child(ren) coming up to you and telling you they love you.

During my darkest time I found happiness at the beach just staring out over the ocean listening to the waves rolling in, breathing the fresh clean air and feeling the wind in my hair pushing on my body, waking me up.

I hope you too have a place where you can go to find happiness in times of darkness.

What is your reminder to turn on the light to find happiness?

My hallway makeover

This is what my hallway has looked like ever since we moved in to our condo 4 years ago. Well it wasn't actually this bad, but then last summer we added to the family and the laundry pile grew to unreasonable proportions.

It was a mess. It got hard to walk to the children's bedroom and my toes would sometimes end up in a bloody mess.

Add my mom to it all and we had one more set of bloody toes. My solution to it all so far was to buy more baskets and put them all in the bathtub when company arrived with the shower curtain hiding it all. This did not work any longer.

Inspiration came from many different blogs. Off which I of course can't find right now and trust me I spent almost all day looking for it. Funny how it is that when you need it you can't find it.

The solution came from IKEA and now my hallway looks like this. All nice and tidy.

Finding Gods Will

Rachel Anne at Home Sanctuary asked in her blog post this morning for everyone to put Micah 6:8 somewhere for us to see it and remember that God has a plan for us that he will reveal, but that God does ask something from us too.

She also asked us to ask ourselves some hard questions to see if we do follow Gods requirements for us in our daily life.

Acting justly: I live according to the laws and I do not owe anyone any money or anything else. Actually I have a really hard time asking anything of people unless I know I can pay them back again one way or another. I give without asking, but I don't expect anyone to do the same for me.

Last year while I was pregnant my neighbor helped me almost every day for a month while I was too sick to do it myself by bringing to or picking my oldest up from school. She has never asked for anything back, but I still feel like I have to do something for her. Later I helped a friend of mine by bringing her daughter home from school and also by watching her while mom went to school herself. I never asked for anything back, though she gave back later by taking family photos of us after the baby was born.

What I need to do is learn to accept help from others and to help others without boasting about how nice I am to do this. That is my lesson today. Accept help and help gracefully.

Love mercy: This is one I do need to work on. For me it is a little hard to understand what it means to love mercy or love kindness. I do always feel that I put everyone first and me last. Feeling as though I have nothing to give of material blessings, I really should think of everyone who has even less than I do. It is easy to give when it is convenient for me, but I need to be better at putting others first and help more.

Walk humbly with your God: Oh my do I need to work on this. I make my decisions on how they benefit me more than how they benefit God's kingdom. And yes I do take credit for all that I have done even though it is all through Gods will that it is so. I do feel like I deserve more than I have right now. And yes I do sometimes feel that my good deeds should count for something the day I die.

Still I am aware that I do not live a perfect life, I am not perfect and I will never be. I try to convoy that to others too, that even though my life looks pretty awesome sometimes it surely is not. But what is working for me in my life I need to be better at thanking God for and glorifying him for.

I still wonder what God has planned out for me, but while I wait for an answer or till I see clearer what he has already shown me, I will work on these things. I will try my best to do as required by God and maybe my life will show a meaning.

Linking it to Home Sanctuary Company Girl Coffee

Mottos

Dance as if no one were watching,

sing as if no one were listening,

and live every day as if it were your last.

Every weekday morning I walk Isabel to school. Living in the Northwest we have all kinds of weather during the winter months and that can some mornings make it more dreary getting out.

On rainy days it takes an extra 10 minutes just getting dressed in our raingear and putting the baby in the stroller without getting her soaked. Everything then seems to go so slow and you just wish you could skip the whole thing and just stay home or at least take the car.

The thing is that as soon as we are out and on our way we start singing and dancing and jumping in puddles. It is so much FUN. Everything smells so nice and fresh and everything seems so clean and brightly colored. I love being out in the rain, just not the thought of going out in the rain.

I am not a morning person and I can be a little bit cranky to say the least in the morning. Getting the two kids ready every morning to go to school and then having to hurry up at the end because I lost track of time while being online can make me super cranky. My poor kids... Then as soon as we are out Isabel will start singing and I start humming. Soon we are both singing funny songs that we make up right there on the spot. We run as fast as we can to catch up time and try to get to school on time and we always make it. We even have time for a few jokes on the way. Anyone heard of the two tomatoes crossing the road? One got hit by a car and the other one said: Come on ketchup... I know totally funny right..., well at least for a 5 year old.

I really do believe in this motto and really should try to live up to it more. Tomorrow is Monday again and it is time for school. They say it will rain and be cold tomorrow so a good song is needed to keep warm on the way to school.

Have a wonderful week everyone.